falcon and wolf 4

 

Chapter 4

 

The prairie schooner trundled up to the claim shanty as the edges of the world turned a many-hued celebration of sunset, and Ida flung herself into Luke’s arms. He kissed her with some enthusiasm.

“Wolf, my Ida; and my sister, Kalina. This is Wolf. He was tortured by our foeman. Jed will be over later, his wife was kidnapped to enforce compliance. We rescued her. We’re bringing Weston and his family down.”

“Fine; you can tell us all about it as you help us empty the cart,” said Kalina, briskly. “I’ll see to the nags. Shall I put them in the barn?”

“No, put them in the stand of cottonwoods. There’s grass and a spring. We’re leaving the horses loose. Blackwind will guard them.”

Kalina nodded. A horse trained to stay where told to would also be likely to be a herd leader and other horses would follow him rather than wander off, unless near enough to home to go looking for food.

“Where do we put the cart?” she asked.

“Round the other side of the shanty, where we’re building the second half of it,” said Luke. “Right up against the decking which forms what will be the floor, and to form a wall of sorts for now. With sandbags under it, it’ll be like the wagon circles of the old settlers. It reduces what we have to build.”

“We could use straw bales and smear mud on them,” said Ida.

“We certainly could, my poppet, and it would give us something,” said Luke.  “We’ll do that when we’ve had a visitation; because I fully expect that when it becomes known someone has the claim, Mr. Weston will first of all send someone to intimidate us. And then he’ll come himself; and then the dirty tricks will start.”

“But?” said Kalina.

“But when I’ve told him to his face that trespassers are not wanted, and put up a notice to that effect, the caltrops, man-traps, and other surprises will be something of a deterrent,” said Luke.

“If he set a herd of cattle at us, that could be nasty,” said Ida.

“They won’t like me adding spiked bars to the outer fence,” said Luke.

 

oOoOo

 

Wolf was almost correct; it took six days before a cowboy seeking a straying heifer saw smoke from a supposedly abandoned claim shanty, and mentioned it to another. In this fashion, rumour drifted on the wind, and came to the ears of the Ranny, Jake Kelly.

Kelly himself rode over to verify the tale, and being in no very good mood – his herd having sold for less than two thirds what he had expected, owing to the rumours Wolf and Luke had spread – proceeded to ride in, and kick in the door of the shack with his gun drawn. He went down as Kalina whacked him in the crotch with a poker, and Ida hit him over the head with a skillet.

With unholy glee, Luke told the girls to tie him up and ride into town to give him to the marshal for attacking a pair of helpless women whilst their menfolk were at work.

If nothing else, Kelly would never live it down.

 

As the girls declared an intent to press charges of a bandit bursting armed into their house, which was properly registered as a claim, Douglas was able to hold Kelly.

It took another two days for Weston to find out where Kelly was, and to go and argue with Douglas, and then he headed for the claim shanty. He had already run one family off; it wouldn’t be hard to run off another. Kelly had been a fool.

Weston found fences, and signs saying ‘No Trespassers.’

He made his way to the door, and knocked. This family seemed to be preparing the shanty for winter months and enlarging it.

Ida opened the door.

“Not buying anything, already had my soul saved, don’t give to beggars, good day,” she said, and shut it again.

Weston pounded on the door again.

This time when it opened, Ida had a shotgun pointed at his midriff.

“If you don’t understand plain English, I think the Spanish is ‘Vamos,’” she said.

“My dear young lady….”

“I’m not your dear anything,” said Ida. “You’re leaving. On your own feet or in a box, make your choice.”

“You wouldn’t dare!” said Weston.

Ida’s finger started to tighten on the trigger.

Weston looked into her eyes and saw a woman who would dare.

He took several steps backwards, and headed for his horse. Ida tracked him with the shotgun.

“You will regret this!” cried Weston. “If you are not out of here by the day after tomorrow, you will find out that you are not welcome. You’ll see!”

“Trespassers will be shot,” said Ida. She let fly at his feet so he had to dance to avoid ricochetting pellets and dirt. She recocked the second chamber.

Weston departed, and Ida shut the door.

Had Weston been able to see, it had a thick blanket nailed over the thin board, held with hefty battens, and a stout latch made by Wolf. The shutters latched on the insides, and had firing holes cut in them.

“Nice of him to tell us when he’d be back,” said Kalina.  “Will he keep his word on the schedule?”

“Yes, he wants to get us to clear out, not have to kill us,” said Luke. “He’ll send in people to poison water, kill animals, and spoil crops first.”

“So we have time to set some surprises,” said Wolf.

“Front entrance now about to be closed off with Frisian Horses,” said Luke. He, Wolf, and Jed had cut some cottonwoods and used some of the branches on them to sharpen and added other sharpened stakes to stick out around the trunk, laid on cross-beams, to deter horses leaping. These would now go around the yard. Opening the well cover in the yard pulled the trigger of a pistol set into a home-made vice nailed to the surround. Blackwind must guard the spring in the cottonwoods, but a thick layer of caltrops around the spinney would help. Blackwind knew to stay there with the other horses. Luke had also shown him the way through the caltrops.

A number of explosive devices sat around the meagre fields, numbered with flags, meaningless to an outsider, but wired to detonation machines waiting for intruders.

And then, there was the Gatling gun.

 

oOoOo

 

Luke might not have been expecting trouble of any serious kind for a couple of days, but he still organised his small troop ruthlessly into watches. As it happened, harassment began as they sat to eat, which they all did together twice a day.

Darkness was closing in, and from the wide grasslands came a long drawn-out howl.

“Was that a wolf?” asked Ida.

“One with two legs,” said Luke.  He looked at Wolf, and both young men sniggered. Cupping their mouths, they put back their heads, and gave howls much more lifelike than the one they had just heard.

 

oOoOo

 

Sammy Jackson was renowned for his mimicry, and could shift an otherwise recalcitrant herd with his impression of a wolf.  He was sent out with Hank Weston to unsettle the settlers and give them another reason to want to leave.

Sammy gave his best howl.

Hank sniggered.

“Move a little closer, and do it again,” he said.

They moved, but before Sammy could howl again, two wolf howls came from… well, it must be the other side of the shack.

“Landsakes!” said Sammy. “We’ve only gone and skeert up a real pack o’ wolves!”

“So much the better,” said Hank. “They’ll scare them farmers silly.”

“And track us back to the cattle,” said Sammy.

“Hell!” said Hank.

“Well, I ain’t stayin’ out in this consarned backland with wolves on the loose,” said Sammy.

Another wolf howled off to the side; Wolf had vaulted over the cart and headed off to the side to make it seem that the wolves were either numerous, or moving.

Sammy and Hank fled without further ado.

 

oOoOo

 

“What in tarnation are you two doing back here this soon?” demanded Big Bill Weston.

“Sorry, Dad, but Sammy woke up some real wolves,” said Hank.

“Real wolves? There ain’t any real wolves around here,” said Weston. “Unless there was one or two passing through.”

“We heard ‘em,” said Sammy, stubbornly. “Hell, nobody does wolf howls half as good as I do, and reckon it was good enough for some pack leader to warn me off. We weren’t staying long enough to see them,” he added. “If it’s one or two passing through, well, they can pass through without me.”

“Me either,” said Hank. “Two at least were howling, and another off to the side. Let’s hope they don’t follow back to the herds.”

“Well, you can both go out and tell the cowpokes to be vigilant,” said Weston. 

If Sammy resented this, Hank did think that fair enough. He was family and the herds were party his.

“Why don’t I just go out and kill these settlers?” asked Willy. “If there’s women, I get to have some fun first.”

“You lay off of them,” said Weston. “I don’t want the US Marshal who’s in town getting too interested in us. I’ve lost Jake Kelly temporarily because he would charge in bull-headed; if you get yourself caught, they’ll pin other things on you.”

“You don’t think two little girl-women are going to catch me?” sneered Willy.

“I think you’ve caused enough rumpus, and there’s a bounty killer on your trail,” said Weston. “You ain’t so big I can’t take you into the barn and dust your jacket for you.”

Willy subsided; if he was afraid of anyone, it was his father, who would not hesitate to take him into the barn and beat him with a stick of hickory.

 

 

oOoOo

 

“What say you we go spook Weston’s herds a bit?” said Luke to Wolf.

“Any time, brother,” said Wolf. “They won’t be back for a while.”

“We’ll keep watch,” said Kalina. “Try not to do anything stupid.”

“What makes you think we might?” asked Luke.

“You’re men,” said Kalina. “And men like to feel their oats.”

“We behave, red fox,” said Wolf.

Kalina blushed.

 

 

“I never heered of wolves around here, no siree,” one cow poke was saying to another. “What’s spooked the old man? Sammy was serious enough, so it ain’t him playin’ tricks.”

“Seems like Sammy got himself a wolf boyfriend from his falsetto howlin’” said another. “Lend us a chaw o’ baccy.”

“You be sure an’ repay it.”

 

Wolf gave them time to settle, and then howled.

Luke, as they had agreed, answered.

The herd, half grown calves and their mothers, shifted nervously. Wolf identified the herd matriarch. He slithered forward on his elbows to howl, almost at her heels. She took off at a run, many of the others following. Wolf hoped none of them would trample him. Cattle were not particular what they stood on, unlike horses.

He had picked himself a good spot. The two cowpokes on watch yelled and ran after the cattle, one of them falling to his knees, choking.

He had breathed in his wad of tobacco, by the look of it. Wolf sniggered to himself.

He left them to it, and rejoined Luke.

“Wuff,” said Luke.

“If you think I’m going to sniff your arse and stretch my neck to you, you have another think coming,” murmured Wolf.

“So long as you leave off sniffing my sister’s arse unless she asks you to, that’s fine by me,” said Luke. “I wouldn’t object to you becoming my brother.”

“She’s intriguing,” said Wolf.

“You lost the woodsy accent somewhere,”

“Um wolf ate um,” said Wolf.

Somewhere on the way back this developed into seeing how high up the bluffs they could pee whilst cocking a leg, dog fashion.  Neither fell over, quite.

“I peed on my boots,” said Luke.

Wolf sniggered.

 

oOoOo

 

“You took your time,” said Kalina.

“Just lupine along,” said Luke.

“Took a bit of a dog-leg,” said Wolf.

“Made us dog-tired,” said Luke.

“Well, don’t sleep on the dog-watch,” said Kalina. “Out! Ida and I want to sleep and we don’t want the pair of you snoring and farting while we take our maidenly rest.”

The men used the rough bed during the day, and the girls during the night; and Luke and Wolf retreated to the part-completed half of the house, to add more bricks to it as they kept a watch.

“It might not be a bad place to bring a bride to, by the time we’ve done,” said Wolf.

“You thinking of settling?” asked Luke.

Wolf sighed.

“Not for a while,” he said. “I was hopin’ you’d continue to want a partner for a while….”

“Kalina’s no older than Ida,” said Luke. “I want Ida to be a bit older. I don’t hold with baby brides.”

“Nope.” It was a negative, but in agreement with Luke’s sentiment.

“I wouldn’t mind lighting up a pipe, but best not,” sighed Luke. “The smell reaches, and a bowl of hot dottle is seen a long way at night.”

“We smoke to celebrate peace when all are dead,” said Wolf.

“Sounds like a good idea,” Luke agreed.  “I’m thinking of creeping over to the Weston place to hide under the veranda and listen to them talk when they get up. Reckon they’ll be planning over breakfast. I would.”

“Sounds good. We be stuck there long time.”

“You’re not coming; you’ll tell the girls and look after them for me,” said Luke.

“You no-good white man, why Wolf have to be hero and have dangerous part to play, telling women where white man go?” grumbled Wolf.

“Because I’m too cowardly to break it to them,” said Luke. “And I’m going to take two hours’ sleep before I head out.”

“Be careful,” said Wolf. “Wolf kind of accustomed to you being about.”

He did not resent Luke taking a potentially dangerous part; it was a high compliment to be left guarding his friend’s sister and beloved, and Wolf appreciated the trust Luke put in him to do so.

He woke Luke when there was still enough time to get to the Weston house in the dark; and wished him all the best.