The Devil Turned and Said, "Life is Cruel Out Here"

          We finished the fence a few days ago and I was relieved to not have to dig anymore three foot deep holes. The horses had been fighting, biting one another and so on, so we were looking forward to letting them out into the yard, with enough room that there should have been no conflict. All horses have different personalities. The seven are each very different and could probably be stereotyped parallel with something you'd see in high school.  Herman, Cheyenne, Thunder, Lil' Devil, Laya, Abandon, and Chap. Laya, Abandon and Chap are the 'popular' kids, but really they are just mean to the other horses. Very territorial. Herman is the 'best behaved', bought already trained, a friendly Paint, who loves attention ,but bucks when he has to leave the other horses...sometimes. Cheyenne and Thunder are the brother and sister pair we brought in the first few days. Kids of Laya, but sweet, friendly, and curious. Lil' Devil is an original. When the rancher inherited the ranch there were three hundred wild horses on the property. They rounded up all of them and took them to sale, except for one, who was hiding the whole time and reappeared about a month later. He was then named The Little Devil. He spooked like nobody's business and could run faster than you would believe. The rancher got on him only once and was thrown literally and figuratively for a loop. Since then Devil was deemed un-rideable and would rarely let anyone come near him, though we had gotten him to eat out of our hands in the last few weeks. Him and Herman stuck together a lot, but other times Devil would go off from the group and do his own thing. When we turned all the horses loose, they stuck together enough while still maintaining their space. At about six last night we saw that Thunder and Herman were on the wrong side of the fence and brought them in. We put all the horses in the coral after seeing that one of our posts for the fence had snapped in half. At that time, we couldn't find Devil and assumed he had spooked at whatever caused the fence to break and would come back later.
       The rancher had made delicious Maple Oatmeal bread and I had told him of my plans to stuff it with strawberries and make french toast in the morning. He wakes up at 4 AM pretty consistently and I merely guilt myself into walking into the kitchen at half past six. He is usually sitting at the kitchen island watching the radar for the weather, but this morning he was pacing in the living room when I woke up and I knew something was wrong. He turned around with watery eyes and said, "Devil's gone." "What do you mean?" I asked. He was obviously going to come back and be with the herd and get water. He may have wondered, but he wasn't gone. "I went up to the top to look for him and didn't see him, then came down and followed some blood I saw had splattered. He must have got stuck in the brush and punctured himself. He bled out." He walked towards me and hugged me. "I'll have to call John to get him out with the tractor. We'll have to clear some of the brush so he can get to him." "I'll pour you some coffee, then we'll go."
   Walking up, I felt hesitant. Not sure if I was ready to see the condition he might have been. I had heard coyotes last night before we went in and wasn't sure if I could walk up to a half eaten horse at seven thirty in the morning. He was already starting to bloat. Having fallen on his side, his hide quarters were on top of a pile of branches. Three of his legs were covered in blood. His mouth was slightly open, exposing a few of his top teeth. I couldn't see any immediate puncture wounds on his legs. Tracing back there were spots in the grass where he'd fallen, blood sprayed all over weeds, telling that there must have been more to it than his legs as the blood spray was more correlated to a rupture of an artery. We cleared all the fallen branches around him so that we could pull him out and take him to the 'bone yard', which is where all the dead animals get put. Having them near the house attracts all kinds of scavengers that aren't safe, though the turkey vultures circled all morning. The rancher wrapped a chain link around his hind legs and pulled him out with the pick up truck. It was only once we were able to move him that we saw what killed him. Devil had an eight inch puncture wound in his left chest. He'd spooked and ran into a fallen branch, probably turned and twisted to get away and bled out until he collapsed about thirty feet away. It was sad, horrible, honest and real.
   A few days after I had gotten to South Dakota, I saw a lone horse on the neighbor's property. "They probably got rid of the rest. That horse will either find water, or he won't. Life is cruel out here,"the rancher said.
   Life is cruel and Lil' Devil was proof. We knew there was lots of brush in that area, but had assumed the horses wouldn't get into it, because we assumed they wouldn't spook and break the fence. This morning when I woke up, it was absolutely gorgeous outside and it remained so all day. That's how things happen. Beauty and horror continue to walk hand in hand. I've always been a fan of the statement that life is a beautiful struggle, but sometimes we forget about the struggle. That each day is a feat and an accomplishment if finished. I felt bad and I liked Devil, and though my eyes welled up a few times, I never actually shed a tear until tonight, when we let the horses out again and found Herman, Laya, and Thunder, over by where Devil had died. They were looking for him.  They sniffed around and I found them licking some of the spots where there were pools of blood. Earlier in the morning, after we'd pulled Devil out, I went in to get the horses, and they were all acting strange. Half laying down, all together, they all came over when I walked in.
     In working with Cheyenne the last few days, I've asked myself how long it takes to tame something wild. I've found the answer in myself and in them. Something wild is always wild, because the spirit itself is free and that can never be tamed. It can behave and it can listen, but it can never be tamed and wild hearts never die. Devil's wild spirit will carry on over this ranch and those of us with something wild inside should never try and domesticate that feeling. Wear it with pride, be reckless, be free, be wild. It's what living is all about.

 Herman (left) with Devil (right)