Blood at Bear Lake

by Gary Franklin

  When he thought about it, there was an awful lot of prime country he and the other boys used to roam back in the days when fur was king and they were the lords of the mountains.

  Remembering those days, Joe permitted himself a small smile.

  Then he sobered. Fiona. He had to think of Fiona and Jessica. He had to protect them from this Ransom Holt.

  Grim and determined, Joe knocked the dottle from his pipe and dropped it back into his possibles pouch, then took one long, cautious look around, searching for the sight or the scent of an enemy, before lying down for the night.

  40

  FORT LARAMIE HAD not changed much since the last time Joe was there. It was perhaps busier thanks to increased traffic on the old Oregon Trail, but it was no grander. The few buildings were weathered, the logs warping and adobe brick melting.

  But there were pens of livestock—oxen, mules, and heavy horses taken in on trade and allowed to recuperate here while their former owners traveled on to California and Oregon and Deseret—and sheds where goods were either stored or manufactured. There were a leatherworks and harness maker, a blacksmith, a low shed where bunks could be hired with or without a plump Shoshone girl to warm a man’s blankets . . . and whatever.

  There was the usual assortment of white and red inhabitants, almost enough to make a small town out of what was initially only a trading point for mountain men and the occasional emigrant. Now it seemed that the emigrant trains had become the majority. And a busy traffic they were providing. The place swarmed with wagons and draft stock and the curses of bullwhackers.

  Joe stopped at one of the many corrals only long enough to put his horse and mule in and strip their gear. Then, his heart in his throat at the prospect of finding Fiona again, he hurried to the trading post where he had so many memories from the past.

  The place was very much as he remembered it. Low, dim, smelling of whiskey and cured fur and tobacco. Goods were piled on shelves and stacked on the floor, and there must have been three dozen people crowded inside looking to buy or to trade for whatever they needed to go onward.

  Joe wove his way through the crowd, sliding this way and that and becoming impatient at the pork-eating sons of bitches who were in his way now that he might at last find Fiona.

  “Move, dammit!”

  A pasty-faced man with stringy hair bristled at being so ordered. He spun around ready to fight, but one look at Joe Moss’s face convinced him that would not be a good idea. The fellow wilted and scurried out of Joe’s path.

  Joe stepped up to the counter and eyed the middle-aged clerk who stood behind it.

  “Where’s Sol?” he demanded.

  “Who?” the clerk said.

  “Sol, dammit. Sol Pennington. He’s your boss here, ain’t he? So where is the old sonuvabitch?” Sol Pennington was an old and true friend, a former mountain man himself who had helped Joe recover from the bender he had gone on when he first lost Fiona some years back. Joe was looking forward to seeing Sol again.

  “Oh, yes. Of course.” The clerk shook his head. “Pennington was gone before I got here.”

  “Gone? Where the hell’s he gone?”

  “Gone like in dead, mister. Pennington got himself killed.”

  The news hit Joe harder than he would have believed. He grounded the butt of his Henry rifle on the trading post floor and reached out to touch the counter. He needed to take hold of something solid in a suddenly dizzying world.

  Sol had come through more Indian fights than most men had ever heard tales about. He had saved Joe’s life many times over. And Joe had saved his in return. Now . . . dead?

  “How?” Joe asked. “How’d old Sol go under?”

  The clerk shrugged, not particularly interested in the topic. “He back-talked some customer, I think. The customer killed him.”

  “Shot him?” Joe asked.

  “Knife, I think.”

  Joe frowned. Sol was a canny old wolf. He would not have been easy to take any way at all, but . . . a knife? Unless it was in the back, Joe would not have thought that possible.

  “What about Sol? Did he get his licks in? Did he at least take the pilgrim with him?”

  “Mister, I wouldn’t know about that shit, and I don’t have time to stand here jawing with you to no purpose. If you want to buy something, fine. Otherwise, please stand aside so’s I can take care of these other folks.”

  Joe wanted to ask about Fiona, too. But not of this snotty son of a bitch. Surely there would be others hanging on from the old days. He would question any of those that he came to. In the meantime, he would drift through the compound and see if he could spot Fiona or her pretty little sorrel.

  He turned away from the counter, his eyes moving back and forth over the crowd, searching for a familiar face among all these strangers.

  But old Sol. Dead. Joe could scarcely believe it.

  Henri Valderama was noisily engaged in trying to barter a pair of poor-quality wolf skins to a family of Easterners whose three boys were wide-eyed at the yarn Valderama was spinning in an effort to get a good price for the skins. Likely the trading post had already refused them, so now he was trying to unload them on the pilgrims.

  Joe walked close by, looking and listening as he did so. He was tempted to stop and ask Henri about Fiona, but stifled the impulse. Henri likely had not spoken a true thing since he told his mama he was leaving home thirty or forty years ago. Anything Valderama might say would almost certainly be a lie anyway, so why bother?

  He wandered back past the pigpens—oh, they brought back memories: laying up drunk and crawling into the hog house on hands and knees to share the warmth given off by the hogs’ bodies—and saw a fat, homely squaw squatting in the dirt to take a piss.

  She looked up, saw him, and began to grin. Quickly, she finished, gave a little wiggle of her hips to shake herself off, then stood and came trotting toward him.

  Probably looking for a handout was his first thought. Then she called out, “Hel-lo, Man Killer.” It was a name he had been given long ago and was known by among the Indian tribes. Damned few white men would know it, though, especially now when he had been away from the mountains for so long.

  There was something about the woman’s voice . . . something familiar. And her face . . . Joe cocked his head and half-closed one eye as he took a closer look.

  Joe broke into a grin. “Lulu!” he yelped, and gathered her into a bear hug.

  Nine or ten years back, Lulu was a slim and pretty Man-dan girl who had been captured by the Lakota and kept as a slave. Joe bought her out of captivity for use as a “winter wife” one year. She was a hard worker and a fine fuck. Come spring, he had married her off to a young Cheyenne who did not own enough horses to buy a wife among his own people. Yeah, he remembered Lulu.

  “How’ve you been, Lulu? Where is your husband?” Joe could not remember the young brave’s name, but he did not want to say so.

  “He is dead. Rubbed out. Baby dead, too.” She shrugged. “Now I am here. Work hard.” She brightened. “You want wife, Man Killer? You know I am good wife.”

  “I know you’re a fine wife, Lulu, but I already got a wife. White woman. She wouldn’t understand me takin’ another wife, too.”

  “Oh.” Lulu did not look overly disappointed by the news.

  “Maybe you’ve seen my wife, Lulu. Her and me got separated so now I’m lookin’ to find her. Maybe here. You been here at the fort long?”

  “I live here, Man Killer. Here three, maybe four winter.”

  “Then you might’ve seen her. White woman about this tall.” He held his hand to indicate Fiona’s height. “Long red hair. Pale complexion with freckles.”

  “Freck . . . what are them?”

  “Little dots on the face. Like tiny flecks of paint but they don’t wash off.”

  “Oh, yes. I know.”

  “You know her? You’ve seen her?” Joe’s excitement rose at the prospect of being reunited with his darling, then was quickly dashed when Lulu said, �
��I know what you mean by freck, not know white woman with red hair.”

  “Damn! You haven’t seen anyone like that?”

  Lulu shook her head.

  “All right, thanks. Say, you’ve been here awhile, so that means you was here when Sol was killed. D’you know what happened to him?”

  “Huh! Sol, he was good to me. Gave me work when did not need work. You know what I mean?”

  “I do, Lulu. Sol was a good man. A good friend.”

  “This new man”—she made a sour face and spat—“he is not a good man, Man Killer. Not good. No work for me, none.”

  “That’s a shame, Lulu. I’m sorry ’bout that. But you was gonna tell me about Sol.”

  She shrugged. “A man comes. Big man. He is hunting someone. Show Sol a metal star, very shiny and pretty. I see it myself. I am standing in the store. Going to ask Sol for work. I do not hear what they spoke of, but Sol gets angry. Tells the big man to go. They argue. Yell. Back and forth. Back and forth. The big man has a knife. He cuts Sol. So.” Lulu ran her index finger across her more-than-ample belly and made a swishing sound.

  “Sol’s guts fall out. The big man takes a bottle from behind counter, then goes to a table and speaks with other white men. Sol tries to catch his guts and push them back inside, but pretty soon he falls down. They say he dies next day sometime, but I was not there when he dies, Man Killer, so I cannot say about that, no.”

  “Dammit, Lulu, Sol was a good friend o’ mine. I want you to tell me more about what this big man looks like an’ who it was he talked to after he cut Sol.”

  “I will tell, Man Killer, but do you want fuck? You know I am good.”

  “I know you are, sweetheart, and I’m gonna give you some money t’ help you out, but right now what I most need from you is a real good description of this big man that killed Sol.”

  “Over here, Man Killer. Come over here. We will sit and we will talk, eh?”

  41

  RANSOM HOLT. IT was the Peabody head of security who killed Sol. The same son of a bitch who was putting a price on Joe’s head. And on Fiona’s.

  Joe could forgive the man for trying to kill him. Could even accept his having killed Sol, for Sol was a man grown and well capable of defending himself. But Fiona! There was no power on earth that could make Joe forgive Holt— or anyone else—for seeking to harm his beloved Fiona.

  Or anyone else, he reminded himself.

  Ransom Holt was but a cur dog doing his master’s bidding, and that master would be a Peabody.

  By Joe’s reckoning, there should be only one of the Peabody brothers left alive after the carnage he had brought upon them back in Nevada. That was one Peabody too many. They were the cause of Fiona’s troubles, falsely accusing her of murdering one of their own and siccing the law on her when they knew she was innocent. Now they continued to threaten the lives of Fiona and of little Jessica.

  Joe intended to do something about that.

  But first things first.

  He had to find Fiona. It worried him to be apart from her and unable to protect her from Holt and his hired thugs. Jessica was safe enough, at least for the time being, in the convent back in Nevada where Fiona had left her. The responsibility for protecting both of them lay on Joe’s shoulders, however.

  He needed first to find Fiona. Then to stop Holt from engaging assassins who wanted to lift Joe’s hair and to kill or capture Fiona and Jessica, too. Joe had to find Ransom Holt. He had to kill the man. That was the only sure way to stop him. That was exactly what Joe intended to do.

  But, dammit, he was in the middle of a dilemma. On the one hand, he needed to be here at Fort Laramie where he believed Fiona was headed. On the other, he needed to find this Holt son of a bitch, and, according to Lulu, Holt had already moved on, headed south into what they were nowadays calling Colorado. Denver, Fountain Creek, the Bayou Salado maybe.

  Holt was probably planting seeds of treachery. Leaving them behind him wherever he had been, men who were told what to look for and what reward they could expect if they succeeded in killing Joe or Fiona.

  Cy Brainard back in Salt Lake City had been the first of Holt’s would-be killers that Joe encountered. It was not likely that Cy would be the last.

  Joe sat cross-legged on the ground, leaning back against a fence post on the corral where his horse and mule were confined. He loaded his pipe with tobacco and used a burning glass to light it, then sat slowly puffing the tasty smoke. To all outward appearances, he seemed a man who was half asleep and paying no mind to what was around him.

  He was anything but inattentive, however, his senses alert to danger and his thoughts churning.

  If he left immediately to catch up with and kill Ransom Holt, he would be leaving Fiona on her own that much longer. But if he waited to find Fiona, Joe would only be giving Holt that much longer to sow his seeds of murder.

  Joe grunted and dropped the half-smoked pipe back into his possibles pouch. He stood and brushed off the seat of his britches.

  Regardless of what he decided between those choices, he realized, there was something more immediate that needed his attention.

  There was someone—somewhere—here amid the crowds and confusion of Fort Laramie—who intended to kill him.

  He was sure of that. Otherwise, Ransom Holt would not have left to head south. Fort Laramie was one of the major stops on the Oregon Trail, and anyone crossing the plains in either direction was sure to come through. It only stood to reason that Holt would not have left the post without hiring at least one killer to wait here and to watch.

  Joe checked his revolver to make sure the caps were all properly in place, then loosened the bowie in its sheath and touched the head of his tomahawk to make sure everything was correctly placed. If he needed any of his weapons, they had to come to hand without any fumbling or uncertainty because there might very well be no warning before Holt’s snakes struck.

  Then he set off, seemingly relaxed and aimless, to smoke out whoever it was at the post who wanted his head.

  42

  AT THE END of a long day of questioning strangers and a handful of acquaintances from his old days in the mountains, Joe knew nothing more than he had already learned from Lulu.

  He was sure Ransom Holt would not have left Fort Laramie without hiring an assassin, but he had no idea who that person might be.

  He was equally sure—no, upon reflection not equally, but reasonably sure—that Fiona was likely to come here in an effort to find him.

  After all, Fiona would be looking for him just as surely as he was anxious to reunite with her. The two of them were one person, man and wife, and they needed to be together so they could reclaim Jessica from the convent and make a life together as a family.

  Fort Laramie was one of the few places Fiona would associate with Joe. He tried to think back to the conversations they had had in the brief period when they were together after that first awful separation.

  They had talked. Of course they had talked. But more about her ordeal than about his life before they married.

  Had he mentioned Santa Fe and his days as a bull-whacker and wagon master? He could not recall.

  Certainly there were things he had done—and women he had bedded—that he would not want to discuss with Fiona. Oh, if she ever directly asked, he would be honest about those days. He would tell her rather than lie, for a good marriage cannot be built on a bed of lies. But unless she directly questioned him about those times, well, there was no point in bringing them up when he did not have to.

  Thinking back to the women he had known then, Joe now felt his manhood lengthen and swell inside his britches. It was time to change the direction of his thinking before he went and did something he might regret afterward. Not all the Indian girls who were here were as fat and homely as Lulu, and Joe could have had almost any of them for a kind word and a few twists of tobacco. It was difficult to keep from remembering that.

  In past times, he would have had a bottle in one hand and a red-hued bre
ast in the other by the time the sun went down.

  Which it was soon going to do. Joe tilted his head and squinted, staring off toward the west where the sun was disappearing beneath the horizon. Lost in thought, he stood like that for a moment. Then visibly shook himself as he came back to the here and now of his situation.

  He slipped inside the corral where his Shire and the mule were lodged, and gave them each a brief rubdown. He bought some grain from a Kansas mule packer and gave it to his animals to go along with the wild grass hay that was already available in a rick. By that time it was dark, and there was a chill in the air.

  Another day had passed with no sign of Fiona. Dammit!

  Joe strode to the trading post and pushed his way through the knot of emigrants, Kentuckians these were, who were gathered outside.

  “Whiskey,” he roared as he approached the counter. “Two bottles o’ whiskey. None o’ that fancy shit now. Injun whiskey is good enough for Old Joe Moss.” He banged the flat of his hand on the counter. “I been drinking Injun whiskey since before you was born, sonny. No reason for me t’ change now.” He banged the counter again and laid a tiny gold quarter eagle down to pay for it. “Two bottles, I said. One for me and one for them boys outside. They look like they could use a drink, too.”

  “Two bottles it is.” The clerk brought them and picked up Joe’s money. Indian whiskey should have been no more than a dollar a bottle, but he did not offer any change. The man peered closely into Joe’s face for a moment, then asked, “You’re Moss, ain’t you?”

  “That’s right. That mean something t’ you, mister?”

  “No. I asked after you were in here looking for Pennington, that’s all. They said you used to be a real he-coon.”

  “That’s right. Still am, too.” Joe pulled the cork from one of the brown bottles and took a slug of the cheap trade whiskey. He coughed and half-choked, spitting at least half of it back out again. “By God,” he roared, “you people here ain’t learned to make any better Injun whiskey than you ever did. An’ don’t be telling me what’s in it. If you did tell me the truth, I wouldn’t wanta know it.” He took a more moderate drink. “Snake shit an’ turtle turds is what it tastes like.” He grinned. “But it’s whiskey. Damn me if it ain’t.”