Walker bent down and studied the ground. Horse prints were everywhere but he looked carefully for one in particular.
“This one has shoes on.” He said excitedly, pointing to a horse track that looked identical to every other horse track.
“What’s so great about that?” I asked, I had left home at three in the morning to hike down to his cave before dawn. He wasn’t expecting me, but there is no way for me to reach him to tell him I was coming so I just made sure to get there really early. I had an open invitation to come down anytime I wanted so I figured I might as well use it. I am always curious to learn more about the wilderness and I was sure he knew more than I.
After he had roused himself from sleep and made some hickory nut coffee he had told me that today he was going to try and track down some of the wild horses, see if he can find where they bed down at night. He invited me to join in, I went along curious as to how you track anything on this hard rocky ground.
“Wild horses don’t wear shoes! This one ran off from a camp or a farm. Plus that means it is tame, or relatively tame. A horse will usually throw its shoes in about a year. This one has got all four on.” He paused to brush some leaves aside from the tracks. “Now if I can just figure out which one it is that will be the one I try and grab. Problem is, it is with a herd, the herd is wild and will behave wild. Singling this guy out from the herd will be tough.”
We were in the bottom of a ravine, mud had washed through from just above us where a tree had been uprooted by a storm. Other than this small patch of soil it was all rocks and leaves. We continued up the ravine, following an intermittent stream, Walker constantly scanning the ground. I had no idea if we were still on the trail of the horses but Walker seemed to know for sure. While we walked he told me some of the history of this area. “The civil war was vicious down here. The Confederates came through raiding, every farm was fair game, except if it was one of the raiders farms. The Union came through and any farm that wasn’t raided they assumed to be a confederates or a sympathizer so they burnt it. This area never really recovered. The only thing this land was really good for was logging anyway. When they cleared it for railroad ties right after the war there was nothing left to sell. The government ended up with most of it due to unpaid taxes during the great depression, converted it to a wilderness area in the fifties.” He paused to look up the side of the hill. “Up we go.”
We climbed in silence, both of us trying to catch our breath. Occasionally he would point to the ground and say “print”, I still had no idea how he was tracking these animals. The Ozark hills are deceptively tall, and very steep. Every hundred or so steps we would stop, pant and try not to slide back down the hill. The leaves and rocks made the going harder, never giving us firm traction, but after a bit the hill gradually got easier and we found ourselves on a rock outcropping with a beautiful view of the valley we had just left and a nice clearing in the forest ahead.
“Horses gotta eat.” Walker said as we paused to catch our breath. “What they are eating is what has been confusing me. Deer eat about anything, I suppose horses will too. Something tells me they hit this clearing often, lots of clover in there. How much range does a horse need?”
I had no answer and so we continued along the hilltop through the clearing, “Look at that!” Walker was pointing at some plants near the edge of the forest. “Those are day lilies, you know what that means?” I had no idea so he went on to explain. “Day lilies mean a cabin. Day lily’s probably mean that it was a good sized cabin cause guys don’t plant lillys. I am going to assume that there was a woman with the guy, maybe even an entire family.” He scanned the ground, walking forward a few steps. “This was the foundation, right here” he said pointing to a faint line running along the ground. Slowly we traced out the size of the cabin, about fifteen by fifteen. “They generally built these cabins the size of the trees they can find. One big sleeping room, big porch, outbuildings for washing, cooking, storage. Bet we can find a spring with 200 feet. ”
“Why do you say that” I was really amazed at how he deduced what was invisible to me. I would have walked right by the plants, even if I had noticed them I never would have made the connection to why there where here and what they had meant.
“You don’t build a big cabin and plant flowers that need water without there being water around. “ Walker replied and I could see where he was following obvious logic that I hadn’t ever considered. A brief search and we found the spring, it was very small, just a trickle flowing. But that constant trickle would be enough to sustain a family, animals and even water a garden. We both drank from the spring and decided to abandon our tracking of the horses. Walker thought they were probably very close, as they had food and water here, we might have scared them off with our climbing up.
“Besides, I am not ready to catch one yet! What would I do with it? I just want to get a general idea of their habits and in the spring will try and grab one.”
Heading back to my truck that evening it struck me that a hundred years ago or so a family have lived, played, loved, struggled and survived for a while on top of that mountain. They had done all of this and disappeared. Perhaps burnt out during the war between the states. Perhaps they lost the land during the great depression, but regardless now the only trace of them was the faint lines in the earth that showed where once they had built a life. Now not even their names are remembered. The same will happen to me, Walker, Erik, everyone I have ever known or cared about. When we are all dead and gone we will no longer be remembered and will probably not even have a foundation left for future generations to notice.