San Domingo: The Medicine Hat Stallion Read online

  In a speech to his legislature, California’s Governor Leland Stanford rose to Lincoln’s defense: “The federal government is still in existence, with a man at the head of it. Our great state will remain loyal to the Union.”

  Like storm clouds lifted by fresh winds, the rebel groups surrounding Sacramento disintegrated, lost interest in their plans to form a separate Republic of the Pacific.

  The message had reached California in time. Peter and all the other pony boys who took part in the famous ride felt proud of their help in saving the Union. They rode on, in grinding routine, unaware that the South was preparing for war. Peter lived these days on a seesaw of misery and bliss—misery when he had to leave Domingo; bliss when they met again.

  Meanwhile, there was uneasiness in Washington over the unpreparedness of the North. Government forts were poorly protected and supplied. In early April, Fort Sumter, in Charleston Harbor, sent an SOS to Washington for food. By ship and train federal cargoes were rushed to the fort. Mistaking the supplies for arms and ammunition, the Southerners opened fire.

  Even then, the pony boys did not expect a full-scale war. They rode on, tossing the mochila from one saddle to the next.

  May and June went by. And every second or third day, for a brief hour or two, Peter and Domingo were together again, with no thought for anything beyond their joy in each other and in the living, breathing, singing wilderness.

  But on July 21 the United States stopped wearing blinders to the facts of war. Jim Baxter raced into Deer Creek Station, yelling, “Northern troops retreating in the Battle of Bull Run! Lincoln calls for seventy-five thousand volunteers.”

  The catastrophic news spread like brush fire. Manes and tails now licks of flame. Hoofs burning up distance and time. Alexander Majors no longer saying, “Take good care of your horses.” Now the command, “Get full speed out of them.”

  What amazed Peter was that, while other horses grew gaunt and ribby on this torrent of speed, Domingo thrived, grew tougher. Yet Peter couldn’t shake a secret terror that never stopped gnawing at him. It was born of such shame he couldn’t speak of it even to Max. The fear kept running around in his head like a mouse in a cage. If the war were suddenly to end, Domingo would be sent back to the daughters of Alexander Majors. Peter couldn’t bear losing him a second time. At thought of it, the old hatred for his father boiled up again, as if the tragedy had already occurred.

  But instead of an early peace, the rebellion of the South stiffened, and prophecies of a short war were drowned in blood. Domingo and Peter belonged to this life, belonged to flight, and the fight for their country. No time now to halt the Overland Stage, asking, “Is the way ahead clear of Indians? Of road agents?” No time now to wave to emigrant children.

  Only a glance at the surveyors dotting the trail, to see if among them was a little whiskery man, mostly hat. One day Peter pulled up short, his voice a medley of doubt and hope.

  “Brisley! Brisley?”

  The little man turned, smiling. “I favor him,” he said, “but I’m his brother Ferdie.”

  Peter’s face fell.

  “You must be his young friend, Peter Lundy,” the brother said. “On your day off, you go see him. His shack is only a hoot and a holler north of Independence Rock, plumb near yer next pony stop.”

  Peter reined around, then came back. “What you surveyin’ for?” he asked.

  Ferdie shoved his hat back in a gesture so like Brislawn’s it made Peter’s heart ache. “I thought everyone knew!” he said. “The telegraph’s comin’ through—all the way from St. Joe to Sacramento. Then it’s good-bye and farewell to the Pony.”

  On the heels of the surveyors came the pole diggers, laughing and singing; then scores of linemen waving gaily from their perches in the sky. As day after day Peter saw the procession of men and supplies, he had hours to think: After the Pony Express, what? Home? The trading post, and Pa? “Please, God,” he prayed, “don’t let the Pony end. Not ever.”

  The Indians worried, too. The white man was digging holes in their land, stringing wires across their sky. Burnings and scalpings were the answer, and rifles replacing arrows. Ronny Fergus, a pony boy, shot dead on his horse while talking to the linemen. Two stations in the Sierras burned to ashes.

  Yet Peter’s rides remained unmolested. Word had traveled from Sioux to Cheyennes to Arapahos and back again: “Pooty good fella . . . brother to Indian.” His Indian ways amused and pleased them—his twin braids tied with thongs; the way he sat on his horse; the way he mounted on the off side, Indian fashion, instead of on the near side, like the white man.

  Only the Crow tribe mistrusted the boy with the yellow hair. “Him no Crow,” they said. “Him steal Medicine Hat.”

  One late night with a full moon riding, Peter on Domingo was heading for Devil’s Gate, the last station on his run. For miles he had not seen a moving creature. The land was mute, deserted. Not even a rabbit leaped from the sage, nor a coyote or wolf howled at the moon. He felt an uneasiness he’d never known before, as if from every mountaintop and ravine eyes were watchful, boring into him.

  For the first time he wished Domingo were dark brown all over, instead of a white target in the spill of moon. He knew every Indian, every outlaw lusted for a sacred Medicine Hat. A feeling of fierce possessiveness took hold of Peter. No one else could have Domingo. Domingo was his! His to save and protect from whips and spurs and wolves . . . from everything that could hurt him. “I know now how a mare feels,” he thought, “when a snarling wolf threatens her colt.”

  Independence Rock was behind them now. Only a few miles until he and Domingo could bed down in the warmth of straw and buffalo skin.

  The night deepened. The Sweetwater picked up starlight, and quicksilvered a moon-path. Peter was suddenly afraid. He thought he saw Indian fires at the gap in the rocks of Devil’s Gate; or were the moon and the stunted pines playing him tricks?

  Ahead, banking the Sweetwater, a row of willows made a long arbor of shade. Even with Indians lurking behind the trees, Domingo would be a lesser target skinning through the tunnel of leaves.

  Peter dropped his reins, whipped out his pistol, commanded himself: “Get out of the open! Head for cover!” He tightened his knees. Domingo bolted into the broody willows as if he were in a race for fun. Halfway into the trees a rain of arrows and rifle balls crashed through the leaves from both sides. Peter returned a volley of fire. One arrow grazed his thigh. He barely felt the sting of it, barely felt the whip of branches across his face as Domingo slashed through them.

  Out from the tunnel of trees now, and up the slope, the wind fierce in their faces. As suddenly as the terror began, the night went back to silence. Peter’s sigh was a high whisper of relief. It hurt to breathe. And still Domingo seemed unwilling to slacken his pace. Almost to the top now. The world all silent and at peace again.

  They would stop at the crest to blow, but before Peter could draw rein, Domingo stumbled to his knees. Peter leaped off, watching in horror as his pony fell heavily onto his side. And then in the bright moonlight Peter’s eyes caught the spurting of blood and a trail of blood staining the path behind them. With a cry Peter fell down beside Domingo. “I should have stayed in the open, but, oh, Domingo, I thought . . .” He didn’t finish the thought.

  Desperate, torn by conscience, he pulled off his neckerchief, wadded it into a ball, and pressed it against the ragged hole in Domingo’s side. For long seconds he sat holding the crumpled wet thing to the wound. “Domingo,” he whispered, “I thought only of the arrow that near killed me when it was you that stopped a bullet.”

  The pony’s eyes were open and amber-lit, and the nostrils fluting, and the ears asking.

  “Yes,” Peter answered. “I’ll be here. I’ll stay.” He loosed the cinch and tossed the saddle and the mail on the grass. He took off his coat and put the warm side over Domingo’s body, tucking it gently about him.

  He sat close, in silence, in the cold night while the moon slowly slid down and down into
the pocket of the horizon. He tried to make his mind think about the mail, about the men in Washington who had written the messages, and the telegraphers in Washington who had translated them into dots and dashes, and the receivers in St. Joe translating them again into words that now lay sealed in his mochila. He tried to think of the horse and rider waiting at Devil’s Gate, and Mr. Dogberry fretting and pacing.

  But his mind numbed, and his free hand stroked the divided mane that never would stay on one side of Domingo’s neck or the other, but grew in its own sweet stubborn way. In dazed sadness he got up and placed both hands tenderly, like a mother-person, over Domingo’s heart. All he could feel were the sweat-dried hairs, and no stirring beneath.

  He stayed with Domingo until there was no warmth left in the great body beside him. Then he put Domingo’s forelock over the brown hairs of his Medicine Hat, and he let it cover the eyes too, thinking about that long-ago time when the wind had tossed the forelock aside and shown him what manner of colt was his. And he saw him impish and young again, kiting up to Lucia, bunting her for his dinner. And then he thought of Brislawn’s words: “He’s a Medicine Hat! To the Injuns he’s big medicine. He’s sacred. A god. Nothing can harm his rider. Not slingstone, nor arrow. Not rifle ball, nor lightning.”

  He didn’t want Domingo to die for him; to give him all he possessed, which was his life. He longed to hear him neigh again and sneeze again. And then the tears flowed and would not stop as he tore up fistfuls of greasewood and sage by the roots and gathered buffalo chips and built a fire to keep the wolves away until he could come back with pick and shovel in the morning.

  Then burdened with mochila, saddle, and bridle, he trudged in the chill morning—hatless, coatless, and with pants torn—the two miles to Devil’s Gate Station.

  • • •

  The next hours were lost to Peter. He remembered nothing of reaching the station or handing over the mail. He remembered nothing until the sun was high overhead and he found himself sitting on the doorstep in the sun, still wearing his blood-spattered shirt and the pants ripped where the arrow had grazed. Behind him he heard the clattering of tin plates and the sizzling of frying meat.

  “Soon,” Peter told himself, “I will feel strong enough to go back and dig the grave.” His tired brain tried to reason: Would Domingo like a carved marker telling of his bravery? Or would he like the earth smoothed over so that only Peter could find the place and never any strange eyes prying? He had about made up his mind when his nostrils smelled dust and the Overland Stage came rattling up to the station, which was not a regular stop.

  With much pulling and shouting, the driver halted his horses, jumped down from his box and opened wide the door—for Alexander Majors and the man Bolivar.

  Mr. Dogberry came running out and poked Peter to his feet with a kindly, “Mind yer manners, son.” Then bowing, he said, “My roast ribs of buffalo are about ready, gentlemen. I’d be honored . . .”

  Mr. Majors shook his head. “Thank you, Eli, but my business is with Peter. Then we must continue to Fort Bridger.”

  “Sir,” Peter’s words fell heavily, “it was my fault, sir.”

  “In what way, Peter?”

  “I should have stayed out in the open, but I thought . . .”

  “Nothing is your fault, Peter. There is a destiny that shapes our ends, and we have little to say.”

  Peter’s misery was past bearing.

  “All life is a crucible, Peter. It tests our mettle, sometimes almost beyond endurance.”

  Mr. Dogberry interrupted. “Begging your pardon, sir, but the boy ain’t slept and he ain’t et.”

  “Perhaps you’ll try those buffalo ribs, now that you know I don’t fault you.”

  “But, sir, I must get back before the wolves . . .”

  Mr. Majors shook his head again. “You won’t need to go back, Peter. Bolivar here and two pole diggers dug the grave deep, and San Domingo is lying peacefully inside, and they piled the earth softly atop him and smoothed it while I read from the Book of Common Prayer, ‘Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.’ ”

  The stagecoach horses began pawing fretfully, and those in the stables, sensing their presence, let out shrill whinnies. Above the chorus Mr. Majors said, “Now then, Peter, would you like a new route in the faraway Sierras? Or would you like to return home? You’ve earned a change or a rest, and I should recommend the latter.”

  A silence fell between them while heads poked out of the coach, listening for the boy’s reply.

  It came without hesitation. “Sir, I have an old friend who lives only a short way from here and . . .” Peter hesitated, afraid he might burst into tears at the thought of Brislawn.

  Mr. Majors finished off the sentence. “Now, if ever, is the time to seek the comfort of an old friend.” He held out his hand to Peter, and there was such a wringing clasp between them that Mr. Majors’ face broke into a great smile.

  They stood so for a long moment.

  “Forward Is the Ticket”

  TOWARD LATE afternoon on the same day, Peter slowed his steps, then halted. By instinct, by love and need, he had traced the meandering trail through the grasses to Brislawn’s shack. He knew at once when he had found the place—not by the neat-built shack, but by the animals in the corral. They all turned his way, staring in statuelike silence. Goats and burros, horses and banty chicks—all seemed in a trance of curiosity. Some Peter had never met before, but those he knew he called to by name.

  “Shoshone! Choctaw! Sweet Sioux! Jenny! Nanny!”

  The spell broke. Nostrils snuffed and whuffed. Legs slow-footed toward him, then bodies jostled each other in their eagerness.

  Peter leaned over the fence, offering both hands to be lipped. Nanny-goat danced forward, toed the top rail eye-to-eye with Peter. Did she, he wondered, see more with the barlike pupils of her eyes than humans with their round ones? A young horse nosed his way between Choctaw and Shoshone. He had one yellow eye, one brown. Peter waved his hand before the yellow eye and was glad when the eyelid blinked.

  Somewhere far off, a meadowlark whistled as if he couldn’t stop. For a moment the song brought homesickness. Peter turned from the animals and set his lonely heart and aching legs toward the shack.

  The latchstring was out. He pulled it and went inside. No one was home. But all in a moment the room engulfed him with the warmth of Brislawn. It smelled sweet of leather and tobacco, apples and wild plums, and chicken stewing in a pot over a banked fire. He ate one of the plums, thick with juice, then fell onto the cot, sinking deep into the dry cornhusks and leaves. Now at last he knew the depths of his tiredness and the beginnings of peace.

  A ring-tailed cat leaped up beside him, tentatively whiskering his face, his ears, his hair. Purring her approval, she relaxed, wriggling and squirming against Peter, pummeling him with her boxing-glove paws. Peter no longer felt alone with sadness. His fingers stroked the shiny fur, accepting the living warmth. It was almost like being with Dice, except for the rumbly sound of the purring.

  The sun, working its way around the sky, poured a yellow haze over the bed. A great drowsiness flowed into Peter. He blinked, trying to focus on objects in the room—on the map over the mantel, on the surveying instruments in the corner, on a clipping of Abraham Lincoln’s Inaugural Address hanging on the wall beside the bed. But the harder he tried to stay awake, the sleepier he grew. His arm fell over the brink of the cot, alongside the dangling tail of Ringtail Cat. Soon both creatures fell into a deep sleep.

  Brislawn found them so. In the half twilight he didn’t recognize Peter at first. Then he took a step closer and opened his mouth to let out a clarion cry of welcome. But the sound never came. He saw the drawn face of the boy, the weary flush of his cheeks. On tiptoe he turned and steadied his rifle on the antler rack. Carefully he hung up his bullet pouch so it wouldn’t bang against the wall. His mind was jumping with questions. “Something’s saddened the boy,” he thought, making a fist at the person or thing that caused it. “Else wh
y the smear of shadow beneath his eyes? And how come he’s so thin, and plumb wore out with fatigue?”

  He lighted the oil lamp, shielding it from Peter with a half-circle of tin. Then he set to work, heating water, making a batter of corn meal and lard, stirring the mix. The cat opened one eye accusingly, then purred itself back to sleep.

  “Nothin’ so bad,” Brislawn said to himself, “but what hot corn bread and stewed-hen gravy can lessen the pain.” He beat the batter, gently at first, then fiercely when he saw that nothing disturbed the boy.

  Minutes ticked by. And the quarter hours. The window was black with night when Peter opened his eyes. Still half asleep, he stared into the fire until he caught movement beside it. And there he was! Hat and all! Robert O’Breaslain, son of the Kings of Ireland! For a moment Peter studied the little man in silence, thinking, “He hasn’t changed, hardly any . . . only his hat seems a bit bigger and himself a bit smaller.” The fire caught the lower half of Brislawn’s face, shining up the yellow moustache. Suddenly the hat turned, and Peter saw his eyes underneath had not changed at all! A fierce joy leaped up in him; and such a warmth and happiness coursed through Peter’s body that he was across the room like an arc of light. Words caught in the tremble of his throat, but no matter. Brislawn was saying them all, and hugging him like a long-lost son, and cheering loud enough to be heard over the mountains and beyond.

  At the sound of the racket, the door burst open, letting in a black dog and a white one and a frowsy pup that barked in high C.

  “Peter,” Mr. Brislawn said as the three rushed in, “you remember Blacken and Penny, but now make the acquaintance of Penny’s last pup, name of Handy Andy Potlicker.”

  The room grew merry with laughter as Handy Andy lived up to his name, eagerly licking a dish on the floor, already tongue-scrubbed to a shine by Ringtail Cat. Oh, but it was good to laugh again, and no questions asked. No “How’d ye come?” Nor “Why?” Nor “Where’s yer horse?” Nor “How long ye stayin’?” Only this tug-chain of happiness tight between them.