Pearlie blushed. “No, I think I’ll be all right for a while, Smoke.”
“I wished you hadn’t put the idea in his head, Smoke,” Cal said, grinning. “Now he’ll be dozing in his saddle an’ we’ll have to stop ever so often to pick him up when he falls on his butt.”
“That’ll be the day,” Pearlie retorted, smiling at the picture Cal painted.
“So I guess you’re saying you can stay awake then, at least until dinnertime anyway,” Cal said, swinging up into his saddle.
Pearlie took a swat at the young man with his hat, but missed.
They rode as hard as they could push the horses through the rough terrain, Smoke electing to hold off stopping for supper until just past ten o’clock that night. The half-moon cast enough light so that they could easily follow Wilson’s blaze marks, and other than stopping for a quick pot of coffee and to let the horses rest, they continued riding until late that night.
Smoke decided to stop after Cal had fallen asleep in the saddle twice and almost fallen off his horse, much to the delight of Pearlie, who teased him unmercifully about being the one who almost fell off his horse.
“All right, men,” Smoke finally said. “Enough is enough. Let’s make camp, eat, and get some sleep. Dawn’s gonna come awfully early.”
“Thank God,” Louis said, getting down off his horse and rubbing his buttocks with both hands. “I didn’t realize how sitting in my saloon all day had made me unused to the saddle. I think my blisters have blisters on them.”
“I still got some of that liniment Bear Tooth gave me,” Pearlie said, a malicious grin on his face. “Want to give it a try?”
Louis shook his head quickly. “No, thanks, Pearlie. I saw how it affected you, so I’d just as soon live with my blisters if you don’t mind.”
“I may be too sleepy to eat, Smoke,” Cal said. “Mind if I just crawl into my blankets now?”
“Hang on for a little while, Cal,” Smoke said. “You need to put some food in your stomach. I wrapped up some of the fish from lunch, so it won’t take long to heat them over the fire.”
As Pearlie got the fire going and Louis made sure the horses were fed and watered, Smoke threw some fish on a skillet and began to heat it over the fire.
While they were eating, Smoke suddenly cocked his head to the side and held perfectly still, his fork halfway to his mouth.
Louis, noting his actions, whispered, “What is it, Smoke? You hear something?”
“Keep on eating, boys,” Smoke said, putting his plate down on the ground. “Just act like nothing’s wrong. I’m gonna take a look-see around.”
Seconds later, Smoke melted into the darkness and slipped away.
A few minutes later, a tall, dark figure walked into the camp, a rifle cradled in his arms. “Yo, the camp,” he called softly, and Tom Wilson moved into the light cast by the campfire.
“Hey, Mr. Wilson,” Pearlie called. “Where’d you come from?”
Wilson put his rifle down and squatted next to the fire, warming his hands. “I made my camp just about a half mile up ahead. I smelled your fire and then I saw the glow.”
He glanced at Louis. “You boys should post a guard when you camp. If I’d been an Indian, you’d all be dead.”
Smoke moved out of the darkness behind Wilson and walked into the light, his rifle cocked and ready. “Oh, I don’t know about that, Tom. I heard you coming ten minutes ago.”
Wilson, startled by Smoke’s sudden appearance behind him, grinned. “But I didn’t make no noise.”
“You made enough for these old mountain-man ears to hear you.”
“Would you like some lake trout?” Louis said to forestall any further arguments.
“Why, yes, thank you kindly. I’m kind’a tired of beans and fatback.”
After Louis prepared a plate of fish for Wilson, Smoke asked, “Where are the rest of your crew?”
“Oh, they’re camped about a mile ahead,” Wilson said, hungrily devouring the fish on his plate.
“But you said your camp was only a half mile away,” Smoke said. “Don’t you camp with your men?”
Wilson shook his head, his mouth too full to answer for a moment. “No, not usually,” he said. “It’s my habit to camp by myself, especially out in the wild.”
“Why is that, Tom?” Louis asked.
Wilson shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess it’s just my contrary nature. I cannot stand to spend too much time around other people, and working with them all day is just about all I can stand.” He drained his coffee cup and stood up. “So at night, after we eat, I usually make my camp a little ways off from the others.”
He touched his fur cap with his right hand. “Thanks for the grub, gentlemen. I’ll see you in the morning and we can all have breakfast together.”
After he’d left, Louis shook his head. “What a strange man.”
Smoke smiled. “Oh, he’s not so strange, Louis. He is a mountain man, after all. The main reason men come up to the mountains is they value their solitude.”
“But Bear Tooth and Red Bingham are partners and spend time together, just like Bobcat Bill and Rattlesnake Bob,” Pearlie said.
“Yes,” Smoke said, “but those men are the exceptions, and they didn’t team up until they were quite old. For many years, all of them rode and camped alone. It’s the mountain-man way to distrust others, even other mountain men.”
He looked over and saw that Cal was slumped in front of the fire, his plate on his lap, fast asleep. He chuckled and shook the boy awake.
“Now, let’s hit the blankets, boys.”
“I can’t believe you woke me up just to tell me to go back to sleep,” Cal said grumpily.
“If I had let you sleep sitting up like that, Cal,” Smoke explained, ‘you would be so stove up in the morning you couldn’t sit a saddle.”
“Oh,” Cal mumbled as he crawled beneath his blankets. “Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it,” Smoke said, pulling the edge of the blanket up a little to cover the boy’s ears.
25
There was only one doctor in the town of Winnipeg. After Hammer told his men to split up and go to several different saloons to eat their lunch, or in most cases to drink it, so that so many men traveling together wouldn’t arouse suspicion, he went to the doctor’s office and entered.
Doctor Mack Freeman had his office in an old Victorian-style mansion on the outskirts of town, and he used several of the extra bedrooms as patient rooms for men recovering from injuries or sicknesses.
A lady wearing the white dress and dark blue apron of a nurse met Hammer in the foyer.
“I’m sorry, sir,” she said. “The doctor has been called away on an emergency. If you’re ill, you may have a long wait to be seen.”
“Oh, I’m not sick,” Hammer said, holding his hat in his hands. He rarely dealt with women other than of the dance-hall variety, and he didn’t quite know how to act when speaking to a lady.
He kept his head down and mumbled, “I’m here to visit a friend I heard had suffered an injury working on the railroad a while back. A Mr. Albert Knowles.”
The woman pursed her lips and frowned. “I’m afraid I don’t recognize that name, but most of the railroad employees stay out at the clinic at the rail yard if they need to be kept under observation.”
“So, Mr. Knowles isn’t here then?” Hammer said, disappointed. He’d gotten himself all fired up to kill the man on sight, and now he was going to have to wait.
“I’m afraid not, but if you want, you’re more than welcome to call back later and ask the doctor.”
Hammer put his hat on and tipped it to the nurse, trying to control his impatience. “I’m sure that won’t be necessary, ma’am. I’ll just ride on over to the rail yard and check there.”
Hammer left the doctor’s house and went to the saloon where he’d left Bull and a few of his other men. He entered and walked directly to their table.
“You done him already?” Bull asked, looking over Hammer�
��s shoulder to see if there were any lawmen on his trail in case they had to leave in a hurry.
“No, damn it!” Hammer exclaimed. “The son of a bitch is evidently in a tent for injured workers over at the rail yard,” he added, signaling the waiter to bring him a glass of whiskey and some food.
Bull pursed his lips, thinking. “That ain’t gonna be easy, Boss. Going out there, you’re liable to run into some of the men on that train that might recognize you.”
Hammer sighed. He was getting tired of having to do all the thinking for his men, but the alternative was to have men smart enough to perhaps challenge his leadership. “I know that, Bull,” he said, trying to hide his disgust at having to discuss the obvious. “So what I’m gonna do is wait until nightfall, and then I’m gonna sneak into the tent and put a bullet through Knowles’s head.”
“But Boss, don’t you think a knife might be better, seeing as how a gun might wake up the whole place and bring the guards running?” Bull asked innocently.
Hammer started to utter a sharp reply, and then he realized Bull was right. Damn, he thought, even a blind hog will find an acorn once in a while. He smiled and patted Bull on the shoulder. “You know Bull, you’re right. A knife will do just fine.”
* * *
Just before midnight, after having his men set up camp north of the rail yard so they could get an early start going after Smoke Jensen, Hammer pulled the collar of his coat up around his neck, pulled the brim of his hat down low over his eyes, and walked through the darkness toward the rail yard at the end of town.
Once there, he stopped a man walking back from town who was carrying an almost empty bottle of whiskey and who looked drunk enough not to remember his face. “Say, friend,” Hammer said. “Can you tell me which tent is the one where they keep the injured workers?”
The man grunted and swayed on his feet as he looked around. After a moment, he pointed to a tent off to one side that had a single lamp burning just inside the doorway.
“Thanks,” Hammer said, and immediately walked toward the clinic tent.
When he got to the doorway, he slipped a large-bladed skinning knife from his right boot and held it under the lapel of his coat.
Pushing the canvas flap of the doorway open, he eased inside and looked around. At a small desk just inside the doorway, a young man sat with his head down resting on his crossed arms. He was evidently asleep on the job. Hammer grinned, but just to make sure he wouldn’t be interrupted in case the man woke up, he stepped behind the man and brought the steel hilt of the knife down hard on the back of the man’s head, knocking him off his chair to lie stunned and groaning on the floor.
Hammer took the lamp from its hook near the door, turned the wick down low to lower the flame, and carried it in front of him as he walked among the beds in the clinic.
A couple of men moaned as he passed and laid their arms over their eyes against the light, but no one challenged him on his journey to the end bed.
He recognized Knowles’s face and moved toward the bed. The light woke Knowles up, and he shaded his eyes against the light, smacked his lips a couple of times as he caine awake, and asked in a low voice, “Yes, Doctor?”
Hammer set the light down on the small table next to Knowles’s bed, keeping it between them so Knowles couldn’t see his face. He leaned over the bed, putting his left palm over Knowles’s mouth, and put his face close to the injured man’s. “I ain’t no doctor, Knowles. Remember me?” he asked.
Knowles’s eyes widened and he reached up to try and grab Hammer’s hand over his mouth, but Hammer slammed the point of the knife into Knowles’s throat, pushing it in all the way to the hilt.
Knowles strangled and gurgled once or twice, and then blood spurted out over Hammer’s hand and the light went out of Knowles’s eyes and he died, drowning in his own blood with his good leg doing a little dance under the covers.
Hammer wiped the blood on his knife and hand off on Knowles’s sheet, and then he slipped the knife back down into his boot and strolled calmly out of the tent, whistling softly to himself.
That’s one less problem to worry about, he thought as he made his way to where he’d left his horse. Now, all we have to do is kill Jensen and his men and we don’t have a thing to worry about.
As he rode north along the blazed trail by the side of the tracks that had already been laid, he considered how best to accomplish his goal of killing Jensen and the men who rode with him.
First, he reasoned to himself, we have to find them, but that won’t be hard if we just follow this here trail. Then all we have to do is keep out of sight until Jensen and his men are off all alone. Then we ride down in force and pump them full of lead.
“Hah,” he said aloud to the back of his horse’s head. “I’ll show that chicken-shit judge who’s the baddest hombre around, and it sure as hell ain’t Smoke Jensen.”
26
Over breakfast the next morning in Wilson’s camp, Smoke and his men had a reunion with the four mountain men he’d convinced to come to Canada for a new adventure.
As Bear Tooth put away an impressive number of eggs and flapjacks, he said to Smoke, “Damn but I’m glad you’re back, young’un.”
Smoke smiled. Only a mountain man who was old enough to be his father would call him a “young’un.” “Why’s that, Bear?” Smoke asked, doing a fair job on the flapjacks himself.
Bear Tooth inclined his head toward Wilson, who was sitting nearby staring at them over the rim of his coffee mug. As usual, especially early in the morning, Wilson’s face was serious, without a trace of a smile or good humor anywhere on it.
“That damned Wilson is plumb near workin’ us to death out here.”
Almost as if it pained him, Wilson cracked a small smile as Bear Tooth continued. “He looks like a mountain man an’ he dresses like a mountain man, but he sure as hell don’t work like no mountain man,” Bear Tooth groused, scowling at the weakness of the coffee as he took a drink of the brew that for almost anyone else would be considered too strong by half.
“What do you mean?” Smoke asked, winking at Wilson where Bear couldn’t see.
“Hell, a real mountain man knows he has to git up with the birds ’fore dawn and git his traps run an’ such. But we also know that come noon, a body’s natural tendency is to take a after-noonin’ nap. After all, ain’t nothin’ happenin’ during the middle of the day. Even critters as dumb as beavers an’ foxes know the middle of the day is for sleepin’, or at least lyin’ around takin’ it easy.”
He looked around and grinned when Red Bingham, Bobcat Bill, and Rattlesnake Bob all nodded their heads in agreement. “You know we ain’t lazy, Smoke, but ol’ Tom over there he don’t allow hardly no time fer a noon nap at all. He’s got us up an’ pushin’ through the bush from dawn to dusk,” he said grumpily.
“An’ then some,” agreed Red, snorting at the idea of a civilized man not taking a break in the middle of the day like most folks with any sense knew was only right. “A man can’t hardly digest his food traipsin’ around the wilderness with a full stomach like that.”
Smoke looked at Bear’s ample gut, hanging over his buckskin trousers. “Yeah, Bear, I can see ol’ Tom’s damn near working all the fat off you.” He grinned. “It’s a good thing I got back here to slow him down ’fore you wasted away to a mere two hundred pounds or so.”
Bear glanced down and grinned, showing dark yellow stubs of teeth worn down by years of no dental care. “Well, now, Smoke boy, I got to admit I ain’t got no grouse comin’ ’bout the quality nor the quantity of the food he serves,” Bear said.
“’Ceptin’ the coffee, dagnabbit,” Red added. “He just won’t hardly make it strong enough to be fit for a man to drink. He uses way too much water.”
“Yeah!” Bobcat added with emphasis. “We been tellin’ the man if’n you don’t need a knife to cut it, it ain’t near strong enough.”
Tom laughed and shook his head as he got to his feet. “Speaking of work, gentlemen,” he sai
d. “If you’re through stuffing your faces full of my terrible coffee, how about we get the dishes washed and put away and see if we can’t blaze a couple of miles today, or do you want to petition Smoke for an after-breakfast nap too?”
Bear stroked his beard, smiling as his eyes twinkled. “Now, I ain’t never considered no after-breakfast nap, but if you insist, Tom . . .”
“Off your asses and on your feet!” Tom yelled, pretending to be angry. “Before I take my boot to your hides!”
Bear shook his head and struggled to his feet, groaning and giving Smoke an injured look. “See . . . see how the man abuses us, Smoke?”
While the other men were breaking camp, Tom gestured Smoke over to show him his map. “See here, Smoke,” he said, pointing to the map. “Fleming went on across Lake Manitoba, using handmade rafts according to his journal. But since we had to blaze an alternate trail for Van Horne in case he didn’t want to bother with a bridge, we’ve come on south and then back north around the lower edge of the lake. Now we’re gonna head for the lower end of Lake Winnipegosis, where we’ll turn west again and head for Fort Edmonton.”
“What are these lines here?” Smoke asked, pointing to two divergent lines running approximately east and west, one up near Fort Edmonton and the other lower and running more north and south.
“That lower line there is the South Saskatchewan River and the upper one is the North Saskatchewan River. We’ll have to find a good fording place to cross the south branch, but we’ll stay south of the north branch and with any luck won’t have to cross it,” Wilson explained. “In any event, neither of them is much of a river till the spring thaws bring all that glacier water rushing down ’em. Then they can get a bit hairy.”
“I see by the map that once we’ve reached Fort Edmonton, we’ll start running into the Rocky Mountains again,” Smoke observed.
Wilson nodded, his face grim. “Yes, and that’s gonna be really tough going. It may be spring everywhere else, but up this far north, it’ll still be winter for another couple of months.” Wilson stroked his short beard with his hand as he peered at the map over Smoke’s shoulders. “We’re gonna be up to our asses in snow, and the horses are going to need more feed and rest after struggling through the snowpack.”
Quest of the Mountain Man Page 18