Buffalo Jump Blues Read Free

was, Martha now seeing that he was bending over and his head was down. She felt a flutter in her blood and subconsciously brought two fingers to the artery in her throat.
    â€œWhat’s that in the bottom of the boat?” Cowdry had pulled on his waders and was stepping into the river to help Peachy with the skiff. The girl, Dorry, stepped up beside Martha and reached for her hand. Her mouth was white with powdered sugar from the donut Martha had given her.
    â€œLook,” she said. “Look.” She let go of Martha’s hand and jumped on a rock to gain a higher vantage. “Look, Sheriff, he’s got a buffalo!”
    Harold had stepped out of the boat into thigh-deep water, his back to the bank. When he turned around, the bison calf was bleating against his chest. The veins on his biceps stood out from the strain of lifting it. He sloshed to shore and stepped onto the bank.
    Martha started to speak, but there was something behind Harold’s half smile that gave her pause.
    â€œDid that snakebit calf pull through?” he said. He set the bison down so that the girl could pet it with her sticky fingers.
    Martha gave him a look. “No, I gave her mouth-to-nose until Jeff Svenson showed, but she was too far gone.”
    â€œWhat happened to the carcass?”
    â€œSkinned and hanging. Why, do you want some veal? Personally, I’m a little put off by meat pumped with poison.”
    â€œWhen did this happen?”
    â€œLast night.”
Last night when you didn’t come over
. That part went unsaid.
    Martha caught the amused look Peachy Morris was giving them. The last time Peachy had heard Martha talking with Harold about something and what they were really talking about was something else, he’d told them to get a room.
    She looked hard at the fishing guide. He rolled up a stick of gum and put it in his mouth, wiped the grin off his face.
    â€œWhat did you do with the skin?” Harold asked.
    The shoe dropped as Martha shook her head.
    â€œHun-ah,” she said. “It isn’t going to happen.”
    Harold knelt down beside the little red bison, which had quieted down while the girl had her arm around it, but was now bleating incessantly.
    â€œHey, little fella,” Harold said. He lifted his eyes to Martha, who mouthed the word “No.”
    â€œMeet your new mother,” Harold said.
    â€”
    It took some finagling. You couldn’t just put a bison into the bed of a truck unattended. Somebody would have to hold it while the other drove, and Harold took the honor, climbing into the bed. After introducing the bison to the Angus cow that had lost her calf, presuming that went smoothly and there was no guarantee it would, they’d drive back to pick up the Cherokee, which Peachy Morris and Robin Cowdry agreed to shuttle downriver to Ennis after their float.
    Martha looked at the girl, sitting under a frayed straw hat on the stern seat of the skiff. They’d had to pry her arms from the bison’s neck and tears had tracked down her cheeks, beading up on top of her sunscreen. But she’d bucked up when Martha told her she could visit the calf, a lie of a certain color.
    â€œDon’t let her play with the siren,” Martha said, as she pushed thedriftboat off the ramp. “You know how birds attack a boat when you hit the siren.”
    â€œI won’t let her touch it.” Peachy pulled at the oars, winking at Martha, going along.
    â€œAnd remember the ejector seat. Whatever you do, don’t touch the red button.”
    Peachy curled his fingers underneath the rowing platform. “It’s right under my thumb here.”
    â€œEjector seat!” the girl said. Her eyes grew big. “You don’t have no ejector seat. Do you?”
    â€œPitch you right into the water if you don’t behave,” Peachy said.
    â€œNah. He doesn’t have an ejector seat, does he, Uncle Robin?”
    Martha waved good-bye as the