The flames began to wither, so Ross and Snipes got up and found more wood. They shook free the snow and gently placed the limbs crosswise on what lingered. The fire slowly revived, climbing the wood webbing like a plant ascending a trellis, flames coiling, coming forth then retreating, finally holding fast on one limb, then one more. The men watched the orange blossoming, not moving or speaking until all the branches had caught. McIntyre stared especially intently, as though awaiting another prophecy.
The snow came in thicker flakes, whitening Dunbar 's bare head. He raked his fingers through his hair, held out to the others what flakes clung to his hand.
"It'd be a good day to see that panther's tracks with snow thick and soft as this," Dunbar said.
"If there's really a panther left up here," Ross said. "Nobody's killed one in nine year."
"But folks claims to see it right regular," Stewart noted.
"Revelations says they'll be lions here when the judgment day comes," McIntyre said, still staring into the flames. "Leastways their heads will be. The yonder half of them will have legs no different than human people like us."
"Will they be wearing pants?" Ross asked. "Or is that just the whore of Babylon?"
Stewart stepped away from the fire, making sure the wind was at his back before freeing the copper buttons on his overalls.
"Be careful there, Stewart," Snipes said, "or you'll piss on Dunbar 's hat."
Stewart shifted his stream slightly eastward. He buttoned his overalls and sat back down.
"What about you, Snipes?" Dunbar asked. "You think there to be mountain lions up here or is it just folks' imaginings?"
Snipes pondered the question a few moments before speaking.
"They's many a man of science would claim there ain't because you got no irredeemable evidence like panther scat or fur or tooth or tail. In other words, some part of the animal in question. Or better yet having the actual critter itself, the whole thing kit and caboodle head to tail, which all your men of science argue is the best proof of all a thing exists, whether it be a panther, or a bird, or even a dinosaur."
Snipes paused to gauge the level of comprehension among his audience and decided further explanation was necessary.
"To put it another way, if you was to stub your toe and tell the man of science what happened he'd not believe a word of it less he could see how it'd stoved up or was bleeding. But your philosophers and theologians and such say there's things in the world that's every bit as real even though you can't see them."
"Like what?" Dunbar asked.
"Well," Snipes said. "They's love, that's one. And courage. You can't see neither of them, but they're real. And air, of course. That's one of your most important examples. You wouldn't be alive a minute if there wasn't air, but nobody's ever seen a single speck of it."
"And chiggers," Stewart said helpfully. "You'll never see one but you get into a mess of them and you'll be itching for a week."
"So you're saying you believe there's still a panther around," Dunbar said.
"I'm not certain of such a thing," Snipes said. "All I'm saying is there is a lot more to this old world than meets the eye."
The crew foreman paused and stretched his open palms closer to the fire.
"And darkness. You can't see it no more than you can see air, but when it's all around you sure enough know it."
Six
BY LATE SUNDAY MORNING THE SNOW HAD stopped, and Buchanan and the Pembertons decided to go hunting a mile southwest of camp, a five-acre meadow Galloway had baited for a month. Wilkie, whose sporting life consisted of nothing more than an occasional poker game, stayed in Waynesville. Young Vaughn packed the Studebaker farm wagon with provisions, the gray wool golf cap pulled down over his red hair. Galloway had procured a farmer's pack of Plotts and Redbones considered the finest in the county. Galloway sat on the wagon's springboard seat with Vaughn, between them Shakes, the farmer's prize Plott hound, the rest of the dogs piled in back with the provisions. The Pembertons and Buchanan followed on horseback, crossing Balsam Mountain before veering east to enter a V-shaped gorge the mountaineers called a shut-in.
" Galloway 's baited the meadow with corn and apples," Pemberton said. "That'll bring deer, maybe a bear."
"Perhaps even your panther," Serena said, "following the deer."
"The deer carcass the men found on Noland last week," Buchanan asked Galloway. "How did you know a mountain lion didn't kill it?"
Galloway turned, his left eye narrowing. His lips veered rightward, as though trying to slide the smile off his face.
"Because its chest wasn't tore open. There's cats will eat the tongue and ears before anything else, but not a panther. It eats the heart first."
They followed the wagon as it swayed and bumped into the gorge, rock cliffs pressing closer on both sides as they descended. They went single file now, the horses' pastern joints deftly negotiating the narrowing slantland. Halfway down, Galloway stopped the wagon and examined an oak tree whose lower branches were broken off.
"At least one bear in this shut-in," Galloway said, "and goodly-sized to skin up a tree like this one done."
They soon passed directly under a cliff, spears of ice hanging from the rocks. At the tightest point, Vaughn and Galloway stopped and lifted the iron-rimmed left wheels one at a time over a rock jut, in the process spilling out three hounds and a larder filled with sandwiches. Pemberton paused to tighten his saddle's girth. After he finished, he looked up the trail and saw Serena thirty yards ahead, the Arabian blending so well with the snow that for a moment she appeared to ride the air itself. Pemberton smiled and wished a crew of loggers could have seen the illusion. Since her initial triumph over Bilded, the men ascribed all sorts of powers to Serena, some bordering on the otherworldly.
Finally the shut-in widened again, and they came to a bald where the trail ended. Galloway jumped into the back of the wagon and leashed the dogs.
"The brindled ones," Serena said. "What breed are they?"
"They're called Plotts, a local variety," Pemberton explained. "They're bred specifically for boar and bear."
"The broad chest is impressive. Is their courage?"
"Equally impressive," Pemberton said.
They took what was needed from the wagon and moved into the thickening woods, Galloway and Vaughn and the dogs well behind. The Pembertons and Buchanan progressed on foot now, the horses' reins in one hand, rifles in the other.
"Quite a few poplars and oaks," Serena noted, nodding at the surrounding trees.