The fire was almost burnt out. John Fitzgerald saw that Bridger was fast asleep, finally. All day long Bridger had a worried look on his face. He kept turning around to look behind them. Fitzgerald shook his head. Not sure what Bridger expected to see. It's not as if Glass would be running up to catch up with them.
At least Bridger had not brought up the topic of leaving Glass behind. He was smart enough to keep his mouth shut anyway. Conversation had been kept to a minimum since they had run out of camp that night, leaving Glass behind, alive, in his own grave.
Fitzgerald sniffed around the darkness and pulled his coat up against the cold. He rubbed his scalped head and pulled his hat down to keep his ears warm.
His conscience was not bothering him, not really. But, for some reason he could not sleep. So, he continued to stare at the fire as the last red hot embers began to blacken out into cold darkness.
"Kind of like Glass." Fitzgerald thought to himself.
It would have been so easy for Glass to go quiet and dark, so easy. Fitzgerald remembered that Glass had blinked. Glass had squeezed his eyes closed with no doubt as to the signal. Glass was ready to go. He'd been able to convince him at last. Fitzgerald began to take his life away. Then, what had happened?
It was all a blur. Glass started to struggle and squirm. Then his damned son had started to scream. Fitzgerald reflexively put his hands over his years even now to stop the screams. The screaming, that damned screaming. That's all Fitzgerald had wanted to do, make the screaming stop. Hawk just wouldn't stop. That damned Indian hadn't known what his screaming had done to Fitzgerald, it almost drove him mad. Maybe it had. Fitzgerald had too many memories of shrieking and scraping and scalping. All he had to do was touch his own scalped head to remember the Indian screams as they scraped the top of his head with a knife.
"Well..." Fitzgerald murmured to himself. He wasn't feeling any qualms about killing Hawk. He'd brought it on himself with his screams. The cold knife went in, up, and finally, silence.
As for Hugh Glass, well, the damned fool, taking them off the river and into this God forsaken wilderness, he had gotten just what he deserved. Damned fool would be the death of them all. Fitzgerald was not going to be another victim. Not after all he'd survived in his life. Let's just walk into the jaws of death, shall we?
The fire finally went completely out. It was cold, so damned cold. Fitzgerald could hear wolves howling out in the dark, snowy night. Their howls echoed for miles in the cold air.
It would be a miracle if he and Bridger got back to Fort Kiowa alive. If an avalanche did not kill them, damned Indians, bears or wolves would tear the life out of them. It was that simple. Survival was all that mattered now and Fitzgerald would survive and come out of this experience better off. He was determined to make a profit out of this cursed misadventure. He smiled wryly at the thought of honest Captain Henry handing over the payment he had earned for taking care of Glass. He'd live to see the day.
As long as Glass just stayed dead he had a chance. Yes, he had a chance. Fitzgerald finally laid back, closed his eyes and fell to sleep.
