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HORSES
THEY RODE - A
novel by Sid Gustafson
Wendel
Ingraham departs the devious workings of the Playfair Racecourse
in Spokane, Washington, on the eastbound passenger train, Empire
Builder. A forlorn man, he leaves behind a broken
marriage and a small daughter he dearly loves. Although
ticketed to the Blackfeet Indian Reservation east of Glacier
National Park, he disembarks in the small resort town of
Whitefish, Montana, where he was a good downhill ski racer
in his youth. He looks for a drink and runs into Nancy,
a former teammate. They spend the night reminiscing and
making love.
The
encounter confuses Wendel. By sunrise he finds himself
in an empty boxcar headed over the Continental Divide.
He barely survives the trip, encountering a grizzly bear
on the way, and wakes up in a desolate railroad yard with
his old mentor, Bubbles Ground Owl, a part-time Blackfeet
Medicine Man.
After
too much hard drinking, the pair head to a cattle ranch
owned by a pretentious white rancher, Rip Ripley. It is
the ranch where Wendel grew up, mostly without his parents.
After a week of sobering up, Wendel and Bubbles fall into
the ranch life they both once knew well.
The
two become a team, reunited after a lost decade. They ride
the range and tend to the horses and cattle. They help
each other cope. Bubbles immerses Wendel in a native spirituality
rooted in the depths of an ancient animal connectedness.
Both learn to live in a more positive fashion.
Then
the ranch owner’s half-blood Indian daughter, Gretchen,
shows up with a 12-year-old son and announces that Wendel
is the boy’s father. The son Wendel never knew he
had is the only heir to the largest ranch on the reservation.
As
autumn approaches, Wendel must reconcile two fatherhoods
and an array of complex relationships with women. The story
culminates in several exciting events—vision quests,
divorce and marriage, death and inheritance, and a thrilling
cross-country horse race along the rugged Rocky Mountain
Front. The conclusion rings with native resonance as Wendel
finally understands his life and the lives of his children.
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