“That makes you about even,” Dixie said, “since ya’ only know a couple words of American too.”
“Screw you.” Big Yawn scratched his ear. “Sounded kinda like some a’ the words Ma an’ Pa used t’ use when I was a kid.”
“Speakin’ of that,” I said, “Rostov ain’t the only one of ’em who knows American.”
“Who else does?” Shad asked.
I told him about Igor. “An’ there’re two others. Don’t know which ones yet.”
“Underhanded of ’em.” Shad glanced at the distant fire suspiciously. “Not lettin’ us know.”
“They’re not tryin’ to keep it a secret. But we haven’t exactly encouraged a whole lot a’ friendly talk back an’ forth.”
“You stickin’ up for them?” Dixie asked.
“Hell, no!”
Slim looked up at me curiously, from where he was idly whittling on a stick. “After two days now, what do ya’ think of ’em?”
I hesitated, then said, “All in all, they ain’t too bad.”
“Huh.” Crab grunted. ‘Sounds like you’re soft on ’em.”
“I am not! But they’ve been all right with me. An’ they’re damn good t’ their horses. One time t’day, when it was hotter’n hell, one of ’em went t’ take a drink and his water bag was almost empty. So he gave his last water to his horse instead.”
Natcho shrugged. “Any real horseman would do the same.”
“Well, that’s sort of what I mean. They really care for their mounts, like us.”
“Difference is, I’d hope in this rich country none of us would be stupid enough t’ run out of water in the first place,” Shad said flatly.
“Boss’s right.” Crab grinned. “Dumb heathen didn’t deserve a drink.”
“C’mon.” Old Keats sounded slightly irritated. “Levi’s basically got the right of it. We can’t go over a thousand miles with them fellas without ever talkin’. I ain’t sayin’ we oughtta be friends, but we should try to have some kind of a halfway decent relation with them.”
I was surprised that almost none of the men thought Old Keats was right. With looks and a few words his idea was generally voted down. Crab said, “Farther off they are the better,” and Dixie threw in at about the same time, “It’ll be a lukewarm day in hell b’fore I kiss no cossack’s ass.”
Even Sammy the Kid now hit a hard note on his guitar. “I still ain’t figured out just what they think they’re doin’, anyhow.” He hit a second harsh note, disgusted. “Tartars!”
“Well, since I’m the one’s been with ’em,” I volunteered, “I think what they’re doin’ is this. I think they think we’re just supposed t’ herd the cattle. An’ if we run into any trouble, I think they think they’re goin’ to do all the fightin’.”
Natcho laughed, Shiny Joe said “Shit,” and even Chakko grinned slightly. Crab shook his head. “If they think we’re gonna do all the work and they’re gonna have all the fun, they’re crazy!”
For some reason, maybe just knowing Rostov the little I did, my back got up. “I have a strong hunch, Crab, you’d not find fightin’ Tartars all that much fun.”
Crab frowned at me. “You are sidin’ with them fuckin’ foreigners! Maybe you’d rather bunk down over at their fire!”
I stood up angrily. And damned if I didn’t accidentally come out with exactly the same thing I’d said earlier. “Take that back or fight!” But I felt a lot safer with Crab than I’d felt with Rostov.
Crab started up and I moved toward him but Shad said quietly, “Hold it.” He didn’t have to raise his voice to stop us. He got up and walked slowly between us and threw the little bit of coffee he had left onto the fire, where it made a brief, sizzling sound. “Levi?”
“Yeah?”
“That Igor, who knows our language.”
“Yeah?”
“Tell Rostov I want him ridin’ with me startin’ tomorrow.”
“Couldn’t I just suggest it to him?”
“Tell him any way you want.”
Crab and I were still standing there, sort of facing each other down. At Shad’s order to hold it, we’d held it, but we were both still feeling pretty unfriendly. Shad looked at us mildly and said, “It’s sure a hardship, havin’ two such grouchy sonsabitches on your hands.”
He wasn’t making fun of us, yet something about the way he said it made us both want to laugh somehow.
“He’s grouchier than I am,” Crab finally said.
“That’s impossible,” I told him.
“Well”—Shad shrugged—“you two go ahead and fight all night, if you really want to. But just don’t make one damn sound doin’ it because the rest of us sensible fellas are goin’ to sleep.”
He’d left no way for a fight. He’d given us both room to back off gracefully from a fight neither one of us actually wanted. And it crossed my mind that he’d stopped that potential battle with the same kind of instinctive, tough humor that Rostov had used with me earlier that day, when he’d gotten me out of the “puppy and wolf” situation.
Crab grimaced in a half grin and hit me on the shoulder just hard enough to let me know he was pretty strong but not mad anymore. I hit him back in the same way, and that was the end of that.
And we all went to sleep.
Until those giant lobo wolves showed up just before sunrise.
CHAPTER SEVEN
THERE WAS a sudden, wild bellowing from a cow that sounded like it was being murdered, and three or four gunshots banged out on top of each other.
That greasy-sack outfit came to life like lightning. I’d jumped up and was jerking on my second boot when a voice yelled out from the other side of the herd, “Wolves! A million of ’em!” The watch had changed and it was Slim’s voice.
“Don’t shoot into the herd!” Shad roared. He’d gotten up early and was already dressed and saddled. He jumped aboard Red and tore off toward where there was now more scattered firing, and that section of the herd was starting to mill around in wild panic, the other cows quickly picking up the feeling of fear.
From the cossack camp I heard Rostov give a loud, brief order in Russian.
And then the rest of us were getting aboard horses, and if it hadn’t been so serious it would have been kind of funny. Most of us were in various states of undress, and about half of the hands were still in red or white long johns, a couple with the rear-end flaps still flopping open. I always slept with my shirt and pants on, so that was no problem for me. But in the whole group there were only three things every man had on without exception—his boots, his gun and his hat.
I threw a bridle on Buck and jumped on his back, not taking the time to saddle him, and galloped off at about the same time Natcho and Chakko did.
There was enough gray morning light to see fairly well as we forced our way through the milling herd toward the center of trouble.
The first Siberian wolf I saw scared me and Buck so much we almost went down in a heap together. It was bigger than any timber wolf I’d ever seen, with a mottled gray body and a black stripe running all the way down its back, from the top of its huge head to the tip of its tail. It flashed across our path almost under Buck’s front legs and Buck reared up, nearly over backward.
“Jesus Christ!” Slim was yelling. “These crazy wolves are outta their minds!”
By any of our standards he was certainly right. Those first shots should have sent any normal pack hightailing it. But these fierce bastards weren’t afraid of the gunfire or of our loud shouting. Come to think of it, they didn’t seem to be afraid of anything. Unlike our wolves they didn’t make, and hadn’t made, a sound, no howling or growling or snarling. They also hadn’t bided their time to sooner or later pick off a stray, but had boldly hit the whole herd, probably to cut one cow and kill it. And while any normal wolf will retreat in an instant once the pack is broken up, these didn’t feel that way. With yelling, sometimes shooting cowboys on their tails, and badly split up within the wildly milling cattle, every damned wolf seemed to be making his own individual fight of it. Shad charged Red a few feet up a hill out of the herd and a big gray monster lunged for Red’s hind legs. Shad swung around in the saddle and shot him through the head so that he went sprawling away down the hill. “Look t’ your horses!” Shad roared. “They’re goin’ after them too!”