The Tempering of Ben Ferrell
A hundred years from the spring he felt it, smelled it — the grizzly was here, someplace close.
George Ostrom
Fiction
Originally published in issue #7, June 2010
It takes years to change some boys into men — there are those who never make the grade. Benjamin Ferrell made it in less than 24 hours, but of course, the grizzly’s fee was rather high.
Ben was sixteen years and four days old when he took the switchbacking trail to Battlement Lookout. With the Army taking many foresters in 1944, high school recruits were still getting summer jobs; and being a local boy, Ben had drawn one of the toughest posts in the primitive Big River district, one where a bolt of lightning could run wild in virgin timber if the lookout missed that first telltale puff on a distant slope.
With the last steep mile-and-a-half of mountain ahead, and four hours of climbing behind him, the hurt of pack straps began to cut through Ben’s denim shirt, and the coarse cloth became an abrasive across his collarbone.
The trees thinned here, and those in the slide rock above bent like gnarled dwarfs, with backs to a wind that always blew. The whistles of marmots echoed across basin walls before dying away in the strange silence of Montana’s alpine country. The sight of a human spooked a mountain goat that scrambled under a cliff, and Ben could hear shale kicked loose, clattering into a gorge far below.
Another half mile and Ben passed the water-trail junction where, according to the ranger, a good spring was located, down on the Ousel Creek side. He planned to check that later, but now he was anxious to reach that peak, and the last mile of ground sped quickly beneath his boots.
The 12-foot cabin sat atop a 30-foot tower of logs and poles. Stairs wound around its outside supports, ending at a trapdoor in the four-foot catwalk, and windows ran along all sides. As soon as the shutters were raised, Ben sized up the interior: a small wood stove, a cot, a table and, in the middle, the alidade stand with telephone underneath. The alidade was a sighting instrument that could be rotated to any point, for taking location readings on fires.
He called the ranger station’s dispatcher, who logged the call and listed Battlement as officially manned. After hanging up, Ben checked the supplies brought in the week before by mule train: a 60-day ration of canned and dried fruit, bread, meat and vegetables and the standard staples — flour, salt, sugar, cornmeal, lantern gas. There was wood by the stove and more under the lookout. Ben had filled two canteens on the hike up, so there was enough water until the next day.
That evening he climbed down to explore the immediate area. The ground sloped away in every direction, gently to the west, more steeply to the south and east, then abruptly dropping off to the north. Only scattered, stunted stands of spruce and pine grew on three sides, but on the shaded cliffs to the north in Ousel Canyon, the timber created a veritable jungle. The garbage pit was 80 yards from the tower, at the edge of this dark tangle.
Ousel Creek twisted 4000 feet below, but the thunder of its cataracts drifted up to the peak, combining with the constant wailing of rising and dying wind, as shadows began climbing high purple slopes to the east. Ben went back up the stairs and reported in. By lantern light he unpacked the rucksack and assembled his old single-shot .22 rifle.
When he stepped outside for a last look around, two porcupines were below, chewing on the handle of his chopping axe. He killed the first with one shot, but had to shoot the other one twice. The shooting scared a cow elk that melted into the dusk.
For a long time Ben lay in the sleeping bag, listening to the wind. It was lonely and frightening, but that made everything more important. He knew this was work for a man.
After breakfast and the 8 a.m. call to the ranger station, he tied a five-gallon galvanized can to a packboard and went for water. From where the spring trail turned off the main ridge, it entered a dark, timbered world that could have been 1000 miles from the harsh rock crest above. Here on the north slopes, the ground grew mossy, and thickets dank. The path slipped back and forth into a steep side canyon to a grassy bench where the spring trickled out from the base of a 100-foot cliff. It formed a pool in the center of a small clearing. From this opening, visibility into the undergrowth dropped to zero.
Ben filled the big can and started back. It took three rest stops, but he hit the ridge top at 10:30 a.m. and was in the tower before noon check-in time.
On the 8 p.m. final report he told the dispatcher it had been a wonderful day, and he was enjoying the first taste of life as a wilderness lookout.
Later he heard rocks rolling and instinctively picked up the gun before stepping out on the catwalk. In the shadows near the garbage pit loomed the outline of a large grizzly bear. It might have scented dead porcupines, because it started toward the tower, great head swinging as it came. Thirty yards from the base the bear turned profile to the cabin and reared up on its hind legs.
Benjamin Ferrell had hunted deer since he was ten years old and had killed a royal elk at 13. He knew more about animals, hunting and guns than most 16-year-olds know about cars…but he was 16.
There couldn’t have been a decision made. He simply did it…aimed the puny .22 at the head of a 600-pound grizzly and squeezed the trigger. The stupidity of such provocation smashed through Ben’s mind with numbing force even before the first tiny slug hit the hulking form on the ground below.
There was a snarling cough as the second shot hit close to an ear, and the grizzly roared with fury, going back down on all fours. He viciously rubbed the side of his head on the ground and slashed a stump to pieces with one sweep of an enormous paw.
When the initial bullet left the muzzle, Ben knew there was no going back, and now fateful questions rushed in. If the bear located the gun, could and would he climb the tower stairs? If he stayed on the ground, could the little weapon eventually kill him?
The .22 cracked again, and the grizzly roared louder, demolishing the mule hitching rack as he lurched from the sting.
Ben tried to move and fire only when the beast’s face was away from the lookout. It was growing dark fast, and the powder flashes might reveal the bear’s tormentor. Four more shots snapped off, and sounds of savagery rolled across the canyons as the brute crashed into the woodpile and dead porcupines under the tower. Twice the frenzied bulk slammed into a corner post, and the cabin shuddered.
Leaning perilously far over the railing, Ben managed three last shots before the maddened grizzly crashed away downhill toward the Ousel Creek jungle. He held his fire as darkness closed in, and within seconds the receding snarls were erased by the wind through trees and rocks and tower.
Ben slumped on the catwalk and was sick. He couldn’t even move his head out over the slivery edge.
He had soaked up hundreds of hunting stories in his life, but the only ones remembered now were about wounded grizzles stalking, ambushing, killing and mauling.
He also thought of his obligation to protect everything in the wilderness, and he knew this included bears. But here…now…100 yards away, perhaps 1000 yards, was a grizzly, maybe slipping back through darkness to end this night of terror. The bear could return in a day or two. It might be down there now, planning, bleeding, waiting.
After many minutes, possibly an hour, Ben crawled inside and stealthily closed the door.
All the water had been used up on window washing that afternoon, except for one canteen. A deep swallow was cold in his empty stomach. He opened the window next to the cot, figuring if the bear came back and did climb the tower, a man could reach the cabin roof from the catwalk railing, but the big animal could not follow. If such a thing happened, Ben reasoned he could shoot many times at close quarters…if it came to that. He taped the flashlight to his wrist in preparation. Stench of the bear lingered, and Ben shivered at thoughts of another meeting.
If daylight is a time of wind-filled silence in the high country, night is a time of noise-filled silence. Ben speculated that the grizzly smell would keep away the usual salt-seeking deer, goat and elk, so any heavy sound could signal returning trouble, but in the blackness of the primitive lookout, it was impossible to assess the mysterious snapping of a branch or the rustle of a nearby bush. The boy spent six and a half hours counting off minutes that few men would face with calmness, awaiting the showdown that might come before dawn.
At 5 a.m. he crept back to the catwalk, straining aching eyes at emerging forms on the ground below, praying for the sun to hurry. It did not hurry, but it did come, and in its light Ben could view the savagery of the bear’s work. The earth was rent and gouged. Only hunks of the porcupines remained. Huge splinters had been ripped from the tower supports, and there was blood. The whole thing seemed an ugly fantasy, but the evidence was there, and Ben knew this would be a very long day.
He ate a cold breakfast, using the last water to wash it down. His voice sounded normal during the 8 a.m. call to the ranger station, though there were suppressed longings to blurt away the whole sickening mess, in preference to the unfinished business on Battlement. Ben knew that the ranger would have men with high-powered rifles up to the peak on horseback by early afternoon, but there would also be a new lookout man coming with them. The Forest Service didn’t need a kid who abused the privilege of owning a small varmint gun.
Several times during the morning he stood on the catwalk and yelled at the grizzly, “Where are you, you yella bastard? Come out of the brush and fight…I know you’re there some place. Ya can’t hide forever, ya big sonfabtich.”
He threw empty cans and sticks of wood into all thickets within range that could hide the enemy, but nothing stirred, and the sun rose higher, and the little gun sweated under the tormented squeeze of his hands.
“Come out, ya dirty devil. Come out and fight. I’ll show ya how I shoot in the daytime.”
Once, when hysterical obscenities came echoing back on the wind, Ben wondered if reason might be slipping away, and the grizzly was having the final joke.
He made up stories about what really happened, but each one turned sour in his brain. He tried to invent an ending, but the real ending kept ruining the dreams. Last evening there had been no personal emotion toward the bear, but now there was hatred, and curses for this day of slowly passing hell. The bear had no right to come around the lookout, caving in the garbage pit, threatening a Forest Service man who was there to protect the wilds.
On the noon check-in, Ben again felt the desire to seek help, but at the last second passed it by to lie that things were well. He also told the dispatcher that he had used up all the water and would have to go for more. Ben knew this farce could not go on much longer. He was embarrassed about mentioning the need for water, when stark fear had him trapped on the tower.
After lunch he managed to face the decision about going to the spring, planning to carry the can only half full so the return could be made much faster.
He left the tower running, and the first crash of his boots on rocks brought him up short, glancing about in panic. He thought of going back, but fought it down and decided to sneak instead, avoiding thickets, sticking to the open wherever possible. He carried some gas-soaked rags and stick matches along with the gun, and now he unsnapped the handle guard from the knife sheath.
Near the water-trail junction, ptarmigan burst from a huckleberry patch, and Ben fell over backward in fright. The can clanged loudly on the rocks, and he cursed while swinging the rifle in jerky circles. Only the wind moved, so he continued down the hill, gulping in air, trying a return to less violent breathing.
In the muggy foliage of the north slope, visibility dropped and Ben walked ever slower, one step at a time…listening…peering into the tangles on all sides.
A hundred yards from the spring he felt it, smelled it — the grizzly was here, someplace close. He whirled to check the back trail — nothing there.
The packboard was removed and silently laid aside. With the rags stuffed part way into pants pockets, and matches clamped in his teeth, his free hand could hold more cartridges.
For a few seconds Ben again considered going back to the tower…if the bear hadn’t already blocked the exit above. Thoughts of such an ambush made anger rise higher, and the boy stepped into the jungle. Clear of the trail, movement was difficult; but he didn’t mind, for the concealing greenery now seemed a welcome change from the exposed brown ridge above.
In an hour’s agonizing time he had inched up near the cliff top above the spring, and crawled forward cautiously to peer from its brushy rim.
For a flashing second, the sight didn’t register, then it hit…short yards below, a huge mound of hair slumped sideways in the riled spring, the object of all Ben’s fear and hate.
The bear had dug deep to press into the mud, and lay with small eyes shut, bawling quietly with each great, heaving breath. Right at the mud line, pink froth mixed with the oozing dirt, telling of one tiny slug that had hit a lung. From the smear beneath the massive neck, Ben guessed that another shot might have nicked the jugular vein. The .22 could never have broken any shoulder bones, so everything now depended on one questions: did the bear have enough left to get up and come at him around the cliff? The answer was here, and Ben wanted it now. He carefully picked an escape route back through the brush, then triggered the little rifle.
The enormous form shuddered and lurched from the mud with a sucking sound. A massive front leg sank under the weight and the grizzly bellered, swinging that monstrous head toward the cliff, then struggled to rise again.
This was not idiotic point shooting in the dusk. This was cold firing in perfect light, with each little slug malevolently placed where aimed.
Ben didn’t count the shots, but there were many, and after a time the grizzly didn’t struggle at all, so Ben threw rocks at the body, then slid around the cliff and down to the clearing. Approaching from the rear, he stood tensed to flee and fired point blank at the base of the skull. Was there a movement? Ben’s pumping lungs sent air whistling through gritted teeth as he brutally drove the five-inch knife between the forward ribs, leaping clear again. The bear was still.
Ben collapsed, gasping, beside the shaggy head, studying the powerful forelegs, the curving claws, the steel-trap jaws, and he shuddered in recalling the fight the previous night.
With glazing sight locked to the blood-soaked earth, he slowly came to know how the grizzly had suffered, also alone in his fear and hate.
Ben Ferrell started sobbing. The fuzz-covered face pressed hard into sweaty hands, the tears trickled across his wrists. There was no fear or hate now, only death and shame, and the wind coming up from Ousel Creek.
