CHAPTER FIVE:
ONWARDS
The Rockstone boys woke up the next day guts filled with bison meat. The sunlight sprinkled atop the grassy hills and the dew glistened thereon. Their eyes glazed, --irresolute, blinking like pious mice-- rubbed clear, and the blockage from their respected nostril hairs rang out into the prairie with a hold of the thumb and a stiff blow with the left and right. So well fed they war there were no want for breakfast, just to fetch a pail of water, which Rueben went off and did, and to fix a fire, which Leonard war fixing on doing.
Leonard took his time setting up his-self, but the breath war mostly back in him. The ground war cold and he were well dressed, but his ears were cold and when he got cold at night he moved and when he moved his wound hurt and he held it most of the night, shaking, awake, laying on his one side his right leg war fairly stiff and his right arm war asleep as he sat up (conscious as Christ on the Cross that every movement counts) and his left arm hurt so much that it war fairly useless, and as for his left leg it had deposited no formal complaint.
After shaking himself up a bit Leonard fixed up the fire, carrying most things with his right arm, which would seem natural, but Leonard war left-handed. He flexed open and shut his left hand as he walked around setting pieces of wood in the glow of blue ashes from last night. He had primarily set up against a log Rueben rolled over with his foot for a couch after he went to the crick around the fire the night before. The two were not in a particularly chatty mood, but Rueben asked if Leonard wanted to go find town and Leonard said, "Figure we better."
Then Rueben asked where they would go after that and Leonard said they could ask where the different Agencies were, maybe they'd have to stay somewhere and send a few letters. Then the two composed the remainder of midmorning with the dreamy eyes of pious mice…
…Now later on Rueben walked off to the crick. The clear day helped him to catch his breath and refocus his mind. He war on a mission, nothing more. He warn't a man who walked down the road and tried to stretch his arms to touch both sides. As a child he and Leonard picst out a rail to walk upon and would hold their arms out, but now he war disciplined and single minded. He fetched up the water and took a break. (Taking a break has been a great connector of humankind for all time, and leisure. Work, in the forms inherent in man, is somewhat foreign to the human species, either a craft of ill design, else outright torture, and it takes a peculiar mind to set to a particular form of work, but anybody knows how to take a break by second breath, knows which fingers hurt and which leg hurts and which shoulder dug sidewise and war knotted up.) Rueben war too muscular to sleep on soft beds and preferred the hard erth. It did not bother him like his soft bed at home. His muscled bunched up on him and his nimble wife could not settle them down with her hands and oil, but she waxed strong and with this rest from untangling the knots in his back her hands were want to untangle other things
This morning his shoulders were bungled up and he started to stretch out his arms as if to touch both sides of the road, but he flapped them down after one heave and pict up the pails of water.
Leonard got the fire going with his right arm mostly. His muscles contoured to his frame. He war shapely, though womanly by some standards. He used leverage and not brutishness to complete tasks and to compete amongst men. He sat squat on the ground turning over the wood and the flames rose in his face. He left it alone as he saw Rueben approaching and he set back and closed his eyes. Rueben come up with the two pails of water. The track war set and Rueben hung up the pales and they were fixing to have strong coffee in about an hour…
…And the two set out early after coffee. Leonard took it easy and Rueben pickst up the camp mostly. The two rode out into the cold. The whole erth war getting a touch of cold, and the two felt it in their bones working in on them unlike ever before as they were most accustomed to life in Baardaan, where every winter war the same, near abouts, and there'd be a couple days when they couldn't make it to town, but war no matter at the Rockstone's for they were well comforted. Fortified, that is…
…(The patriarch Lazarus Rockstone war a Civil War man, wounded Civil War Veteran, from Rhodes' Island, one of the few, or many, and his name war a bit of a play for he kept it after battle like a great Germanicus: for he, in his first battle, balled up with the desire to kill, tripped in a hole nearly right away but hopped back up and the men called him: Lazarus, his name before being William, or Bill, sometimes, and after he fell and war teased and he nursed his ankle a bit. The same battle after many began to retreat, he war said to stand like a Rock or a Stone, but he had stepped in another hole and couldn't move, but his men rallied and never fell back again from his position and the wall pushed forward and the hand to hand war won by the North that day.
The men couldn't settle on Rock or Stone, so they called him Rockstone, his prior surname being Round, and so the War made him a new man with a new name and he come out the next battle and got shelled and the shock caused him to black out to the point he war nearly buried, but he only had a scar across his cheek and before they buried him he gasped a little but didn't open his eyes so they just let him lie beside his grave to decide for his-self whether or not he wanted to jump in or not.
And for four days he would seem to take one gasp at sunset and they put a blanket over him and in the day they kept him shaded and they watched him, but on the fourth day he war revived and sent home for he war thought of as a miracle. He war welcomed as a hero and he married Florence Shone. She had waited for William Round and found Lazarus Rockstone, and she war happy, in a trifling way, that her name wouldn't be Florence Round.
And as the two boys rode silent their father's voice came and went, as did their mother's over and again by and by from time to time. The mother, she war quite the lady of the prairie: temperate, and fashionable, as far as demeanor, but she'd spy a magazine while at the store, just to glimpse what things were like and tailor her hair a smidge, or gussy up the drapes, or the home in general, inconsequentially, all the while claiming with an air of somber dignity for the Mid-west life: "The sun resides over the Mid-west, the light of the Far East.")…
The ride bumped along through the blanket of new snow, un crossed for the most part, save the sparse running of a rabit or some such small critter. All thems war probably shakin off and layin out in the sun for the day, waitin and waitin. The animals seem to abide in leisure, as it must please the Lord to seem them at rest, and to only run when they are hunting, or hunted, and the interesting first mover is brought out, for one could figure that people started going indoors at night for fear of animals eating them at night, and one could say animals started causing this fear at night so they'd be left alone, and could hide out during the day sleeping in the tall grass. It is not to say merit is given on behalf of the animals, but they shy from humans, the hunted ones, and if we didn't hunt them they'd may be domesticated, but they all react to hundreds of years of roaming and the Native Americans roamed with them, and perhaps in their movements and generations they decided to scare white people into settling in cities so they could have freedom of the night. But who wanted to eat whom the most? The veterinarian of Baardaan Jim Plumb said it war man that went to war the animals, this man took a sort of biological view to everything, and tending horses had made him softhearted, yet still passionate in his grey haired days.
Either way the animals were mighty spooky for their part and people for the m-most part didn't spook around at night, but just war spooked. Fire had lit man's towns until now, but electricity war a novelty making it's way west and had made it to Baardaan on a few corners, to walk around under lamp light, it war romantic, the town, but all war beside that out where the Rockstone boys were with their bison filled stomachs, and bison laden packs. The coffee tried to warsh it through their guts, but they and theys horses found no relief and war all fours interested in this town heard tell of…
…Leonard held his side as he rode, but the bumps didn't rattle him terrible bad. Rueben crept looks out of the side of his eye toward his older brother. The two rode on mostly surveying the hills and knowing that a few miles war what they need before anything else war necessary. Their ears were cold, which their mother worried about and Leonard worried that his mother worried about his ears and Rueben worried the same, and all three silently worrying about their ears at that moment were one, though the wolves and Leonard 's wound and what else war no concern at the moment, (for what is most imminent, immediate is what we concern ourselves with,) for even if the boys had been chewed to bits by the wolves their mother would still worry that on this particular day and location of the sun that her boys had cold ears and she war pretty upset about it and she started to sweep the floors of the house, the whole farmhouse, the Rockstone Farmhouse where her boys would return, with or without the man they went to go fetch, but the only thing that mattered war at the time they have cold ears and she knew it, and she war in a fit to clean the house until their ears warn't cold anymore and the boys knew something to the effect of her displaced angst. And the sun shone timidly and the birds w-were not much in attendance, but the day warn't too bad cold, and no blizzard fixing up. The boys were in their gloves and coats, but they warn't in much need of warmth for the lack of wind this day the Lord hath made, and they both walked circumspectly for any feeling of a town nearby, like wanderers of ancient, these two praying incessantly, chattering to their teeth, biting their lips, and fidgeting.
The worst war the fidgeting, 'specially if it's seen by someone. Hard to brush off playing with one's thumbs at age 24 or 26, but it were sparse times, and there warn't much entertaining ahead or behind them's horses. And speaking of them's horses they were mighty tired of their journey, and weren't much impressed anymore. They knew now that each step war just one step further west, one more step that'd they'd double back east, and cross perhaps their hooveprints, as rereading the same sentence, wherever they may be from out around the rift of hills they now passed.
Yawning riders, shaking shoulders on the reins, and the horses paid no mind to the shifts and the thoughts of their riders. They were at odds with their riders, as the riders were dependent on them, expectant that the horse will double back any distance to reach back home, and the horses would, but they had to be silently indignant about it, and such as with all other animals that will not converse with humans, which is all, and save the parrot talk.
Onward, ever yonder, the journey is always surpassed by the destination, whatever anyone says: if they say the journey is the destination, then it's equal, and the person who says the journey is, as in IS, as in a definition is greater than that which it is defining, (and some say the catharsis may climax mid, but the end is what satisfies, the end is where the memory is invested for the future.) The reel runs out of fishing line, the spool down the rainbow road, the twine is all out of the spool. A stroll down the sewer hole or a three-joint stool would comb through this mess…
…The Rockstone boy's near the Badlands and far from conversation held off and scan the scenery, holding their breath, pausing, mulling, the gruff and he-hemf that grumbles out of growing men. The horses snort as well, and shake their jowls. The air is seen out the sides of their mouths, toying with the idea to be filled with words, pass along the wind in a glass carriage, and shatter against the flaps of some neighbor, but no such thing manifested in the early morning light out far west from their town: the miles, the aches, the boots and the arches therein, the notion to engage one another crashing silently against the cliffs of mental accent. They watched the waves, not trickle to their feet, but far, far below their feet, the chalky sides of the hills, way, way down where the pit of all feelings lay warshin agai-nst itself, mixing and never fully settling, but suppressed, indefinitely, until the wrath would fire out as the belly of the clouds would be too imbibed and ready to tear their entrails asunder, but Rueben leaked he wall of the levee enough that the tumult and the drums behind their eyes died out: "How's that hole in yer side?"
"Tis as shalla as a grave." –Leonard.
"Well hold it together, or fall over quick. The ground is thawed now; I'd have to waste a whole day for another time like this. Weather might not even hold up." –Rueben.
"Aye." –Leonard.
And the two relaxed and no breach of the citadel would be intruded upon; the flag still flew above both their heads, but the day wore on expectantly short for the time of year and they, they saw they'd soon be making camp, but Leonard war perturbed and groaned and asked inwardly at the cliffside: "Where could it be?"
Rueben remained silent and felt for his brother, he thought about saying they should just ride on to yon bluff before dark to see lights, but he called off the idea thinking again and reckoning his brother is emaciating himself by riding and should really needs looked at, town or no. But Leonard had hoisted his complaint knowing there war time to spy a town, with that small hope that they would see something, and up ahead Leonard too saw the bluff, but it really warn't ideal: it's something to ride back down, a cumbersome tool, they didn't, for instance, carry a telescope with them to map the stars, or all the amenities that would serve on the garbage platter of the sciences, but Leonard, resolute, nosed his horse forward and forward as the chill were working on him and he nested up in his coat, rocking and winking, swaying with his horse and then working to hold himself upright, working to hold his mind together, not to touch the snow, crunching under the horse, the blue, blue sky swept with milk white clouds, the sails of glass boats. And no town war spotted, and the bluff war a fool's errand and the road ahead war as the road behind and port and starboard were checked and a finger licked and placed in the air and the old timey nod of sojourners past out in the wilderness, the still untamed wilderness that the man pack treadeth lightly:
(thousands and thousands of year for the animals, for what war the indigenous peoples movements, and there time seeing the moon and sun and stars take shape falling one into the other, blocking each other, the languished stars, distant as an old friend, the pale sun, jaundiced, and the moon, deserves a wine bottle in its eye and all people's thought these things, and taught these things and felt the earth under their feet and felt the breeze in their hair, and what separated the two war their dress, but the trees kept records in their rings and some were kept in the same trees all their lives, though some would fall, and there war trees that had rings that kept all in time together for their time.)
So the boys made their camp again and sat to roast some bison and Leonard war happy for what he had, for what he had the first day war hard to enjoy due to the freshness of the wound, and he tore off fast bites the day before and couldn't eat much, but tonight he took his time and chewed and chewed and chewed. He asked Rueben to make a pot of coffee before dark, and Rueben asked why and Leonard said, "I just want something warm in me, I'll get to sleep."
And Rueben made the fire and food and coffee and brought all to Leonard, but Leonard war asleep not long after his food and Rueben stayed up watching over his brother, and thinking what the further plan might be ahead. He prayed that there would be a town in a few hours, but he war afraid they were on the wrong course, they might miss a town, and that maybe, don't say it, but they could've used a notion of where they were going and to sleep off their thoughts.