The pale horse and Chili suddenly heard something to the north. When the Pale horse turned its head Doug realized that the horse had no eyes
The shadowy figure brought his rifle up and stood it on his right knee,” They’re coming, horses always know.” He pulled his hat down, buttoned the top button on his coat. Stood laid what he had been reading down on the stump. Stepped around to right side of the pale horse and slid his rifle into the scabbard, “I’ll take the high ground. All you can do is wound them, I can kill them.” He stepped back to the left side and effortlessly onto the pale horse.” So wound them good.”
“Where are they?” asked Doug, startled by the sound of his own voice.
“Don’t worry they’ll find you and when they do keep that horse of yours moving, pull them into the open.” And he was gone.
Doug sat there for a moment wondering if had just seen what he had just seen. Then his eyes came to rest on the stump, he urged Chili forward till he could see what the stranger had left behind. There in the snow was a small Bible. Doug stepped off Chili and gingerly picked it up. He took off his glove and brushed the snow away, it was very old and very heavy he thought. When he opened the old Bible, there written on the back of the cover was: to our daughter Emily 1872, to my nephew Earl Durand may God watch over you, Aunt Emily 1917.
Doug was dumb struck he had never been this close to the divide between the here and now and the there and now. He looked up at Chili,” I guess we’re in it Son …whatever it is.”
At that very instant Chili turned and looked at Doug; with that look you get from a horse when and only when it counts. Doug tucked the little Bible in his shirt pocket, “Horses always know. We better beat feet for the Dunoir.”
Doug headed Chili back the way that he had come. He hadn’t gone thirty yards and he rode out of the snow he looked back to see a raging blizzard no more than a hundred yards across and about that long and it was August all around it.
The Magpie had stayed close until it started getting light. Then he started moving further and faster. Long arcing glides, down, down, down Togwotee Pass.
Bamby moved like the wind, faster and faster, leaping, twisting, turning. He was winning and he knew it. He was a buck. He may be the Last deer but he was no longer a Lost deer. He could feel the Medicine.
At the foot of Togwotee the Magpie waited for Bamby, who wasn’t far behind.
“From here go straight on till morning,” he pointed to the east with his beak, “you can’t miss Dubois, run as fast as you can and don’t let anything stop you. I’ll go back and see where the wolves are … Don’t forget ‘squawk’ don’t stop for anything.”
As Bamby looked at all the open ground that lay in front of him his neck stiffened as did his resolve. He cast a glance in the direction of the Magpie who was already headed back up the pass. Then Bamby stepped into the Valley of the Warm Winds, the head waters of the Big Wind River.
