Mad Amos Malone

Neither a Borrower Be…

Roy Rogers had Trigger. The Lone Ranger had Silver. Hopalong Cassidy had… c’mon now, western trivia buffs. All the great western heroes had great western horses.

When I was a kid, it made me sick.

I mean, come on, now. Who wants to watch a film or TV show where the horse is obviously smarter than the hero? Not to mention braver and better-looking. The giants of animation recognized this contradiction and jumped on it with all four pencils. In Robert Clampett’s Buckaroo Bugs the horse can barely stand his idiot master. Tex Avery (as one would expect) frequently gave the horse as many lines as the other protagonists in his western-theme cartoons. Chuck Jones satirized the western horse in Drip-Along Daffy, even allowing two of them their own shootout on Main Street.

And the inimitable Jay Ward gave us a heroine in the Dudley Do-Right cartoons who quite senslbly (and with just a hint of borderline bestiality) preferred horse to hero.

No, sir, pardner. If I’m expected to survive in the real Old West, I don’t want no gussified, slicked-up, pommaded palomino between my legs. I want a horse that’ll kick and spit and bite and go all day on a diet of sagebrush and tumbleweed. That’s to match me. One to match Amos Malone would be something.

Might not even be a horse, strictly speakin’.

For three days it had snowed hard enough to freeze a preacher’s sermon to his pulpit. Now it had let up some, but while Mother Nature had become less profligate with her precipitation, sporadic flakes still spiraled to earth fat and flat, heavy with moisture, while a blindingly blue sky flirted with the fast-moving clouds as intermittently as a Swedish dancer.

The little brown box of a cabin was two-thirds blanketed and buried. Smoke curled fitfully from the stone chimney, winkling its laborious way skyward, cutting a sinuous path through the drifting snow. The rough-hewn unpeeled logs of which the modest structure was fashioned differed in appearance from the surrounding pines and firs only in their spatial orientation. The living trees towered above shelter and snowpack alike, their branches slack and burdened with hermetic whiteness. They dominated the surrounding mountain slopes, clawing toward the barren, rocky tree line.

A bit away from the building, the crest of a split-rail fence barely showed above the snow. It enclosed a partially cleared oval of bare ground. Accepting of the deceptive moderation, the scraggly grass thus revealed thrust bravely toward a bright sun and a false spring.

The clearing fronted a crude lean-to beneath which clustered three horses. A chestnut mare stood nose to tail with a roan gelding. Slightly off to one side, the third member of the equine contingent leaned against the rear of the shelter. It was a stallion of indeterminate lineage, being mostly black with white markings on rump and fetlocks and a distinctive white ring around its right eye. Thin straps secured a leather patch to its forehead. Part Shire, it loomed over its more svelte cousins. While they browsed on the newly sprung grass, quick-frozen exhalations emerging from their nostrils like the signatures of miniature steam engines, it chose to doze contentedly in the shade.

A slight noise from the nearby forest caused the massive animal to straighten. Lifting its muzzle, the stallion sampled the air and peered into the dense woods with its good eye, the one that was white-ringed being half-shut in a perpetual squint. It stood thus for a long moment. Then it snorted a small cloud and relaxed again.

When the heavy horse huffed, Fifth John froze. Only after it had turned away from where he stood crouched in the snow did he move, turning and hurrying back to where his companions waited anxiously by the little stream that flowed clear and free beneath sheets of clinging ice.

Having mocked the warnings of wiser, more experienced men, they’d sure enough found themselves caught out unprepared by the early spring storm. With hopes and bravado dashed in equal measure, their thoughts had been only of making it safely back to the lowlands with nothing to show for their recklessness. Until now.

His wide-brimmed, floppy hat slumped down over his face, and Fifth John cursed improvidently as he angrily shoved it back. It was nearly as filthy as the rest of his outfit, but then, he’d never been one much for personal hygiene. It wasn’t his mother’s fault, either, though his name was. A poor, simple woman gifted with minimal powers of cogitation, she and her dour husband between them had possessed just enough skills to feed themselves and about as much imagination as a Denver omelet.

They’d had (“raised” being too genteel a term) five children, all of the male persuasion. The father’s name being John, they’d named the first boy John. And the second, and the third, and so on unto Fifth John, whose handle anyone could rapidly discern related no more to that portion of the good book than did its ornery namesake.

He was the de facto leader of the importunate trio by virtue of determination and sheer meanness rather than any inherent talent, his skills consisting pretty much of humble expertise with a sharp knife and the ability to lie like a Tennessee lawyer.

“There’s smoke comin’ from the cabin, but no movement. Couldn’t smell nothin’ cooking. I reckon they must all be asleep.”

“Any pickin’s?” asked Great Knox, chewing on a finger. It was a wonder the huge mule skinner had any left. He always had a well-gnawed digit between his brown and yellow tobacco-stained teeth. John had seen him chew on his toes, too, the bulky Yankee displaying unexpected dexterity. It was good that he was comfortable in his habits, because he wasn’t apt to be invited to any local cotillions. He wore a hat too small for his head, a narrow brown beard that traced the lower curve of his face from ear to ear, and an old tobacco-juice-stained vest over his heavy winter clothes.

Halfweed crouched nearby and listened. Though he was quite capable of speech, he chose not to say much, which was fine with his companions. Wiry and ruddy-hued, with a thin, down-arcing mustachio, he was good with both animals and a gun on the rare occasions when his brain and eyes managed to act in concert. His name descended not from his scrambled ancestry but from an addiction to peyote, which he’d acquired in the course of an extended jail stay down in Santa Fe.

These three solid representatives of the republic squatted in the snow by the creek and contemplated larceny.

“Three horses.” Despite their cover and the distance from the cabin, Fifth John was careful to keep his voice down. “All of ’em healthy and well rested, though one’s kinda weird-lookin’.”

“What d’you mean weird-lookin’?” Great Knox pursed badly chapped, swollen baby lips.

“I ain’t sure.” John scratched under his left arm. “Just weird. Big, though. Biggest damn animal I ever seen.” Beneath the brim of the battered hat, iniquitous eyes glittered. “Great for packin’. Bet he’ll fetch twenty, maybe thirty dollar in town.”

Knox nodded. “We’re wastin’ time sittin’ here talking about it, then.”

John agreed curtly. “You stay with the horses. Halfweed and I’ll do it.” The half-breed broke out into a wide, gap-toothed grin as he rose.

Knox watched them go, pleased that their ill-conceived journey into the mountains wouldn’t turn out profitless, after all. He wondered idly whose animals they were stealing, hoping he hadn’t at some time in the past made their acquaintance.

Leaving a man stuck in these mountains without a horse was not too different from shooting him in the back. Just slower.

Caiben was preparing to clean the previous night’s dishes when he noticed the empty makeshift corral. As he straightened, his gaze instantly swept the surrounding forest, but there was no sign of movement. Setting the laden bucket aside, he dashed over to the fence line, ignoring the powdery snow that clung to his faded long johns and slid with icy slyness down into his boots. He yelled even as he was checking the gate and the double set of footprints nearby.

In response to his shouts, two men emerged from the cabin. One had to bend low to clear the lintel. His companion replied, his words as sharp in the chilly afternoon air as if they’d been chiseled from granite and hung in the sky to read.

“What’s happened, Caiben?”

Caiben rejoined them, looking grim. “Bad doin’s, friends. Horses are gone. Two men. Whites, not Indians.” He shaded his eyes against the snow glare as he looked back and nodded toward the trees. “Reckon they got about a two-, three-hour start.”

“Damnation.” The other man spit into the snow, making a tiny stained crater. “What you think, Amos?”

The giant who stood next to him gazed phlegmatically at the forest, an incongruous sight in his bright red, custom-sewn oversized long johns. As he considered the situation, he slowly stroked the impenetrable tangle of black wire that was his beard. There were some folks who thought strange small critters lived within that ebon briar patch, but none ever had courage enough (or the reach) to examine the confusion for themselves. Beneath heavy brows, startlingly black eyes examined the distant line of tracks in the snow.

“Never catch ’em in this.” He kicked absently at the deep powder. “Not on foot.” His expression was unreadable. “I don’t know about you two, but first off I’m gonna fix me some breakfast. Then I think I’ll go back to bed.” He squinted skyward. “Not much point in checkin’ the traplines while it’s still snowin’.”

His companions exchanged a glance. “Is that wise, Amos?” the man next to him wondered.

The giant peered down at him. “That depends, now, Jim, on whether or not you think I am.”

Caiben shook his head slowly as he eyed the forest. “I dunno. They get more’n a day ahead of us, we’ll never find ’em even if this starts to melt.”

“Don’t reckon we’ll need to.” Malone had turned toward the doorway. “Cold out here. I’ll put some wood on.” He bent to clear the opening and glanced back at his companions. “Y’all comin’?”

They hesitated briefly. Then Jim Bridger sighed. “Hell, I remember once Amos told me we could make it from New Orleans to St. Louis in half the regular time, and we did. Never did tell me how he’d knowed that the Mississip was gonna reverse her course that day. Danged if she didn’t.” He followed the giant into the cabin.

The third mountain man gazed longingly at the woods, then shrugged. The snow that had fallen into the bottom of his boots was starting to melt, a condition sufficiently incommodious to decide the immediate course of action for any man.

The three thieves allowed themselves to hoot and holler freely once they were certain they were well clear of any immediate pursuit. Their plunder followed meekly behind Halfweed’s mount, each animal tethered securely to the one trudging on before it, with the unclassifiable prodigy bringing up the rear.

“Hell’s fire if’n I wouldn’t give a dollar to see their faces when they wake up and find their animals gone!” Great Knox chortled and slapped his leg gleefully, his hand returning immediately thereafter to his mouth, regular as a homing pigeon.

Fifth John rose in his stirrups and turned to peer back the way they’d come, their trail as definitive in the deep snow as if it had been bashed out by a six-team wagon. He could see almost to the top of the ridge they’d just traversed, and his little piggish eyes were sharp. He allowed himself to relax. There was no sign of any pursuit.

Damned if they hadn’t brought it off, he thought with satisfaction. Tough for those marooned in the valley behind them, but it was their own damn fault for leaving good horses unguarded. Served ’em right. Fifth John sure enough knew all about life’s lessons. If only he hadn’t failed so many of them.

“Me, I’m gonna get me some whiskey with my share.” Knox salivated around the finger he was masticating. “Not that cheap shit. Real drinkin’ whiskey. And a woman. I’m gonna have me a pretty woman. A big woman. With red hair. All night, on a real bed, with sheets.”

Fifth John struggled to avoid mental contemplation of such an invidious collusion. Great Knox was a useful associate, a good man to have in front of you in a fight, but was afflicted with constipation of the brain. Whereas Halfweed’s hypothesized higher functions were much diluted by his daily intake of peyote, above the neck Great Knox was simply ill-endowed.

Which was just as well. Fifth John was suspicious of anyone smarter than himself, which meant that suspicion was the country in which he most habitually dwelt.

“Get drunk,” Halfweed mumbled as he swayed atop his mount. “Stay drunk a week. Maybe a month.” He grinned like a tubercular cherub.

“They ain’t followin’ us, that’s fer sure.” Fifth John was mightily well pleased with himself. He’d take three good horses over a stack of beaver and otter pelts any day. “Thought we might have to ride on through the night, but looks like we can have a camp, somethin’ to eat. You boys done good.” Knox tried to smile in reply but was reluctant to remove his finger from his mouth. Halfweed was always smiling.

They found a good spot near the base of a steep slope, largely clear of snow and not particularly muddy. After making certain all six animals were secured, Fifth John broke out the jerky while Knox and Halfweed worked to start a fire. They lucked into a stack of dead dry wood that had accumulated in the hollow of an old lightning-blasted fir and by the time night fell had a crackling good blaze going atop stones gathered from the hillside.

Halfweed was making a last check of the tethers. Two of the horses they’d absconded with snorted and shied uncertainly at his approach, but the big stallion just stood motionless, watching him out of its good eye. Halfweed studied it intently.

“Me, I know horseflesh pretty good, seguridad. But I never seen nothin’ quite like you, grande. What’s this for, huh?” Reaching up, the half-breed took hold of the patch over the animal’s forehead and tugged sharply. On the third pull it came away in his hands. His gaze narrowed in confusion.

“Hey! I think maybe this big one got something wrong with him.”

Fifth John looked up from the fire. “What, fer instance?”

“I dunno.” Halfweed reached up to gingerly feel of the two-inch-high conical bump that protruded from the animal’s skull. “He got some kind of risin’ or somethin’ on his head. But it ain’t soft like a risin’. It’s hard. Like bone.”

“So he’s got a funny head. Nothin’ wrong with his teeth or his back an’ legs, an’ that’s all what matters. We’ll cover it up agin afore we sell ’im. Meanwhile, leave that piece o’ leather off. Maybe the air’ll help the spot heal.”

Halfweed nodded to himself, turned to rejoin his companions, and found himself glancing back over his shoulder. He could’ve sworn that, just for an instant, the big stallion had been grinning at him. That was crazy. Horses occasionally smiled. They didn’t never, ever grin.

Especially not like that.

Fifth John lit the stuffing in his pipe and leaned back on his bedroll, much gratified with the way things had turned out. It was not a sensation he’d been able to experience often.

Unfortunately, it did not last long.

The howl made Knox sit up fast. Then he smiled a trifle warily and lay back down again. The fire continued to sputter, and he tossed another broken branch in the middle of it. Embers flew up like escaping moths.

“Wolf,” he mumbled.

“Yeah.” Fifth John turned in his bedroll. “Shet up and go back to sleep.”

Knox nodded and closed his eyes. He ignored the howl when it was repeated. When it was picked up by a second animal, he ignored that, too, and tried to cover his ears when the nocturnal choir was joined by a third.

The fourth howl, however, made them all sit up quick.

“Madre de Cristo.” Eyes wide in the firelight, Halfweed sat erect in his dirty roll and stared into the night.

“What in hell…?” Fifth John squinted hard. Twitching skittishly, their mounts were pawing the ground where they’d been tethered. Two of the stolen horses were also moving, though less restively.

Sitting back on its haunches, its long head thrown back, lips parted and teeth white in the firelight, the outlandish heavy horse was baying at the moon. Its howl was perfectly indistinguishable from that of the unseen carnivores, melding with and simultaneously inspiring the chilling moonlight chorus.

Great Knox was shaking his head slowly. He was so stunned, both hands hung at his sides. “That ain’t no horse. No horse never made a noise like that.”

Fifth John hesitated, then deliberately lay back down in his roll. “Course it’s a horse, you dang fool. Looks like a horse, walks like a horse, smells like a horse. A mighty big horse, true, but a horse nonetheless.”

“Don’ sound like no horse.” Halfweed’s voice had dropped to a whisper, and he was looking around uneasily, as if the night itself were watching him.

John glanced up irritably. “An’ you don’t sound like no normal man, neither, but I still ride with you. But that’ll come to quittin’ if you don’t shut your food hole and go to sleep.”

The horse continued to howl. John tried, but with the woods by now resounding to what seemed like the concerted wailing of a hundred wolves, it was impossible for any man to rest. Frustrated, he rose to realign his sleeping kit, when he heard something else. Something different.

“You hear that?” he asked no one in particular.

Knox blinked sleepily. Somehow the great oaf had managed to fall asleep. “Hear what?”

“I hear it.” Halfweed rose and stood trembling in his long johns, looking around edgily. “I hear it, yes.”

As the two men listened intently, the suggestion became a whisper, then a rumble. Then a thunder that woke even Great Knox.

“Hey, Fifth. What’s makin’ thet…?”

John’s eyes became as wide as Halfweed’s. “Run! It’s the Devil’s own signature! Run for your lives!” Still half-asleep but waking up fast, Great Knox struggled with his bedroll. It had become all twisted around him in his sleep and was reluctant to release his legs. The horses whinnied and shied, rolling their eyes. All except for the big black, which continued to sit and howl.

Fifth John’s chest heaved until he thought it would burst as he raced down the mountainside in the darkness. He could feel the snow catching up to him, teasing him, toying with his backside. He slid, fell, and came up scraped and bleeding but still running, leaping over fallen logs, sliding down talus crumbly as stale johnnycake. When he could run no more, he scrambled desperately behind the biggest tree he could find and closed his eyes tight.

It was like being swallowed by an express train. The tree shook, quivered, even bent a mite, but stayed put. As quickly as it had gathered strength, the avalanche began to spend itself, spreading out like white butter across the land. Only when it was done did Fifth John allow himself to leave the shelter of the tree and begin the long, difficult slog back uphill.

Of their camp there was no trace. Kettle, pan, bedrolls, clothing… everything gone, swept downslope and entombed beneath tons of snow. Only the horses remained. Apparently the angle of the cliff beneath which they’d been tethered had caused the bulk of the avalanche to just miss them. It infuriated Fifth John to realize that had he kept his wits about him instead of panicking, he could have survived alongside the horses and completely avoided the dangerous downhill flight.

Halfweed joined him a few moments later as John was dragging his insufficient but nonetheless welcome spare clothing from the saddlebags they had providentially left near the horses. The skinny half-breed was terrified but otherwise unhurt. He looked around, blinking in the moonlight.

“Where’s Knox?”

John continued to dig at the saddlebags. His good buffalo coat was gone, and he’d have to put on every stitch of clothing he had left in the world if he expected to keep from freezing. “Dunno. He ain’t with you?”

“No, man.” Shivering, Halfweed crossed his arms over his sallow chest. “I thought he’d be here.”

“Well, he ain’t, so I guess it’s done for him.” Fifth John grunted. “More for us. Split the money from the horses two ways.”

“Yeah. Hey, yeah, that’s right.” Halfweed relaxed a little, his smile returning. It didn’t stay long. “Hey, Fifth, you notice somethin’?”

“No, what?” the other man replied testily.

Halfweed was looking around again, jerkily scanning the woods. “It’s quiet. Howlin’s stopped.”

Fifth John eyed the night sky and the treetops, then returned to his digging. “Yeah? What of it? Avalanche scared ’em off.”

“Yeah, that’s right.”

“Check the animals.”

Halfweed nodded, glad to have something to do to take his mind off the misfortune that had just struck their camp and taken the life of their beloved friend. Friend, anyway. Well, maybe casual companion.

The horses, at least, had survived unharmed. The way east out of the mountains was clear, and their four-footed booty was intact. He was about to rejoin John when something made him squint into the moonlight. The stallion stood munching a green branch it had pulled from a nearby tree. Once again it stood placidly and allowed him to approach. Halfweed reached for the broad forehead, ignoring the bad right eye, which swiveled up to watch him.

“Uh, hey, Fifth?”

“What now?” Fifth John did not look up as he wrestled a ragged shirt over the upper half of his long johns.

“That bump I told you ’bout? On the front of the big one’s head? Pork me for a nervous nun if it ain’t got larger.”

John shoved his head through the reluctant shirt, wondering what his companion was babbling about. “What’s that?”

“Come look for yourself.” The half-breed stepped back.

Fifth John slogged over and frowned. The broad-backed stallion regarded him expressionlessly. Fingering his goatee, John ran his fingers the length of the bony protrusion, then gripped it hard and pulled. The animal’s head didn’t move, nor did it otherwise react.

“Cabra del diablo.” Halfweed tried to cross himself, nearly stuck his finger up his nose, tried again. He was more or less successful the third time, but by then he entertained serious doubts that the Virgin Mother was still paying attention.

“Naw, it ain’t the Devil’s goat,” John groused, “though I grant you it’s passin’ strange. You’re right about t’ other, though. It is bigger. ’Bout six inches long now, I reckon. Grows fast, whatever it is.” He shrugged, secure in his ignorance. “Don’t matter none so long’s the rest of the animal is sound. We’ll cut it off before we sell.” He turned away, grumbling to himself. “Now, where the blazes did I put those old coveralls?”

By morning his good mood had returned. Too bad for Great Knox but better for him, and Halfweed. ’Tis not an ill wind that gives the other man pneumonia, he mused. There was still no sign of any pursuit, and by evening even Halfweed had mellowed. The half-breed didn’t have sense enough to stay upset or unhappy for very long. Truth be told, he didn’t have sense enough to find his ass with both hands.

As the sun scurried for cover behind the mountains, it started to snow again, just hard enough to be indifferent. Fifth John was thinking of fashioning a lean-to when he spotted the opening in the hillside.

Halfweed took one look at the shadowy fissure and shook his head violently. “I ain’t goin’ in there, man.”

“What’s the matter, toad cojones? You frightened?” John dismounted. The rifle that had providentially been secured to the back of his horse in one hand, he hunted up the precious box of matches and fashioned a torch of reasonably dry pine needles and twigs. Burning taper in hand, he was able to enter the spacious cave standing up.

Halfweed held on to his reins and waited nervously, his face turned skyward, on the lookout for the tentative moon. A deep moan from within the cave made him sit bolt upright in his saddle.

He’d half turned to flee when John reemerged, smiling maliciously. “Scared you, didn’t I? Damn fool crazy half-breed.” He gestured curtly at him with his rifle. “There ain’t nothin’ in there. Ain’t been for some time. It’s dry an’ warm, plenty of room for both of us to stand and walk around, even.”

Halfweed slid out of his saddle, as much relieved as angry. “Dumb sumbitch. You didn’t have to do that.”

“Yeah, I know. But it was fun. Shoulda seen the look on your face. For a moment you was even dumber-lookin’ than usual.” John started to remove the saddlebags from his mount. “Let’s get a fire goin’. Rate we’re travelin’, I figger by tomorrow this time we’ll be well on our way to startin’ out of these damn mountains. Then it’s over the trail back to town and the high life.”

“Right.” Halfweed perked up at the thought.

They built the fire near the entrance so it wouldn’t smoke up the cave. In such snug quarters even the tired old jerky tasted good.

“Got to take a piss.” John rose and headed toward the outside. Halfweed didn’t bother to look up, concentrating on his jerky.

Something close by went snuf.

“Hey, man, no more jokes, okay?” The half-breed flailed absently behind him. Much to his irritation, the sound was repeated. Smiling to himself, he deliberately extracted his revolver from the gun belt lying nearby.

“Okay. I ain’t afraid o’ no duende. Since you won’t answer, I guess you some kinda animal now and I got to defend myself, verdad?”

“Defend yourself ag’inst what, you loco freak?” Fifth John stood framed in the entrance to the cave, fastening his pants.

“Fifth?” Halfweed fumbled for a flaming brand from the fire as he cocked his pistol. He tossed the burning stick toward the unexplored recesses at the back of the cave.

Something monumental rose up in the light. Primeval fire glinted from black eyes and off teeth the length of a man’s hand. The bear raised forepaws equipped with claws like bent railroad spikes. It was ten feet tall—no, fifteen—with silver hairs shimmering among the brown. The Great Bear of the Arapaho, the bear overwhelming: the ur-bear.

“Jesus!” An openmouthed Fifth John stumbled backward, fumbling with his belt. In the confines of the cave, the bear’s roar was Vesuvius and typhoon and the Port Royal earthquake all rolled into one. It shook the ground underfoot and shattered rock from the walls.

“Oh, Gawd, John, help me!” Adding to the frantic pandemonium as the bear lumbered forward, Halfweed fired his Colt repeatedly, six times in all. All this did was make the brute mad, a tactical decision not dissimilar to Napoleon’s decision to invade Russia.

Between the earthshaking roars of the bear, Halfweed’s Colt going off, and its owner’s terrifying screams as the monster dismembered him one limb at a time, it was a choice cut of purgatory.

“John, John, it’s eating me, it’s killin’ me, oh Gawd, help me!”

Fifth John had not survived an upbringing among four tormenting elder brothers each as mean and ornery as himself without becoming pretty good at sizing up his chances in a fight. It was deuced clear to him that poor Halfweed was already as good as finished and that even with rifle in hand he didn’t stand much of a chance against a grizzly from Hell, and what would be the point, anyways?

Too bad, Halfweed, he thought sorrowfully as he swung into his saddle. Unlike Great Knox, who’d been tolerated, he’d genuinely liked the greasy, addled dimwit. The bellowing from the cave followed him down the mountainside as he struggled to lead five horses behind him. They were all understandably skittish and edgy. All except for the big black-and-white, who brought up the rear docile as an old hound.

He thought of the money he was going to make selling the five and how Providence had decreed he was going to have to spend it all by himself, and it did help to drown out the memory of Halfweed’s final piteous shrieks.

When he was confident he was safely beyond the attentions of the monster bear should it have felt any unsociable inclination toward his person, he stopped and tied his animals. Then he passed methodically among them, speaking to each in a reassuring voice, rubbing its muzzle and neck until it calmed down. Only when that was done did he think to give a care to himself.

“I saw that!” He whirled, simultaneously drawing his gun. “You wuz grinnin’ at me, you gawddamned big-butted squint-eyed sumbitch!”

Easy, Fifth, he told himself. Horses don’t grin. They dang well can’t grin. You’re jest tired an’ upset. And no wonder, what with the past couple days’ goin’s-on.

Mighty peculiar goin’s-on at that.

Funny thing how that avalanche come up on that howlin’ horse. He’d about forgotten that, but it came back to him now, sharp an’ clear. That big old animal a-howlin’ like a wolf, and then the snow crashin’ down on them and buryin’ poor Great Knox and somehow just missin’ all the horses. Then that bear. Biggest gawddamn bear ever was. But he’d checked that cave himself and woulda swore it was cleaner than the inside of a crinoline skirt.

Down the mountain then, all the animals a-frothin’ and a-rollin’ their eyes until he could quiet ’em. All except this one, this oversized, overfed, great ugly four-legged bad-eyed bastard of a horse with a lump growin’ out of its head. He blinked in confusion. Damn thing was more’n a foot long now, and pointed at the end, an’ all twisty-curly round like a stick of store-bought peppermint candy.

Impossible or no, he’d have bet a quarter eagle then and there that it had winked at him.

“What are you, anyways?” He approached with caution. It raised its head from where it had been cropping the grass that poked green threads through the snow, and gazed back at him blankly, innocently. Just another dumb animal.

Fifth John wasn’t afraid, but he kept the muzzle of his pistol aimed straight at the creature’s forehead, just below the ivory-colored spiral spear.

“You cursed? Thet what it is? You a bad-luck beastie? I heard tell o’ such down in New Orleans. Island people come up and put curses on chickens an’ such. Or maybe you’re jest bad luck. I kill you, I still got t’ other four to sell. You worth the trouble? I wonder.” He was within arm’s length now. As before, the animal just stood patiently and gazed back at him out of bland equine eyes.

Reaching out, he stroked the spear that grew from the creature’s forehead. It was smooth and warm to the touch. Fifth John lowered his pistol. “You’re different, that’s fer sure. Reckon you might be worth a passel to the right buyer. Maybe you are worth the trouble. But from here on I’m gonna be watchin’ you as well as my step, hear?”

Carefully but with increasing confidence, he began to circle the animal, patting it on its flanks, inspecting its withers. It was sure enough an odd-lookin’ concoction: a blind Quaker could’ve told that. But all muscle underneath that peculiar back. No, he wouldn’t kill it. Too much money to be made, and he’d already put up with enough trouble to make it worth keepin’ him.

He smiled and nodded at nothing in particular. “Guess you’re all right, big’un. Somebody pay plenty to have you hitched in their team.” A hot, wet sensation made him glance down at his boots.

The horse was pissing on his right leg.

“The hell with it, you damn four-legged play-actor! I knewed you wuz grinnin’ at me!” Irate beyond common sense, he raised the pistol.

The big animal swung its head around to regard him thoughtfully. As John leveled his gun at his impassive target, he noticed that something else was different about it. Something new.

Lit from beneath, from inside, the white circle around the bad eye was glowing intensely. And that eye weren’t squinting now, weren’t more’n half-shut. It was full open, open all the way wide. And staring straight… at… him.

Mesmerized, Fifth John looked deep into that eye and let out a meager, completely involuntary moan. His whole body started to shake. That wasn’t surprising because in an instant his mind had become as unhinged as his body. At the end of his arm, his gun was waving up and down like a semaphore flag in the grip of a high gale. The precarious moan rose up in his throat as if trying to escape.

The animal was growling at him. That was crazy. Horses didn’t growl. The growl became a snarl. Crazier still. Horses didn’t snarl. Tremendous unsuspected muscles rippled and tensed in its back legs, its hindquarters, its neck, as it prepared to spring. That was madness. Horses didn’t spr—

“I’ll be hornswoggled and hog-tied.” Caiben turned and yelled back toward the cabin. “Amos, Jim! Git out here and have a look at this!” Clutching the water bucket and heedless of the cold, he splashed through the stream back toward the cabin.

Amos Malone and Jim Bridger emerged, Malone with skillet in hand. It was his turn to do the cooking. Bridger specialized in rabbit, while Caiben wasn’t good with anything more than beans. They didn’t much understand what Malone was talking about when he served them medallions of elk béarnaise au poivre or trout almondine with new potatoes and asparagus hollandaise or even how he came by the fixin’s. Smart men that they were, they didn’t push the question too hard.

Ignoring the icy water dripping from his deerskin leggings, Caiben joined his trapping companions as they watched the six horses, with Malone’s in the lead, wander solemnly back into the crude corral from which three of them had been abducted. Once within, they dispersed amiably and began to nibble at the greening grass.

No small man himself, Caiben got a crick in his neck looking up at Malone. “Well, you were right, Amos. Danged if you weren’t right. They come back.”

“Wonder what happened to the thieves,” Bridger murmured.

“Reckon they had enough.” Malone started toward the corral. His companions followed.

“What’s that thing on your animal’s head?” Caiben asked. “Looks like he got somethin’ stuck in it.”

“Just a growth,” Malone murmured. “’Tain’t hurtful. I’ll take care of it.”

They entered the corral. Each man saw to his own mount and then collectively to the three they’d apparently acquired. Malone patted the stallion on the neck. It snorted as if bored by the attention.

“Well, Worthless, they give you a hard time? Other way round, I reckon. Some folks are just dumber’n dirt, thinkin’ they could horsenap a unicorn.”

“A what?” Bridger had come up behind him and overheard. “I know what that is. A mythical creature. Somethin’ out of stories, that don’t exist.” The two mountain men regarded each other silently for a long moment. Then Bridger broke out into a wide smile. “Kind o’ like you, Malone.”

Malone smiled, too. Have to replace that restrainin’ patch quick, he mused. “I reckon so, Jim. Tell me: you ever had crawfish étouffée on saffron rice?”

“Huh-uh. Sounds like Frenchie food.”

“Sort of. With lemon chiffon cake for dessert.”

Bridger eyed him sideways. “Now, where you gonna git lemons up here, Amos? In late winter, no less.”

“Leave that to me, Jim.” Malone gestured with a nod. “Better get cleaned up. Looks to me like you might’ve had an accident.”

Bridger glanced around and down at his stained backside, thoroughly baffled. “Now, when’d I do that? I don’t recall…”

Malone put an arm around the other man’s shoulders. “Let’s eat, Jim. Caiben, you ready for dinner?”

“Ain’t I always?” The third trapper joined his companions as they sloughed back toward the cabin.

Behind them Worthless shifted his phenomenally flexible anatomy and turned to thoughtfully eye the nearest mare.

Espying his intention, she gave a startled snort and bolted twelve feet.