Gabriel's Story by David Anthony Durham Read Free Book Online Page B

climbed aboard the horse and reached down for his brother. Ben swung up behind him.
    â€œCome on,” Gabriel said. “Let’s go. I don’t aim to be here if he rides back this way.” He dug his heels into the horse, and Raleigh jumped forward into a fast walk.
    James called out a protest but quickly fell into step, trotting along next to them like a servant doing penance. Gabriel spoke no more, except within himself. For the first time he thought that while there was still nothing interesting about the toil of his daily life, at least adventure was skirting the edges of it, offering occasional glimpses that tempted with promises more mythical than the thin tales of cheap novels.
    THE PLOW RESTED ON ITS SIDE like a creature breathing its last. The blade had finally given in, the greater portion of it bent back and sheared away from the frame. How the soft earth could have wreaked such damage on iron was a thing to wonder at, but the proof was there before them. Gabriel stared at it long and hard before he went to fetch Solomon, wondering at the malignant force beneath the turf.
    Solomon kneeled before the plow and studied it with calm eyes. He caressed its rough edges with his fingers, a gentle touch, as if he feared to do more injury but thought that his fingertips might ease the metal back into place. They had not this power, as he conceded with a long breath of air. “Well, this ain’t gonna do,” he said, slowly easing himself up. “You think a smith could mend her?”
    Gabriel stood just behind him, watching his back. He rolled his eyes at the question. “I doubt God could mend it.”
    Solomon cut his eyes at the boy, and his words came quick. “Watch yourself. No need to be profane just yet.” He kept his gaze on Gabriel, but the boy studied the lay of the grass and made no comment. “What we have to think on is what to do next. I think we can mend her. We might could buy a secondhand plow next year from someone who’s quitting, but this year we just need to make do with what we got. We could take this down to Maubry’s, see what he makes of it.”
    Gabriel looked toward the southern horizon in time to see a lone rider come over the hill there. The horseman surveyed the land, took in the house and the two standing before it, then disappeared from whence he had come. Gabriel’s thoughts flew back to the Indian, although he knew straight away that this was somehow different.
    â€œHow about you hitch up the mule and we see about this today?” Solomon asked, not having noticed the horseman. “No use wasting a day over it.” He grapsed one handle of the plow and looked at the tool from a new angle. But this improved it little, and he let it fall again. “I’ll just tell your mother.”
    He started to move off but paused, first to look at Gabriel, who still stared out at the empty horizon, and then to follow his eyes. As they both stood there, a faint rumbling noise could be heard. It rolled over the landscape like a low-flying flock of birds, a grumble that was both sound and feeling, heard not only through the air but through the soil itself.
    The rider appeared again, cresting the hill at a gallop, pausing, and twirling his horse around in a half-circle. He looked back and motioned with his arms, then let his horse fall into a canter down the slope. A second later a section of the horizon began to seethe. It boiled as if a stream swollen with debris had suddenly cut its way through the prairie. This illusion held for a moment only. Then, at either edge of the river, two mounted drovers appeared, and it became clear that the river was one of moving cattle, the first of what promised to be a great herd of livestock.
    They came on fast, pouring down into the valley, picking up speed as they approached. They were a sort of cattle that Gabriel had never seen before. They were quick and bony, with low-slung heads and enormous horns