 Part 1 of The Song of Hugh Glass by John Nyhardt. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Nathan at antipodeanwriter.wordpress.com. The Song of Hugh Glass by John Nyhardt. Part 1. Grey Beard and Gold Hair. The year was 1823. It was when the guns that had blasted at the reed had ceased to brag and ten-scored martial clowns turned from the unwipped harry-cara towns earning the scornful laughter of the zoo. A withering blast of the arrowed south still blew and creeks ran thin beneath the glaring sky. It was a month when honking geese would fly southward before the great white hunters' face and many generations of their race as bow-flung arrows now have fallen spent. It happened then that Major Henry went with 80 trappers up the dwindling grand bound through the weird unfriending barren land for where the bighorn meets the yellowstone. An old Hugh Glass went with them, large of bone, deep-chested that his great heart might have played. Grey bearded, grey-of-eye and crowned with grey glass. It seemed he never had been young and for the grudging habit of his tongue none knew the place or season of his birth. Slowly he woke to anger, autumn-earth, yet none laughed louder when the rare mood fell and hating him was like a still white hell, a thing of doom, not lightly reconciled. What memory he kept of wife or child was never told for when his comrades sat about the evening fire with pipe and chat exchanging talk of home and gentler days, old Hugh stared long upon the pictured blaze and what he saw went upward in the smoke. But once, as with an inner lightning stroke, the veil was rent and briefly men discerned what pent-up fires of selfless passion burned beneath the still-gray smoldering of him. There was a rake-hell lad called Little Jim, Jamie or Petite Jacks, for scarce began the downy beard to mark him for a man, blue-eyed was he and femininely fair a maiden might have coveted his hair that trapped the sunlight in its tangled skein. So tardily out-flowed the wild-blonde strain that gutter-grown grown over that in sloth, again a meady's haunted by a goth was Jamie. When the rest of ghost was laid, he seemed some fancy-ridden child who played at manliness mid all those bearded men. The sternest heart was drawn to Jamie then, but his one mood never linked two hours together to schedule Jamie's way, as prairie weather was to get fact by wedding doubt and whim. For very lightly slept that ghost in him, no cloudy brooding went before his wrath. That, like a thundersquall, reeked not its path, but raged upon what happened in its way. Some called him brave who saw him on that day when Ashley stormed a bluffed town of the Rea, and all save beardless Jamie turned to flee the shelter from that steep lead-harrowed slope. Yet hardly courage but blind rage a grope inspired the foolish deed. To his then-old hue, tore off the grey mask and the heart shone through for halting in the dry flood-gutted draw, the trappers rallied, looked aloft, and saw that travesty of war against the sky. Out of a breathless hush, the old man's cry leaped shivering an anguished cry and wild as of some mother. Fearing for her child and up the steep he went with mighty bounds. Long afterward, the story went the rounds how old glass fought that day with gun for club. Grim as a grisly fighting for a cub, he laid about him cleared of the way and so, supported by the firing from below, brought Jamie back, and when the deed was done, taking the lad upon his knee, my son, brave men are not ashamed to fear, said he, neither mind to make a man of you, so here is your first acquaintance with the law. Grout he spanked the lad with vigorous poor and having done so limped away to bed, for wounded in the hip, the old man bled. It was a month before he hobbled out and Jamie, like a fond son, hung about the old man's tent and waited upon him and often would the deep grey eyes grow dim with gazing on the boy and there would go, as though spring fire should waken out of snow. A wistful light across that mask of grey and once Hugh smiled his enigmatic way while pouring long on Jamie's face and said, so with their sons are women brought to bed, so wounded, thus united were the two and some would dub the old man mother Hugh, while those in Hume, all living waters, stank to some dull in a pool that teemed and stank with formless evil into that morass, gazed and saw darkly there, as in a glass, the foul shape of some weakly envied sin. Preach man builds a world and dwells therein, nor could these know what mocking ghost of spring stirred Hugh's grey world with dreams of blossoming that would no seed to swell or bird to sing. So might a dawn-struck digit of the moon dream back the rain of some old lunar dune and ache through all its craters to be green, little they know what lights one love can mean who shrine it in a bower of peace and bliss, paying dwelling in a puckered sigatris or truly figures this belated love, yet very grievous was the hurt thereof, grievous to bear too dear to cast away. Now Jamie went with Hugh, but who shall say if twas a warm heart or a wind of wind love all the rovers teasing itching him, moved Jamie. Howsoever was good to see grey beard and gold hair riding knee to knee, one age in young adventure, one who saw, was likened to a February thaw, Hugh's mellow mood those days, and truly so, for when the tempering south-west wakes to blow a phantom April over melting snow, deep in the north some new white wroth is brood, out of a dim trailed inner solitude. The old man summoned many a stirring story, lived grimly once, but now shot through with glory, caught from the wandering eyes of him who heard, tales jagged with the bleak, unstudied word, stark, sacred stuff. A fellow that I knew, so nameless, went the hero that was Hugh, a mere pelt merchant as it seemed to him, yet trailing epic wonders through the dim, whisked world of Jamie's all, and so they went. One heart it seemed, and that heart well content with tale and snatch of song and careless laughter, never before and surely, never after, the grey old man seemed nearer to his youth, that myth that somehow had to be the truth, yet could not be convincing any more. Now when the days of travel numbered four, and nearer drew the barons with their need, thus the hunter fell the task to feed those four score hungers when the game should fail. For no young eye could trace so dim a trail, or line the rifle sights with speed so true, nor might the wistful Jamie go with Hugh. Four, so Hugh chafed, my trick of getting game, might teach young eyes to put old eyes to shame, an old dog never risks his only bone. All the sprain packs, the lion hunts alone is somewhat nearer what he should have meant. And so with very jest the old man went, and so they parted at an unseen gate, that even then some gust of moody fate claimed to betwixt them, each a tale to spell, one in the nightmare scrawl of dreams from hell, one in the blistering trail of days, a crawl venomous footed, nor might it air before these two should meet in after days, and be grey beard and gold hair riding, with a bluff, heroic scorn, the haps of either tale. Puzzly mourn, when Hugh went forth, and all day Jamie rode with Henry's men, while more and more the goad of eager youth sore-fretted him and made, the dusty progress of the cavalcade, the journey of a snail flocked the moon, until the shadow weaving afternoon turned many fingers nightward, then he fled, pricking his horse, nor dined to turn his head with any dwindling voice of reprimand. For somewhere in the breaks along the ground, surely Hugh waited with a goodly kill, hoofbeats of ghostly steeds on every hill, mysterious muffled hoofs on every bluff, spurred echo horses clattering up the rough, confluent drawers, these flying Jamie heard, the lagging air droned like a drowsy word of one who tells weird stories late at night, half headlong joy, and half delicious fright, his daydreams pace outstripped the plunging steeds, laying galloper in the wind of splendid deeds like Hughes, he seemed unto himself until, snorting a haunch above a breakneck hill, the horse stopped short, and Jamie was aware of lonesome flatlands fading skyward there, beneath him, and zigzag on either hand, a purple haze denoted how the grand fought wide, twigged sunset and the polar star. A tiptoe in the stirrups, gazing far, he saw no Hugh, or any moving thing, save for a welter of coring crows a wing, about some banquet in the further hush, one faint star set above the fading blush of sunset, saw the coming night and grew. With hand for trumpet, Jamie gave Halu, and once again France at the horse-nade, some vague mistrust, now made him half-afraid, some formless dread that stirred beneath the will, as far as sleep from waking. Down the hill, close-footed in the skitter of the shale, the spurred horse floundered to the solid veil, and galloped to the north-west, whinnying. The outstripped ear moaned like a wounded thing, but Jamie gave the lion to his dread, the old man's camping out tonight, he said, somewhere about the forks as like as not, and there'll be hunks of fresh meat steaming hot and fighting stories by a dying fire. The sunset reared a luminous phantom's spire that crumbling sifted ashes down the sky. Now pausing, Jamie sent a searching cry into the twilight river-skirting brush, and in the vast denial of the hush, the champion of the snaffled horse seemed loud. Then, startling as a voice beneath a shroud, a muffled boom woke somewhere up the stream, and like vague thunder hearkened in a dream, rolled back to silence, now with heart abound. Keen for the quarter of the perished sound the lad spurred gaily, for he doubted not. His cry had brought hues answering, rifle-shot. The lagged ear was like a voice that sang, and Jamie half-believed he sniffed the tang of wood smoke, and the smell of flesh arose, when presently before him like a ghost, upstanding, huge in twilight, arms flung wide, a grey form loomed, the wise horse reared and shied, sporting his inborn terror of the bear, and in the whirlwind of a moment there betwixt the brute's horse challenge and the charge, the lad beheld upon the grassy marge of a small spring that bullberries stooped to scan, a ragged heap that should have been a man, a huddled broken thing, and it was hue. There was no need for any closer view, as on the instant of a lightning flash, ere yet the split bloom closes with a crash, a landscape that stares with every circumstance of rock and shrub, just so the fatal chance of hues, one shot made futile with surprise, was clear to Jamie, then before his eyes a light whirled in a giddy dance of red, and doubting not, the crumpled thing was dead that was a friend, with but a skinning knife he would have striven for the hated life that thrived there, but with a shriek of fright the mad horse bolted through the falling night, and Jamie, thumbling at his rifle boot, heard the brush crash behind him, where the brute came headlong, close upon the straining flanks, but while at length low lying, river banks, white rubble in the gloaming glimmered near, a swift thought swept the mind of Jamie, clear of anger and of anguish for the dead, this seemed the raging beast a thing to dread, but some foul playing braggart to outwit, now hurling all his strength upon the bid, he sank the spurs, and with a groan of pain, the plunging horse obedient to the rain, swerved sharply streamward, slidering in the sand, the bear shot past, and suddenly the grand loomed up beneath and rose to meet the pair, that rode a moment upon empty air, and smote the water in a shower of spray, and when again the lowly ebbing day came back to them a drip from nose to flank, the steed was scrambling up the further bank, and Jamie saw across the narrow stream, like some vague shape of fury in a dream, the checked beast ramping at the water's rim, doubt struggled with a victor's thrill in him, as hand to buckle of the rifle sheath, he thought of dampened powder, but beneath the raw hide flap the gun, they snug and dry, then as the horse wheeled, and the mark went by a patch of shadow dancing upon grey, he fired, a sluggish thunder trailed away, the spreading smoke rack lifted slow, and there, floundering in a sea the foam, the bear, hugged yielding water for the foe that slew, triumphant Jamie wondered what old Hugh would think of such a trick of getting game, young eyes indeed, and then that memory came like a dull blade thrust back into a wound. One moment, it was as though the lad had swooned into a dream adventure, waking there, to sicken at the ghastly land a steer like some familiar face gone strange at last, but as the hot tears came, the moment passed, song snatches, broken tails, a trooper for lawn, like merry friends of Eld came back to mourn, overwhelmed him there, and when the black bulk churned, the star-flecked stream no longer, Jamie turned, recrossed the river and rode back to Hugh. A burning twist of valley grasses through, blear light about the region of the spring, then Jamie tore to loft and shuddering, knelt there beside his friend and moaned, oh Hugh, if I had been with you, just been with you, we might be laughing now, and you were dead. With gentle hand he turned the hoary head that he might see the good grey face again, the torch burned out, the dark swooped back, and then his grief was frozen with an icy plunge in horror, twas as though a bloody sponge had wiped the pictured features from a slate, so pillaged by an army drunk with hate home stares upon the homing refugee, a red gout clung where either brow should be, the haughty nose lay crushed amid the beard, thick with slow ooze, wence like a devil-lead, the battered mouth convulsed into a grin, nor did the darkness cover for therein some torch unsnuffed with blear funeral flair still painted upon black that alien stare to make the lad more terribly alone. Then in the gloom there rose a broken moan, quick stifled, and it seemed that something stirred about the body, doubting that he heard a felt of a panicked catch of breath, pale vagrants from the legendary of death, potential in the shadows there, but when the motion and the moaning came again, hope like a shower at daybreak cleansed the dark, and in the lad's heart something like a lark sang mourning, bending low he crooned, Hugh, Hugh, it's Jamie, don't you know? I'm here with you. As one who in a nightmare strives to tell shouting across the gap of some dim hell, what things assail him, so it seemed he heard, and flung some unintelligible word, a thwart the muffling distance of his swoon. Now, kindled by the yet unrizen moon, the east went pale, and like a naked thing, a little wind ran vexed and shivering along the dust till Jamie shivered too, and worried, lest twer bitter cold where Hugh, hung clutching at the bleak raw edge of life. So Jamie rose, and with his hunting knife split wood and built a fire, nor did he fear the staring face now, for he founded deer with the warm presence of a friend returned. The fire made cosy chatter as it burned, and reared a tent of light in that lone place. Then Jamie set about to bathe the face with water from the spring, oft crooning low. There's Jamie here beside you, don't you know? Yet came no answer, save the laboured breath of one who wrestled mightily with death, where watched no referee to call a foul. The moon now cleared the world's end, and the owl gave voice unto the wizardry of light, while in some dim-lit chancel at the night snouts to the goddess, Wolfish Corribants, in turned their wild, antiphonery chance, the oldest saddest worship in the world. And Jamie watched until the firelight swelled softly about him, sound and glimmer merged, to make an eerie void through which he urged with frantic spurs some whirlwind of a steed that made the way as glass beneath his speed, yet scarce kept pace with something dear that fled on, ever on, just half a dream ahead until it seemed by some vague shape dismayed. He cried aloud, the hue, and the steed, nade a nade that was a burst of light, not sound, and Jamie, sprawling on the dewy ground, knew that his horse was sniffing at his hair, while mumbling through the early morning air. There came a roll of many hoofs, and then he saw the swinging troop of Henry's men canter up the valley with the sun. Of all hue's comrades, crowding round, not one that would have given heavy odds on death, for, though the greybeard fought with sobbing breath, no man it seemed might break upon the hip so stern a wrestler with the strangling grip that made the neck veins like a purple thong tangled with knots, nor might hue tarry long bear where the trail fought outward far and dim, or so it seemed. And when they lifted him, his moan went trewell like a song of pain he was so tortured, surely it were vain to hope he might endure the toilsome ride across the barrens, better let him bide there on the grassy couch beside the spring, and, furthermore, it seemed a foolish thing that 80 men should wait the issue there. For dying is a game of solitaire, and all men play the losing hand alone. But when at noon he had not ceased to moan and fought still like a strong man he had been, there grew a vague mistrust that he might win, and all this via tale for wandering ears. So Major Henry called for volunteers two men among the 80 who would stay to wait on glass and keep the wolves away until he did whatever he should do. All quite agreed. Twas bitter bread for hue, yet none save Jamie felt in duty bound to run the risk. Until the hat went round and pity wakened at the silver's clink in Jules Le Bon. He would not have them think that mercenary motives prompted him, but somehow just the grief of little Jim was quite sufficient not to mention hue. He weighed the risk. As everybody knew the rickerees were scattered to the west, the late campaign had stirred a hornet's nest to fill the land with stingers, which was so, and yet three days a south-west wind may blow, false April, with no drop of dew at heart. So Jules ran on, while ready for the start of the pouring horses, knicked and the men impatient in their saddles yawned, and then, with brief advice, a round of bluff goodbyes and some fear reassuring backward cries, the troop rode up the valley with the day. Intent upon his friend with naught to say sat Jamie while Le Bon discussed at length the reasonable limits of a man's strength, a self-conducted dialectic strife that made absurd all argument for life and granted, but a fresh dug hole for hue, twizz half like murder. Yet it seemed Jules knew unnumbered tales according with the case, each circumstantial as to time and place and furnished with the death's head colophon. Viciously despondent Jules ran on. Did he not share his judgment with the rest, ya see, twizz some confusion of the chest that did the trick, heart, lungs and all that mixed in such a way they never could be fixed, a bear's hug, hug, and often Jamie winced at some knife thrust of reason that convinced, yet left him sick with unrelinquished hope, as one who in a dark and room might grope for some beloved face with shuddering anticipation of a clammy thing. So in the lad's hard sorrow fumbled round for some old joy to lean upon and found the stark cold something Jamie knew was there. Yet womanlike he stroked the hoary hair or bathed the face while Jules found tales to tell a gubriously garrulous night fell at sundown day-long winds alike to fear so summoning a mood of relished fear alarms by night, the sweep of savage hordes the desperate fight of men outnumbered and, like him of old, in all that made Jules shudder as he told his the great part, a man by field and flood fate tossed upon the gloom he limbed in blood their situations, possibilities to men against the fury of the reeds a game in which two hundred men had veiled. He pointed out how little it availed to run the risk for one as good as dead. Yet Jules Le Bon meant every word he said and had a scalp to lose if need should be. That night, through Jamie's dreaming, swarmed the reed gray-soled he wakened to a dawn of gray and felt that something strong had gone away nor knew what thing some whisper of the will made him rejoice that Hugh was living still but Hugh the real seemed somehow other where Jules snug and snoring in his blanket there was half a life the nearer just so pain is nearer than the peace we seek in vain and by its very sting compels belief Jules woke and with a fine restraint of grief saw early dissolution one more night and then the poor old man would lose the fight such a man a day and night crept by and yet the stubborn fighter would not die but grappled with the angel all the while with some conviction but with more of guile Jules colonised the vacancy with reeds till Jamie felt that looseness of the knees that comes of oozing courage many men may tower for a white-hot moment when the wild blood surges at a sudden shock but when insistent as a ticking clock blind peril haunts and whispers fewer dare dread hovered in the hushed and moony air the long night through nor might a fire be lit lest some far-seeing foe take note of it and day long Jamie scanned the blank sky room for hoof flung dust clouds till they awoke in him a childish anger dumb for Ruth and shame that Hugh so dallied but the fourth dawn came and with it lulled the fight as on a field where broken armies sleep but will not yield or had one conquered was it Hugh or death the old man breathed with faintly fluttering breath nor did his body shudder as before Jules triumphed sadly it would soon be or so men grew quiet when they lost their grip and did not care at some down he would slip into the deeper silence Jamie wept unwitting how a 30th gladness crept into his heart that gained a stronger beat so cities long beleaguered take defeat unto themselves half traitors Jules began to dig a hole that might conceal a man and as his sheath knife broke the stubborn sod he spoke in kindly bane of life and God and mutability and rectitude the memorial funerary mood brought tears mute tribute to the mother dust and Jamie seen felt each cutting thrust less like a stab into the flesh of Hugh the sun crept up and down the arc of blue and through the air a chill of evening ran but though the grave yawned waiting for the man the man seemed scarce yet ready for the grave now prompted by a coward or a naive that lurked in him Le Bon began to hear faint sounds that the lads less cunning here was silence more like tremors of the ground they were said than any proper sound thus one detected horsemen miles away many moments big with fate he lay he oppressed to earth and rose and shook his head as one perplexed there's something wrong he said and as at daybreak white and winter skies a gay pant staring with a wild surmise the lads face whitened at the other's word Jules could not quite interpret what he heard a hundred horse might noise their whereabouts in just that fashion yet he had his doubts it could be bison moving quite as well but if Twerese there'd be a tale to tell that two men he might name should never hear reckon scalps that fall were selling deer in keeping with the limited supply men fit to live were not afraid to die then in that caution suits not courage ill Jules settled up and canted to the hill a white dam set against the twilight stream and as a horseman riding in a dream the lad beheld him watched him clamber up to where the dusk as from a brimming cup ran over saw him pause against the gloom pretentious huge a brooder upon doom what did he look upon some moments past then suddenly it seemed as though a blast of wind keen cutting with the whips of sleet smote horse and rider launched on huddled feet the steered shrank from the ridge then rearing wheeled and took the rubbly incline fury healed those days and nights like seasons creeping slow had told on Jamie better blow on blow of evil hap with doom seen clear ahead than that monotonous abrasive dread blind Nora at the sole views of the blind thin worn the last heart string that held him kind strung thought the final tie that kept him true now snapped in Jamie as he saw the two so goaded by some terrifying sight death riding with the vanguard of the night life dwindling yonder with the rear of day what choice for one whom panic swept away from moorings in the sanity of will jules came and summed the vision of the hill in one horse cry that left no word to say reese settle up we've got to get away small wit had Jamie left to ferret guile but fumblingly obeyed LeBon the while Jules knelt beside the man who could not flee for big hearts back not time for charity however thick the blows of fate may fall yet in that Jules LeBon was practical he could not quite ignore a hunting knife a flinter gun a blanket gear of life scare suited to the customs of the dead and Hugh slept soundly in his ample bed star canopied and blanketed with night unwitting how venality and fright made hot the westward trail of Henry's men end of part one recorded by Nathan at antipodeonwriter.wordpress.com Hugh Glass by John Nyard this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information auto volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Nathan at antipodeonwriter.wordpress.com the song of Hugh Glass by John Nyard part two The Awakening no one may say what time elapsed or when the slumbrous shadow lifted over Hugh but some globose immensity of blue unfolded him at last within his light he seemed to float as some fate swimmer might a deep beneath an overhead a deep so one late plunged into a lethal sleep a spirit diver fighting for his breath swoops through the many fathomed glooms of death emerging in a daylight strange and new rousing a liquid wonder came on Hugh at the quiet steep arched splendor of the day a grove for some dim memory he lay upon his back and watched a lucent fleece fade in the blue thunder of peace as did the memory he sought in vain then with a stirring of mysterious pain old habit of the body made him rise but when he would obey the hollow skies broke as a bubble punctured and went out again he woke and with a drowsy doubt remote unto his horizontal gaze he saw the world's end kindled to ablaze and up the smoky steep pale heralds run and when at length he knew it for the darkling reaches of his mind we're in the twilight he began to find strewn shards and torsos of familiar things as from the rubble in a place of Kings men school the dream to build the past anew so out of dream and fragment build a hue and came upon the reason of his plight the bears attack the shot and in the night we're in men talk to scostes about a grave some consciousness of will the memory gave he would get up the painful effort spent made the wide heavens billow as a tent wind struck the shaken prairie sag and roll some moments with an effort at control he swayed half raised upon his arms until the dizzy cosmos righted and was still and would he stand erect and be again the man he was an overwhelming pain smote him to earth and one unruly limb refused to wait and crumpled under him second with torture he lay huddled there gazing about him with a great despair proportioned to the might that filled the chain half long as dawn collusive sky and plain steered bleak denial back why strive at all that vacancy about him like a wall yielding as light a granite scarf to climb some little waiting on the creep of time abandonment to circumstance and then he have lashed a southern thought of Henry's men until his mind and drove the gloom away they would be riding west to it with the day how strange he had forgot that battered leg or some scalp wound had said his wits are big was this huge glass to whimper like a score rimly amused he raised his head and saw the empty distance listened long and heard naught but the Twitter of a lonely bird that emphasized the hush was something wrong it was not the major's way to Dally Long and surely they had camped not far behind now woke a query in his troubled mind where was his horse again came creeping back the circumstances of the Bears attack he had dismounted thinking at the spring to spend the night and then the grizzly thing of course the horse had bolted plain enough but why was all the soil about so rough as though a herd of horses had been there riddle vexed him till his vacant stair fell on a heap of earth beside a pit what did that mean he wormed his way to it the newly wakened wonder dulling pain no poor of beast had scooped it that was plain to a squared indeed to us like a grave he thought a grave a grave the mental echo wrought sick fancies who had risen from the dead who lying there had heard above his head the ghostly talkers death and to his shout now searching all the region round about as though the answer were a lurking thing he saw along the margin of the spring and ash heap and the litter of a camp suspicion like a little smoky lamp that dobs the murk but cannot fathom it flung bear grotesques before his groping wit had rees been there and he alive who then and where he did it might be Henry's men how many sons had risen while he slept the smoky glow flared wildly and he crept the dragged limb throbbing till at length he found the trail of many horses westward bound and in one breath the groping light became a gloom devouring ecstasy a flame a dazing conflagration of belief. Punch deeper in the seats of hate and grief he gazed about for ought that might deny such baseness. Saw the non-committal sky the prairie apathetic in a shroud the bland complacence of a vagrant cloud worldwide connivance smilingly the sun approved a land wherein such deeds were done and careless breezes like a troop of youth unawed before the presence of such truth went scampering amid the tussled brush then by and by came on him with a rush his weakness and the consciousness of pain while with the chill insistence of a rain that pelts the solid wreck of summer's end his manifest betrayal by a friend beat in upon him Jamie had been there and Jamie Jamie Jamie did not care. What no man yet had witnessed the wide sky looked and saw a light wind idling by heard what no ear of mortal yet had heard for he whose name was like a magic word to conjure the remote heroic mood of valiant deed and splendid fortitude river to that shared a fire might be gave way to grief and wept unmanfully yet not as day for whom tears fall like dew to green a frosted heart again wept hue so through to strife so engineed to prevail and make harsh fate the Zania for tale his own might shook and tore him for a span he lay a gray old ruin of a man with all his years upon him like a snow and then at length as from the long ago remote beyond the other side of wrong the old love came like some remembered song were of the strain is sweet the burden sad a retrospective vision of the lad grew up in him as in a foggy night the witchery of semi-lunar light saw the air some memory of wind blowing golden hair the boy sloth the merry eyes of blue brought marvelously in the heart of hue as under snow the demon of the spring and moment seemed a little thing to suffer nor might treachery recall the miracle of being loved at all the privilege of loving to the end and there upon a longing for his friend made life once more a struggle for the price to look again upon the merry eyes to blame golden hair I one should lavish very tender care upon the vessel of a hope so great lest it be shattered and the precious freight as water on the arid waste poured out yet though he longed to live a subtle doubt still turned on him the weapon of his pain now as before collusive sky and plain outstared his purpose for a puny thing praying to live he crawled back to the spring with something in his heart like gratitude that by good luck his gun might furnish food his blanket shelter and his flint a fire for after all what thing do men desire to be or have but these condition it these with a purpose and a little wit and how so ever smitten one might rise push back the curtain of curving skies and come upon the living dream at last exhausted by the spring he lay and cast dull eyes about him what did it portend nor to but the footprints of a fickle friend a yawning grave and ashes met his eyes scarce feeling yet the shock of a surprise he searched about him for his flint and knife knew vaguely that his seeking was for life and that the place was empty where he sought no food no fire no shelter Dully wrought the bleak negation in him slowly crept to where despite the pain his love had kept a shrine for Jamie under filed of doubt then suddenly conviction like a shout aroused him Jamie Jamie was a thief the very difficulty of belief was fuel for the simmering of rage that grew and grew the more he strove to gauge the underlying motive of the deed un-tempered youth might fail a friend in need but here had wrought some devil of the will some heartless thing too cowardly to kill that left to nature what it dared not do so bellows all the kindled soul of Hugh became a still white hell of brooding higher and through his veins regenerating fire ran driving out the lethargy of pain now once again he scanned the yellow plain conspiring with the overbending skies and lo the one was blue as Jamie's eyes the other of the colour of his hair twin hues of falseness merging to a stare as though such guilt thus visibly immense regarded its effect with insolence alas for those who fondly place above the act of loving what they chance to love who prized the goal more dearly than the way for time shall plunder them and change betray and life shall find them vulnerable still bittersweet narcotic to the will hues love increased the peril of his might but anger broke the slumber of his might quickened the heart and warmed the blood that ran defiance for the treachery of man defiance for the meaning of his pain defiance for the distance of the plain that seemed to gloat you cannot master me and for one burning moment he felt free to rise and conquer in a wind of rage but as a tiger conscious of the cage a smolder with a purpose broods and weights so with the sullen patience that is hates who taught his wrath to buy it expedience now cognizant a very quickened sense came upon him leaning to the spring he stared with fascination on a thing that rose from giddy deeps to share the draught a face it was so tortured that it laughed a ghastly mask that murder well might wear and while as one they drank together there it was as though the deed he meant to do took shape and came to kiss the lips of Hugh lest that revenge might falter hunger woke and from the bush with leafy grey as smoke were in like flame the bulberry's glinted red scarce sweeter than the heart of him they fed he feasted and the hours of waiting crept a bloom a glow and though he waked or slept the pondered purpose or a dream that wrought by night the murder of his waking thought sustained him till he felt his strength returned and then at length the longed for morning burned and beckoned down the waste way he should crawl that waste to be surmounted as a wall more sky rings steeper to climb that similar crumb of enduring time the hundred empty miles to extend where the stark Missouri ran yet why not dare despite the useless leg he could not die one hair-spread father from the earth and sky or more remote from kindness end of part two recorded by Nathan at antipodeanwriter.wordpress.com part three of the song Hugh Glass by John Nighart this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Nathan at antipodeanwriter.wordpress.com the song of Hugh Glass by John Nighart part three the crawl straight away beneath the flare of dawn the re-land lay and through it ran the short trail to the goal there on a grim turn pikeman waited tall but was so doomed that Suthering geese should flee nine times ere yet the vengeance of the re should make their foe the haunter of a tail midway to safety on the northern trail the scoriac region of a hell-burned black forbade the crawler and for all his lack Hugh had no heart to journey with the suns no suppliant until those faithless ones should bid for pity at the big horn's mouth the greater odds for safety in the south allured him so he felt the midday sun lays down the coolly of a little run it dwindled upward to the watershed where on the feeders the morrow head scarce more than deep carved runes of vernal rain the trailing leg was like a galling chain and bound him to a doubt that would not pass defiant clumps of thirst in bittered grass at bitter-parched earth with bed and fang-like roots dwarf thickets jealous for their stunted fruits harsh-tempered by their disinheritance they symbolised the enmity of chance for him who with his fate unreconciled equipped for trouble as a weanling child essayed the journey of a mighty man like agitated oil the heat waves ran and made the scabrous gulch appear to shake as some reflected landscape in a lake where lagged breezes move a taunting reek rose from the grudging seepage of the creek whereof he drank and drank and still would drink and where the mottled shadow dripped as ink from scanty thickets on the yellow glare the crawler faltered with no heart to dare again the torture of that toil until the master thought of vengeance woke the will to go him forth and when the sun the ironic heavens in the west the region of false friends who gained a rise went to the fading the signature of the skies a purple panorama swept away scarce father and a shout might carry lay the place of his betrayal he could see the yellow blotch of earth where treachery had digged his grave a futile wroth and toil tucked in beneath yon cublet of soil turned back for him how soundly had he slept fool, fool to struggle when he might have crept so short of space yet farther than the flight of swiftest dreaming through the longest night into the quiet house of no false friend alas for those who seek a journey's end they have it ever with them like a ghost nor shall they find who deem they seek at most but crave the end of human ends as hue now swoopingly the world of dream broke through the figured wall of sense it seemed he ran as wind above the creeping ways of man and came upon the place of his desire where burned far luring as a beacon fire the face of jamie but the vengeful stroke bit air the darkness lifted like a smoke and it was early morning gazing far from where the west yet kept pallid star to thinner sky where dawn was wearing through hue shrank with dread reluctant to renew the war with that serene antagonist more fearsome than a smashing iron fist seemed that vast negativity of might until the frustrated vision of the night came moon wise on the gloom of his despair and lo the foe was nought but yielding air a vacancy to fill with his intent so from his spacious bed he rose and went three footed and the vision goaded him or morning southward to the bare sky rim the rugged coolly zigzagged looking slow and ever as it rose the lean creeks flowed windled and dwindled steadily until at last a scooped out basin would not fill and henceforth it was a way of mocking dust but in that hue still kept the driving lust for vengeance this new circumstance of fate served but to brew more venom for his hate and nerve him to avail the most with least and noon the crawler chanced upon a feast of bread root sunning in a favoured draw a century gopher from his stronghold saw some three-legged beast bearlike yet not a bear with quite misguided fury digging where no hapless brother gopher might be found and while with striped nose above his mound the sentinel chirped truly to his clan scare tales of that anomaly the man devoured the chance-flung manner of the planes that some vague reminiscence of old reigns kept succulent despite the burning south so with new vigor hue assailed the south his pockets laden with the precious roots against that coming traverse where no fruits of herbal vine or shrub might brave the land spread roof like twix to the morrow and the grand the coolly deepened yellow walls flung high sheared to the ragged strip of blinding sky dazzled and sweltered in the glare of day capricious draughts that woke and died away into the heavy drows were breathed as flame and midway down the afternoon hue came upon a little patch of spongy ground his thirst became a rage he gazed around seeking a spring but all about was dry astruan bones bleaching to a desert sky nor did a flawed hole bought with needed strength return a grateful ooze and when at length he sucked the mud he spattered in disgust and had the acrid tang of broken trust the sweetish tepid taste of feigning love still hopeful of a spring somewhere above he crawled faster for his taunted thirst more damper spots no less grudging than the first occurred with growing frequency on the way until amid the purple wane of day the crawler came upon a little pool clear as a friend's heart twas and seeming cool a crystal bowl went sky e deeps looked up so might a god set down his drinking cup charged with a distillation of hot skies as famished horses thrusting to the eyes parched muzzles take a long sort water hole he plunged his head into the brimming bowl as though to share the joy with every sense and lo the tang of that wide insolence of sky and plain was acrid in the draft how ripplingly the lying water laughed how like fine sentiment the mirrored sky one credence for a sink of alkali so with false friends and yet as may a crew from specious love some prophet of the true one gift of kindness had the tainted sink stripped of his clothes Hugh let his body drink at every thirsting pour through trunk and limb the elemental blessing soullessed him nor did he rise till vague with stellar light the lone gulch buttressing an arch of night was like a temple to the Holy Ghost as priests in slow procession with the host to gusty breeze intoned now low now loud and now as to the murmur of a crowd yielding the dim torched wonder of the nave aloft along the dusky architrave the wonder tale of drifting stars evolved and Hugh lay gazing to the hole resolved into a haze it seemed that little Jim had come to share a merry fire with him and there had been no trouble to whisper to and Jamie listened eagerly while Hugh assayed a tangled tale of bears and men breadroot and stars but ever now and then the shifting smoke cloud dimmed the golden hair the leal blue eyes until with sudden flair the flame effaced them utterly and low the gulch banker full with mourning loath to go Hugh lay beside the pool and pondered fate a pilgrimage of hate stretch out a fool's trail and it made him cringe still amid the nightly visions fringe his dull wit strayed companion with regret but when the sun a tilted cauldron set upon the gulch ring poured ablaze of day he rose and bathed again and went his way sustaining wroth returning with the toil at noon the gulch walls hewn in lighter soil fell back and Cooley's dance with shrub and vine climbed zigzag to the sharp horizon line and swan might choose the pilotage of crows he laboured upward through the noonday doze of breathless shade where plums were turning red entangled boughs and grapevines overhead purple with fruit to taunt the crawler's thirst with little effort he attained the first the latter bargained sharply ere they sold their luscious clusters for the hoarded gold of strength that had so very much to buy now having feasted it was sweet to lie beneath sunproof canopy and sleep came swiftly you awakened to some deep star snuffing well of night while he lay wondered what had happened to the day and where he was and what were best to do but when fog like the drows dispersed he knew how far the rim above the plane stretched far to where the evening and the morning are and that to a better he should crawl by night sleep out the glare with broken hands for sight skyward along broken steepy crawled and sore at length immense and purple ward all sensed the dusky mystery of plane gazing aloft he found the capsized wane in mid plunge down the pole of steep there too he set his back and far ahead there grew as some pale blossom from a darken root the star blanched summit of a lonely boot and thither would he dragged his heavy limb it seemed not moved time hovered over him an instant of incipient endeavour was ever thus and should be thus forever this groping for the same harmful of space and insubstantial essence of one place extentless on a weird frontier of sleep sheer deep upon unfathomable deep the flood of dusk bore down without a sound as ocean on the spirits of the drowned awakened headlong leagues beneath the light so lapsed the drowsy eon of the night a strangely tensile moment in a trance and then as quickened to some nambulance the heavens imperceptibly in motion were altered as the upward deeps of ocean diluted with a seepage of the moon the boot top later gossamer balloon in mid air tethered hovering grew down and rooted in a blear expanse of brown that lifting slowly with the ebb of night harsh solidity of light and day was on the prairie like a flame scarce had he munched the horde of roots when came a vertigo of slumber snatchy dreams of sick pools inaccessible cool streams lured on through giddy vacancies of heat in swooping flights now hills of roasting meat made savoury the oven of the world yet kept remote peripheries and world about a burning centre that was hue gone say one and it turned blue and was a heap of cool and luscious fruit until at length he knew it for the boot now mantled with the weaving of the glow it was the hour when cattle struggle home across the clearing in a hush of sleep they saunter lowing loiter belly deep amid the lush grass by the meadow stream how life the sound of water in a dream the intermittent tinkle of yon bell a windlass creaks contentment from a well and cool deeps gurgle as the bucket sinks now blowing out of the trough the plough team drinks the shaken harness rattles sleepy quails call far the warm milk hisses in the pales there in the dusky barn lot crickets cry the meadow twinkles with the glowing fly when he is the horses munching at their oats the green grows black a veil of slumber floats across the house of home inanimate men some freak of memory brought back again the boyhood world of sight and scent and sound it perished and the prairie ringed him round blank as the face of fate in listless mood he set his face against the solitude and met the night the new moon low and far a frail cup tilted nor the high swung star it seemed might clint on any stream or spring or touch with silver any toothsome the coyote voiced the universal lack as from another fire the plane gave back the swelter of the noon glare to the gloom in the hot hush he heard his temples boom first tortured motion was a languid pain I seek some further nowhere on the plane he might coyote's feast as well as there so spoke some loose lipped spirit of despair and still he moved volitionless a weight submissive to that now unconscious hate as dark and water too the hidden moon and when the night wore on in middle swoon the crawler roused from stupor was aware of some strange alteration in the air to breathe became an act of conscious will the starry waist was ominously still the far off coyote's yelp became sharp and clear as through a tunnel in the atmosphere a ponderable resonating mass the limp leg dragging on the sun dried grass produced a sound unnaturally loud hanched panting Hugh looked up but saw no cloud an oily film seemed spread upon the sky now dully staring as the open eye of one in fever gasping choked with thirst a childish rage assailed Hugh and he cursed it was like a broken spirit's outcry tossed upon hill's burlesque sabbath for the lost and briefly space seemed crowded with the voice to wait and die to move and die out of choice Hugh chose not yet he crawled though more and more he felt the futile strife was nearly awe and as he went a muffled rumbling grew more felt than heard for long it puzzled Hugh somehow twas coextensive with his thirst yet boundless swollen blood veins ere they burst might give such warning so he thought and still the drone seemed heaping up a phonic hill that towered in a listening profound and suddenly a mountain peak of sound came toppling to a heaven jolting fall the prairie shuddered and a raucous drawl ran far and perished in the outer deep as one too roughly shaken out of sleep Hugh stared bewildered still the face of night remained the same save where upon his right the moon had vanished beneath the prairie room and suddenly the meaning came to him he turned and saw a thought the northwest sky like some black eyelid shutting on the eye a coming night to which the night was day star hungry ranged in regular array the lifting mass assailed the dragons lair submerged the region of the hounded bear out topped the tall ox driver and the pole and all the while there came a low turned roll less sound in air than tremor in the earth from where like a flame upon a windy hearth deep in the further merc sheet lightning flared and still the southern arc of heaven half shut eye near blind with fever room and still the plane lay tranquil as a tomb ring the dead reek not a menaced world what turmoil now low ragged columns hurled pale mill up stellar slopes swift blue fires leap above the wild the silence of the steep along the solid rear a dull boom runs so light horse squadrons charged beneath the guns now once again the night is deathly still what lastly peace upon the zenith hill no longer starry not a sound is heard so poised the hush it seems a whispered word might lose all noises in an avalanche only the black mass moves and far glooms blanche with fitful flashes the capricious flare reveals the boot top tall and lonely there like some grey prophet contemplating doom but hark what spirits whisper in the gloom what civilization of conspiracies ruffles the hush or murmuring of trees ghosts of the ancient forest rolled rain in some hallucination of the plane a frustrated phantom morning all around at ever evolving never resolving sound groups in the stifling hollow of the night then once twice dross a blade of blinding light ripped up the heavens and the deluge came a burst of wind and water noise and flame that hurled the watcher flat upon the ground a moment past hew famished now half drowned he gasped for a breath amid the hurtling drench so might a testy god long sought to quench a puny thirst to pour a sail hurling after the crashing bowl with wild sardonic laughter to see man wrestle with his answered prayer prone to the roaring floor and ceaseless flare the man drank deeply with the drinking grass until it seemed the storm would never pass but raven down the painted mergue for a when had what dreamer seen a glaring day and leagues of prairie panting lia quiver flame flood wind noise and darkness were a river tearing a cosmic channel to no see the tortured night were on then suddenly peace fell remotely the retreating Roth trolled dull reluctant thunders in its path and up near of cloud the dawn came creeping widely like a shroud grey vapours clung along the sudden plane up rose the sun to wipe the final stain of fury from the sky and drink the mist against a flawless arch of amethyst the boot soared like a soul's ring and white because of the catharsis of the night all day he fought with sleep and struggled on south eastward the heavy heat was gone the naked sun the blank north west breathed coolly and the crawler thought it best to move while yet each little break and hollow and shallow basin of the bison wallow begrudged the earth and air its dwindling storm but now that thirst was conquered more and more he felt the gnaw of hunger like a rage and once from dozing in a clump of sage alone jack rabbit bounded as a flame hope fled in hue until the memory came with him who robbed a sleeping friend and fled and hate and hunger merged the manswell red and momentally the hare and little jim for one blurred mark the murder and to him elusive taunting sweet to clutch and tear the rabbit paused to scan the crippled bear that ground its teeth as though chewed a root but when in witless rage you drew his boot and hurled it with a curse the hair loped off its critiquers turned back as though to scoff at silly eyes that threw their legs away night like a shadow on enduring days herbed by the dream of crawling and the act were phases of one everlasting fact he woke and he was doing what he dreamed the boot outstripped it even tied now seemed intent to follow ever now and then the crawler paused to calculate again what dear bored yawn of distance dwarfed the hill close in the rear it saw a titan still whose hand in the water kept the pace distinct along the southern rim of space a low ridge lay the crest of the divide what rested plenty on the other side through what lush valleys ran what crystal books and there in virgin meadows wayside nooks with leaf and purple cluster dulled the light all day it seemed that distant pisca height retreated and the tall boot dulled the rear at eve a striped gopher chirping near gave a vibration now at least no thieving friend should rob him of the feast his great idea stood him as a shout off came the boot a sock was ravelled out the course yarn fashioned to a running sneer he placed about the gopher's hole with care and then withdrew to hold the yarn and wait the night bound moments ponderous with fate crept it slowly by the battered gray face leered in expectation down the grizzled beard ran slaver from anticipating jaws evolving twilight hovered to a pause the light wind fell again and yet again the man devoured his fancied prey and then within the noose a timid snout was thrust his hand unsteadied with the hunger lust you jerked the yarn it broke down swooped the night a shadow of despair bleak height on height it seemed a sheer abyss enclosed him round clutching a strand of yarn he heard the sound of some infernal turmoil under him grimly he strove to reach the ragged rim that snared a star until the sky's space was darkened with a roof of jamie's face and then the yarn was broken and he fell a tumble like a stricken bat his yell woke hordes of laughers down the giddy yawn at that black pit and suddenly it was dawn dream dawn dream noon dream twilight yet possessed by one stern dream more clamorous than the rest you headed for a gap that notched the hills where through a luring murmur of cruel rills a haunting smell of the Dua seemed to creep by fits the wild adventure of his sleep became the cause of all his waking care and he complained unto the empty hair how jamie broke the yarn the sun and breeze had drunk all shallow baseness to the lease but now and then some gully choked with mud retained a turbid relict of the flood dream dawn dream noon night and still obsessed by that one dream more clamorous than the rest you struggled for the crest of the divide and when at length he saw the other side towards but a rumpled waste of yellow hills the deep sunk wiser self had known the rills and looks to be the factor of a whim it had the pleasant lie befriended him and now the brutal fact had come to steer so coming to a languorous despair he mourned his fate with childish control and nursed that deadly adder of the soul self pity but the crows swooped down and feed eyed baton on a thing that died of need a poor old wretch betrayed of God and man so previously his broken musing ran till glutted with the luxury of woe he turned to see the boot that he might know how little all his striving could avail against your luck and blow a fingernail at arm length could blot it out of space a goading purpose and a creeping pace had dwarfed the titan in a haze of blue and suddenly new power came to Hugh with gazing on his masterpiece of will so fair the wise on pisca down the hill unto the higher vision consecrate now sullied forth the new triumphorate a weariness, a hunger and a glory against tyrannic chance as in a story some higher Hugh observed the base apart so the artist thrown above his art wreaks the travail so the end be fair it seemed the wrinkled hells pressed into steer the arch of heaven was an higher gaze and as Hugh went he fashioned many a phrase for use when by some friendly ember light his tale of things endured should speed the night and all this gloom grow golden in the shearing so wrought the old evangel of high daring the duty and the beauty of endeavor the privilege of going on forever a victor in the moment ah but when the night slipped by and morning came again the sky and hill were only sky and hill and crawling but an agony of will so once again the old triumphorate a buzzard hunger and a viper hate together with the baser part of Hugh went visionless that day the wild bees flew vague in a gray profundity of sky and on into the night their muffled cry haunted the moonlight like a far fair well it made Hugh homesick though he could not tell for what he yearned and in his fit for sleeping the cry became the sound of Jamie weeping measurably distant morning broke blear chilly through a fog that drove as smoke before the burning north west sweet and sad came creeping back old visions of the lad some trick of speech some merry little lilt the brooding blue of eyes too clear for guilt the wind blowing golden hair hate slept that day and half of Hugh was half a life away a wandering spirit whistled in the past and half went drifting with the autumn blast that mourned among the melancholy hills for something of the lethargy that kills came creeping close upon the ebb of hate only the raw wind like the lash of fate could have availed to move him anymore at last the buzzard beak no longer tore his vitals and he ceased to think of food the fighter slumbered and a maudlin mood foretold the dissolution of the man he sobbed and down his beard the big tears ran and now the scene has changed the bleak winds cry becomes a flight of bullets snarling by from where on yonder summit sculpt the reeds against the sky and silhouette he sees the headstrong Jamie in the leaden rain now serenely beautiful and slain the dear lad lies within the vast intent thus fixed with dull form winds the crawler went adrift before the wind nor saw the trail till close on night he knew a rugged veil had closed about him and a hush was there though still a moaning in the upper air told how the grey wind gale blew out the day beneath the clump of brush he swooned away into an icy void and waking numb it seemed the still white dawn of death had come on this cradle valley of the soul he saw a dim enchanted hollow roll beneath him and the brush thereof was fleece and like the body of the perfect piece that thralled the hole abode the break of day it seemed no wind had ever come that way nor sound dwelt there nor echo found the place and Hugh lay lapped in wonderment of space vexed with a smile where of the ends were lost till shivering he wondered if a frost had fallen with the dying of the blast so vaguely troubled listlessly he cast a gaze about him low above his head the grey-green curtain of his chilly bed was broided thick with plums or so it seemed for he was half persuaded that he dreamed and with a steady stare he strove to keep that treasure for the other side of sleep returning hunger bait him rise in vain he struggled with a fine spun mesh of pain that trampled him until the yellow stream of day flowed down the white veil of a dream and left it disenchanted in the glare then warmed and soothed he rose and feasted there and thought once more of reaching the morrow to southward with a painful pace and slow he went stiff-jointed with a gnawing ache in that hip wound he had for Jamie's sake oft made him groan nor wrought a tender mood a rankling weapon of ingratitude was turned again with every puckering twinge far down the veil a narrow winding fringe of wilted green petokened how a spring there sent a little rule neandering and he was greatly heartened for he knew what fruits and herbs might flourish in the slew and thirst henceforth should torture not again so day on day despite the crawler's pain or in the windless golden autumn weather these two as comrades struggled south together the homeless greybeard and the homing rill and one was sullen with the lust to kill and one went crooning of the moonward vast freech the many fathomed peace at last but oh the boon of singing on the way so came these in the golden fall of day unto a sudden turn in the ravine wherefrom he saw a flat of cluttered green beneath the further bluffs of the morrow with sinking heart he paused and gazed below upon the goal of so much toil and pain gone green had seemed a paradise to gain the while he thirsted where the lonely boot looked far and saw no toothsome herb or fruit in all that yellow barren dim with heat but now the wasting body cried for meat and sickness was upon him game should pass nor dined a fear the mighty hunter glass but curiously moving pause to stare now while the smoozing he became aware of some low then a basic and profound scarce risen over the borderline of sound it might have been the coursing of his blood or thunder heard remotely or a flood flung down a wooded valley far away yet that had been no well breeding day toward frost that night amid the thirsty land all streams ran thin and when he pressed a hand to see the ear the world seemed very still the deep warn channel of the little real here fell away to eastward rising rough with old rain furrows to a lofty bluff that faced the river with a yellow wall there too perplexed Hugh set about to crawl nor reached the summit till the sun was low fast spread shade dimpled in the level blow the still land told not whence the murmur grew but where the green strip entered blue far down the winding valley of the stream he saw what seemed the tempest of a dream at mimic havoc in the timber glooms as from the sweeping of gigantic brooms a dust cloud deepened down the dwindling river on the distant treetops ran a shiver and huddled thickets writhed as in a gale on creeps the windlass tempest up the veil the wild murmur deepens to a roar as with the wider yawning of a door now the agitated green gloom gates to belcher flood of countless dusky shapes that mill and wrangle in a turbid flow migrating myriads of the buffalo bound for the winter pastures of the plat exhausted faint with need of me to Hugh sat and watched the mounting of the living flood down came the night and like a blot of blood the locked moon weltered in the dust bleared east sleep came and gave a marmosidal feast about a merry flame with simmering sweet haunches of the carving of the spring and tender tongues that never tasted snow and marrow bones that yielded to a blow such treasure Hugh awoke with gnashing teeth and heard the milling drone of cows beneath the roll of hoofs the challenge of the bull so sounds afresh it when the banks are full and bursting brush jams bellow to the crew of water leaves the ragged moon now drenched the valley in an eerie rain below the semblance of a hurricane above the perfect calm of brooding frost through which the wolves and doleful tension tossed from hill to hill the ancient hunger song broken sleep Hugh rolled the chill night long half conscious of the flowing flesh below and now he trailed a bison in the snow that deepened until he could not lift his feet for a chunk of meat with some grey beast had fought with icy fang and when he woke the wolves no longer sang white dawn a thought of white world smote the hill and thunder rolled along the valley still more wiping up the frosters with a sponge day on the steep and down the night would plunge and twilight saw the myriads moving on dust to the westward where the van had gone and dust and muffled thunder in the east Hugh starved while facing on a titan feast the tons of beef that edded there and swirled had stilled the crying hungers of the world yet not one little morsel was for him the red sun pausing on the dusty rim induced a panic aspect of his plight the herd would vanish and pass in the night and be another dream to cling and flout now scanning all the summit round about and led to the rubble of the ancient drift he saw a boulder rolled it painfully and slow he worked it to the edge then let it go and breathlessly expectant watched it fall it hurtled down the leaning yellow wall and bounding from a brushy ledger's brow it barely gazed the buttocks of a cow and made a moment's eddy where it struck the peevish wroth Hugh cursed his evil luck and seizing rubble gave his fury vent by pelting bison till his strength was spent so might a child assail the crowding sea been sick at heart and using bitterly he shambled down the steep way to the creek and having stayed the tearing buzzard beak with bread root and the waters of the grill slept till the white of morning over the hills like a whisper groping in a hush the stream slow trill seemed loud the tumble brush and rumpled treetops in the flat below upon a fog that clung like spectral snow lay motionless nor any sound was there no frost had fallen but the crystal air smacked of the autumn and a heavy dew lay whore upon the grass there came on Hugh a picture vivid in the moment's thrill of marsh or corn shocks marching up a hill and spiked fields dotted with the pumpkin's gold it banished and a shiver with the cold he brooded on the mockeries of chance the shrewd malignity of circumstance that either gave too little or too much yet with the fragment of a hope for crutch his spirit rallied and he rose to go though each stiff joint resisted as a foe and that old hip wound battled with his will so down along the channel of the rill unto the vile below he fought his way the frail fog rifting in the risen day revealed the havoc of a living flood the river shallows beaten into mud the slender saplings shattered in the crush all lower leafage stripped the tousled brush the spoiled fruitage winter thin agast and where the avalanche of hooves had passed it seemed nor herb nor grass had ever been and this the hard one paradise wherein a food devouring plethora of food had come to make a starving solitude yet hope and courage mounted with the sun surely you thought some ill-begotten one of all that striving mass had lost the strife and perished in the headlong stream of life to fill the bellies of the strong that still the weak might perish all day long he struggled down the stricken vale nor saw what thing he sought but when the twilight awe was creeping in beyond a bend arose a din as though the coyotes and the crows fought there with shrill and raucous battle cries small need had Hugh to ponder and surmise what good on beak and fang contended for within himself the most cause of war brought forth upon the instant fang and beak he too would fight nor had he far to see committed the driftwood strewn about the sand for weapons suited to a brawny hand with such a purpose armed with club and stone he forged a head into the battle-zone and from a screening thick it spied his foes he saw a bison carcass black with crows and over it a welter of black wings and 20 rings that like a muddy current churned to foam upon a snag flashed widely in the gloom with naked teeth while close about the prize red beaks and muzzles bloody to the eyes betrayed how worth a struggle was the feast then came on Hugh the fury of the beast to eat or to be eaten better so to die contending with a living foe than fight the yielding distance and the lack he opened the attack and ever where a stone or club fell true about the stricken one an uproar grew and brute to brute forgetful of the prey until the whole pack tumbled in the fray with bleeding flanks and lacerated throats then as the leader of a host who notes the canon wrought confusion of the foe you seized the moment for a daring blow the wolf's a coward who in goodly packs may counterfeit the courage that he lacks and with a craven's fury crushed the bold but when the disunited mass that rolled in suicidal strife became aware how some great beast that shambled like a bear bore down with roaring challenge fell a hush upon the pack some slinking to the brush with tails adrew while some that wind in pain writhed off on reddened trails with bristle domain before the flying stones a bolder few snailed minutes at the foe with drew to fill the outer dusk with clamorings aloft upon a moaning wind of wings the crows with harsh the tupperative cries now sore a grey wolf of prodigious sighs devouring with the frenzy of the starved thus felt hew a bison killed and carved and so fates winds mysteriously trend woe in the silken meshes of the friend wheel in the might and minutes of the foe but with the fading of the afterglow the routed wolves found courage to return amid the brush he saw their eyeballs burn and will he knew how futile stick and stone should prove by night to keep them from their own better as less with safety than enough with ruin he retreated to a bluff and scarce had reached it when the pack swooped in upon the carcass for night long the din of wrangling wolves assailed the starry air while high above them in a brushy lair hew dreamed of gnawing at the bloody feast along about the blanching of the east when sleep is weirdest and a moment's flight remembered co-extensive with the night may team with hapful years as light in smoke upon the jumble of hew's dreaming broke a buzz of human voices once again he rode the westward trail with Henry's men of smitten leagues consuming in a dust and now the nightmare of that broken trust was on him and he lay beside the spring a corpse yet heard a muffled parlaying above him of the looters of the dead but when he might have riddled what they said the babble flattened to a blur of grey and globed upon a bleak frontier of day the spent moon staring down a little space he scrutinised the featureless white face as though to speak but when again the sound grew up and seemed to come from underground he cast the drills and peering down the slope beheld what set at grapple fear and hope three Indian horsemen riding at a jog their ponies wading belly deep in fog that clung along the valley seemed to swim and through a thinner vapour moving dim the men were ghost like could they be the Sue almost the wish became belief in Hugh were they reese as steadily the doubt withheld him from the hazard of a shout and while he followed them with baffled gaze grown large and vague dissolving in the haze they vanished westward knowing well the want of Indians moving on the bison hunt forth with Hugh guest the early riders were the outflung feelers of a tribe stir like some huge cat gone mousing so he lay concealed in patient with the day that dawdled in the dawning would it bring good luck or ill his eager questioning as crawling fog took on a golden hue from sunrise he was waiting for the Sue their path flesh panniers fat with sun dried maize and wasna from the mint of evil days he would coin tales and be no begging guest about the tribal feast fires burning west but kinsmen of the blood of daring men and when the crawler wept again no friend betrayer at the big horns mouth beware of someone riding from the south to do the deed that he had lived to do now when the sun stood hour high in the blue from where a cloud of startled blackbirds rose downstream a panic tumult broke the days of windless morning what unwelcome news embroiled the parliament of feather trues a boiling cloud against the sun they lower flakering now a sooty shower big flaked squall driven westward down they flutter to set a clump of cottonwoods a splutter with cold black fire and once again some shock of sight or sound flings panic in the flock gray boughs exploding in a ruck of birds what augury in onoscopic words did yon swat symbols on the morning scrawl now broke abruptly through the clacking brawl a camp dog sparking and a ponies nay rat a running nicker fled away attenuating to a rearward hush and lo in hailing distance round the brush that fringed a jutting bluff space like a beard upon a stubborn chin out thrust appeared a band of mounted warriors in their van a looth and lonely rode a gnarled old man upon a piebald stallion stooped was he beneath his heavy years yet waterly he wore them like the purple king keen for a goal as from the driving string a barbed and feathered arrow truly sped his face was like a flinty arrow ahead and brooded westward in a steady stare there was a sift of winter in his hair the bleakness of brown winter in his look he saw and huddled closer in his nook fled the bright dreams of safety feast and rest before that king cold brood on the west as gaudy leaves before the blizzard flee the sun fighting chieftain of the rea with all his people at his pony's tail full two score lodges emptied on the trail of hunger on they came in rubble rank and many a haggard eye and hollow flank made plain how close and piteously pressed the enemy that drove them to the west such foemen as no warrior ever slew a tale of corn fields plundered by the Sue there sagging banniers told yet rich enough they seemed to him watched them from the bluff yay pampered nigh the limit of desire no friend had filched from them the boon of fire and hurled them shivering back upon the beast erect they went full armed to strive at least and nightly in a cosy ember glow hope fed them with a dream of buffalo soon to be overtaken after that home with their horny cousins on the plat much meet him merry making till the spring undragged the rubble like a string too tortly drawn the rich in pony's road for much is light and little is a load among even with no Christ to save gray seekers for the yet grudging grave bent with the hoeing of forgotten maize wood hewers water bearers all their days tall neath the lifelong hoarding their packs and nursing scores their babies at their backs whining because the milk they got was thinned in dugs of famine strobes with a wind invincibly equipped with their first bows the stripling strutted knowing as youth knows how fair life is beyond the beckoning blue cold-eyed the grandsires plotted for they knew as frosted heads may know how all trails merge in what lone land raw maidens on the verge of some half-guessed out mystery of life in wistful emulation of the wife stooped to the fancy burden of the race nor read upon the withered wind dams face the scrawled tail of that burden and its woe slant to the sagging poles of the Travaux numb to the scores harsh railing and the goat the lean causes toiled and children rode atop the household plunder wonder-eyed to see a world flow by on either side from blue air sprung to vanish in blue air a river of enchantments here and there the campers loped upon a vexing quest where countless doves had left a palimpsest a taunting snarl of broken scents and now they sniffed the clean bones of the bison cow howl to the skies and now with mains are rough they nose the mansmill leading to the bluff whores puzzled at the base and sweep the hide with questioning yelps aloft crouched low in fright already Hugh can hear the braves gaffaws at their scorned foment yielded to the scores inverted mercy and a no one grave since earth's first mother scalded from a cave and that dear riddle of her love began no man has wrought a weapon against man to match the deadly venom rude above the lean blue blinding heartfires of her love we'll might the hunted hunter shrink aghast but thrice three seasons yet should swell the past so was it writ airfates keen harriers should run Hugh glass to earth the hungry cures took up again the old centre food still flowed the rubble through the solitude a thinning stream now of the halt the weak and all who had not very far to seek for that weird pass where to the fleet are slow and out of it keen winds and numbing blow shrill with the fleeing voices of the dead slowly the scattered stragglers making head against their weariness as up the steep fled westward and the morning lay asleep upon the valley fallen wondrous still Hugh kept his nook nor ventured forth until the high day toppled to a blue descent when thirst became a master and he went with painful scrambling down the broken scarf lured by the stream that like a smitten harp rippled a muted music to the sun scarce had he crossed the open flat and won the half way fringe of willows when he saw slow plodding up the trail of tottering score whose years made big the little pachy ball crouched in the brush he watched more and more the little burden tempted him why not a thin cry throttled in that lonely spot could bring no sucker none should ever know save him the feasted coyote and the crow why one poor crone found not the midnight fire nor would the vanguard quick with young desire devouring distance westward like a flame regret this ash dropped real on she came slow footed staring blankly on the sand so close that it needed but a hand out thrust to overthrow her eye to win that priceless spoil a little tent of skin a flint and steel a kettle and a knife what did the dying with the means of life that thus the fit to live should suffer lack poised for the lunch what whimsy held him back why did he gaze upon the passing prize nor sees it did some gust of ghostly cries awake and round her with springs of wreath voices of the babies she had held to plead for pity on her grave with days far down a moments cleavage in the haze of backward years he saw her now nor saw the little burden and the fee will score but someone sitting haloed like a saint beside a hearth long cold the dream grew faint and when he looked again the crone was gone beyond a clump of willow crawling on he reached the river leaning to a pool calm in its cup of sand he saw a fool a wild rye mask of moth a grin yet grim he was there to claim identity with him and ridicule his folly pity for who pitted this that it should spare a score spent in the spawning of a scorpion brood he drank and hastened down the solitude fleeing that thing which flared him and his hue and as he went his self accusing grew and withered anger till it came to seem that somehow some slide jamey of a dream had plundered him again and he was strong with lust of vengeance and the sting of wrong so that he traveled faster than for days now when the eve in many shade of grays wove the day's shroud and through the lower lands lean fog arms groped with chilling spirit hands he paused perplexed elusive haunting dim as though some memory that stirred in him invasive of the real outgrew the dream there came upon the breeze that stole up a stream of wood smoke fixed a beat and beat of hues diluted heart it seemed the sweeter lure of home a brief way and one came upon the clearing where the sumac flame ran round the forest fringe and just beyond one saw the slough grass nodding in the pond until the sleepy troll the bullfrog sung and then one saw the place where one was young the log house sitting on a stumpy rise half lit within its windows were as eyes that loved much and affaded with old tears it seemed regretful of a life's rears yet patient with a self-denying poise like some old mother for her bearded boys waiting sweet hearted and a little sad so briefly dreamed a recredecent lad beneath grey hairs and fled through chill and damp still groped at the odor hinting at a camper two-tongued herald wooing hope and fear of hospitality or danger near a sue war party hot upon the trail or legged rears you crawled across the veil twirled up along a zigzag gully's bed and reached a bluff's top in a smudge of red at the west burned low will summits yet a light and pills gloom anticipating night mottled the landscape to the dull blue rim what freak of fancy had imposed on him could one smell homesmoke fifty years away from the spire of grey rose in the dimming air to rule all warm he lay upon the bare height fagged for lawn and old times came upon him with the creep of the subtle drugs that put the world to sleep and reek doom to the soothing of a dream so listlessly he scanned the sombrous stream scarce seeing what he scanned the dark increased till wind wakened from the frowning east and sailed along the veil then with a start he saw what and set the wild blood free from where he lay an easy point blank rifle shot away appeared a mystic germinating spark that in some secret garden of the dark a beard of frail blue nodding stem were on a ruddy lily flourished and was gone what merry call was this again it grew the scarlet blossom on the stem of blue and withered back again into the night with pounding heart he crawled along the height and reached a point of vantage he saw capricious witch lights dim and glow like far spent embers quickened in a breeze to a surely not a camp of legged reeds nor yet of suing warriors hot in chase dusk and a quiet viviwak dim that place a doddering vagrant with numb hands the wind fumbled the dying ashes there and wind it was the day old campground of the foe glad hearted now Hugh gained the veil below keen to possess once more the ancient gift nearing the glow he saw vague shadows lift out of the painted gloom of smoldering logs distorted bogs that bristled and were dogs snarling at this invasion of their lair Hugh charged upon them growling like a bear and sent them whining now again to view the burgeoning of scarlet gold and blue the immemorial miracle of fire from heaped up tweaks a tenuous smoky spire arose and made an altar of the place the spark glow faint upon the drizzled face transformed the kneeling outcast to a priest and native of the light begetting east the wind became a chanting acolyte these two in temple in the vaulted night briefed conjuries of interwoven breath then hark the snapping of the chains of death from deadwood low the epiphanic god once more the freightage of the fennel rod dissolved the chilling paw of Jovian scorn the wonder of the resurrection mourn the face apocalyptic and the sword the glory of the many cymbal Lord Hugh lifting up his eyes about him saw and something in him like a vernal thaw voiced with the sound of many waters ran and quickened to the laughter of the man. Light heartedly he fed the singing flame and took its blessing till a soft sleep came with dreaming that was like a pleasant tale the far white dawn was peering up the veil when he awoke to indulge and content a few shorn stars in pale astonishment were huddled westward and the fire was low three scrawny camp cures mustered in a row beyond the heap of embers heads askew he is pricked to question what the man might do sat wistfully regarding the arose and they grown canny in a school of blows sculpt to a safer distance better raise a dolorous chanting of the evil days their grey breath like the body of a prayer he nursed the sullen embers to a flare then set about to view an empty camp as once before but now no smoky lamp of blear suspicion searched a gloom of fraud were in a smirking friendship like a board embraced a culled safety now no grief twixed hideous revelation and belief made womanish the man but glad to strive with hope to nerve him and a will to drive he knew that he would finish in the race the staring impassivity of space no longer mocked the dreadful sky would climb where distance seemed identical with time was past now and that mystic something luck without which worth may flounder in the ruck had turned to him again so flame like sword rekindled hope in him as he explored among the asheaps and the lean dogs ran and barked about him for the love of man surely he could find some trifle in the hurry left behind or happily hidden in the trampled sand that to the cunning of a needy hand should prove the master key of circumstance for tears the little gifts of grudging chance well husband and make victors long he sought without a veil and crawling back he thought of how the dogs were growing less afraid and how one might be skinned without a blade a flake of flint might do it he would try and then he saw or did the servile eye trick out and mentally mean like the real he saw a glimmering of wetted steel beside a heap now washed with morning light scarce more of marvel and the sense of might moved after when he reached a hand to take the favorite brand emerging from the lake whereby a kingdom should be locked of strife then you now pouncing on a trader's knife worn hollow in the use of bounteous days now behold a rich man by the blaze of his own hearth a lord of steel and fire not having but the measure of desire determines wealth who gaining more seek most are ever the pursuers of a ghost and lend their fleetness to the fugitive for you long goded by the wish to live what gauge of mastery and fire and tool that twain wherewith time put the brutal to school evolving man the maker and the seer hunger and restraining fear the gaunt dogs hovered around the man while he cajoled them in the language of the rea and simulated feeding them with sand until the boldest dead to sniff his hand bare fanged and with conciliative wine through bristle domain the quick blade bit the spine below the skull and as a flame struck thing the body humped and shuddered withering the length limbs huddled wilted now to skin the carcass dig a hole and he changed therein and fixed the pelt with steaks the flesh side up this done he shaped the bladder to a cup on willow wives and filled the rawhide pot with water from the river made it hot with roast and stones and set the meter boil those days of famine and prodigious tall and raw to bulimic cravings in the man and scarce the cooking of the flesh out ran the eating of it as a fed flame towers according to the fuel it devours through north-east until the kettle empty of the feast went dim the sky and valley merging swirled and subtle smoke that smothered out the world who slept and then as diverse mounting sunder a murmuring to blinking sudden wonder upon a dazzling upper deep of blue he rose again to consciousness and knew the low sun beating slantly on his face now indolently gazing round of the place he noted how the wills had reveled there the bones and entrails gone some scattered here alone remaining at the pot of hide how strange he had not heard them at his side and granting but one afternoon had passed what could have made the fire burn out so fast had daylight waned night fallen morning crept noon blazed a new day dwindled while he slept and was the friend like fire a jamie too across the twilight consciousness of hue the old obsession bird fluttered he got upon his knees and stirred the feathery ash but not a spark was there already with the failing sun the air went keen betokening a frosty night he winced with something like the clutch of fright how could he bear the torture how sustained the sting of that antiquity of pain rolled back upon his face again the foe that yielding victor fleeting being slow that huge impersonal malevolence so readily the tentacles threw it in the larger standard of desire that hue fell farther in the loss of fire than in the finding of it he arose and suddenly the place grew strange as grows a friend's house when the friend is on his beer and all that was familiar there and dear puts on a blank inhospitable look hue set his face against the east and took that dreariest of ways the trail of flight he would outcrawl the shadow of the night and have the day to blanket him in sleep he went to meet the gloomer creep and used with life's irrational rebuffs a yelping of the dogs among the bluffs rose unguetted stabbing rent the pool of evening silence blunted to a drawl amid the arid waterways and died and as the echo to the sound replied so in the troubled mind of hue was wrought a reminiscent cry of thought to thought without groping found an unlocked door to life the dogs king flint to skin one then the knife discovered why that made a flint and steel no further with the subtle foe at heel he fled for all about him in the rock to waken when the needy hand might knock a saviour slept he found a flaker flint scraped from his shirt a little walled of flint spilled on it from the smitten stone a shower a frutty seed and saw the mystic flower that genders its own summer bloom anew and so capricious luck came back to hue its happier than he had been since jamie to that unforgiven sin had yielded ages back upon the ground now he would turn the cunning of his hand to carving crutches that he might arise be manlike lift more rapidly the skies that crouched between his purpose and the mark the warm glow housed him from the frosty dark and there he wrought in very joy smooth and sang by fits were at the solitude set laggard singers snatching at the tune for their hunt the dogs came soon to haunt the shaken fringes of the glow and pitching voices to the timeless woe outweild the lilting so the chorus sings of terror pity and the tears of things when most the doomed protagonist is gay the stars swarmed over and the front of day whitened above a white world and the sun rose on a sleeper with a task well done and roused him till its burning topped the blue when you awoke there woke a younger hue now half a stranger and was good to feel with ebbing sleep the old green vigor steel thrilling along his muscles and his veins as in a lull of winter cleansing rains the grey bough quickens to the sapper creep it chanced the dogs lay near him sound asleep curled nose to buttock in the noon day glow he killed the larger with a well-aimed blow skin dressed and set it roasting on a spit and when it was cooked ate sparingly of it for need might yet make little seen the feast forwarding the river shallows south by east he hobbled now along a withered rill that issued where old floods had gashed the hill a cyclopean portal yawning sheer no storm of countless hooves had entered here it seemed a place where nothing ever comes but change of season he could hear the plums plash in the frosted thicket over lush while like a spirit lisping in the hush the crisp leaves whispered round him as they fell and ever now and then the autumn spell was broken by an allelating cry from far way back with muzzle to the sky the lone dog followed morning darkness came and huddled up beside a cosy flame used sleep was but a momentary flight across a little shadow into light so day on day he toiled and when a float above the sunset like a Stygian boat the new moon bore the scepter of the old he saw a dwindling strip of blue out rolled the valley of the tortuous cahing and ere the half moon sailed the night again those far lone leagues had sloughed their garb of blue and dwindled dwindled dwindled after Hugh until he saw that titan of the plains the sinewine Missouri dearth of rains had made the giant gaunt as he who saw this loud chain smasher of a late march thaw seemed never to have bellowed at his banks and yet with staring ribs and hollow flanks the urge of an indomitable will proclaimed him of the breed of giants still and where the current ran a boiling track towards like the muscles of a mighty back grown at land in in the restless craft he set to work and built a little raft of driftwood bound with grapefines so it fell that one with an amazing tail came drifting to the gates of Gaia war. End of part 3 Recorded by Nathan at www.antipidianwriter.wordpress.com