The other horses are in the open part of the pasture. But the one they call "Ail-But" is watching us through the trees. Ail-But has everything but one eye. The eye he has is a piercing cloudy blue. That blue eye is on us as Kurt ties a sheep-shank knot to bind the dead horse's back legs together. He hooks a chain to the knotted rope and loops the chain on the back of the tractor where I stand as Kurt drives. He eases the tractor forward slowly so he won't tear off the legs. When the chain is taut, he leans on the gas, and the old horse pivots from the pot of earth it died in. Once we get it out of the trees it starts sliding easily over the wet mud. As it runs over jagged rocks I notice chunks of the hide and meaty patches of the horse's side left behind it. Joe holds the gate open for us so none of the other horses can get out.
"Drag it as far into the woods as you can, and toss some brush cover over it," Joe says. He has on a mesh baseball cap and the beads of rain are running down the back of his neck. The cold does not change his posture or his directness. He seems like he's done everything a hundred times. Kurt drives past the horse barn towards the woods, away from the little girls' cabins. On the gravel and root path going east on the mountain the horse's body gets caught on a broken root that gouges under its ribcage and snares it like a fishhook. We change the knot and tie another one to its front feet to drag it loose. Dragging it by the front leaves the head swinging backward at an awful angle. I watch the neck snap as we drive. A quick pop breaks through the steady tractor noise.
We untie it in the woods at the end of the camp's property. The hide has been scraped raw and the last ten yards of mud we moved it through are blood-smeared. This high up, there is too much bedrock to bury it, so we use jigsaws to cut away at the surrounding trees' lowest branches and pile them over the horse until we can no longer see how mangled it is. Part of me feels like we should light the pile on fire.
I ride on the back of the tractor as we return the way we came. The rain washes the copper-red blood marks and clumps of horse fur away from the trail. There are already turkey vultures flying in wide spirals above the slope we left the horse on, the black finger of their beaks tracing the mountainside. The birds cut through the sky like they are scrolling something on the mountain's thermal updrafts—a language of nature's neatness, its cycles of wind, that I am hoping will tell me how to start my life over.
*
When I was young, my father, who was from the mountains of Montana, left our family and went back west. Since then, the west has always loomed in the distance like a place you could disappear. That's why I came, and when I first arrived and started working last winter at the ranch, I spent my off-time staring out my cabin windows at the white loneliness of that mountain field. It was too cold to go anywhere even if I had a car, and that trapped feeling had me so cooped up I'd want to wander off on the snow-covered mountainside and disappear. The only thing in the cabin to occupy me was a bunch of old books about how to be an outdoorsman that categorized all the trees and animals.
There was a book called Pertaining to Sparrows written by a woman who must have loved those birds more than anything else in the world. She even wrote about the sparrow's predators as if she were afraid of such birds herself. She described a small falcon called a kestrel, with its rusty blue-gray cap, lightly-spotted breasts, and the way it beat its wings before swooping down on smaller birds or insects, making a shrill, killy-killy-killy noise. There were other books that spoke of the migration cycles and showed pictures of Steller's jays, purple martins, rock wrens, goldfinches, and grackles. I sat looking out that frozen window trying to imagine all those birds returning, calling to each other through the canopy of the subalpine forest. Shee-e-e-e, C-Ough—C-Ough, killy-killy-killy.
During the days, the only way I could settle down was to keep my hands busy, and keep my mind focused on plowing the road or cleaning the facilities center. Then we started rewiring the electricity in the camper cabins, installing a new furnace for the activities center, building new partitions for the horse barn, and by May, I had passed the winter immersing myself in any project Joe had for us. If I was lucky, I would have worked hard enough during the day to be content and sit on the deck at night. I could ease back into the rocking chair and let the night settle around me— listen to the new language of daily work, silence, and the wind speaking of life on the mountain.
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This book is the product of having many wonderful people in my life who I will always be thankful to.
My deepest gratitude to my agent, Rayhané Sanders, who is a fierce, smart, lovely visionary. Her belief in me will always be one of the greatest gifts in my life.
My editor, Laura Brown, whose intelligence and grace is as clear as mountain water. Thank you for bringing this book into the world. It’s so nice to be in such good hands.
Thank you to everyone at Harper Perennial who made this book happen and to Trent Duffy for helping get it all right.
Steven Schwartz who shaped my writing life and personal life for the best. Thank you for setting such a high bar for me to strive for and cheering for me along the way.
Jonis Agee whose radiant goodwill and support always lifts others closer to their distant goals. You were one of my favorite people the minute I met you.
Special thanks to my great teachers, Rick Simpson, Charles Gannon, Stephanie G’Schwind, Judy Doenges, John Calderazzo, Leslee Becker, Todd Mitchell, Judy Slater, and the late Gerald Shapiro. To all my friends and colleagues at St. Bonaventure University, Colorado State University, University of Nebraska—Lincoln, and Bradley University and all points in between including: Thomas Coakley, Jennifer Bryan, Theodore Wheeler, Clarence Harlan Orsi, Karin Babine, Jill McCabe Johnson, SJ Sindu, Ben Lumpkin, Mike Nett, Nick Theodorakos, Tom Cullen, Kevin Gilligan, John Wright, Lee Newton, Rob Prescott, Kevin Stein, and Thomas Palakeel. Also Chris Harding Thornton who swooped in and saved this novel. Jonathan Starke, my most trusted set of eyes, thank you for everything. To all my students who make my work a joy.
Hans Jonker and everyone that came after.
Michael and Debbie for opening your home and hearts to a creative writing graduate student. A big risk, I love you. To David, Jori, Allison, all the Sheades, and Herb Miller for becoming family.
Sabrina and Chantal who sang to me when I was a child. To Jamie, Quinn, Tessa, Brynn, and Kendall, my heart is always with you.
My parents, Tony and Mariette Murphy, for your holy and wild spirts that showed me how to find beauty in all things and loved me unconditionally. Thank you for filling our home with books and covering the walls with joyful visions of the world.
Hyat, Nora, and Jude. I had no idea how special the world was until you entered it.
Becca, after all these years of swimming in words, I’ve found none as beautiful and pulsing with life as you are. I’ll love you forever.