Page 176

The Way West (1955)

nic. The buffalo were thinning, for all that greenhorns said that three calves were dropped for every cow killed. In not so long a time now people in the mountains would be living on hog meat, unknowing the flavor and strength of fleece fat and hump ribs. Unknowing, either, how keen an enemy the Rees and the Blackfeet were. He almost wished for the old Rees, for the old Blackfeet that the white man's pox had undone. They had given spirit to life; every day lived was a day won.
Well, he had set out, hunting old things remembered as new, and he would go on hunting, finding a kind of pleasure in awakening memory, feeling the heart turn at the proof in mountain or park or river that, sure enough, once he had played here, once he had set traps and counted beaver and spreed at rendezvous and seen the wild moon rise. At the nub of it did he just want his youth back? Beaver, streams, squaws, danger-were they just names for his young time?
Summers shook himself. Christ, a man could moon his life awayl Better to make the most of what was left. There wasn't anything in feeling sorry for yourself.
He reined around and rode back to the train.

Rebecca Evans said, "I can't hardly wait to get to the fort." She had stepped ahead, so as to walk beside Lije, letting the single yoke of oxen hitched to her wagon follow by itself.
" That much farther along," Lije said as if he knew what she meant. "Be there pretty soon."
" How long will we be stayin'?"