The Englishman's Boy by Guy Vanderhaeghe Page A

shadowy cavalry. Then he nodded and, without raising his voice, said: “I got one thing to say to you boys before we commence this enterprise. I don’t tolerate a slacker. If one of you thinks he can slack on Tom Hardwick, take another think and fall out now.” There came a pause in which he seemed to be taking thought himself. “And I hope there’s no cowards among us,” he added. “I won’t break bread with a coward.” He smiled briefly and that was confusing, as if the smile was taking back or amending what he had just said. The Englishman’s boy was sure that was not the case. “Well,” said Hardwick, turning his horse, “let’s move out.”
    They went up the street at a walk, the slow, sombre pace of a funeral procession, past the shuttered house Fort Benton’s merchant prince, I.G. Baker, had built so his wife would not have to give birth to their first baby in the fort, past the ox wagons and trailers parked by the warehouses, past the sporting and gaming houses at this hour black as the heart of sin, past the old adobe fort which had stood godfather to the town, its four massive blockhouses featureless and blank but for the rifle slits in the walls.
    Wraiths, they stole out into the country, accompanied by the singing of meadowlarks, the horses steadily warming to their work in the chill morning air. The file lengthened under the blush of sun rising behind them, Hardwick and Evans assuming an air of generalship at the head, the company sorting into a natural order of march, friend falling in with friend, acquaintance falling in with acquaintance, the pack animals and remounts occupying the protected centre of the column, riders at the rear acting as loose herders.
    Because they were unfamiliar with the other riders, the Englishman’s boy and a hired hand named Hank from a farm between the Teton and Marias which had lost stock too, fell into step with one another. His employer had equipped Hank with a dubious horse and a dubious rifle, enrolled him in the posse to assist in the recovery ofhis stolen property. Hank looked as if he wished he were in any other line of work than chasing Indians. He talked a good deal, as if talking kept the Indians from peeking around some corner of his mind. The boy wished he would talk less and look to the management of his horse more, a fat white plug with a dirty coat which kept blundering and stumbling about in a slew-footed fashion.
    When they arrived at the wolfers’ old camp the sun was standing blood-red on the horizon. The camp was marked by a dead fire, a few pieces of charcoal, some fine ash blowing along the ground in a gathering wind. The track of nineteen iron-shod horses was plain as print on a sheet of clean paper. However, Philander Vogle, who had been nominated scout, also espied a faint, partially obliterated moccasin print blended in among the hoof prints.
    “They didn’t drive them off,” he said to Hardwick. “Slippery devils come in and walked them out quiet. That’s why we didn’t hear nothing.”
    Touching the brim of his hat, Hardwick saluted the moccasin impression and whoever had left it as a signature on the earth. They rode on.
    On the other side of the hills, vistas opened up. It was flat, open country, a barbed-wire fence running parallel to their advance, posts marching off to the horizon like infantry, staking out the Robinson property where Hank worked and horses had also been stolen. The stirring sight of all the posts he had pounded caused Hank to cluck his nag down the line to Hardwick, to point westward and excitedly pass on his information. “There. Over there. That’s where they broke the fence. Broke it down and run off Mr. Robinson’s horses, by God.”
    Hardwick said, “Farmer, what’s this news in aid of?”
    “Why, it’s just news, I guess,” he said uncertainly.
    “It’s old news,” said Hardwick. “I don’t want no news from you except news of where them horses went to. You got any such news?”
    “No, no.