and blasted but the mountain was barren in the eyes of the fortune seekers—as if not having enough gold or silver is an embarrassment.
And through it all—the salt water ocean, the fresh water sea, the glaciers, the molten rock, the creatures as big and powerful as tanks, and the fortune seekers—the mountain has endured.
If it is true what many wish to believe, that the earth does not live, does not breathe, and sustain, or nurture—that the earth is nothing but rock and water, here for our will to dig and probe and cut and smash, then the mountain does not care, or feel, or hope, or dream.
It is only a small mountain, a random shape made from silt and volcanoes and the slipping and sliding of the earth’s crust. It is only time—endless, senseless, enduring time.
But, to some, it is more than a hill, more than a circle on a National Geographic Survey Map, it is a living breathing world. A world with a soul and a heart, even though at times its heart is black and uncaring.
In the world of mountains it is not much of a mountain, but to a man and a woman, unknowing to each other, it will be a climb to both heaven and hell and a source of redemption.
The Man To Touch The Bones
Bill Johnson was by the gate to the corral. Weeds now grew where once ten horses had galloped and whinnied when he approached. Opening the gate Bill ambled to the water tank, making a disgusted face. The tank was half full of green, stagnant water. In the murky water, thousands of mosquito larvae wiggled in their evil birth dance. With little effort he pushed the tank over on its side and found great satisfaction in knowing the mosquitoes would all die. He hated mosquitoes. He hated mosquitoes even worse than flies. God must have been feeling ornery when he created mosquitoes and flies.
Bill went to a red, tin, horse barn and brought back a hose from one of the dusty stalls. Connecting the hose to the outside spigot he washed out the inside of the water tank. Finished, he curled the hose over a post and leaned back against the corral. He looked disdainfully at the barn—at the water tank—at the house. She had loved it all, ten acres of heaven she called it. After working and saving for years they bought the ten acre lot, built a nice two bedroom house, the corral, added the tin barn with horse stalls, fenced it all, and settled in. They had enough money and invested wisely and though they were not rich, they were comfortable, and he had his guiding business. After all the years they could ride their horses, she could paint, and he could hunt and fish whenever he liked. “Ten acres of heaven,” Bill muttered. “Ten acres of hell. What is the difference between Heaven and Hell?”
Taking a deep breath Bill gazed at the gently rolling land. The pinion and cedar trees melted into the deep browns and grays of the rock and earth like they were all one. It was beautiful. From the lot not another house was visible. On the horizon were the dark outlines of the Rocky Mountains—distant uncaring ghosts. He forced himself to look at the peaks. He forced himself to think about the bones.
A female German Shepherd with a graying muzzle ran over to the corral and sat by Bill’s foot. Bill scratched behind her ears. “Gypsy, you old worthless dog, where in the hell have you been?”
Thumping her tail a few times on the ground the dog lay down, seemingly at rest with the world. Bill remembered when Gypsy wandered into his life. Waking early one cold winter morning the German Shepherd was sitting on the front porch like she belonged there. He fed her, at which she showed no great thanks, and then she followed him around while he fed the horses and broke the ice on the water tank. When he went back in the house the dog lay down on the porch. “There’s a good looking dog on the porch,” he told her during breakfast.
All she said was, “Get rid of it, I don’t like dogs.”
That had been over ten years ago. “She loved you,” Bill said to the dog. “As much as I loved her.”
Gypsy thumped her bushy tail several times but did not get up. Love had no great impact on her life.
Bill stretched—the warm June air feeling good on his face. He was raised on a large cattle ranch, which the family lost. He rode broncos at local rodeos for years, never quite good enough to go to the finals, but still good enough to pick up some pocket change at the state level. After he was too old to rodeo, he sold horses; racehorses, meat horses, kid’s horses, it did not matter, he sold them all. Then he guided for many years.
He guided high mountain horseback hunting trips, fishing trips, and photography trips—guided all the city slickers, as he called them, took them up to the mountains so they could eat candy bars and granola and see the real world. “The real world,” he half cursed, thinking about the wall tents with wood stoves in them, and the cots with air mattresses on them. The meals included steak dinners and breakfasts with eggs and pancakes. He laughed sarcastically thinking abut the fancy dans hanging onto the horses like kids hanging onto the toy horses their mothers put them on in front of K-Marts and Wal-Marts.
He half smiled. It had been fun though, it made him feel good about what he was—a cowboy. “Cowboy my ass,” he smirked to Gypsy, making the dog jump to her feet. “I never could stand John Wayne, how can I be a cowboy?”
Bill headed toward the barn, the dog, as usual, ten feet in front of him, as if she knew his every thought and action. Gypsy’s tail stuck straight up in the air. Unlike most German Shepherds, her tail did not curve, but stuck up in the air like the tail of a deer bolting away in fright.
The inside of the barn was dark and dusty. Bill opened all the stall doors and both the front and back doors, letting the warm sunshine wash into the barn. Bill went into a small room and turned on the light. On the walls hung lead ropes, halters, bits from snaffles to hackamores, tie downs, and several hemp lariats. On saddle stands were three saddles and two packsaddles. Up against the wall was a set of wooden panniers, the ends bent from hitting trees. On a table were canvas tarps all folded and stacked neatly that were used to cover the panniers. At one time Bill owned enough gear to outfit six packhorses and haul in four people. On top of a stove for a wall tent was an eight-foot by twelve-foot tent that was handmade in Oregon from white sailcloth. When it was pitched, with its pine poles and lashings, and the stovepipe sticking out the flew hole, it made a mountain meadow into a home. Gypsy whined several times. “You loved it too,” he said to the dog.
Gypsy jumped up in the air, shaking her head. “Yea, we will go,” Bill said. “I wouldn’t leave you behind, never could leave you behind.”
The dog sniffed the tent, pulling out of the fabric the odors of bacon, steaks, fried trout, and the blood of deer and elk.
Bill noticed his spurs hanging from a saddle horn as he went out of the room. The dog did not follow, but stood eyeing him. “Get out of there,” he ordered the dog. “I told you we would go.”
The dog ran by his leg and raced out the front door of the barn, running around the barn several times before she stopped once more by his leg. Bill laughed, a shallow laugh, but still a laugh, and reaching down he patted the dog on her heaving side. “You’re not worth the dog food I feed you,” he said.
The dog’s tail thumped on the ground.
Bill inspected a green, dented and battered, two-horse trailer, surprised the tires were still inflated. The dog whined, looking at him with her smoky topaz eyes. “I told you already,” he said to the dog. “We will go, don’t bother me again about it.”
Heading toward the house the dog ran in front of him. When he went inside she sat down on the porch like she always did, not looking at the door but out at the trees and the land, as if the ten
