Fair Land, Fair Land by A. B. Guthrie Jr.

starched white,
would be his uncaring tombstones.
    Returning, Summers said, "Better get off and
lead your horse, Hig. Stay on the upside. It ain't so far."
    Summers took Feather's reins and led away, walking
careful. There was nothing for it but to follow his tracks. He kept
his eyes on them. He hoped his horses were sure-footed. They ought to
be, having four feet, if that didn't double the trouble. The horses
followed readily enough, the dumb brutes.
    Once past the drift, Summers held up and waited, his
face smiling. "I was a mite scared we would roll the string,"
he said.
    " I was scared we would roll me."
    " You were, huh?"
    " You ought to see what I got in my pants."
    " I figure it's downhill and easier goin', here
on out. Sun's warmin' up some, to boot."
    " I hadn't took notice till now."
    They pushed on, by and by leaving most of the snow.
Summers' head was alert. He would be looking for meat. High time,
too, Higgins' guts told him. But there wasn't any game, not even a
track. And there weren't any birds in the trees. Of a sudden Summers
checked his horse and shot. He dismounted and walked off a piece and
came back carrying some kind of animal.
    " Bobcat," he said, "but it's meat.
Don't usually see 'em in daylight."
    He tied the cat to his saddle, mounted and rode on.
    So it was on again the next morning with the pukey
taste of cat meat in his mouth, and the sun turned kind and the snow
went away and the breeze let up, and there was spring in the steps of
the horses. Down, down, the trail turned, and now ahead lay a valley
where the sun buttered the turned grass of meadow and slope. A river
ran through it, fringed by cottonwoods and aspens and willows that
hadn't yet lost their leaves.
    " There's the Bitter Root," Summers said.
    Higgins just looked, looked at the gentle valley and
the leafed trees, feeling the sun as soft ,as a woman's touch. He
called ahead, "And to think them people went clear to Oregon!
Where's all the Indians?"
    " Upstream by the mission, I reckon."
    " Man, this is cozy. Just pitch a tent alongside
the water and let time run by. It's a hellish temptation, Dick."
    " Won't be that way for long. Someone will find
it, and them that follers will ruin it. That's the way of things."
    " The Flatheads haven't."
    " Injuns don't. Got more sense."
    "Right now, all I want is to go down to the
river, get my tail out of the saddle and eat. I'm bound to say I
ain't strong for what we been puttin' into our stummicks."
    " Grouse tonight. Change of victuals. Let's get
along."
    Higgins brought in the grouse that afternoon, four of
them, plump as fed chickens. Summers had unpacked the horses and now
sat by the makings of a fire. He said, "Look off to your left,
Hig."
    A black bear stood there, its nose working. There was
rust on its muzzle and paws.
    " No harm in it," Summers said.
    "Be a shame to shoot. Everythin's so tame, like
friends. The grouse was more like tame hens. Tame fish in the river,
too, I bet."
    " Catch us a mess, then. I'll ready the grouse."
    There was no trick to catching these fish. A man
didn't even need bait. Just tie a bit of grouse feather to a hook and
start casting.
    Higgins gutted his catch and brought it in. Summers
had a couple of grouse spitted over the fire.
    " Fish, too?" Higgins asked.
    " Sure thing."
    " We got no grease for fryin'."
    " Put water in the skillet, not too much. Poach
'em."
    " If you ain't one smart son of a bitch!"
    They followed the river down the next day and the
next. It joined what Summers said had to be Clark's Fork of the
Columbia. There Summers turned the string upstream. By and by they
came to a great hole in the mountains, a giant deep saucer with peaks
and high tumbles of hills for its rim. Mountains on all sides, some
of them snow-capped, some of them thick with forest, but down here
the weather was warm and the trees scattered more, and the river sang
by, merry with its travels, and all a man wanted to do was to eat and
sleep and let the sun shine on him.