Rocky Mountain Locusts

“I command you, my dear Ida, to almighty God, and entrust you to your Creator. May you rest in the arms of the Lord who formed you from the dust of the Earth. May Holy Mary, the Angels and all the Saints welcome you now that you have gone forth from this life. Amen.”

Clarence traced a cross in front of his chest with bony fingers marred by dirt. He stood. Silent. His youngest son Thomas pierced the exposed earth, freshly removed from its resting spot, with his spade. The shovel’s contents dropped onto the makeshift coffin tucked snugly in the shallow grave.

Once the grave had been filled, Anne positioned a wooden cross where the upturned soil met the snow that shielded the rest of the desolate farmland from the harsh Dakota winds. Once satisfied with its placement, Anne firmly grasped at the base of where the two planks intersected and nodded at Matthew. The eldest child gingerly tapped the underside of his spade atop the cross. His pace and power increased as the cross’s position stabilized in the resistant earth. Suddenly, the upper portion of the cross creaked and splintered, shearing off a chunk of wood that tumbled carelessly through the air and landed at Clarence’s feet.

He glanced down at the fragmented wood, his faded blue eyes lingering on it with a look of longing, “We’ll make another tomorrow, the sun is setting.”

His three remaining children began trudging silently back towards the house. Clarence paused and brushed the hefty coating of snow off of the two crosses atop the mounds bordering his mother’s hastily dug grave.

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Otto’s eyes narrowed as he examined the page before him. Satisfied, he clasped the little black notebook closed and returned it to his coat’s inner pocket. He shuddered as his bare, wintry hand stung his stomach.

He glanced at the wagon, speckled with mud clinging desperately to the wood as it sought to unburden itself of the moisture that could prevent its escape from the bleak landscape it had called home for centuries.

The twenty thousand dollars resting neatly inside was the greatest haul he had seen. It might be nearly twenty-five once he was done at the Reilly’s. Though one never knew for sure.

Working for the old man who offered loans to those most in need had been appealing after he returned from the war. An opportunity to mend his damaged standing with his Maker. However, collecting repayment rarely went as seamlessly as Mr. Vonleigh had advertised.

Now nearly nine years later, he no longer concerned himself with self-preservation, and the only thing he prayed for currently was the absence of the God to which he directed those prayers. He knew it didn’t make sense.

It doesn’t fucking matter, he thought.

He had barely slept since crossing into Dakota. Though whether that was due to his thoughts of escaping to a new life with Mr. Vonleigh’s money or the breath-taking brick wall of a cold front that he had slammed into four days ago, he was unsure.

His maps showed that the Reilly’s house in Emerson wasn’t far from the Northwest Territories. Or, he could retrace his steps south to any one of the train stations he had passed. East and west were options too, he supposed. For whatever reason, he couldn’t decide. But the money would be sufficient to get him far enough from Mr. Vonleigh to never again hear the name. No matter the direction.

His body convulsed in a shiver, dragging his mind from endless possibilities. Otto gazed at the vast, never-ending plains coated by a windswept snow shawl. The constant breeze whipped up a fierce, two-foot high drift that nipped between the seams of Otto’s too-thin, faded black corduroys. He had become accustomed to it.

After reattaching the horse-cart to Caesar, he stepped into the stirrups and took his position atop the saddle. Gently guiding his white mare, he scanned the plains for signs of the ever-elusive road forward.

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Clarence paid no mind to the open ledger on the desk. Instead, his gaze pierced the weak flame in the fireplace, desperately dancing to keep from extinguishing.

He thought of his mother.

He pictured her body, dead well before its inhabitant. Frail and fragile, he remembered the chill of her touch. It was the same chill he had noticed from Grace as life fled her body. And Arthur. His newborn hands like the paws of a sled dog.

Grace died shortly after Arthur’s birth. Her immune system weak from hunger and cold, disease had coursed through her body in hours. Arthur wilted and faded shortly thereafter. But Ida…Ida went slowly.

He broke eye contact with the defeated flame, inhaling slowly, deeply. He tried to expel the recent past from his lungs as he exhaled.

He forced his focus to the ledger, bleak as it was. If they could make it to spring, he thought, people would return to this land, eager to exploit what was left of others’ failures. He could sell everything and move west. He would accept any kind of work. Anything to get his family far from this godforsaken wasteland.

Footsteps shuffling towards him pried him from fantasy. Stopping just on the other side of the closed door, he recognized Thomas’s voice. “Father, there’s a visitor outside.”

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Otto approached the hitch out front of the weary house. It’s weathered brown shade looked out of place amidst the endless gray and white separated only where the land kissed the sky.

He pressed his gloved hand beneath his ribs and felt the gun’s icy metal shell against his bare side. A reassuring discomfort.

He slogged towards the front walkway, his wool socks dampened once more from the snow that had infiltrated his boots, “Clarence Reilly?” he inquired to the young man standing puzzled and beaten at the door.

“He’s coming,” the boy replied.

“Well shit, what do ya say we wait inside?”

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Descending the stairs, Clarence could hear the kitchen floor groan under two sets of footsteps. A weathered man, one with the environment, came into view. The skin on his face was raw and red from the prevailing winds. There wasn’t an inch of him left unscathed by the plains’ brutal winter.

“Mornin’,” said the man. He quickly pulled out a golden pocket watch lodged under his coat.

“Oh hell, doesn’t work anyhow,” he said with a chuckle and tossed it, still ajar, on the table beside him.

He sat down and sighed, “Clarence, right? Otto,” he said.

He revealed from beneath his jacket the revolver, in its holster, stained auburn in some places, and dropped it carelessly on the table alongside the watch. Still not fully settled, he dug deeper under his coat, now pulling out the little black notebook from what seemed to Clarence like an abyss in which this gruff, gnarled man stored his life.

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Once relieved of the burdens that had been nestled securely inside his jacket, he opened the notebook, “Clarence, my good man, go ‘head and read those lines at the bottom of the page.”

He turned the book in his gloved hands and pushed it across the table. Clarence said nothing.

“Go on now,” he prodded, “I mean, my handwriting—”

“Clarence Reilly. 2 Sturbridge Road, Emerson.”

“Keep goin’.”

“Four thousand and five hundred dollars.”

Otto sat back satisfied and crossed his right leg over his left knee, “Got it or no?”

Clarence dropped his eyes to his lap. He shook his head no.

Otto screeched the legs of his chair back abruptly, ignoring the protesting wood floor, and rose. He wandered slowly around the kitchen like a zoo animal new to its cage.

“Children, go upstairs,” he heard Clarence say, “go on run along.” They left.

“Were you in the war Clarence?”

This time Clarence nodded his head in the affirmative.

“Me too. That fightin’ was bad business.”

Clarence repeated his previous response.

Otto pressed his rear end against the counter in front of the sink, “I’m here on account of Mr. Vonleigh, as you might expect.” Otto paused, leaving room for Clarence to confirm. Instead he remained silent.

“Your payment is overdue and I’m here to collect one way or another. Now, you got any money we can work with?”

“’Fraid not.”

“Says here you needed it to start a cattle farm,” Otto said, his tone sharp now. Having removed one glove, he approached Clarence and pointed with his middle finger at the notebook, nubs where his index finger and thumb should have been.

He turned back and pointed out the small window above the sink, “I don’t see any goddamn—” his suddenly bellowing voice cut off. Otto’s head pointed in the direction of three makeshift crosses stuck into slightly raised mounds. The snow there was not as plentiful, “—cattle,” he finished, in almost a whisper.

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Otto’s arm lingered outstretched, his remaining index finger pointing to the vast swathe of land, plain and uneventful, outside of the house. Clarence’s eyes darted to the gun. The hammer was cocked. At the ready. His right hand instinctively jumped off his knee and lunged forward. But he stopped. He gazed down, his own hand unrecognizable.

He stood. Approaching Otto, he pretended not to realize what the man was looking at.

“There was cattle. See that splintered fence there?” now directing Otto’s gaze with his own finger, “that used to circle ‘round that tree and back to the barn.”

His hand pointed to a patch of emptiness, “Had to use the wood for fire.”

Clarence moved his finger to the right, “Over there was corn, then back behind that was barley and lentils. On this side of the house,” he continued, shifting his extended arm towards the wall further to his right “was sugar beets and peas.”

Finally his hand dropped down beside him, “then all out front was a whole bunch of wheat,” he finished.

“Well what happened?” Otto asked, finally finding his voice.

“The goddamned bugs,” replied Clarence.

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Otto had heard about them. For years now, swarms of Rocky Mountain locusts had invaded areas all over the plains at random. Minnesota, Nebraska, Kansas, and apparently, the Dakota Territory. A white blanket would descend on whole, unsuspecting towns, blackening the sunlight and destroying every crop in its path.

A man he had fought in the war beside once paid him to fetch ingredients to make some sort of poison that would kill the bugs. So he said, at least. The man couldn’t do it himself on account of having both his legs blown off during the second battle of Bull Run, so Otto did it. The bugs never came.

Clarence went on, “It was only our second harvest year, and they destroyed everything. Crops didn’t have time to grow back before winter set in.”

The two men were back in their original positions at the table. Clarence seemed more animated now. Less pitiful, Otto thought.

“Soil’s completely ruined. We ate all the cattle already,” Clarence paused before adding “should’ve held off a bit longer.”

Again, they sat in silence. Eventually, Otto nodded towards the window above the sink, “Wife and kids?” he asked.

“Wife and kid. Mother was just yesterday.”

“Shit.”

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“Drink, Mr. Reilly?” Otto asked as he pulled a beaming silver flask from his jacket. It was the only thing on him untouched by the elements.

Clarence shook his head no.

Otto shrugged and put it to his lips. He drank. When he had upended the flask he let out an audible exhale. Tucking it back into the jacket’s void he looked to Clarence, “Well, best be off,” he said simply.

Clarence watched in awe, as one by one the pocket watch, the notebook, and finally the revolver were returned beneath the coat.

Otto looked at him, “Take care of what’s left of ya’ll,” he said.

Clarence could only nod.

Otto paused at the door, “Which side you fight for?” he asked.

Clarence hesitated, “Ya know what? Don’t answer that,” Otto said suddenly, “doesn’t fucking matter.” He chuckled grimly and left.

Clarence ran to the stairs and called to the children. They scurried down anxiously.

“It’s alright. We’re lucky this time. First time in a while, eh?” Clarence smiled. His children returned the grin. Clarence couldn’t remember the last time he had seen them smile. He instructed his eldest to gather wood from the back.

Just then he heard Anne’s voice coming from the window, “Father, the man left his wagon.”

Clarence and his children ran out the front door and down the sloppy path leading to the horse-cart that lay on the ground. Matthew threw open the cover, revealing bills stacked nearly to the top.

The children scrambled and gathered pile upon pile. Clarence stood stupidly, unable to speak. He walked further down the path, as if uninterested in the bills in danger of being whisked away by the wind. He could make out the stranger as a fading spec atop his white horse. He watched for minutes until that spec became engulfed by the vast sea of nothing.

“Father,” Matthew’s touch startled Clarence. He wasn’t sure how long he had been standing there. Tears streamed down Matthew’s face, “It’s got to be twenty thousand dollars.” His voice was quivering so severely that he could hardly get the words out.

Clarence looked back and watched his two younger children dance, waving their emaciated bodies beside the carriage. A wave of emotion hit him. He closed his eyes. The three crosses atop the mounds out back seared his mind. Otto’s right, he thought, it doesn’t fucking matter.