by Terry Grosz
Jacob and Martin just grinned at their luck and were thankful for the land’s lay and geographical knowledge of their Lakota Indian partner, Buffalo Calf. It was he who had led them to this place of plenty and come the rendezvous, they would be loaded with the land’s riches.
After an exploring ride of about four hours, Jacob and Martin returned to their first sets of traps. They could not believe their luck on their first outing—every trap had a dead beaver. Ben’s teachings had not only been very definitive back on the paddle wheeler but they had also learned their new trade well, as their traps so displayed.
They reset their traps and applied more castoreum to the lure sticks. They headed home with the heavy beaver carcasses draped and swinging along the packhorse’s front shoulders and sides.
When they arrived back in camp, they were surprised to find Ben and Buffalo Calf already there. They were already skinning and fleshing out their catches as Singing Bird fixed another beaver stew heavy with ham chunk meat. They, too, had caught six large beaver each and couldn’t be happier.
“I don’t think this could have been a better day,” said Jacob as he and Martin lighted down. “Trapping beaver here is like taking candy from a baby.”
“The same with the western side of the valley,” Ben said. “I’ve never found it so easy to trap beaver, and as near as I can tell, the same prosperity awaits up the individual streams, up into the surrounding drainages as well.”
Skinning out the beaver, minus the legs and tail, the men had fresh hides that were left in a round pattern. Singing Bird had cut the men an armload of fresh willow limbs from the adjacent stream and to that they turned for material to make hoops to stretch the green beaver hides. The willow limbs formed hoops to fit the size of the pelt, and they cut thin strips of elk hide to weave through small slits cut along the edge of the beaver hides to tie around the willow frames. This kept the hide stretched and allowed for easier drying.
With that, the men finished fleshing out any meat or fat still hanging from the hides and then lined them standing up alongside the cabin and on the porch roof to dry.
The men split and placed the beaver tails on the smoking racks for drying. They would make a great tasting, fat-heavy soup during the winter months when their bodies were in need of high-energy fuels. Then they loaded the carcasses on two pack- horses and delivered them to a draw at the end of their valley for the critters to eat.
Dinner was ready and the men fell to as if they hadn’t eaten in a month; they had been so wrapped up in their trapping routines, all four men had forgotten to eat their cornbread and jerky that they carried in their saddlebags.
The next day and what seemed like endless fall days thereafter, everything ran smoothly as the traps were filled many times with beaver from the rich waters of their trapping grounds. For the next several months, the men raced winter’s icy blast as they trapped the seemingly never-ending supply of beaver. The men found that the plews got better and better in quality as the days shortened and the nights grew colder. With that, the men realized they had a bonanza in their valley that would soon make them economically well-off at the next rendezvous. Back at the cabin, safely tucked away in the cave storage area, they already had over four hundred beaver plews. If this success kept up, they would soon decimate the beaver’s numbers and would have to move on to new trappings. But the bounty continued and their thoughts of wise use were lost in the value of their ever-increasing hoard of pelts back at the cabin.
One morning Martin checked his first trap only to discover it was empty. Next to the trap in the soft mud was a partial human footprint. Martin looked all around quickly to see if he had been observed or if someone was drawing a bead on him. He was relieved to see Jacob slowly riding his way.
Reining up, Jacob quietly said through a set of tightly drawn lips, “I have someone robbing my traps!”
Martin held up his empty beaver trap as their eyes knowingly met. Looking all around one more time for anyone laying in ambush and seeing none, they closely examined the footprints.
“Not an Indian,” stated Martin flatly. “He walks the wrong way for an Indian.”
Martin grabbed his rifle and commenced to track the small scuffmarks and impressions in the damp earth left by the trap robber. Jacob rode behind him on his horse with his Hawken at the ready. Soon Martin tracked the culprit’s footprints to hoof prints made in the earth by that of a tethered horse.
“Hoof prints that were made by a shod horse,” Martin whispered over his shoulder, “which in this wilderness must be ridden only by a white man.”
Both men just looked hard at each other. Neither had seen any sign of anyone, not even an Indian, for the last several months. Now they had a stranger in their midst and a thief at that.
Martin mounted his horse and then the two of them followed the suspect horse’s tracks until it entered one of the valley’s many streams and disappeared.
Both men rode up and down that stream’s banks for a ways, with neither of them finding where the horse tracks exited the stream. They now realized they had a very woods-wise thief in their midst. Why else would one go to such bother to cover his tracks in such a fashion if he isn’t an outlaw trapper? thought Martin.
They returned to check their remaining traps and confirmed their worst fears. All had been picked clean by the thief. They reset their traps in the beaver-rich waters once again, then headed back to camp.
Singing Bird’s quick look at their absence of beaver flashed into a look of surprise. An hour later, Ben and Buffalo Calf also arrived in camp without a single beaver carcass swinging from their pack animal.
Both alighted from their horses and Ben said, “Someone is in the valley robbing our traps and doing a right good job of it, too.”
“Us, too,” said Martin grimly. The men just looked at each other for a long moment and then Martin added, “Whoever is doing it is not an Indian.”
“Ours neither,” said Buffalo Calf. “He not walk or ride like Indian. His horse is shod and with loose shoe on the left rear foot.”
Martin just grimly stood there for a long moment with the other men, mulling over the problem. “Our thief’s horse has no loose shoe,” he said.
It was a high crime in the wilderness to take one’s beaver. It was like stealing a man’s horse. To deprive a man of his transportation or living was a killing offense to the trapper way of thinking.
And now they had an even bigger problem—they had two thieves in the valley robbing their traps and both appeared to be sneaky white men.
The next morning, long before daylight, Martin and the three other men left camp for their trap lines. Only now there was a seriousness in the air he had not felt since they had left the Platte River. Beaver was now secondary in his thoughts. All of them were out to catch the thieves and deal with a rather seamy issue.
Martin quietly sat out of sight in a thick stand of willows with Jacob and watched one of his traps set in a beaver pond full of the creatures. His trap had a huge beaver in it, one probably weighing at least seventy-five pounds. This pelt would be called a “blanket” due to its extreme size and would be of high value at any trading post or rendezvous. Shortly after daylight but with some darkness still remaining in the dense stands of willows, Martin thought he saw the shape of a small bear approaching his trap. Then the “bear” turned slightly showing an obvious white man’s features.
This is the man they call Bear, Martin realized. The same man earlier on the paddle wheeler who tried to get them to play a card game for their Hawken rifles.
Martin, without a thought of more than killing a varmint, quickly raised his rifle to end a life.
Jacob placed his hand across the barrel and pushed it downward. He motioned that they should dismount and stalk the trap robber.
Martin nodded and shortly thereafter, both men silently walked in behind the trap robber as he intently tried to remove the heavy beaver from the trap. Once Bear finally wrestled the huge beaver out of the trap, he turned
with a big grin on his face and about jumped back into deeper water upon seeing the two stem-faced trappers quietly standing there watching him from just a few feet away.
“What do you two pieces of crap want?” yelled Bear—yelling partly at being surprised finding Jacob and Martin standing there and partly out of fear for being caught red-handed in the serious act of trap robbing.
“We was meaning to ask you the same,” mumbled Jacob through set teeth and narrowed, cold flashing eyes.
“Step aside. This here is my beaver and I mean to take him. If he was caught in your trap, that is too bad because you are trapping in my waters,” snarled Bear through an equally tight set of lips with an animal-like sneer crossing his face.
“I don’t think so, Bear,” spoke an equally tight-lipped Martin. “We have been in this here valley since summer and call it and the beaver trapping our own.”
Bear grinded his teeth, a sound that could easily be heard over the gurgling of the creek over the beaver dam. Jacob tightened up as well. Make a move, Bear, Jacob thought.
Ka-poof! went Jacob’s coonskin cap boiling off his head as a speeding lead ball lifted it cleanly into the air like it was a goose- down feather in a draft. That was followed by the loud boom of a nearby rifle.
Man! That shot came from behind me and up on the side of the hill, Jacob instantly thought. He whirled and looked for the white telltale puff of black powder smoke. Jacob saw a man struggling with the reins on two nervous horses while hurriedly trying to reload his rifle.
In that same instant, Martin and Bear wrestled each other off the bank and into the beaver pond with a loud splash.
Jacob raised his Hawken, set the double trigger and touched it off in one practiced, fluid motion. He aimed at the man who had just shot at him. Boom went his Hawken as the report echoed loudly throughout the valley. The man being shot at did not have to worry about reloading anymore.
Jacob looked around quickly, but saw no one else on the hillside but the nervous riderless horses. Then Jacob whirled to face the struggling Martin and Bear. As he did, he reached for his pistol.
Bear had his knife out and was about to plunge it into Martin.
Martin’s gutting knife in a flash found Bear’s midsection. Martin’s long knife slid deeply into the stomach and then was jerked violently upward into the blood-rich area of the heart and lungs.
“Ugghh!” screamed Bear as the knife blade drove deeply into his vitals.
Martin jerked the bloody knife out, then with a quick backhanded swipe, slashed it deeply across Bear’s throat. A spew of bright red blood sprayed forth. That was followed by a gurgling sound from the stricken man’s lips.
Bear dropped into the knee-deep cold water face first, wiggled some and then went still in death. The normally clear water flowing through the beaver pond now turned bright red below Bear’s body, then faded away to pink as it raced along.
Jacob reached out for his partner’s hand and helped him up the slippery bank. Apparently without an afterthought, Martin took Bear’s knife from his lifeless hand and then removed the beaver trap from this place of death. Martin then bent back down and lifted the spectacular grizzly bear necklace from Bear’s neck, washed the blood off and handed it to Jacob.
“Maybe we will have a use for it somewhere down the line,” Martin quietly said.
I can’t imagine what for, thought Jacob as he placed the necklace in his saddlebag.
Jacob and Martin left Bear where he fell for the crawdads and varmints. They walked up the hill to the two thieves’ horses. Wentz, Bear’s partner, lay on the ground at the feet of the nervous animals. The .54-caliber ball from Jacob’s rifle had entered just below Wentz’s nose and blown out the top of his head with unbelievable force. There were brains and bright red blood blown all over Bear’s horse, the ground, and the surrounding trees.
Martin smiled with pride at Jacob’s shooting ability.
However, Jacob wasn’t smiling. “Well, I just killed a mean-assed varmint that needed killing!”
Without another word, the two men rolled Wentz over and took his rifle, powder horn, possibles sack and knife.
“No use in leaving such valuable things to another varmint,” thought Jacob out loud.
They left both bodies where they fell for the ever present and always hungry critters. The two men rode quietly back to camp after checking, emptying and resetting the rest of their traps. Each man now led an extra horse and carried an extra rifle.
On the way back, they crossed paths with Buffalo Calf and Ben riding like the wind towards their partners’ side of the valley. They had heard the shooting and must have figured Jacob and Martin found the culprits. With that, they came just “a-hellin”’ to see if they could help.
Jacob and Martin explained what had happened and both Ben and Buffalo Calf grunted their approval.
“Bear and Wentz have been pure poison from the start and best they’re now bear bait,” said Ben, as a smile crossed his weathered face. “The life of a trapper can be tough but can get a whole lot worse if one does not follow the trapper’s code of honor.”
Back at camp, the men examined the two dead men’s tack. Their horseflesh was good—although one needed his left rear shoe fixed—and their rifles were top notch. Both rifles were .54-caliber Hawkens. Surprisingly. Since neither Bear nor Wentz had a Hawken in their possession on the boat months before, the men surmised they had recently killed their two partners from the fur brigade and had taken their rifles. After that discovery and deduction, Jacob felt no remorse for killing Wentz.
Martin on the other hand, rather enjoyed killing Bear up close and personal like.
The men looked for two days in a vain attempt to locate the dead men’s camp. They were unsuccessful. From then on, no one stole from their traps as they continued their trapping successes. They gave one of the recently acquired Hawkens to Buffalo Calf to use; the other they kept in reserve for any of the men to use in case a Hawken was lost, stolen or destroyed in a horse wreck. Buffalo Calf’s flintlock was then left with Singing Bird for her defense when the men were out trapping. Singing Bird just smiled. She knew how to shoot and now had four firearms in her tepee.
Lord help anyone going after her if she got the chance to get to her arsenal, Jacob thought.
Chapter Thirteen
Buffalo Hunt
The men worked hard in the valley trapping beaver, river otter, fox and some muskrats as winter and its icy blasts blew more and more. Icy cold wet feet and legs were now becoming a problem. Many a morning, the men had to vigorously rub their feet in front of the fire in order for their limbs to loosen up enough for them to be able to even walk normally. However, the trapping was good and the men worked hard realizing downtime was coming with winter’s ice and snows. At first, the ice was not much of a problem as the men busted through it with their hand axes and continued setting their traps. They were catching less beaver now but still enough so that it paid for them to be out and about.
Then one morning after the icy wind had blown hard all night, they awoke to a vast and deathly quiet white wilderness. The air temperature was probably ten below zero but the men ventured forth just the same for beaver once again with high hopes.
When they returned home that evening, they had one beaver between them to show for all their frozen feet and water-numbed hands. They pulled their traps as the ice formed right in front of their eyes in the intense cold. Beaver trapping to their way of thinking was now done for in the winter of 1830. Sure, they could trap them under the ice, but that was a lot of hard, ice-busting cold work for small returns. As they sat around the fireplace that evening, they decided it was time to hunt some buffalo for the fresh meat it offered. That plus their hides would bring a premium during the up and coming rendezvous in Cache Valley.
Ben reminded them, “Buffalo hides are thicker in the winter and bring the highest trade premiums. Winter hides also make the best machinery belts in England. And, the British Army believes buffalo leather makes the
best marching footwear for its soldiers.”
With the hunt close at hand, the men recharged their powder horns, cast bullets around the fireplace, added more balls to their “possibles” bags, and checked the mechanics of their Hawkens.
Singing Bird moved about excitedly with the change in plans from beaver trapping to buffalo hunting. “She is hungry for buffalo meat, especially liver, fat and intestines,” Buffalo Calf explained.
They figured their camp was safe since they hadn’t seen any Indians for months, so they decided Singing Bird would accompany them to help “make meat” for their winter larder.
Dawn the next morning found the trappers on the hunt as they trailed every horse they owned. For about five bitter cold miles across the country in knee-deep snows, they discovered nothing in the way of fresh tracks, droppings or anything indicating buffalo in the area. Then in the next valley over from their camp, they discovered great clouds of steam rising into the freezing air. Clouds of steam from their breaths that only a large herd of resting buffalo could make.
They tied off the horses in a draw out of the way downwind from the herd and left Singing Bird to guard them. The men crawled up over the snowy sagebrush-covered rim and looked. There below them were about five thousand buffalo some fifty yards distant, quietly feeding and resting. The four men spread out along the rim so each team of shooters could shoot the edge of the herd. They made ready. Soon the resonant booming of the heavy Hawken rifles filled the frigid morning winter air. Being as cold as it was, the sound of the firing rifles loudly cracked through the dense, moisture-laden winter air.
But the shots flew true and soon the snow was dotted with many dark and lifeless mounds of bison still emitting steam from their cooling bodies.
Still the heavy lead balls flew through the air and more of the great shaggy beasts toppled over and dropped onto “Mother Earth” for the last time.