Crossed Arrows: Mountain Men (The Mountain Men Book 1)

by Terry Grosz

  Tom said, “Let’s light down. This looks like a great spot to drop our feet and rest our backsides a spell.”

  The men needed no further coaxing and soon unloaded their gear. First and foremost, the horses were unpacked, double hobbled and set out to take up some grub in the lush meadow. Then the men set about building a large lean-to for their temporary sleeping area. With that and a fire pit set into place in front of the lean-to for the warmth it would afford, the men set up shop.

  Martin grabbed his bow and arrows and slipped off quietly into the dense stands of lodgepole pine and sagebrush flats at the edge of the meadow and was soon out of sight.

  Jacob stacked all their packs in front of their lean-to to make a barricade for protection in case they got into a surprise fight with any local Indians upset over their presence. It shouldn’t be a problem with the local Snake Indians. But those damn Blackfoot and Gros Ventre...thought Jacob. He let his thoughts drift off into nothingness as he finished stacking the packs and saddles in a protective barrier in front of the lean-to.

  Al grabbed his Hawken and slowly ambled off downstream from their camp to look for fresh beaver sign.

  Tom, with rifle in hand, walked upstream to ascertain the beaver trappings in that neck of the woods as well.

  Twenty minutes later, Martin came back dragging a nice rolling fat, four-point mule deer buck whose antlers were just coming out of the velvet. Jacob and Martin then built a meat pole set up between a couple of stout aspens near their lean-to. Soon the buck was hanging head down. As Martin gutted and skinned their dinner, Jacob scouted around for some stout green willow sticks that could be used in roasting the meat. In the process, he spooked a small herd of cow and calf moose out of the thick stands of brush adjacent to a large beaver pond. Jacob grinned at the abundance of game so near their camp and especially at the numerous signs of beaver and beaver houses in the watered areas.

  This area has the possibility of being as good as the first valley we trapped in the Bighorn Mountains northeast of here, he happily thought.

  When he arrived back at camp, Jacob soon had several large slabs of the mule deer’s hindquarter and back straps merrily roasting around the fire. Martin, in the meantime, had staked out the deer hide in the sun and was busy scraping off the remaining scraps of meat and fat.

  Yes, this area had great potential, thought Jacob with a grin.

  Soon Tom and then Al returned. Both had wide grins beneath their massive beards.

  “Beaver sign and beaver everywhere,” advised Tom in a pleased tone of voice.

  “I found the same as well,” replied Al as he moved over to the fire and the cooking venison. Soon all the men followed Al’s lead as he fell to the dinner provided by Martin. After finishing the first round of roasted meat, they fastened more to the roasting sticks and sat back and talked over the work that lay ahead of them before they could trap a single beaver.

  “Tomorrow we had better start on our cabin,” stated Jacob as the other three nodded in agreement.

  “Better get a stout corral built as well before some Indian lifts our horses,” mumbled Al as he picked the slivers of meat from between his teeth with the sharpened tip of his gutting knife.

  “We have enough deer meat to last through tomorrow so maybe we can get an early start on the cabin and corral before we get doused with the afternoon rains and end up looking like a couple of wet beavers,” suggested Martin.

  The men grinned at the comparison, knowing what a summer thunderstorm soaking was like in the mountains, and nodded in agreement. The second set of roasting deer meat was now ready and the men fell to like they had not yet eaten anything that afternoon. Piping hot Dutch-oven biscuits accompanied that meaty repast. They soon disappeared, as did the second set of Dutch- oven biscuits. Then out came the men’s pipes and the sweet smell of pipe smoke quickly filled the cooling evening air.

  When the campfire was reduced to coals and the mosquitoes emboldened, the men retreated to their sleeping furs in the lean-to. Soon the faraway howl of wolves and a star-filled sky were the only signs that God was still awake.

  The next morning, Jacob and Martin started cutting timbers and setting posts as they made a sturdy corral for the group’s horses. Tom and Al continued doing nothing but cutting and dragging green logs to the area where the cabin was to be constructed. By that evening the corral was finished and a large pile of green logs had been stacked by the cabin site.

  Jacob and Martin started construction of the cabin the following morning as Tom and Al continued cutting and hauling additional logs for construction. Their work started with scraping off the accumulated ground’s duff then digging down a foot into the soil and packing a dirt floor outlining what was to be the cabin’s exterior boundary. Next came the cabin’s base logs which were the largest in size. After that, they measured and notched logs, descending in size, while log ramps to aid in the lifting of the logs onto the wall and a pair of pulling horses completed the work.

  Soon the cabin’s walls were six feet in height. Windows and doors were then cut, and shutters, shooting ports and log doors were constructed and placed. All the wood scraps were piled next to their central fire pit and used for cooking meals as the days and work progressed. By week’s end, the men had their cabin. It was about twenty feet in length, fifteen feet wide and seven feet high on the inside height. It had the typical log, sagebrush and dirt roof. It also possessed two windows in front for the light they offered and two shooting holes per side on the walls. In short, it was ugly but hell for stout and built for warmth in the winter and coolness in the summer.

  Another lean-to was constructed by the corrals and eventually filled with drying winter hay, cut and hauled from the meadow in huge armloads by the men between bouts of cabin making.

  The next two days were devoted to cutting dead pine trees and dragging them to the camp area so they could be used for cooking and heat throughout the coming winter months. Since there was no mountain mahogany in the area—a species of iron hard, hot burning wood—a ton of aspen, cottonwood and willow was cut and stacked near the side of the cabin. Those woods were to be used for their Dutch-oven cooking, which needed non-resinous wood to prevent the cast-iron from sooting up.

  Then the men went forth to the western foothills and sagebrush flats to make meat.

  Twenty buffalo were shot and the next week was spent in smoking and drying the meat. Martin and Jacob then made numerous parfleches from their cured buffalo skins, filling them with the dried meat from the smoke racks. Moose taken from the waterways among the many willow patches were also harvested. That which was not eaten straight away by the always hungry trappers was jerked for hard times on the trail or during winter snowed-in periods. The moose hides were tanned as well because they made fine winter moccasins due to their thickness.

  None of the men knew what the buffalo did in the winter as far as staying nearby or migrating out of the area once the deep snows came, so a concerted effort was made to make sure there was meat aplenty from the big animals before the anticipated heavy snows flew. They could always eat beaver meat, which they always agreed was very good, but there was just something to be said about a good “buffler” slab of hot meat cooked around an open fire with a slew of Dutch-oven biscuits slathered in wild honey. Then Al and Martin went forth, opened up a few beaver dams and procured the needed castoreum in order to start the serious business of fall and winter trapping.

  Come the anointed day for the start of the 1833 fall trapping season when the beaver were coming into their prime, the men were up early. Jacob had great slabs of fresh moose back strap crackling away around the fire and the smell coming from his Dutch ovens proclaimed sourdough biscuits slathered with wild honey was soon to grace empty bellies.

  The men finished breakfast and rechecked their equipment. Then they saddled their horses and placed packsaddles on two others. Jacob and Martin had decided they would trap the waters south of camp and Tom and Al the northern reaches of the valley. With a wave
of the hand for good luck, the men quietly parted company and headed into another trapping season and the adventures it would bring.

  That evening a tired but happy Jacob and Martin entered camp. They not only had twelve beaver plews across their pack animal, but a fresh hindquarter from a cow moose. The remaining hindquarter was left hanging in a shaded spruce out of reach of Ephraim about a mile distant. Shortly after dark, Al and Tom quietly entered camp. Their pack animal was heavy with twelve beaver carcasses but the looks on their faces was of an ominous nature. They dismounted and walked over to Jacob and Martin as if carrying the weight of the world on their shoulders.

  “Lots of beaver from what we saw but we also have company. Blackfoot as near as we can tell and a pile of them. We found a place where they caught several Snake Indians trapping beaver several days back, butchered them and left what was left of their bodies to the varmints.”

  Jacob and Martin just listened but their earlier lighthearted entry into camp had now turned into something hard and cold.

  “Think we all four need to work together for the protection it affords?” asked Martin.

  There was a long pause as everyone looked to the more experienced Tom for answers.

  “Don’t rightly know,” said Tom slowly. “First time I have seen Blackfoot this fer south so early in the year. Can’t rightly figure out why. They have plenty game in their own backyard and don’t need any of ours I reckon. I am also surprised the Snakes haven’t discovered their presence and rooted them out. No matter. We must be on our toes or they will lift our topknots slicker than buffalo slobbers. Don’t think we need to gang up as of yet because that will reduce our trappin’s. Plus, the four of us would leave a world of fresh-shod horse tracks for them red devils to cross and backtrack. I figure we had better go armed to the teeth and only one man trap at a time. The other one best keep his eyes peeled and ready to fight,” he thoughtfully suggested. “They will come out of nowhere and be as fierce as a she grizzly defending her cubs when they decide to attack, so we best be prepared. Another good thing might be to prime our pistols with buck and ball instead of just ball. That away we can flock shoot them if they come at us in a gang.”

  “With a little luck, maybe we can blind a few with the shot and finish them off at our leisure later,” Tom mumbled as an afterthought.

  Then the smell of fresh moose steaks cooking around the fire overrode their concerns regarding the bad news and soon all fell to chow like it was their last meal. However, all kept their rifles handy and their eyes peeled. Having the Blackfoot in country was no idle threat. All they could hope for was that they would move on into a different part of the country and leave them to their trapping.

  Come daylight next morning, all the men around the campfire thoughtfully ate moose steak fried in bear grease, with bowls of hot cornmeal gruel sweetened with hard sugar, and tar-like coffee. When finished, words were not spoken as they separated with just a quiet wave of the hands.

  This time, both sets of men really took their time working through a darkened forest which could be a friend as well as a foe. But once on the fringe of the beaver ponds, the edge of concern slowly disappeared as the traps set the night before were emptied of beaver and river otter, then reset.

  The Potts Brothers took their work dead serious.

  Al’s practiced eye constantly checked the edge of the woods and patches of willows to the front and rear as his brother checked and reset his traps. When Tom finished, he mounted his horse, took his Hawken and repeated the same watchfulness his brother had just practiced.

  Carrying his rifle and still keeping a watchful eye, Al began checking and then removing dead beaver and resetting his traps set the evening before. Slowly they moved up along the willows towards a finger of lodgepole pine jutting out to the edge of the beaver pond. Tom took the lead and slowly rode into the pine finger that potentially posed a threat if someone was of the mind to use it as ambush cover. Al stood at the edge of the timber holding his Hawken as he covered his brother. Once on the other side, Tom motioned all was clear and for Al to come and bring the packhorse.

  * * *

  Boom-boom—boom-boom—pow-pow, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom broke the silence north of Jacob and Martin. They stopped instantly in their tracks and continued to listen, trying to discern what had just happened. The only sounds returning to their ears was that of a curious gray jay calling to his buddies. That was then followed with the loud call of a Clark’s nutcracker high in a dead lodgepole pine and the ever-whispering wind through the trees.

  Quickly remounting his horse from where he had been checking a trap, Jacob said, “Let’s go!”

  With that, the two men quietly moved through the forest to the north where they had just heard the mass firing of many heavy rifles and pistols. Half an hour later, Martin dismounted to look at a number of fresh horse tracks in the soft forest soil. A grimace soon followed on his weathered face. “Twelve unshod ponies following three shod horses. Looks like whoever they are, they cut Tom and Al’s trail and followed.”

  Martin quickly remounted. The two men spurred their horses on to a faster but still cautious pace.

  Twenty minutes later, Jacob saw something gleaming white through the timber next to a large beaver pond. They carefully working their way through the downfalls, then came upon a bloody scene. The “white thing” Jacob had spied was the naked body of Tom. He had been shot full of arrows and bullet holes, his heart and liver had been cut out and all the fingers on his shooting hand had been removed. His long brown locks of hair were also no more, leaving a bloody and gleaming white skull in their place.

  Then Martin saw Al...or what was left of him. He had made it to the trees before the Indians had overrun his place of defense. He laid alongside a log, also stripped of all clothing like his brother and was mutilated. His head had been almost completely cut off and scalped. His body bristled with about thirty arrows along with two large purple and red bullet holes on both sides of his body. Rolling him over, Martin discovered that Al’s chest had been split open and his heart had been cut out.

  Both Jacob and Martin were appalled and angered at what they saw.

  They rapidly cleared their senses for battle and glanced around to see if the danger still existed. Nothing but the quiet of the forest presented itself for view. It was obvious, however, some Indians had been wounded or killed in the ensuing action as well; there were several blood trails over the marks the hooves of the Indians’ horses had made as they moved off. Both men began following the horses’ tracks without hesitation. Regardless of the odds, their friends had been brutally killed and the killers had to be brought to justice.

  Jacob thought, Even if it means we’re killed in the process, there’ll be company in the killin’.

  Soon the men discovered hastily dug scrapes in the ground for three Indians’ bodies. They were quickly confirmed as the dreaded Blackfoot by their dress and the markings on their arrows. That also meant that there were three less Blackfoot in the raiding party, leaving perhaps about nine. Just about the right odds, thought Jacob grimly.

  A look at Martin’s face revealed that he didn’t care if there were a hundred. Someone was going to pay for what they had done to his friends no matter what the odds or outcome of the battle to follow.

  That’s one thing about Martin, Jacob thought. Once he gets his red up, someone or something is going to die.

  After another careful three hours of travel, they came to overlook a scene of another deadly happening about to take place. In the creek’s lush grasses below, thirty Indian ponies were feeding. They belonged to a peaceful band of Snake Indians. Off in a distance, on a flat under some cottonwood trees, there were fifteen tepees belonging to the horses’ owners. A band of Snakes were camped, totally unawares that a party of dreaded Blackfoot were in their backyard with murder and thievery on their minds.

  Martin pointed silently in a different direction. Not twenty yards from the two men, cleverly hidden in a large patch of w
illows, were the Indian raiders’ horses, including those belonging to Tom and Al. Another twenty yards distant from the horses were nine Blackfoot Indians crawling up on the Snake’s horse herd. They had already surprised the small Indian boy watching the herd from a distance and had quietly cut his throat. With the watcher of the herd dead, their way to the horse herd was almost free and clear. If they could spook the Snake’s horses, return to their animals and then capture the loose mounts, the Snake could not pursue them except on foot. And an Indian on foot was no match for one on horseback.

  As they continued slowly riding silently towards the deadly Blackfoot, Jacob and Martin became aware of another situation taking place in the creek. Two young women, probably in their late teens, were taking the time to bathe in the creek. Both Jacob and Martin, even under the stress of the moment, could not help but marvel at the naked beauty of the women. Then two Blackfoot warriors separated from the other seven and began crawling towards the unsuspecting women. With tomahawks in hand, their intentions were immediately crystal clear to the trappers. They would club the two women so they could not spread an alarm. Then the other seven would quietly move the horse herd back towards their staked horses, mount up and drive the Snake’s horses out of the area, a real coup if they could pull it off.

  Jacob and Martin quietly tied off their horses and took their reserve Hawkens off the pack animal. Normally they would not have carried their extra rifles but after Tom’s words of caution the night before, carry them now they did. The extra firearms would come in handy in the events certain to follow.

  The two Blackfoot Indians continued crawling through the willows towards the unsuspecting bathing women. Lying in the tall grasses unobserved, they waited until their seven partners were in position close to the Snake’s horse herd. Finally the signal was given when the seven could not sneak any further towards the horses without the women being removed from the scene first. Up jumped the two Blackfoot warriors and, in a matter of a few steps, they were upon the still unsuspecting women whose backs were turned to the onrushing danger. Both Blackfoot jumped into the stream and grabbed the women by their long hair before they knew what was happening. Then they jerked the women’s heads back to prevent screaming and started to smash their tomahawks down on their faces. Boom-boom bellowed the trappers’ Hawkens in quick tandem and the heads of both Blackfoot in the creek exploded, spewing blood and brains all over the two naked women. As luck would have it, both those Hawkens had only been loaded with ball, not buck and ball, allowing them to be shot accurately at long range. Screaming in terror, the women ran for the protective cover of the willows on the opposite bank of the stream.