Preacher

by William W. Johnstone

  “You are in the cabin of Monsieurs Pierre Garneau and Clyde Barnes.”

  “I’ve heard of you. You are Bodie’s friends,” Art said.

  “Oui,” Pierre replied, showing little surprise at Art’s response. “Monsieur Barnes and I are most curious. How is it that you are riding Monsieur Bodie’s Rhoda?”

  “I traded my horse for Rhoda.”

  “I thought as much. Are you hungry? Do you wish to eat?”

  “Yes.”

  Art tried once more to sit up, but again he was overcome by pain and nausea, so he fell back down. “I am hungry,” he admitted. “But I don’t think I can sit up.”

  “That is no problem. I will feed you,” Pierre offered. “I myself made this wonderful soup. I think you will like it, and I think it will be good for you to eat.”

  Pierre carried a bowl of soup over, then sat on the edge of the bed and began spoon-feeding it to Art.

  “Thanks,” Art said after taking his first bite. “Umm, you are right, it is good soup. What kind is it?”

  Pierre laughed. “Why it is soup from the bear you yourself killed,” he said, holding another spoonful of the broth to Art’s lips.

  Art studied his benefactor. Pierre looked to be in his late forties or early fifties. He was a big man, bald, with a round face and full beard, brown but turning to gray. His eyes were blue, and one of them was drooping because of a scar that started at his hairline, then came down to the eye socket itself

  Pierre saw Art looking at the scar, and he chuckled. “My face, it is not a pretty thing to see, no?” Pierre asked, pointing to his scar with the spoon, empty between bites.

  “It’s all right,” Art said, not sure how to respond to the question.

  “You are a good boy not to hurt my feelings,” Pierre said.

  “I . . . I didn’t mean to stare,” Art apologized.

  “An unfriendly Sioux left this scar,” Pierre explained. “He was angry because I had no scalp for him to take.” He laughed at the self-deprecating reference to his baldness.

  “Where is this cabin?” Art asked.

  “It is in the mountain range called the Grand Tetons.” Pierre laughed. “That is a joke, my friend. Most Americans do not know that Grand Teton means big titties.” He put his hands over his chest, approximating breasts, and laughed again.

  “Why would someone call mountains big titties?” Art asked.

  “When you are well, look at them from a distance sometime. It looks like a woman lying down.”

  “Oh,” Art said. He looked around the cabin. “Nice cabin,” he said.

  “Oui. I built this cabin myself, many years ago, when there were only a few Frenchmen and many Indians out here. At first I lived alone, then I met Monsieur Bodie. One year ago Clyde came to live with us, and this year Monsieur Bodie left, but as always I have stayed. And now you are here, so we are three again.”

  “Where is . . .”

  “Clyde?”

  “Yes.”

  “Clyde is collecting wood. He will be back soon, I think.”

  Almost as if on cue, the front door to the cabin opened and a man came in, carrying an armload of wood. This man was tall, clean-shaven except for a mustache, and with a full shock of hair that was dark brown. He was much younger than Pierre.

  “Ahh, here is Monsieur Barnes,” Pierre said. “Clyde, our young visitor is awake. His name is Art.”

  Clyde dumped the wood in the wood box, then brushed his hands together as he looked over toward Art.

  “That was some deed, killin’ that bear like you done,” Clyde said. “Folks’ll be tellin’ that story for some time. Most especial you bein’ someone as young as you are. How old are you anyway?”

  “About sixteen, I guess,” Art said. “I’ve sort of lost track of time.”

  Clyde nodded. “That’ll happen to you out here. Don’t happen that much to pups like you, ’cause we don’t normally see folks as young as you out here. What you doin’ here anyway?”

  “I came to see the creature,” Art said.

  Clyde laughed out loud. “Come to see the creature, did you? Well, boy, that’s as good an answer as any I’ve heard.”

  Finished with the soup, Pierre put the empty bowl down, then reached his hand out to touch Art’s wound. Art reacted to the touch.

  “Easy, ami,” Pierre said. “Does it hurt?”

  “Not too much,” Art said.

  Slowly, gently, Pierre pulled the bandage off the wound so he could examine it. “I’ve made a poultice of bear fat and pine needles,” he said. “I believe that might be helping.”

  “Is it putrefying?” Clyde asked.

  “No,” Pierre replied.

  “That’s a good sign. If it ain’t putrefying yet, it ain’t likely to do it.” Clyde came over to look down at Art.

  “Boy, if you ever decide to become a gambler, you ought to do well by it,” Clyde said. “You are one lucky fella.”

  “Yes, sir,” Art said. “I guess what I’m luckiest about is that you two came along when you did. I’m beholdin’ to you for taking me in.”

  “There is no need for you to be indebted to anyone,” Pierre said. “You have purchased your right to be here with the food you brought.”

  “Food?”

  “The bear,” Clyde explained. “Most likely that single critter will feed the three of us for most of the winter.”

  “Oui,” Pierre said.

  “Besides which, we ain’t neither one of us been back to the States in three or four years,” Clyde added. “It’ll be good to have someone to talk to this winter. You can fill us in on all the latest news.”

  “I don’t keep up with the goings-on,” Art admitted.

  “Tell us about the war,” Pierre said. “We have heard talk of a war between the United States and England. Is that so?”

  “Yeah,” Clyde said. “We’re sort of wonderin’ now if we’re Americans or English.”

  “Or French,” Pierre added.

  “You are Americans,” Art said. “We all are. America won the war.”

  “I’ll be damned,” Clyde said. “Beat them Brits again, did we? Well, I reckon that’ll keep ’em in their place for a while.”

  “If the United States won it, it was, no doubt, with the help of France,” Pierre said. “In the last war with England, the war you Americans call your war of independence, you won it only with the help of the French.”

  “I don’t think the French were involved in the war this time,” Art said. “If they were, I didn’t hear anything about it.”

  “Do you know anything about the war?” Clyde asked. “Did you read or hear anything about any of the battles?”

  “I know about only one battle,” Art said. “And that’s the Battle of New Orleans. I can tell you everything you want to know about that battle.”

  “And how is it you know so much about it?” Pierre asked.

  “Because I fought in it,” Art answered simply.

  “Glory be. You? Young as you are, you fought in the war?” Clyde asked, surprised by Art’s response.

  “Why are you so surprised, Clyde?” Pierre asked. “Did the boy not kill a grizzly bear, armed only with a knife? Compared to that deed, I think fighting the British could not be so much.”

  * * *

  Thanks to the attention given his wound by Pierre, Art recovered from the bear-mauling with no aftereffects. He began helping out around the cabin, preparing meals and cleaning and pressing beaver pelts. Finally, the time that Art was waiting for came. Pierre invited Art to go out with him and Clyde to help them set the traps.

  When Art left the cabin to go with them, he was surprised at how cold it was. When he commented on it, Pierre reminded him that it was getting late in the fall. He also told him that the higher one went in the mountains, the colder the weather.

  “How high are we?” Art asked.

  Pierre shook his head. “That I cannot tell you, for I have no way of measuring such things. I know only that it is high.”


  Loading traps and camping gear onto their mules, for like Art, Pierre and Clyde were also riding mules, the three started out to set their trap line.

  * * *

  Pierre was riding in the lead, Clyde was following, and Art was bringing up the rear. The three rode for what seemed like hours, with not a word passing between them.

  Art was actually enjoying the solitude, for he was coming closer than he had yet come to seeing the creature. Never had he seen such towering peaks as these, and he looked at them with wonder and appreciation, sorry only that his friend Harding hadn’t lived long enough to see the mountains with him. And Pierre was right, the Grand Tetons did look like a woman lying on her back, breasts thrusting into the air. “Big titties,” he said to himself, laughing at the illusion.

  “I think this may be good place,” Pierre said after they had been riding for several hours. When he dismounted, Clyde and Art dismounted as well. Pierre walked over to the edge of the stream and looked around. “Yes,” he said. “I was here in 1802. The beaver were many then. I think maybe they have come back to this place.”

  “You were here in 1802?” Art asked in surprise. “But that was before Lewis and Clark, wasn’t it?”

  “Lewis and Clark?” Pierre asked.

  “Yes, you know, the great explorers?”

  “Oh, yes, I remember them. They were nice young men. They were . . . how do you say . . . green behind the ears?”

  Clyde chuckled. “Wet behind the ears,” he said.

  “Oui, wet behind the ears. They needed lots of help, but they were friendly enough.”

  “They needed help?” Art asked.

  “Yes. And I did what I could to help them,” Pierre said without elaboration.

  “But surely they didn’t need much help. They are the ones who opened the West.”

  Clyde laughed. “You think Lewis and Clark opened the West, do you, boy?”

  “That’s what I have always heard and read,” Art said.

  “Well, don’t believe everything you hear and read,” Clyde suggested. “When Mr. Lewis and Mr. Clark came West, there were already people out here, including our own Pierre Garneau. Pierre was one of their guides.”

  “How long have you been out here?” Art asked Pierre.

  “I came out here when I was twenty-two years old,” Pierre said. “That was in 1782.”

  Art whistled. “1782? You must’ve been the first one out here,” he said.

  Pierre laughed. “Hardly the first, my friend. And certainly not the last. Now, let us gather some traps and get to work, for we have a saying out here. La langue n’attrape pas le castor. That means, the tongue does not catch the beaver.”

  “We better get to work, Art. Else we’ll have this old man to deal with,” Clyde said good-naturedly.

  Taking half-a-dozen traps from the back of the mule, Art threw them over his shoulder and followed his two mentors. When Pierre stepped out into the water and began wading, Art hesitated.

  “What is it, boy?” Pierre asked, looking back at him. “Why do you stand there?”

  “Isn’t that water cold?”

  “Oui, it is very cold. That’s why I don’t want to stand here all day.”

  “Then why are you standing in it?”

  “You want to leave your smell for the beaver?” Clyde asked, wading out into the water behind Pierre.

  “Oh, I see,” Art said, understanding now that if they were careful to stay in the water, no human scent would be left. He followed the other two in the water, catching his breath sharply from the icy cold that shot up his legs when he stepped into the stream.

  Pierre wandered down the stream for at least half a mile, looking for sign of fresh beaver activity. Finally, he stopped and held up his hand. Clyde and Art stopped as well.

  “We will put our traps here,” Pierre said. Dropping all his traps in the water, he proceeded to set them, depressing the springs by standing on them, putting one foot on each trap arm to open them up. When the traps were opened, he engaged the pan notch, holding them in the set position.

  Art began setting his own traps, watching the other two in order to learn how it should be done. Once a trap was set, the trap chain was extended its full length outward to deeper water, where a trap stake was passed through the ring at the end of the chain and driven into the streambed.

  Finally, the bait was placed. This was a wand of willow, cut to a length that would permit its small end to extend from the stream bank directly over the pan of the trap. Bark was scraped from the stick and castoreum was smeared on the small end of the switch, so that it hung about six inches or more above the trap. Castoreum, Art learned, was an oil taken from the glands of a beaver.

  Once the trap was set, Art and the others would leave, remaining in the water until they were some distance away in order to avoid leaving their own scent to compete with that of the castoreum.

  When the last trap was set, the men returned to the first group of traps. There, they found that some beavers had already been taken. They removed the beavers, then skinned them by making a slit down the belly and up each leg. After that they would cut off the feet, then peel off the skin. Once the pelt was removed from the carcass, it was scraped free of fat and flesh, the necessary first step in curing the pelts.

  “Here, boy,” Clyde said, lobbing off the tail of one of the beavers, and tossing it to Art. “Cook up our dinner for us.”

  It was the first time Art had ever eaten beaver tail, but he found it quite delicious.

  * * *

  The three men being hanged in St. Louis were river pirates who had terrorized the Mississippi River for several months. Their mode of operation was to wait in hiding along the banks of the river until they saw a flatboat or keelboat making its way downstream. Then they would get into a skiff, paddle quickly out to the boat, kill the unsuspecting boatmen, and take the boat’s cargo.

  More than fifteen boatmen had lost their lives to these same river pirates, and thousands of dollars worth of goods had been stolen. Then a group of St. Louis citizens, tired of the piracy, set a trap for them by concealing several armed men on one of the boats. The pirates were captured, brought to St. Louis, tried, and sentenced to death by hanging.

  Today was the day their execution was to be carried out, and almost two thousand people had gathered along the riverbank to watch the spectacle.

  Bruce Eby, thankful that he had avoided this fate, stood in the crowd and watched as the three pirates, Moses Jones, Timothy Sneed, and Ronald Wilson, were led to the gallows. Wilson was a boy, no older than fifteen, and he was weeping and wailing entreaties to God to have mercy on his soul, and by his contrition had elicited some sympathy from the crowd of onlookers who were gathered for the execution. Moses Jones remained absolutely silent, but he glared sullenly, frighteningly at the crowd. Timothy Sneed, on the other hand, shouted taunts at them.

  “Hear me, all you good people of St. Louis,” Sneed called out to them. “You’ve come to watch ole Timothy Sneed dance a little jig at the end of a rope, have you? Well, don’t be bashful. Come on up close. Hold your children up so they can get a good, close look at my ugly face. When my ghost comes callin’ in the middle of the night, I want all the little children to know it’s me comin’ to get them!” He glared at the children, then laughed maniacally.

  “Mama!” a boy yelled in a frightened voice. “Is he going to get me?”

  “Yes, I’m comin’ for you, sonny!” Sneed said. “I’m comin’ for all of you!” he added. “No more peaceful sleep in St. Louis.” Again, he laughed, a cackling, hideous laugh.

  “You’re an evil man, Timothy Sneed, to be frightening children in such a way,” someone shouted up from the crowd.

  “I may be frightenin’ the children, but I’m givin’ the ladies a bit of a thrill, I think. You men will all be thankin’ me tonight when the ladies, still warm and twitching from watching ole Timothy’s eyes pop out, will be snugglin’ up to you for a little lovin’.”

  “Shut your evil m
outh, Sneed, or I will gag you before the hanging,” the sheriff warned.

  Sneed laughed again. “Why would you gag me, Sheriff? If I didn’t play the fool for you at this hanging, what would be the pleasure in watching? Don’t you know this is all part of the show?”

  “Do you have no shame? Have you no sorrow for your wicked ways?” someone asked from the crowd.

  “None!” Sneed replied.

  “I do!” Wilson shouted. “I am sorely shamed that I left my poor old mother to seek my fortune. How she will grieve for me when she learns of my fate.” Wilson was weeping now.

  “Hell, boy, your mother’s a bloody whore,” Sneed sneered. “Grieve for you? She don’t even remember you.”

  “Lord, I’m sorry for my sins!” Wilson shouted.

  “Die like a man, Wilson,” Sneed said. “Don’t be givin’ these psalm-singers your prayers.”

  “Leave the boy alone, Sneed. I’m thinkin’ it might do us no harm to be goin’ to meet the Lord with a prayer on our lips,” Moses suggested.

  “Ha!” Sneed replied. “It’s not the Lord we’ll be seein’ when we open our eyes again. It’ll be the face of Satan his ownself, and I’ll not be goin’ to see that bloody bastard with prayers. I’ll be screamin’ and cussin’ all the way to hell. And when I get there, I plan to kick the devil right in his rosy red ass.”

  A gasp came from the crowd, for never had this group of God-fearing people been so close to pure evil. Some swore they could even smell sulfur.

  “It’s time,” the sheriff said. He nodded to his deputy, and the deputy slipped a black hood over the head of each prisoner, one at a time.

  Just before he put the hood over Sneed’s face, Sneed happened to see Eby standing in the crowd.

  “Eby, you son of a bitch!” he yelled. “I remember when you was one of us! How is it you ain’t up here getting’ your neck stretched?” The last part of Sneed’s shout was muffled by the hood.

  For a moment, Eby was frightened that perhaps someone in the crowd would connect him with Sneed’s last, agonized challenge. But it quickly became obvious that Sneed’s words were a mystery to the crowd.

  With the hoods in place, the deputy stepped back away from the three men, then nodded at the sheriff. The sheriff pulled a handle that opened the hinged floor under the feet of the condemned.