Old Misery/Chapter 12
CHAPTER XII
AS PROCLAIMED BY TUNKAN
THEY traveled many days; also they loitered and camped and hunted. There were forced marches over dreary deserts and barren mud-plains. On the eastern slopes of the Humboldt they tarried, and Gilbert's interest in life faintly revived at sight of numerous springs cascading down the rocks.
The tumbling ribbons of silver reminded him of Nature's prodigal waste of water among the New England mountains in early summer. They made many side excursions to nameless places, and they halted and did nothing for days in pleasant spots. At first Gilbert had been watchful for Indians, but in time became indifferent to them as a menace.
From the first day out of the outlaws' valley Old Misery had commenced his tutelage, only his companion did not realize it. Liberally supplied with ammunition, the mountain man contrived for his pupil to shoot much of the meat they ate, and initiated him into the various ruses of the hunter. To educate a greenhorn somewhere near to a mountain man's standards is a hard task. Only a great liking for the Vermonter held Misery to the work.
Old Misery might have been somewhat discouraged had he known how hungry his friend was for civilization, and how eagerly he looked ahead to visiting Salt Lake City. Very possibly the mountain man came to suspect this yearning for wooden houses and food on tables. For although they followed the immigrant road around the north end of Great Salt Lake and down the eastern side almost to the Mormon metropolis Misery shifted their course on a cloudy day and traveled east through Ogden Hole. He had hoped to deceive his friend until the city of the Saints was out of reach, and yet he was disappointed.
The fact was Gilbert did not possess the instinct of location. Without the sun to guide him he could not orient himself. On all other points of woods, mountain and plain craft Misery was confident the young man would grow to high standards of excellence. On the most vital of all points he showed but little progress.
Often the mountain man encouraged himself by secretly vowing:
“He'll come to it. I'll make him. Slow myself at first.”
He knew the last was false. There had never been a time he could remember when, placed anywhere, he could not instinctively name the points of the compass. Having always possessed this instinct it was hard to be patient with one who lacked it. But he liked Gilbert. Few of his own generation were alive. He had long since passed the time when a man collects new friends. It had been an amazingly pleasing experience to have the boy “take care” of him in Grass Valley. In all his winter counts that incident would remain most prominent.
Tom Tobin would have taken care of him in a fight against hopeless odds, and cheerfully have died in front of him. But Tom would do it as Misery would do it, with a mouthful of harmless oaths and a manner brusk almost to brutality. Tobin showed his liking by damning. So did Old Misery. The boy had come to the bunk when he believed Misery was asleep and had rested a hand on his forehead. Old Misery almost felt ashamed as he recalled and thrilled over such intimate solicitude.
One night while studying his medicine the notion struck him that had he had a son it would be this Gilbert. He nourished the fancy, a bit ashamed, as if it were a weakness, yet encouraged the idea. A mountain man wasted no time in placing a hand on a “pard's" head unless it was placed there violently. The idea wasn't permissible except one conceive of a son doing it. Then it became all right. It logically followed that Gilbert should have been his son (young enough to be his grandson), and the old man created a little make-believe world in his mind wherein he had raised a boy to look after him.
Up and around the Red Chimney Fork of the Weber they traveled, and only as time passed did the Vermonter come to suspect they were not making for the city by the great lake. He expressed his regret.
The mountain man told him:
“I'd like mortal well to obleege you, but there's reasons why I'd better not go visiting the Elders for a while. Once some of their Destroying Angels jumped me, thinking I was another man. Afore the mistake was found out I'd counted five coups. We're well east of Salt Lake now.”
“Then I'm mighty glad we didn't go there,” warmly declared Gilbert, his disappointment vanishing. “Don't know what I'd do if anything happened to you.”
“Keep shet and don't talk heyoka,” growled Old Misery, feeling more highly pleased than possible for him to express.
For the sake of convenience, reenforced by a feeling of affection, Gilbert began to address Misery as “Dad.” The old mountain man fairly squirmed with delight, but was unusually brusk for several days.
Gilbert was strongly stirred when they came to the head of Sulphur Creek and was told by his companion:
“We're at the rim of the basin. Bimeby we'll strike east-flowing rivers.”
“I'd like to see one of those rivers,” muttered Gilbert, his eyes homesick.
Old Misery studied him furtively. Then he tried to change his line of thought by profanely declaring:
“Damn my moccasins! But you'll make a mountain man yet. You're a good shot. A mighty good shot. Young eyes. You're better at squaw work than I be. You ride well. Just two things for you to l'arn; fighting Injuns and knowing where you be when the sun don't shine. Just a bit more spirit; just a bit more liking for it, and them two things will come.
“Just wait till we strike Jim Bridger's trading-post on the Black Fork of the Green. He'll put a love for mountains and Injun-fighting into your blood! 'Nother forty miles will fetch us there. No one can listen to Bridger and not turn mountain man on the spot.”
Gilbert smiled rather grimly and reminded him:
“Nothing else for me to do, is there, Dad? I can't go home, you know. And I can't wander around alone. I'd go in a circle. It's mighty kind of you to bother with me. I feel as if I were holding you back.”
“Satan and sin!” roared Old Misery, fairly bristling with delight. “Any one would think I was tending the whisky-trade in one of the old rendezvous. Holding me back? From what? I don't have to be on time for nothing— But you'll like Bridger. You'll like his place. You'll prob'ly see Shoshoni, Utahs and Uintahs Injuns there.”
One more camp and they came to the fort. It was built of pickets, with sleeping-quarters and offices in the center, the entrance being through a strong gate. On the north side was a large and enclosed yard where the stock was corralled for protection against the Indians and wild animals.
To Old Misery's great disappointment Bridger was away on the Fort Hall road and would not be back for several weeks. Gilbert learned that the fort occupied the neutral ground between the Shoshoni and Crows on the north, the Dakotas on the east, the Cheyennes on the southeast and the Utahs on the south. Here, also, the immigrant road from the East divided, one fork leading to Oregon by the way of Fort Hall on the Snake, the other extending for a hundred and twenty-five miles to Salt Lake City.
“We'll rest for a day or so,” Old Misery told Gilbert.
The latter was satisfied. It was an excellent place for a camp. The Vermonter was contrasting the sandy wastes with the thick grass, the absence of all timber with the graceful groves of cottonwoods, willows and hawthorns. A mile and a half above the fort the fork divided into four streams, clear and sweet, and reunited two miles below.
This combination of water and beautiful islands, with the Bear River Mountains for a background, was most pleasing. Gilbert found but one flaw—the several camps of Indians around the fort. It made him feel uneasy to observe how carelessly Old Misery entered the skin lodges to talk with former enemies and friends. Sometimes the mountain man spoke the red man's language, and sometimes he depended upon the sign-language.
“I don't like it, Dad,” remonstrated Gilbert. “They'll be doing you mischief.”
“Like hell they will!” roared Old Misery, immensely pleased but anxious to conceal the fact. “When they can show me new tricks you'll be older'n me.”
They tarried three days, and Gilbert was willing to remain longer, but the mountain man suddenly decided he must be traveling. He had no set purpose that Gilbert could learn beyond his explanation that his feet “itched.” It was late in the afternoon that Old Misery insisted they break camp. Gilbert would have preferred an early-morning start.
They went down the fork five miles and camped in a meadow on the right bank where there was good grass. A train for Salt Lake City was passing, carrying stores to merchants. The mountain man exchanged two nuggets for a liberal supply of coffee and sugar, articles which they had long been out of and which were very scarce at the fort.
On the next day they made twenty miles, following the immigrant road to the mouth of the Muddy. When dust clouds told them immigrant trains were coming Old Misery complained and said he felt “too crowded.”
As they advanced Gilbert collected white, yellow and smoky quartz fragments which were sprinkled over the ground. The mountain man watched him closely and consulted his rock-medicine; then became gloomy of mien.
Gilbert noted his depression and asked the cause.
“I was hoping Tunkan had a medicine for you,” explained Misery. “It made me think that when I see you going after the colored stones. I'm 'fraid it ain't so. But don't you fuss; there's lots of medicines. And yours may be mighty strong without being a Tunkan one.”
Thus far the mountain man had been unable to discover whether the rocks, the Thunder Birds, the water or the sun, favored his young companion; and being in doubt meant a troubled frame of mind. Because Gilbert's sense of location seemed to be lacking Old Misery dismissed the sun. His own researches had seemed to eliminate the Stone God. Inasmuch as he was thinking in the terms of the Dakota god-seeking he was forced to believe Gilbert was under the protection of Takuskansan, or the Moving Deity; or of the Unktelii, the Water God.
“He may be so damned wakan I don't know nothing 'bout it,” mumbled the mountain man. And yet there abided the recollection of Gilbert's inability to place himself when the route was changed.
Anxious to leave the white man's road, Old Misery was ready to start before sunrise. They followed the road two miles, long enough to raise Pilot Butte. The road toward the butte was over an empty, barren plain. The country was desolate, and, to Gilbert, depressing. But Old Misery continued to be in high spirits. They covered twenty-five miles, and, after making an easy ford of a hundred and forty feet, camped on Black Fork.
The vegetation consisted of dwarf sage and greasewood and black currant bushes, with much bunch-grass and occasional thickets of willows. Gilbert simulated a gaiety of spirits he was far from feeling, and Old Misery was hilarious in their lonely surroundings.
“Where are we going?” asked Gilbert.
“Nowhere in 'tic'lar. Just looking the ground over,” replied Old Misery, his heart aching as he began to realize his youthful companion sensed but little as to their general direction. “We may go as far as Fort Laramie. Mebbe not. Bimeby we'll swing back over the Oregon road and turn off north into the Beaver Head country. I'm kinda cur'ous to see if things has changed since I was up there last.”
When they awoke next morning it was to find the sky overcast and to feel a chill wind. To add to their discomfort some thirty horsemen charged down on the camp as they were preparing breakfast.
Gilbert yelled, “Indians!” seized his rifle, rolled into a shallow depression and drew a bead on the foremost rider.
Old Misery threw his blankets over the young man's head and warned: “Don't shoot!”
Gilbert got rid of the blanket and beheld Indians spreading to encircle them. Old Misery was walking toward the horsemen, one hand raised. The riders on the ends of the half-circle galloped in, closed the gap and the mountain man was surrounded. Gilbert remembered all he had heard about Indian torture and decided to die fighting. Then the group opened, and his friend was returning, accompanied by the red band. The mountain man shouted:
“Don't feel skittish. They're good folks.”
As he drew nearer he explained:
“Shoshoni. Friends of mine. Carrying a pipe against some Utahs. Thought our smoke was made by their enemies.”
But Gilbert did feel “skittish.” The Shoshoni looked very savage in their paint. Some were armed with old rifles, some had sword-blades fastened to long poles for lances. Every man carried a bow and a quiver of war arrows; and around the neck of each hung a small round shield.
Old Misery made them a feast of coffee and sugar, luxuries they were inordinately fond of. In return they presented to the white men a buffalo-tongue and two marrow-bones. After making sure they could have no more coffee and sugar the warriors rode south in search of the Utahs. By the time the marrow-bones were roasted and eaten a drizzling rain set in. Gilbert would have preferred erecting a shelter and waiting for clear skies, but to the mountain man all weather was welcome.
They traveled to Green River, striking it a mile above Bitter Creek, and descended a thirty-foot bank to splash eight hundred feet to the opposite bank. The gray sky, the pelting rain and the sullen river impressed Gilbert as being dreary and dangerous. However, at no spot of the crossing did the water more than touch their stirrups. The mile-wide bottom was dotted with willows and heavily grassed. Old Misery hurried through this area. The rain ceased, a thick fog taking its place. Gilbert was soaked. Buffalo-berry bushes, fifteen feet in height, stretched out branches through the mist to scratch his face. He tried walking and stepped in holes. At last he urged his companion to halt.
“Just a trifle more travel,” cheerily replied the mountain man. “Three Injuns been follering us ever since we broke camp. Some of my Shoshoni friends. They hanker to git our guns and horses. Good people and all right, but they can't help stealing hosses 'n' guns any more'n white can help driving Chinamen 'n' greasers from a rich placer-claim, or Sailor Ben can help drinking whisky.”
He took the lead as they entered the Bitter Creek Valley and warned Gilbert to cease talking. After a few miles he was forced to call a halt as their course was cut by numerous deep gullies. They were not disturbed that night, and the morning was cloudless. There were no signs of Indians. Gilbert believed he had never gazed on a more desolate scene, except in the Great Basin, than he beheld under the first light. The wash from the sand stone cliffs was so continuous as to prohibit vegetation. Not even a blade of grass was to be seen.
“Ain't this a bully place!” enthusiastically cried Old Misery. “Lawd! But I'm glad to be back here once more.”
“Mighty lonesome, Dad,” sighed Gilbert.
But Misery warmly defended the valley, saying it had little snow in winter and in the old days had been a favorite rendezvous for trappers. As they cooked and ate the buffalo-tongue the mountain man reveled in reminiscences, speaking of times before the invention of silk hats spoiled the beaver-trade. He reviewed the old-time mountain men from Ashley down, and concluded his talk by proudly declaring:
“And you're to be one of the same tribe. And a mighty good one.”
“If I'm not it won't be because I didn't have a good teacher,” agreed Gilbert.
Two more camps found them following up the east, or left, fork of Bitter Creek. Antelope were not numerous. Old Misery shot a buck and Gilbert easily bagged a half-dozen fat quail. They came upon the track of a big bear, and the mountain man's eyes lighted with love of the chase. Then he surprised his companion by foregoing the pleasure.
“No chance to overtake him?” asked Gilbert as they left the trail.
“He's close by. Git him all right,” muttered Misery. “But the notion hit me that mebbe he's a friend of Bill Williams. Hope they don't forgit that Bill likes his chaw of terbacker.”
Gilbert's physical improvement delighted Misery. During the seventy miles up this one valley he seemed to have doubled in strength and in ability to make a camp, read signs, and to find and shoot game. His face was deeply tanned, and, no longer daily living in fear of mob violence, his eyes were keenly objective. There remained but one defect in him, and Misery repeatedly told himself this would be speedily overcome: Without the sun or stars to guide him he had no sense of direction.
They left the valley and rode six miles to a small branch of the Muddy. Gilbert was disgusted to find the water strong of alkali. The animals drank it with reluctance. Grass had been scarce, and the horses and mule had suffered. It was Misery's plan to camp and recruit the strength of their animals, but they barely had reached the creek before buffalo were sighted and the mountain man gave chase. After an hour he returned in disgust, his worn-out horse being unable to carry him alongside the shaggy creatures.
That night Gilbert received the scare of his life when an old bull stumbled upon the camp and stampeded the horses and mule. Aroused from a dreamless sleep by the visitor's blundering about, Gilbert heard his companion shouting, heard the crack of his rifle and took it for granted the Indians had them.
After the bull had departed they built a fire and looked for damage. None of their weapons had been injured, and the property loss was insignificant aside from the disappearance of the horses. Old Misery was much disturbed but presented a cheery face to his young friend as they sat by the blaze and reviewed the mishap.
“I'll fetch 'em back in no time once light comes,” optimistically declared the mountain man. He started his search before sunrise and before Gilbert was awake found the three strays grazing within two miles of the camp.
Traveling less than four miles after breakfast, they passed between high cliffs of red and green clay and came out on a vast prairie, which, Misery informed his companion, stretched from the Snake to the Platte. Then followed days of aimless wandering. At night Misery would ask his friend to make a map of where they had been, but only when the sky was clear and their course had followed a general direction was the result any more than guess-work.
As a rule the young man retained only fragments of recollection of narrow gulches, beaver-dams, silhouettes of interminable mountain ranges, sage, salt-grass, ridges covered with flat black gravel, ridges bedecked with yellow and white quartz, large bear tracks, petrification of shells mysteriously scattered over high places, and grotesque sandstone buttes. But all this data was scrambled together in his mind, and the trivial, if curious, was more keenly retained in memory than some prominent landmark.
“You ain't yet come to the p'int where you're able to carry a picter in your mind of where you've been,” mused the mountain man one night.
“Nowhere near that point. It's all like a jumble of dreams. I'm hopeless.”
“Not by a damn sight!” energetically denied Misery. “You're doing fine. Don't 'spect you to pick up in a season what I've been gitting together for fifty years. Now them last big shells you see. What did the butte east of that ridge make you think off"
Gilbert's face was blank.
“I remember the shells well. I remember there were three overlapping each other like a big fan. But I don't remember any butte.”
“Course you wouldn't,” heartily cried Misery. “Buttes everywhere, every day. Shells is more scurce.”
Yet when he went to look after the horses his face was very grave. He was keenly disappointed. But his liking for the young man was too genuine to permit him to abandon the task.
With a shrug of his shoulders he grimly told himself:
“But I'll do it. I could make a mountain man out of Bill Williams. I'll make one out of the younker, or bu'st. He's gitting along fine 'cept he never knows where he's going or where he's been. Even a bear knows that much. But what of it? Ain't I going to keep at his side? Ain't I got eyes 'nough for two?”
He returned to the camp to find Gilbert about to set out to shoot game. He restrained him by explaining:
“We're now on the war-grounds of a half a dozen hostile tribes. So we won't fire any guns to-day. It's only 'bout two miles from here that Henry Frappe, Jim Bridger's old partner, was wiped out. Five hundred Dakotas, Cheyennes and 'Rapahoes charged his camp, drove off his cattle, killed a white man, two women and a Injun; then scattered and chased his hunters and bagged several of 'em.
“Jim was building his station on Green River and sent word for Frappe to quit this country. But Frappe didn't move quick 'nough and was jumped by another big band. He was killed with eight of his people, but forty Injuns was wiped out.”
“Are the Indians as quick to attack now as they were then?” inquired Gilbert, endeavoring to conceal his anxiety.
“More so. Back in 'forty-one the first immigrant train went up the Platte to Oregon. Till then only some of us trappers had crossed the northern plains. But from 'forty-one on the Injuns began to understand there was lots of white folks in the world, and their eyes bunged out when they see the whites streaming across their hunting-grounds. Wood was cut down and wasted. River bottoms grazed bare by the stock. Buf'ler shot and left to rot on the ground, or scared out the country. Why, in 'thirty-five the Oglala hunted at the forks of the Platte. In 'forty-five they had to travel to the Laramie Plains to hunt. Now they have to go farther where the Shoshoni is ready to carry a fight to 'em.”
“Then why do we come here? Just to get killed?” demanded Gilbert.
“Oh, we'll git through with our ha'r on, if we keep our eyes open. One of my Shoshoni friends back along that was trying to steal our hosses told me that the Pawnees just had a big fight with the Cheyennes, Kiowys 'n' Comanches, and killed some of their men. Now them three tribes is trying to git the Sioux to help 'em carry a pipe against the Pawnees. So you see it makes it mighty nice for us as we can slip through the pass and take a peep at Fort Laramie while them four tribes are busy smoking war-terbacker.
“You can't be a mountain man till you're a plains man. That's why I'm fetching you out here. It's your eddication. You're going to like it, too. No one to boss you round. No posse to come after you. You can just look up to the old mountains every day and tell every one to go to hell!”
Gilbert was not entirely reassured. On the next day they rode through a beautiful pass, and the mountain man reined in and announced they were standing on the height of land that separates the waters of the Atlantic from those of the Pacific. Gilbert's first feeling was of joy. Then he remembered the red danger. Next he was recalling his sentence to exile, and a great misery filled his heart. Before him extended the gently undulating country sloping to the east, with the Medicine Bow Mountains in the background. Old Misery pointed to the range and said the Platte flowed along its base.
“Now don't it make you feel sorter proud to know you've stood where the big rivers git their start?” anxiously asked Old Misery.
“At first. But I can't help remembering that I can never follow them east,” sadly replied Gilbert.
“Satan and sin! A mountain man don't want to foller 'em east. Fort Laramie is far 'nough east for us to foller any river,” impatiently cried the mountain man. Then more gently: “I’m bound to do it, younker. I'm going to make a prime mountain man out of you. You're going to travel with me and see I ain't buried under ground when I’m wiped out. You feel a little out of sorts now, but you'll git over it. Just think of coming all this way from Californy! Don't it make you feel like you'd done something, counted a big coup, and oughter be named to wear the crow in your belt? Don't it make you feel like you owned the world?”
“It’s fine to think about,” agreed Gilbert, essaying to present a better face. “But of course I couldn't have made three camps if it hadn't been for you.”
“What of it? Everybody has to be l'arned. I had to be. Now here we be, two mountain men. Every sky-line is free to us. Let folks stew in towns back East and on the coast. Let 'em rob 'n' cheat 'n' die. We don't have any more truck with such doings than a eagle does. We're free to come and go. No one can tell us where and when to go. We take what we want. We live in a country the Almighty made. Made for us to live in and not for men to shovel into cricks and cover with wooden lodges. We don't need money.”
There was something in this speech that impressed Gilbert as portraying a magnificent freedom. If only a man could forget his kin, could forget ambition as measured by the town, forget the dark-haired Walker girl back home! Then that man would be without a care or a responsibility. Anyway, sentence had been passed on him.
“I'll make a hard try for it,” he stoutly declared. “The East is closed to me. I'm a fool to make myself miserable when it can't be helped.”
“Wakan talk! Wakantanka! Hi yo! A man comes to take a new name! All he now sees belongs to him!”
And in his joy at the young man's decision Old Misery slipped from his horse and executed a little dance of triumph.
Remounting, he sedately announced:
“Now we'll range down to Fort Laramie and take a squint at the immigrant trains making for South Pass, swapping their eastern prisons of wood for western prisons of wood. Mebbe we'll guide a train through Injun country far as Fort Hall. Sometimes I feel I oughter do that for the women 'n' children. Mebbe we'll turn back to the Park Mountains and see where the Colorado rises. Or we can cut up into the Flat Head country and help the Nez Percés carry a pipe over the mountains against the Blackfeet. I owe the Blackfeet a few digs. Lawd! Wish I could live a million years and not have anything changed. Then I'd have time to hunt every crick 'n' buf'ler waller, every peak 'n' canon.”
After this talk, and largely because he was convinced of the futility of fighting against the inexorable, Gilbert did his best to pick up the ways of his companion. While they were camping in a wonderful bottom on the left bank of the north fork of the Platte he announced his desire to shoot buffalo from the saddle. Heretofore he had shot them only by stalking. He felt uplifted by the gigantic cottonwoods, towering sixty feet above their camp. He was determined to complete his education as rapidly as possible.
Old Misery secretly applauded his ambition but had misgivings. Gilbert's horse was not trained to run buffalo; nor had the young man any experience in shooting while at full gallop. But the mountain man would not discourage him. He simply advised:
“Take my hand-gun and leave your rifle. If your hoss will carry you close the hand-gun will do the business and won't need only one hand. Bimeby you can try shooting the rifle when going at a dead run.”
Taking the heavy revolver, he rode out to a small herd of buffalo. He drew very close before the huge animals displayed any alarm. They started off at a ponderous gallop, moving slowly at first, and he had no difficulty in maneuvering his mount alongside a cow. He held the revolver, cocked, and brought it down to fire just as his horse stumbled and all but fell. His gun-hand instinctively moved in and the weapon discharged under the unintentional pressure of the trigger finger; and the horse, minus the tip of an ear, reared violently and threw him to the ground.
With the breath dashed from his lungs he remained on his back until Old Misery flogged his horse forward and in a flying leap gained his side.
“Hurt bad, younker? Bullet hit you? Good lord! To think I let you try it!”
“All right!” gasped Gilbert. “Lost my breath. I'm all right. And what a fool!”
“You done fine!” cried the mountain man. “Never see a man make a better start. But what'n hell made that hoss prance so! Never showed such life afore!”
Gilbert crawled to his feet. Old Misery remounted and caught the runaway. Now assured his companion was not injured, he struggled mightily to keep a sober face as he brought the horse back and rubbed some bear grease on the poor brute's mutilated ear.
“Did I do that?” cried Gilbert.
“If you did it's some of the neatest, closest shooting I ever see,” declared the mountain man.
Now they began to find old Indian stockades where war-parties had camped. They left the Platte to travel around an isolated mountain on the north of Medicine Bow Butte. Old Misery pointed to the narrow opening between the two and explained that while Frémont had passed through the gorge in 1842 they would save time by avoiding it, so rough was the traveling.
He had scarcely finished this bit of information before he was standing in his stirrups and shading his eyes as he stared at the rough defile. Gilbert's gaze, quickened by experience, discovered it—a dot. It was emerging from the pass, and was followed by another and another, until a score had strung into view. A short distance on their right was a clean, open grove of pine, marking the course of a branch of Rattlesnake Creek.
“Are they Indians?” whispered Gilbert.
“Yep. Fetching us a fight,” quietly replied the mountain man. “Mebbe they'll think the risk is too much for what little they can git.”
He shifted his gaze to the pines.
“We'll ride in there and stand 'em off.”
“You've said we should keep in the open,” reminded Gilbert.
“That's what we'd do now if I wan't seeing an old In jun fort in there. It's close to water. Take your time. No hurry.”
But Gilbert's horse was the first to enter the pines.
Instead of one fort they found three, and the burned remains of a dozen more. All were built in the form of the ordinary skin lodge and, being constructed of logs stood on end, were bullet-proof. Old Misery dismounted and pulled back enough logs to permit Gilbert to lead the horses and mule inside. The mountain man closed the opening except for a hole large enough for him to crawl through. This he blocked with their saddles and the pack from the mule.
The horses were told to lie down and had been taught to obey promptly. It was necessary to throw the mule, however. The animals were next tied, to prevent their getting to their feet and plunging madly about when frightened, or if wounded.
The interior of the lodge measured some eighteen feet in diameter and received its light through various loop holes five feet from the ground, and through an opening at the apex.
“Couldn't ask for a better spot!” endorsed the mountain man as he pushed a log aside at the back and picked up a canvas bucket and the camp-kettle.
“Must you go out?” asked Gilbert.
“Crick's close by. Nothing like a drink of water when you're choking on powder smoke.”
He crawled outside and slipped down the bank to the stream and returned with bucket and kettle filled to the brim.
Gilbert was immensely relieved when he saw the kettle slowly advancing through the opening.
“I was afraid they'd come while you were gone,” he whispered.
“Lots of time. It'll be quite a lot of minutes afore they come up. I'm going out again. Be right back.”
This time he went to the next, or middle lodge. He found it contained the remains of a warrior resting on a low platform of logs. The man had been dead for years. The usual burial miscellany of property was piled about the bier. For weapons there was a Hudson's Bay Company trade-musket, an excellent bow and a quiver of arrows, a long lance with a point of obsidian and a trade knife in a fringed sheath. Among the utensils were two large copper kettles.
Old Misery placed these and the bow and quiver outside the lodge and ran to examine the third “fort.” The logs of this showed arrow and bullet marks, and the lower side was burned through. Weather and flames had so weakened it that the mountain man sent it crashing to the ground.
Then Gilbert was racing toward him, rifle in one hand and a camp-ax in the other, his eyes round and wild. On beholding his friend erect the young man explained:
“Thought they'd got you!”
“And come out to git caught,” mildly rebuked Old Misery, but secretly pleased.
“Well, Dad, I wouldn't last long if left alone,” reminded Gilbert. “Let's get back. Whose kettles?”
“Ours. Take the bow 'n' arrers inside. We'll git some more water.”
And for the second time he descended the bank to the stream. When he returned with the extra supply of water he remarked:
“We're fixed mighty fine here. Plenty of grub, and close to water, and plenty of lead 'n' powder. And I'm glad that end lodge is down. They'd be sure to take cover there.”
“Better for us if the nearest one was down,” said Gilert.
“That's a burial lodge. They'll keep out of that even if they ain't Sioux. Dead man in there was a Sioux. He'd carried the pipe more'n once as his war-bonnet tells us.”
“How do you know he was a Sioux?”
“Wrapped in a green blanket. That's their funeral color. Never saw a live Sioux wearing one. Cheyennes 'n' 'Rapahoes don't seem to have any 'tic'lar color. Tom Tobin would like this.”
While talking he was passing from loophole to loophole and peering out. There sounded a smart tap close to one aperture, and Misery announced:
“They're here. Just shot a arrer into the logs.”
Gilbert was immensely excited but to his surprise did not feel afraid.
“I see nothing.”
“Keep down! Use the holes close to the ground. Timber's full of reds. They saw us make for cover, and they rode into the growth above here.”
All doubt as to the Indians' presence was removed as a crash of guns and chorus of hideous yelling spoiled the quiet of the grove.
The mountain man was quick to encourage:
“Don't mind their howling. Hooting never hurt any one. Reckon I'll hoot back.”
And, lifting his head, he sounded the war-whoop of the Pillager Band of Chippewas, the ancient enemy of the Dakota tribes. The yelling was renewed by the besiegers. Old Misery grinned and explained:
“Knew that would make 'em mad. Lawd! But they do hate a Chippewa.”
When the timber became quiet again Misery said:
“Reckon I'll give 'em some more.”
And he shouted defiance in the Oglala Dakota tongue, and repeated it in the Cheyenne, Arapahoe, Crow and Pawnee. The last two raised the unseen warriors to a pitch of frenzy.
Chuckling gleefully, the mountain man hoarsely whispered:
“They don't know what to think. They see only the two of us. But they don't know but what some of their own color is in here.”
That he had not deceived the besiegers was now evidenced by a deep voice from behind the burial lodge demanding:
“Who speaks to the Oglala Tetons with the tongues of many tribes, but always in the voice of a white man?”
Old Misery glanced out on four sides of the lodge to make sure no braves were creeping close under cover of the dialogue, and then answered:
“A man who forgets he was born white. A man who has a rock-medicine sent him by Tunkan. He is a very brave man and has counted many coups.”
“Come out where we can talk with you and smoke.”
“Stand out where I can see you.”
“Makhpia-sha sends his voice. It is enough. Come out here, white man.”
“The white man is an old man. He hunted at the Forks of the Platte where Red Cloud was born, long before Red Cloud was born. Life is a pair of old moccasins to him. He has lived too long. He has seen too many white men come out here and spoil the hunting and trapping. Bring him a good fight, Makhpia-sha, so he can die happy and take some Oglala Tetons to hunt with him to the Land of Many Lodges,” was Misery's answer.
And as he finished his defiance he again made a round of the loopholes. The Oglala leader, crouching behind the burial lodge, began:
“There is another white man with you. Is he tired of life because his people have spoiled the hunting-ground of the Dakota?”
Old Misery suddenly thrust his revolver through a loop-hole and fired, breaking the arm of an Indian who was about to tree himself close to the logs. The wounded brave remained behind the tree, giving no sign of being hurt. Leaping across the lodge, the mountain man sounded his war-cry and taunted:
“Red Cloud talked to keep the old man from using his eyes. Red Cloud forgot the medicine sent by Tunkan keeps watch for the old man.”
And, shifting his position, he fired two shots at random from the front of the lodge.
Gilbert, who had been keeping watch on the side where the wounded warrior was hiding, despairingly confessed:
“I’m useless. I can see nothing. Every time you look you see them.”
“Seen just one man,” chuckled Old Misery. “But they've surrounded us, and they think I’ve seen 'em when I shoot. Fire a couple of shots from the back side to keep ’em from sneaking up from the crick.”
He returned to the loop-hole, facing the burial lodge, ready to resume his conversation with Makhpia-sha, or Red Cloud. This Oglala man was well advanced on a career that was to make him the most powerful and astute chief of the Oglala Tetons. He came from the Snake family, one of the most influential of the tribe. His advancement was more remarkable because he had no claim to the chieftainship, that office among the Oglalas being hereditary in the family of Tasunkakokipapi—“They fear Even His Horse”—or, as the plainsmen called him, “Young Man Afraid of His Horses.”
Red Cloud was taking his time to consider Misery's repeated boast of possessing a strong rock-medicine. Gilbert fired his rifle just as the famous leader began to talk, but as if not hearing it Red Cloud called out:
“The white man lies. He has no medicine from Tunkan. The Stone Spirit does not give medicine to white men.”
“The rock-medicine is in my medicine-bag. Makhpia-sha is a brave man. Let him come to me alone and look at it.”
“It is a lie. If the white men come out they will not be hurt. If they do not come out my men will set fire to the logs and roast them. If taken alive they shall be skinned alive.”
Gilbert fired a second shot; then shifted his position and wasted another.
Old Misery laughed derisively, and reminded Red Cloud:
“When this fort burns, Makhpia-sha, then the burial lodge you are hiding behind burns. That is very bad medicine for the Oglala Tetons. If Tunkan, whose rocks are painted red, is not helping me why does Red Cloud wait? Why does he not bring us a fight? How many warriors must he have behind him before he dares to charge two white men? Are there no Strong-Hearts, or Crow-Owners, or old men of the White Horse Band, with him?”
The shrill notes of a turkey-bone whistle split the silence of the timber. Instantly there was a deafening chorus of ferocious cries, the crash of guns and the thudding of arrows. The mule gave a convulsive twitch and Gilbert was hoarsely whispering:
“Mule's dead, Dad. Shot through the head.”
“Keep low and load for me!” snapped the mountain man.
And at the risk of being hit by a chance bullet through some loop-hole he ranged around the circle, pausing a second before each opening to peer out, then quickly firing. And as he worked he repeatedly sounded his war-cry and added many insults in the Teton dialect. For ten minutes this yelling and shooting continued, and when the whistle sounded and brought silence the only casualty, so far as the defenders knew, was the dead pack-animal.
The mountain man yelled to Red Cloud by name but received no reply. The silence in the grove was more trying to Gilbert's taut nerves than had been the mad howling. Old Misery, too, was accepting it as an evil omen and began spying through the loopholes in an anxious endeavor to discover what the enemy was up to.
Luck, or Tumkan, ruled that he should be kneeling by the choked front entrance and peering through a tiny aperture when a twig dropped within his range of vision from a pine ten feet from the lodge. Working rapidly with his knife between two logs at arm's length above his head, and taking great care his blade should not penetrate to the outside, he whispered for Gilbert to drop on his hand and knees before him. Stepping on the young man's bowed figure, he elevated himself sufficiently to use this new peep-hole.
Twenty feet above his head a naked warrior was working his way out on a limb. He carried a big coil of rope, and obviously his purpose was to lasso the projecting ends of the logs at the apex of the lodge. Did he accomplish this his hidden companions could quickly pull the timbers loose and expose the white men to capture or quick death.
Old Misery pulled his revolver and warned: “Steady. I'm going to shoot.”
The Indian was feeding the coil to the ground, and as it tautened the mountain man knew the invisible foe was ready to pull the logs apart once the noose was in place. Now that his companions had hands on the rope the man in the tree began gathering up sufficient slack for the cast, and while doing this he dropped the noose over his head.
As he was in the act of lifting his arm to remove the noose the heavy bullet caught him in the arm-pit; and before the Oglala men knew what had happened, and while they were holding tightly to the rope, the man fell and was brought up with a jerk that broke his neck, his moccasins within six inches of the ground. But he was dead before he left the limb as the upward course of the bullet plowed through his throat. So unexpected was the dénouement of this ruse that those holding the rope kept the dead man suspended for nearly a minute, his naked form whirling rapidly, a horribly grotesque teetotum.
Back to the loop-hole facing the burial lodge leaped the mountain man and loudly derided:
“How many winters since the Oglala Tetons hung their dead up by the neck? Has Makhpia-sha a new medicine that tells him to do it?”
Then he was crouching behind the saddles and pack at the entrance. The dead man was on the ground. The whistle sounded, and there came a hail of lead and a flight of arrows, and under cover of this assault a brave reached from behind the tree, seized the dead man's foot and commenced dragging him away. He desisted and retired with a shattered wrist.
Old Misery again hurled defiances and abuse.
Gilbert screamed: “Look out!”
Misery wheeled just as the young man kicked a gun barrel thrust through a loophole on the creek side of the lodge. The gun discharged, the bullet harmlessly plowing into the logs above the prostrate horses. As the man yanked the gun back Gilbert fired his rifle through the opening. He was too excited to hear the sound of a heavy body falling. But Old Misery heard it, and he leaped across the enclosure, pushed the young man aside and was in time to see the dead brave being dragged to cover.
“Satan and sin! You counted a coup!” roared the mountain man. “You'll wear a war-bonnet yet! Make you a prime mountain man? Why, already you're almost a second Jim Bridger! Mebbe sometime you'll be almost as good a man as I be. Quick work! Good work! Some new medicine is working for you! He! Hi! Hi! Hi!”
And he proceeded to arouse the savages outside to a maniacal pitch of fury by singing a war-song of the Mississippi Band of the Chippewa.
“'I make him bite the dust, the Teton Sioux, when I see him,'” he repeated in English for Gilbert's benefit.
He howled this arrogantly over and over, but as he sang he did not neglect the loop-holes and kept moving around the enclosure.
Although at first stunned by his unexpected victory, Gilbert suddenly discovered his heart was filled with strength and courage. Knowing no Indian songs, he burst into a violent denunciation in English, his fresh, strong voice carrying far. Old Misery was overjoyed by this metamorphosis in the young man. The flushed face, the sparkling eyes, the confident volume of the ringing voice erased all doubt in the mountain man's mind; the Vermonter had found himself. Under some mountain name his fame would travel far. When Gilbert paused to renew his breath Misery was impelled to shuffle around in a Chippewa war-dance, punctuating his grotesquery with an exclamatory:
“How! How!”
The shrill whistle sounded again. The mountain man believed the last climax was upon them and jumped to a loop-hole. All remained quiet outside. He examined the timber from all sides. At last he proudly informed Gilbert:
“They're drawing back to powwow. Younker, you'll be a Crow-Owner for this day's work. Keep on and you'll figger in one of their winter counts.”
“I never supposed I would ever kill a man,” muttered Gilbert, a slight reaction setting in.
Old Misery feared weakness and harshly corrected:
“You say it wrong. You killed a wild animal that was trying to hoop your ha'r after skinning you alive. And it's a mighty big coup to make a Makhpia-sha draw back and go into council.”
“But there are so many of them! They can easily rush us and tear these logs apart.”
Old Misery grinned and agreed. “Easiest thing in the world. But they ain't done it. They've had two men killed and a couple wounded. That's bad for 'em. It's bad for Red Cloud, their leader. They planned to git us without losing a man. Now Red Cloud is madder'n an old buf'ler bull that's been driven out of the herd. But he's a Injun. He won't let his 'mad' git the best of his red mind. They'll talk it over and think up some new tricks. Mebbe they'll lose some more men, but they won't plan to. They won't rush us in daylight. Red Cloud knows he mustn't lose another man. Now let's drink some water.”
“If they don't get us to-day they will to-night.”
“They ain't going to git us alive any time,” cheerfully assured Old Misery. “If they come in the dark it'll be along toward sun-up. We may git a chance to sneak away afore then. May have to leave the hosses. You start moving round and peeking out. Don't stop more'n a second at any hole. I must talk with my medicine.”
Gilbert began spying on the outside world and saw nothing but two squirrels scampering madly down one tree to cross and ascend another. Old Misery seated himself with his back to the logs, opened his buckskin bag and stared earnestly at the rock. Then he held it to his ear.
“The man's gone you shot out of the tree,” whispered Gilbert.
“The sly cusses,” absent-mindedly murmured Misery.
“What does your medicine tell you?”
In his desperation the young Vermonter was eager to try to believe a curious piece of rock possessed magic powers.
Old Misery listened intently; then frowned slightly.
“Don't git it just clear, but that's 'cause my head is slow. As I make it out we're to bu'st away from this trap. That must mean we oughter make a try after sun-down. I'll make two packs from the mule-load, What we can't carry we'll leave to pay for the dead men.”
Suspecting some new ruse, the two watched with ears and eyes, but there was no sign of life in the timber. After twenty minutes of tense waiting there came a sharp yelping, more like the cry of a dog than a human. At first it was faint and far off but rapidly increased in clearness and volume. From the edge of the timber the assembled Indians began shouting back. The red sentinels left posted around the lodge caught the contagion and from their hiding-places added high-pitched, explosive cries to the general tumult.
“What does it mean?” whispered Gilbert.
“Some one on hossback comes with a talk for Red Cloud. Knew 'bout where to find him. Shows he's one of the band,” explained Old Misery.
The newcomer had now reached the circle of Indians gathered in a war-council, and the howling ceased.
“He's giving his talk,” muttered Old Misery.
An outburst of wild howls told the white men the talk was finished. The whistle-signal pierced the grove.
The mountain man cried:
“Something big's bu'sted loose. They'll be leaving soon. They won't make more'n one rush at us. Keep your head.”
The sentinels began firing on the lodge. Inside half a minute the entire red force was discharging bullets and arrows at the logs. The whistle again commanded, and the firing ceased. Old Misery watched closely from a loop-hole beside the blocked entrance. He had a glimpse of a sentinel retreating through the trees and toward the open country on the west of the timber. He saved his bullet and told Gilbert:
“Untie the hosses and git 'em up. Something big's happened. Mebbe it's war-talk about the Pawnees. They're all leaving.”
“It's some trick,” muttered Gilbert, not daring to indulge in such an extravagant hope.
He got the horses up and was ashamed to find his limbs trembling violently.
From the edge of the timber rose the voice of the red men, singing a war-song. It gradually receded, and the mountain man knew they had taken to horse and were riding away. Gilbert insisted it was a trick to induce them to break cover.
Old Misery shook his head and reminded Gilbert:
“A man rode up, yelping like he had a big talk. They may 'a' left a few braves to take a shot at us when we show our noses, but my medicine says we won't have no more trouble from Red Cloud. Something the medicine tries to tell me I can't make out. We'll wait a bit.”
Half an hour passed and brought no new alarms. The horses shared the mule-pack between them. Gilbert was for throwing away a heavy buckskin bag, tied in the middle, that Misery had said contained lead. The mountain man insisted they might need it.
“Time enough to heave it away when we're jumped and have to ride bareback for it. We'll have to leave the saddles, of course.”
He was not quite ready to depart, however, and directed Gilbert to remain inside with his rifle ready.
“I'm going to take a two-minute scout,” he explained.
And before his young friend could remonstrate he had yanked a saddle from the opening and had squirmed out of the lodge. Inside the two minutes he was back, walking boldly and calling for Gilbert to remove two logs and drive out the horses.
“They've gone north toward the immigrant road. Have a sixty-mile ride ahead of 'em. Must 'a' had word from some of their scouts that a big train is coming. Red Cloud's got to wipe out some whites to make up for his two men killed. The skunks packed the dead men 'way with 'em. So we ain't no ha'r to show for our fight. I was going to show you how to sculp.”
“But I don't want to learn!” cried Gilbert.
Misery was disappointed.
“As a mountain man you've got to know how,” he insisted.
Then more cheerfully:
“Mebbe we'll git a chance to bag one of 'em afore we reach Fort Laramie. Trick's easy 'n' simple.”
“I pray we meet no more Indians,” said Gilbert with a shiver.
The mountain man would have resented this had he not remembered the vague message his medicine had endeavored to tell. His gaze grew somber with fear as he looked at his companion.
“Mebbe it's best that way,” he muttered.
They crossed the creek and covered twenty miles before making camp in the dark. Gilbert gladly would have attempted to walk another twenty, but Misery assured him they could not outwalk danger, but might walk into it. Their course had taken them up a dry branch of the Rattlesnake that headed in a low gap. From the gap they had followed down a hollow to a small tributary of the Medicine Bow River that headed near the northern end of the Medicine Bow Butte.
Starting before sunrise, they took a southeasterly course with the country much more pleasing than what they had left behind on the west side of the Medicine Bow Mountains. The valleys were wide and richly grassed, and were hemmed in by low, rounded hills. Antelope in graceful flight passed back and forth near them. The grass-covered hills swarmed with buffalo. They camped early in the midst of some willows. Cottonwoods and aspen were close by, and the tiny stream was lined with rosebushes.
The day's travel had been short. Gilbert was for covering many miles, but the mountain man appeared to be preoccupied. It was fear of what his medicine had tried to tell him. He tried to keep it from his thoughts but was remembering it each time he glanced at his companion.
Two hours before sunrise they ate emergency rations of dried meat and ascended a high bluff. In the north east and beyond the Laramie Plains, rose Laramie's Peak, dark and mysterious against the early morning sky. Gilbert was confused as to direction until the red glow of the hidden sun had burned a hole in the eastern sky-line. The traveling was easy as they were passing through an open, rolling country. Old Misery explained that the great abundance of game was due to the remoteness of the immigrant road. The buffalo were quite tame, the old bulls refusing to move. The antelope were more curious than timid.
Misery refused to eat antelope so long as he could have buffalo. He shot a fat cow and butchered it “mountain style,” taking only the “bass” and tongue. The former was the hump projecting from the back of the neck, and about the size of a man’s head. It was removed with the skin attached. Misery assured his companion that once the bass was boiled it would prove to be very tender and rich and most nutritious. They crossed the east fork of Frappe's Creek and camped early in the mile-wide bottom. Old Misery informed Gilbert:
“Named after Frappe when the 'Rickaras stole sixty of his horses at the mouth of the crick.”
This information made Gilbert nervous until his companion explained Frappe was robbed years before.
“Now we're clear of the Rattlesnake country we won't hurry,” added Misery. “Might run into another band of Injuns. I’d struck north to the immigrant road if Red Cloud hadn't gone that way. We'll have to dodge some hunting parties most likely. But I'm proud of you, younker. You're going to be a big mountain man.”
Had it not been for fear of roving Indians Gilbert would have enjoyed the next few days. They moved cautiously and each day traveled eight or ten miles before sunrise. One day when it rained they put in twelve hours of almost continuous walking. At each camp Old Misery would produce his medicine-rock and consult it, and each time vainly endeavored to understand what it was trying to tell him.
So far as he could understand he learned nothing to dismiss his secret fear. He told none of his thoughts to Gilbert, however. On leaving Frappe's Creek they had entered the Laramie Plains and traveled a score of miles across a beautiful rolling country to camp on the west fork of the Laramie River.
Old Misery was doubly cautious, saying:
“Probably some Injun villages down the river. But that don't mean all the reds we meet will hanker for our ha'r; not even if they're Oglalas.”
Gilbert found no consolation in his talk. Yet they met with no trouble and rounded the Black Hills Range, but directed their course outside of Cheyenne Pass—a valley rather than a gorge, and so called as it contained a Cheyenne village. They had often seen red hunters at a distance but thus far had escaped discovery. It was after they left the Chugwater and were striking direct for Fort Laramie that they ran into a small band of Cheyennes. All Indians looked alike to Gilbert, but Old Misery assured him there was no danger; and he called by name the leader of the hunters, a man of some sixty years.
The leader was pleased to meet with an old acquaintance and shook hands with both white men and told his followers they were “good men.” The young men, however, eyed the two horses and their packs hungrily. Old Misery informed them that several war-bands of strange Indians were south and west of the Black Hills. The Cheyennes at once became nervous and anxiously asked what tribes were sending out war-bands. The mountain man repeated they were strange Indians, but he was sure one band was composed of Pawnees. The Cheyennes mounted at once and galloped to the Chugwater and their village at its head.
On the next day, and before Gilbert was prepared to receive the heartening information, Old Misery was announcing:
“Afore night we'll be camping just above Laramie. You act s'prised.”
“I've been mixed up as to the direction we've traveled and as to the distance we've covered,” said Gilbert.
Misery felt misgivings, but ousted the thought and explained:
“Used to be called Fort John. Used to be used by 'Merican Trading Company to protect its trade. You still 'low you'll be a mountain man?”
And he anxiously waited to hear the answer.
“Why, Dad, what else is there for me to do?” morosely replied Gilbert. “I'll do my best. I'm afraid I never can get to know where I'm at. But I'll do my best.”
The land around Fort Laramie impressed Gilbert as being very sterile. The absence of dews and the dry atmosphere turned the occasional patches of grass brown, as if they had been burned over. Much of the surrounding country was carpeted with gravel. The fort itself, built of adobe brick and occupying a natural shelf of clay and rock, was a most welcome sight to the easterner. This largely because the Stars and Stripes were fluttering from the top of a bastion.
Old Misery led the way a short distance above the fort to a spot on Laramie Fork and announced they would camp there to be clear of the sun and the dust from passing wagon-trains. He was very quiet as he cooked the midday meal; and while he smoked his pipe he turned aside, peered into the medicine-bag and frowned as if not understanding. About mid-afternoon clouds of dust advertised the coming of a big wagon-train.
Observing how wistfully his friend was watching the sun-riddled dust, Misery remarked:
“It's coming from the Oregon country. Mighty soon we'll be going up where it started from. Big trees. Big mountains. Big lakes. Air cool and make you sleep better'n a gallon o' Missouri whisky. Lawdy! But if I could be young and be seeing that country for the first time again! Waugh!
“And how you're going to take to it! No pindling timber like what you see down here. No burned-out grass. No dry crick beds. But good water 'n' grass 'n' fire-wood everywhere. And game! You'll go plumb heyoka when you see the game and catch the fish.”
He spoke with boisterous anticipation, but his shrewd old eyes were ever watching the woe-begone face across the tiny fire.
“That'll be smash-up good fun, huh?”
“I'll be glad to be with you, Dad. You've been mighty good to me. But I almost wish we hadn't come here. I mustn't go near the fort. Some word may have reached here about me. And to see that train pulling out for the East would make me feel awfully cheap and homesick.— Well, well. It's settled and I'm a fool to be complaining. I'm mighty lucky to have some one to look, out for me.”
“I'll make a mountain man out of you yet,” growled Old Misery. “Hi! He! He! He! There. I feel a heap better. Go to the fort? You're a mountain man. You can go anywhere you damn please. Come along. Folks round here don't know nor care nothin' 'bout any stranger. Soldiers have all they can do to look out for Injuns and git the hay down eight miles from up the river. We'll look at that train. Keep looking at 'em till you laff at the notion of ever wanting to foller one to the East. Mebbe some old cusses I know is with that train, hired to come along to help stand off the Injuns. We'll catch up with a west-bound train and take life easy.”
They reached the fort ahead of the long train, and when it came in it attracted the attention of soldiers, officers, guides and groups of Indians lounging about the place. In the tops and sides of several wagons war arrows were flopping. There were fresh scars from bullets and arrow heads on the wagon bodies, and several horses were wounded.
Ahead of the foremost wagon, mounted on a rawboned horse of wicked eye, rode a man with a face of leather and with gray hair that came down on his shoulders. He gave Old Misery one look and then slipped from his crude wooden saddle, yelling like a Comanche, and playfully tried to knock the mountain man's ragged hat off with a sweep of a rifle barrel.
Misery grinned in keen delight and in ducking the blow scooped up a handful of gravel and tossed it into the weathered face.
“Damn your old hide, Misery! If it ain't you! Wait till I git rid of this dirt from my eyes and I'll climb you. Big beaver! But I'm glad to see you. Who's the young buckskin I see just before you put my eyes out?”
“Partner of mine, Ned. Killed his Injun up on the Rattlesnake when they had us cornered. I wouldn't be here if it wa'n't for his gun. He's going to be the ripsnortingest mountain man you ever see. He's going up Oregon way with me. We hoofed it alone from Frisco way here. Fighting every inch of the way. Left a trail of dead Injuns fifteen feet wide. Wiped out thirty out laws this side the Sierra. Had so many dry sculps we used 'em for wood for cooking our kettle when wood wa'n't handy.”
“You old liar! You fight Injuns? You'd never come east if the Digger Injuns hadn't took sticks and driv' you away. Younker's all right. He'll make a good mountain man, but he's tying up with a mighty weak partner. Heard you was in Californy from Tom Tobin. He's at Fort Hall. Dropped a word that he had a grudge to settle with you.”
“Tom Tobin at Fort Hall!” exclaimed Old Misery, his eyes lighting. “The little lying runt!”
“Yep. Spent a night at our camp. Said you bit him down in Californy.”
“The damned little runt! If I ever bit him he wouldn't have any head on his shoulders. My teeth slipped just as I was going to give my war-hoot. But I promised him a scrimmage next time we met. You go back with us and watch the fun. I'm a wolf from my shoulders up, and a grizzly bar, Sierra kind, from my shoulders down.”
Ned shook his head sadly.
“I've got to go through with this outfit as far as Fort Kearney. I'm home-sick already. Remember the time I saved your h'ar for you at the Three Tetons? You save that fuss till I git back.”
“Saved my ha'r, you ongrateful liar! And me packing you out the Injun country on my back! Couldn't even bring a big train down here without letting Injuns shoot arrers through it.”
“Red Cloud's band jumped us. Got two of our men. We bagged three of 'em that I see knocked dead.”
“And me and this younker stood off his whole outfit and killed seven and wounded a dozen.”
And he turned to Gilbert to have him vouch for the figures. But the Vermonter had heard little if any of their talk. He was staring at the train. Misery broke in on his reverie by saying:
“This is the train that pulled us out of that mess, younker. Red Cloud quit us to tackle it. If you've got 'nough of the fort we'll start up the trail to-day and make a dozen miles afore camping. I'll git fresh hosses and a pack-mule and plenty of grub and powder.”
Gilbert bowed his head on his hands. Fortunately Old Misery's mountain friend had turned back to the wagons and did not witness this weakness.
“My God! What's hitting you?” gasped Old Misery.
“I'm no good, Dad. Don't mind me just now. I'll be all right in a minute. I won't break down again— It's that train— It's going-East— It got me before I could guard against it. But I'll toughen up. I won't act the fool again.”
Old Misery dropped beside him and began pulling up the few blades of grass showing through the gravelly sand.
“You'd go back home, give up being a mountain man and go back, if it wa'n't for that bit of trouble?” he huskily mumbled.
“Oh, but I would! I wish I could go and take you with me.”
“Not by a damned sight! Anything but that, Young Buckskin. That's the new name they'd give you if you'd come with me— Then, bimeby, Old Buckskin— All plain now— Back in the fort on the Rattlesnake my medicine bothered me. Told me things I didn't dast tell you— All the way down here it was telling the same thing. I didn't git the sabe of it. Sounded heyoka 'less I figgered it one way. Kept saying in the lodge that we'd git clear, but that I'd lose you. That's been bearing down on my old neck ever since we struck out for this place.
“That's why I made long travels 'n' short travels, and started long afore sun-up and walked after dark, and come in here by a roundabout way. I believed my rock medicine meant you was to be rubbed out. And all the time it was saying you'd be rubbed out of my life, but not the way I'd figgered.”
“I don't understand you,” numbly remonstrated Gilbert. “I am here. We'll start for Oregon after this train gets under way. I probably won't feel this way when we see the next one.”
“Tunkan is right. His medicine never lies,” sorrowfully continued Old Misery. “You've got guts; but they ain't mountain guts. You've lived too long in the East, where they believe in double-time. If I could 'a' caught you younger— Well, that's all ended.”
“You're wishing to go back alone? I don't blame you,” muttered Gilbert, trying to conceal the shock the mountain man's speech had given him.
“Ned's wagon-train will take you back East. Dragoons will go with it to Kearney.”
“You know I can never go back East. But that's no reason why I should be a drag on you. Maybe I can get work here at the fort. They need men for cutting hay and fire-wood. Or I can get a job teaming.”
Old Misery pulled out the bag containing his medicine rock and from the bottom of it extracted a worn and soiled piece of paper and explained:
“Here's a writing. Saved it to give to you if you didn't pan out as a mountain man. I got it from a long cuss outside of Coloma. Men called him Elnathan Plumb. I give him 'nough gold to make up for what that young streak of scarlet got away from you. I told him you started for Coloma from Frisco with the money and was held up and robbed by Reelfoot Williams and was wounded a bit. I 'splained how I ran across Williams and made him fork over 'nough dust to square the money. So everything's all hunky back East. Now you git on your feet and foller me.”
With the precious paper clutched in his hand and his mouth agape the dazed Vermonter followed Misery to their camping place. From under the blankets the old man produced the bag tied in the middle. He dropped it at Gilbert's feet, saying:
“That's the lead you wanted to heave away. Hell of a tussle to fetch it way from Snake Martin's camp. He had it buried, and I got it. It's yours. Twenty thousand odd in dust 'n' nuggets. Buy a trading-store or a ranch, and marry that home-squaw.”
“You knew all the time I might weaken—”
“Rub it in. I'm o'nary 'n' low-down. Lived with the Crows too long, mebbe. But there was a chance you'd pan out a prime mountain man and like it. But I didn't go to play you dirt, younker.”
“Good lord! Paid up my stealings! Planned to give me a fortune. Dad, if I leave you I'm always going to feel mighty bad. If I stay—”
He paused, and his gaze swung back toward the fort, and his thoughts leaped to far-off Vermont and the dark haired Walker girl. For several minutes he remained motionless and silent, his eyes beholding the green-forested, amiable hills of home, the placid propriety of the village streets and a dark-haired girl standing by an ancient gate—waiting. And when he finally turned back to announce his decision he found he was alone.
The dust clouds followed the long wagon-train traveling under armed escort down the north fork of the Platte, the “Big Medicine Road” of the white men.
From a ridge Old Misery stood beside his horse and stared after it.
“Lawd! But I hated to let him go! Lawd! But I hated to send him home— Took care of me— Felt of my old head to see if I was sick— Lawd! But I feel sorter lonesome— Wonder if the mountains ever feel lonesome. Well, that's ended. That rock-medicine is damned strong— And there's that Tobin runt waiting for me— Said I bit him!”
THE END