Bittersweet

“Moss Face,” she called, “come here, fella.” Slowly the shadow crept forward, hunched down, his chin low over his paws. Sarah reached in, ducking her shoulder under the porch floor. Moss Face stopped, his brown eyes bright in the dimness. Small white feathers were stuck to the fur around his jaws. “Come on now, come here, boy, attaboy,” she cajoled. The coyote crept forward another few feet and she grabbed at his neckerchief. “Gotcha!” she cried as she dragged him out into the light. All around his mouth the fur was spiky with dried blood. Holding on to his collar, Sarah smacked him. “Bad dog!” He growled and bared his teeth. “Don’t you growl at me! And don’t you go killing my chickens!” She spanked him hard. Writhing in her grasp, rubbery lips pulled back in a snarl, Moss Face twisted to bite. His teeth grazed her wrist, barely breaking the skin, but it scared her and she let him loose. He was around the corner of the house and out of sight before she recovered herself.

“It’s Moss Face been killing the chickens,” she told Karl that night as she brushed out her hair. He sat on a chair beside the bed, his heavy workboots neatly side by side under the window, sewing a button on one of his shirts.

“I thought it might be,” he replied. “I guess no one wanted to know it for sure. Did you catch him in the henhouse?”

“No. Almost, though. He was under the house, too full to do anything but sleep. I got him to come out. He had feathers and blood all around his mouth.” She pulled back her sleeve. “I spanked him and he turned and bit me. I think he’s going back to being wild.”

“Maybe. I remember Mac said he might. I guess we’ll have to get rid of him.”

Her hand flew to her cheek as though he’d slapped her. “That’s Matthew’s dog!”

“He’s killing chickens. Today he bit you.”

“We can’t kill him.” She brushed her hair vigorously for a hundred strokes. Adjusting the lamp, Karl squared up his spectacles and pulled the thread around and around the button before tying it off. With the light so close, his face showed the years, the lines chiseled through the flat cheeks and fa

“We can’t kill him,” Sarah said again.

“We can’t keep him, if he’s killing chickens.”

Sarah put the brush down and tied her long hair back at the nape of her neck with a faded blue ribbon. “Couldn’t we take him somewhere and leave him? Let him go wild again?”

Karl thought for a moment. “We could do that. I’ll do it tomorrow. Coby and I pla

Sarah came to kneel between his knees. She still slept in the old fla

He let her bound hair slip through his hand, long and silken. “Mrs. Saunders,” he said, and smiled.

“Mrs. Saunders.” Sarah turned her face up to be kissed. “You need a haircut,” she commented. “Put it off much longer and we’ll have to get out the hairpins.”

He touched her lips softly with the tips of his fingers. “Sarah, do you ever miss Imogene?” he asked.

She was quiet a long time, and when she replied her voice was warm with remembering. “A little. I miss the small things mostly, I think. Pushing in hairpins before any big jobs-things like that.”

“Sometimes I miss her too.”

In the morning he was ready to go before sunrise, before Matthew was awake. Moss Face had not been in his usual place in the boy’s room, but under the porch, and he was uncharacteristically suspicious when Karl called him. He would only crawl into the light and whine, but wouldn’t come close enough to be touched. Finally, Sarah came out in her nightgown and slippers. She put a piece of venison left over from supper on the ground, and when Moss Face came out to eat it, Karl grabbed him. They fashioned a leash out of twine, the coyote’s neckerchief serving as a collar. He slipped out of it twice, but the third time they tied it as tight as they dared, and he couldn’t wriggle free. Karl swung into the saddle and started out, but Moss Face would not follow; he braced his feet and fought the lead until, afraid he would be choked, Karl bundled him into a gu

He leaned down from the saddle to kiss his wife. “Tell Coby I’ve gone out early to lose Moss Face. He can meet up with me at the bluff just south of Sand Pass.”

“I’ll send your lunch with him. It slipped my mind till just now.” Sarah folded her shawl more closely around her, and held the neck of her nightgown shut. A lantern burned on the ground at her feet; in its uneven light, her breath steamed.

“You’d better get inside.”

She nodded and picked up the lantern. “What shall I tell Matthew? First thing he’ll look for is that dog.” She laid her hand on the warm bundle by her husband’s knee. Moss Face stirred inside, whimpering, and Karl’s horse shied and sidestepped.

“Easy.” Karl gentled the old gelding with a touch. “Tell him the truth, Sarah.” A ribbon of light appeared around the porch door as it was opened a crack. “It looks like he’s up. Do you want me to tell him?”

She glanced over her shoulder. “No. You go. Quick, before he comes out. You’ll be at Sand Pass-south side-around noon?”

“That’s right-don’t forget my lunch.” He touched her hair lightly and turned the horse’s head to the southwest. Behind him the night sky was just begi

Where the desert began its ascent to Sand Pass, the road started winding, snaking up through the sage to a notch in the rounded mountains west of the stage stop. Over the pass, Karl turned his horse from the road and struck out through the sage, the eight-thousand-foot peak of Tohakum Mountain on his left and the ragged brown Pah Rah Range on his right. Moss Face lay quiet in his burlap prison. Occasionally he would shift or whine, and Karl would reassure him with soft words.

The sun was well above the horizon when Karl approached the pyramids at the north end of the lake. There was still no wind, but he rode with his coat buttoned high. The lake glittered a hard deep blue, the dark cobalt blue of the sea. He swung free of the saddle and threw the reins over the horse’s head. It began cropping the sparse dry weeds with a tearing sound. Karl lifted the gu

On wobbly legs, the coyote ventured halfway out, the sack draped over him like a cassock, and looked around. He closed his eyes and pointed his nose at the sky, his nostrils quivering as he took in his new surroundings.

“There’s water here, and even such a hearth-dog as you should be able to find enough to eat.” Karl stroked the rough fur, then untied the neckerchief and put it in his coat pocket. “Come all the way out. I want my sack back.” He upended the bag, poured the rest of Moss Face out, and scratched him behind the ears. “Good-bye, old fella, you’ll be fine.” He looped the sack over the saddlehorn, gathered up the reins, and, digging his heels into the horse, started off at a stiff trot.

Moss Face sat where Karl had dumped him, looking around with the confused air of a sleepwalker awakened in a strange bed. As Karl rode past the first hillock, Moss Face shook himself vigorously and started out after him.