Track of the Cat - Walter Van Tilburg Clark (40 page)

She kept tugging at his coat with one hand, but slid
the other up over his shoulder and behind his head. "I’ve been
horrible, darlin’, I know. But it wasn’t you; it wasn’t you,
really. I just couldn’t, with all. . ." and finished in broken
murmuring against him.

He held her tightly, and then, when she tugged at him
less, the small, hard body softening in his arms, loosened his hold a
little too, and lifted her chin with a big knuckle crooked under it,
and put his mouth down to hers. Her head fell back, and she bent
limply to him in his circling arm, letting it bear almost all her
weight. Her lips parted, and her breath came quick and shallow
against his mouth. Harold’s mind thundered at this joining after
the long weariness and the separation the mother had made. He jerked
back the hood from her hair, and holding that hand under her head,
hunted with his mouth along her throat and shoulder, and then back
along her face until he found her mouth again. Then they clung there,
under the low, burning lantern, and almost against Kentuck’s
shoulder. Kentuck swung his head,
munching and
dripping a little at the mouth, and watched them curiously.

When the wish that bound them ebbed a little, being
too long denied, Harold turned Gwen, almost roughly, still holding
her close in his arm, and led her, half lying against him, and both
of them stumbling, into the shed beyond. The light of the lantern
came in there through the cracks of the board partition, making thin
lines of brightness over the mounds of hay, and a dry sweetness
stirred in the cold air where they moved. They sank together against
the first yielding bank of hay that blocked them, and Harold lay over
against her, murmuring her name like the soft echo of a cry that
would break him, and lingered her throat and cheek and temple with a
trembling hand.

"Darling," she sighed, "oh, my
darling," and closed her eyes again, and drew his shoulder down
toward her.

“
Harold," the voice called, from outside and a
distance, and they lay still exactly where they were, his face close
above hers, but not yet touching.

After a moment Gwen turned her face into his
shoulder, pressing hard, and made a long, soft moan that was muffled
by his coat. Harold’s hand lay in the nape of her neck still,
curved as it had been in his last caress, but not moving now, not
even pressing.

"Oh, damn her," he whispered, "God
damn her to hell. Will she never. . ." but stopped there, choked
by the quick fury.

"Harold," the voice called again.

Gwen drew her head back quickly, whispering, "She’s
coming out here, Harold," and stiffened away from him. Then
there was only the knowledge again, almost like hatred, of the clumsy
winter garments between them, and of the mother’s will. It was as
if their own wills, and the sweet, savage desire that had fused out
of them, were sucked away to nothing, leaving them separate and
ashamed and wanting to hide, most of all from each other. Harold
loosened his hold, and Gwen struggled to her feet at once and moved
away two steps toward the door, and stood there with her back turned.
After a moment Harold got up too and stood behind her. They waited,
separated and listening, the thin bars of light from the stall across
them and the motes they had stirred from the hay spinning among
themselves in the narrow gleams.

"Harold," the mother’s voice called
again, from much nearer.

"You’ll have to answer her, Harold," Gwen
whispered, and moved away from him, and began hurriedly brushing the
hay from her skirt and cloak.

The quick rage whirled in Harold again, and he
couldn’t keep it out of his voice, shouting, "Here. What do
you want?" But then he began brushing the hay off himself too.

"Is Gwen out there too?" the mother called.
The voice came from no closer now. She had stopped when he called.

"Yes, she’s here," he called, but then
couldn’t help adding, "She’s helping me. The black stud is
hurt. Kentuck."

Gwen looked up at him, and then straightened up from
her brushing, and drew the hood over her head and moved away into the
lantern light in the stall. She stood in there by the outside door,
with her back to him and her head bent. The lantern made her shadow
like a praying nun on the door. He passed her and opened the door.
The mother was standing out there in the deep path, half way across.

"You’re letting the fire go out," she
said.

"I can’t do twenty things at once,"
Harold said, and again felt the guilt of a half lie, and how dirty
the sweet wildness had turned now. "I’ll get it in a minute,"
he added wearily.

"The girl had to take care of it for you once
before," the mother told him. "While you caught up on your
sleep."

Harold just stood there, not answering, and finally
she said, "Well, you better fix it, and then come in before you
freeze."

Harold came back into the stall and took down the
lantern and picked up the kettle. Gwen waited for him outside, and
when he had closed the door, went on slowly ahead of him, toward the
house. The mother was already standing in the open kitchen door. When
she saw the lantern moving away from the shed, she went in and closed
the door, shutting away its light from the path.

Harold turned off in the drag lane and went out to
the fire. The timbers had burned apart and there were only small,
separate flames at their ends, and the great pile of shimmering
embers in the center. Harold worked slowly around the circle, kicking
the timbers farther in. Then he set the kettle and lantern down, and
brought more timbers from the pile and tossed them on. When the
flames drew together again, and began to rise at the center, he
picked up the lantern and kettle and turned toward the house. Gwen
was waiting for him where the drag had crossed the path, but when he
was nearly to her she went on ahead and into the house alone.

The father was the only man in the kitchen when they
came in. He was sitting at the table, playing Black-Jack against
himself. There was a pile of matches on each side of him, but the
pile by his right hand was much larger than the one by his left. A
new bottle of whisky and a glass full of it stood by the right pile.
He lifted the glass and drank and made a long, sighing "Ah."
Then he set the glass down again, and looked at them.

"No sign of Curt yet?" he asked.

Harold shook his head.

"Two o’c1ock in the morning," the father
said angrily. "Almost two in the morning, and the young fool’s
not back yet."

And now he’s dropped two days clean out, Harold
thought. Well, if you have to lose two days, they were good days to
lose. Does he know Arthur’s dead? I wonder. Gwen turned and moved
off toward the bunk-room, and the father peered after her. "Little
game of Black-Jack, young woman?" he asked loudly.

Without giving any sign that she’d heard him, Gwen
went on slowly and turned into the dim light of the bunk-room, and
disappeared, letting the light fill the door again by itself behind
her shadow.

"Who in hell was that?" the father asked
Harold. "Creepin’ around here like a damned ghost," he
muttered. "Won’t even answer a civil question. To hell with
her then."

He looked at Harold and held up the cards. "What
about you?" he asked. "It’s no fun robbing myself,"
he said, and snorted happily at his joke, and began to fish clumsily
in his vest for a cigar.

"I guess not now, thanks," Harold said, and
having spoken, could move again too. He started toward the stove.

"And what’s wrong with cards, may I ask?"

"Nothing," Harold said.

He slid the kettle onto the stove and blew out the
lantern and set it up on the shelf. Then he sat down in the mother’s
place, across from the father. The old man stared at him fiercely for
a minute, his heavy, black brows drawn together and his breath
snoring in his nose, but Harold wouldn’t look at him, so finally he
just snorted loudly, making a mouth of contempt, and struck a match
to light his cigar. The match made a sound like another snort. When
the cigar was drawing well, he clenched it between his teeth in the
right comer of his mouth, half closing his right eye against the
smoke, and flipped two cards out, face down, and then two more on top
of them, face up, a nine of clubs on one and a queen of hearts on the
other. Holding the rest of the deck ready, he looked at Harold again.

"Have a drink?"

"No, thanks."

The father stared again. "Everybody getting
holier than Christ,” he said. "A whole goddam houseful of
preachers," he exploded, and then, after a moment, asked,
"What’s the matter now? You sick?"

When Harold just shook his head, he snorted again.
"To hell with you too, then," he said. "To hell with
the whole, Sniveling, goody-goody bunch of you. What a family for a
man who . . ." but took a deep, defiant drink instead of
finishing. Then, just in the time it took to put his glass down, his
expression became happy and calculating. He peered at his hole cards.

“
Hit me easy," he said for the right-hand
cards.

He turned up a four of spades and chuckled. "That’s
just about right, just about right," he said.

Harold watched him turning the cards for a while,
though with empty, unseeing eyes. Then he folded his arms on the
table in front of him, and laid his head down on them.

The father went on flipping the cards out and talking
to himself. Sometimes, catching a glimpse of a card as it came off
the deck, he’d say quietly, "Turn one under. House rule,"
and turn it onto the bottom of the deck, and flip the next one out
instead. Whenever he could move another match onto the right-hand
pile, he would chuckle and pause in the game and take a sip of his
drink.

PART THREE

22

Far below, Kentuck moved into the shadow of the pines
again. The red coat across his saddle darkened and vanished, and did
not reappear. When a minute had passed in the increasing light, in
the slow settling of the flakes, and nothing else had moved, Curt
drew a deep breath, let it out slowly, and looked down at his bare
hand holding the sombrero, as if surprised to see it. Then he turned
and climbed back up to where the cowhide parka lay on the snow, with
the snow-shoes beside it, and the little pile of things he had taken
out of the red coat. He laid the sombrero down carefully, like
something brittle, and picked up the parka. He spread the parka in
front of him between his two hands and looked at it. He moved the
torn fiap on the shoulder of it with his forefinger. Except for the
fierce black moustache, which seemed alive by itself, his face was
that of a sleep walker.

Finally he slipped the parka on over his head,
knotted the belt around his waist, and drew up the hood. The coat was
very heavy, but the sleek, quilted lining felt warm and kind. He
didn’t like the hood up though, blinding him on both sides. After a
moment he pushed it back and let it hang between his shoulders. Then
in the same way, slowly and dreamily, he stuffed the oilskin packet
into his left pocket, slid the knife into its sheath and dropped it
and the cartridges and the matches into the right pocket, slung the
bear-paws onto his back, and drew on his mittens. The black sombrero
with the rattlesnake band was left alone on the snow. He picked it
up, bending stiffly because of the bear-paws, and stood holding it
and staring at it as he had stared at the parka. Finally he rolled it
until he could hold it in one hand, and turned and looked down
through the stone gate again, at the edge where he had sent Kentuck
over. Once the wind moved, making soft flutings in the rocks above
him, and the pines down there stirred and whispered and dropped clots
of snow, which broke and thinned away into little veils over the
ravine. There was no other sound or motion. Once more he took a deep
breath and sighed, as if reluctant to move, and then he turned and
started up the trail.

He stopped under the wall of the Cathedral Rock and
pushed the rolled sombrero into a crevice in the granite, thinking,
from the surface of his closed mind, and without interest, I’ll get
it when I come back.

He went on up to where the carbine leaned against the
rock, and picked it up and stood looking at it. Finally he took off
his right mitten and stuffed it into the left pocket of the parka,
beside the oilskin packet. Then he stood staring again, at the marks
of the scuflle in the snow, with sand and brittle manzanita leaves
strewn over them, and the long, bare place across the center where
Arthur’s body had melted through. Finally he looked slowly around
at the confused circle of the big cat prints, like broken flowers.

"No matter what color you are," he said
softly. "No matter what color, or how big, or how long it
takes."

Once more the oath released him. He cradled the
carbine in his right arm, and began to climb again. Out of old habit,
for he wasn’t really thinking about anything now, he climbed slowly
but steadily, keeping each step short enough to be easy, and
flat-footed and a trifle pigeon-toed, so that the soft pacs gripped
firmly in the snow or on stone. The same habit made him walk
carefully beside the tracks of the cat and not in them, and glance up
ahead every now and then, to guard against ambush, and to be sure the
trail made no big swing within sight. Unless the cat had been badly
hurt, it would be a long hunt. He’d been sure of that as soon as
he’d seen the long fork of the trail going up and north, and taking
its time. The thing was to keep the bastard moving until you got a
good shot; don’t give him a chance to rest, don’t give him a
chance to hunt. Keep him feeling the  pressure all the time. If
he’d been hurt bad, it would be different, of course. You might
come up with him in an hour or two. It all depended on how much of a
head start he had. And he might have been hurt bad, at that. There
were still flecks of blood showing sometimes between the flower
prints. Maybe Arthur had hit him with that one shot. But you couldn’t
count on that. You had to count on a long hunt, and take it slow and
steady, just keeping the pressure on the bastard all the time, only
keeping your eyes open too, because if he was hurt so he couldn’t
keep running, he’d be waiting for you somewhere, up on a ledge, as
he had for Arthur.