“It’s the Rocky Mountains,” Helen, the reader in the group of orphans informed him. “The fur trappers called them the ’Shining Mountains’ or the ’High Lonesome.’ ”
“Are we goin’ up there?” Peter asked of Silas Phipps, his thin arm extended, small finger pointing.
“Most likely,” Phipps grunted. He regretted not resupplying on whiskey at Bent’s Fort.
Things cost so dang much out here, he had soon discovered. It had taken all the rest of his cash money to get two wagon wheels repaired, buy food and some warm blankets. The latter were for him, of course, not the brats. They could make do with what they had.
Nightfall had them well enfolded in the ramparts of the Rockies. Silas Phipps sat in his usual, somewhat frumpy regal splendor in the large chair for which he had traded off a six-year-old boy to a childless couple in Missouri. Well and good. The kid had a constantly runny nose anyway. Ruth and Helen cooked supper, their regular chore. While they toiled over the fire pit, Helen shot nervous glances in the direction of Silas.
It made him smile, while he sipped sparingly at the whiskey jug. There was supposed to be a single other trading post up further north, at a place called Trout Creek Pass. Surely he could knock down something worth trading for, or the boys—who he had put to setting out snares--could trap some furry animals. The odor of cooking meat made his belly rumble.
Peter returned first from putting snares in the grass beside a stream. He had noted small footprints and calculated where the animal who had made them would be likely to walk. Proud of his accomplishment, he went to the fire to share his woodsman’s wisdom with Ruth and Helen.
“I found an animal path. Put my snares along it by the creek,” he informed the girls.
“What good will that do?” Helen asked, distracted, at least for the moment, from her contemplation of what awaited her later that night.
“It’s been used more than once. I figger whatever made the prints will use it again: And ... zap! One nice pelt for that ol’ bassard to trade for booze.”
“I wish he’d drown in the stuff,” Ruth said hotly.
“Yes. And before tonight,” Helen choked out.
“Again, honey?” Ruth asked with warm compassion.
Helen nodded jerkily and big, hot tears ran down her cheeks.
“You three shut up and tend to yer cookin’,” Silas Phipps growled from his throne. “Ain’t that grub about ready?”
“Yes, Mr. Phipps,” Ruth replied, subdued. “Peter will bring you your plate.” She gave Peter a “this will get even for Helen” look.
Ruth had no idea how terrible a form her attempt at revenge would take. Peter started apprehensively across the clearing to where Phipps slumped in his chair. He dreaded being around the filthy old man who held them captive. Why didn’t they just run away? Peter had wondered that a hundred times. In his anxiety at not riling Silas Phipps, Peter missed seeing the wrist-thick bowed branch that had fallen from a big old cottonwood.
As a result, the boy tripped over it and went sprawling. The plate flew from his hand and the gravy-covered food took off from there. Some of it splattered on the boots of Silas Phipps. With a roar the thick-shouldered brute came to his feet and charged down on the terrified Peter.
“Goddamn you!” Phipps bellowed. “Can’t any of you do anything right? I’ll teach you to be so clumsy. Waste all that food, will you?”
He bent and yanked the petrified child upright. One big, hairy fist closed around the leather suspenders that held up Peter’s trousers. Phipps pulled them off, then ripped the shirt from Peter’s back. Peter lost it then and began to sob wretchedly. Long, dry, sharp wails came painfully from deep inside. Phipps dragged the boy into the light from the fire.
There he jerked down Peter’s linsey-woolsey trousers and exposed the lad’s bare behind. He snatched up a willow rod, thick as one of his muscular fingers, and yelled at the astonished orphans. “C’mere, all of you. You’re gonna witness what happens for a show of defiance.”
“I didn’—didn’ defy you, sir,” Peter pleaded.
Phipps shoved Peter roughly forward. “Bend over that wagon wheel.”
Then he began to apply the willow switch. He started at Peter’s shoulders, and worked downward. His arm rose and fell rhythmically. The wooden shaft made a wet, meaty smack with each blow. The more Phipps lashed the boy, the greater his fury grew. By the time he reached the small of Peter’s back, each strike split the skin and blood ran in thin, red sheets.
Phipps had entered such a frenzy that he breathed in great, gusty bellows blasts when he reached Peter’s buttocks. He spent the least time there, though, delivering only four sound, stinging stripes. Phipps desisted then, stood looking at the horrified expressions on the faces of the other children.
“Bring me some of that axle grease and some cotton waste,” he commanded Ruth.
Through all his ministrations, Peter continued to whimper softly. When the clean-up had ended, the boy drew up his trousers, his face crimson with embarrassment and humiliation. Then he went to find another shirt.
His whole body throbbed with agony, stung and burned, an hour later, as Peter curled up near the fire pit, under a thin blanket. He bit his tongue to keep from making any outcry, and lay in icy fear as he listened to the whispered pleading, whimpers and cries of agony that Helen made from some distance beyond in the back of the second wagon. Mind awhirl in misery, Peter vowed that he would kill Phipps before anything like that happened again.
* * *
“He’s a ring-tailed whoo-doo, ain’t he?” Rupe Killian said proudly to the man who rode beside him.
“Who?” Delphus Plunkett asked.
Rupe rolled his eyes. “Who else? Mr. Pease, ya ninny. He’s got more smarts than any man I know. Talks like a real gent’man, too.”
“So’s Hashknife, only he don’t put on no airs,” Delphus revealed his opinion of Ezra Pease.
Killian and Plunkett rode in a column of twos, along with the rest of Ezra Pease’s gang of cutthroats, headed cross-country in the wide, fertile valley ringed by the Laramie and Medicine Bow Mountains. They had reached the heart of the Cheyenne country. Unlike many of the men, Rupert Killian did not experience any unease. Nearly 5,000 Indians called this land home. Most of those were warriors. The nearest help, in the form of white men in sufficient numbers, lay 800 miles to the west, nearly a thousand to the east. Yet, Rupe Killian had no fear.
Infused with his hero-worship of Ezra Pease, Rupe Killian waxed expansive on his favorite subject. “Take this little jaunt. Ol’ Rough-house Pease gets word there’s a big pow-wow goin’ on about the Cheyenne makin’ war with the Blackfeet. So what’s he do? He saddles us all up and heads out. We’re gonna ride right up to that confabulation an’ offer to sell ’em guns to use against their enemy. Now, that’s right smart thinkin’, I tell you.”
Delphus Plunkett cut his eyes around the flat terrain that surrounded their exposed position. “I ain’t so sure of that. Those Injuns could find us out here quick as a wink.”
“Why, hell, boy, we’d whup ’em easy. We’s white men, ain’t we?”
Delphus twisted his head to peer behind, just in case. “But there’s a whole lot more of them than there is of us, Rupe.”
“That don’t matter none, nohow,” Rupe dismissed with sublime contempt. “Besides we’re comin’ as friends. They’ll welcome them guns, I tell you.”
The sound of drumming hooves from ahead of the column reached Rupe’s ears. He perked up and rose in the stirrups to look forward. One of the scouts sent forward by Pease came fogging down on the outlaw band on a foam-sheeted horse. He started shouting something while still out of earshot.
“My God, they’re right behind me! Hunnerds of ’em!”
Ezra Pease and Titus Vickers spurred their mounts forward to meet the excited man. “Who are, my man?” Pease demanded.
“They be Cheyenne, Mr. Pease. Gobs of ’em. There’s a village jist beyond this ridge. We showed up on the back slope an
’ they come boilin’ out at us.”
Shots cracked out before he could say more. Some twenty, bare-headed warriors came into view on the crest of the ridge. They reined in and sat their ponies, took aim and fired another ragged volley. Rifle balls plowed dirt a hundred yards from the column of white men.
“What are we gonna do now?” Titus Vickers asked, his throat tight with fear.
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Ezra Pease recovered rapidly. “Why, my good man, we’re going to charge them.”
Those around the well-dressed leader blinked in incomprehension. The number of Indians on the ridge continued to grow. Eyes widened as the count of the angry Cheyenne increased to overwhelming odds. Several of the hard-bitten thugs with Pease cut their eyes to Titus Vickers in appeal. He gave them a curt nod, though not a word had been spoken. Titus Vickers knew
“Not likely, Mr. Pease,” he responded with more formality than usual. “At least not by this chile. I think we’d best make a run for it while the gettin’s good.”
Pease studied the ranks above, war lances aflutter with feather decorations, bows and rifles ready. He sighed gustily and gave a reluctant nod. “Your calm evaluation of the situation may have saved our lives again, Vic. Under the prevailing conditions, I have no choice but to defer to your wisdom.” He paused and then sucked in wind. “Let’s get the hell out of here!” he bellowed.
None of the men needed encouragement. They reversed their mounts on the narrow trickle of a trail and put spurs to flanks. In an eye-blink, only a column of roiling dust remained where the invading white men had been. A smug smile bloomed on the face of Falling Horse. He pointed to the retreating backs of their enemy.
“We will follow them, punish them some. It will be for the honor of Black Hand, not our own.”
At once, the Cheyenne warriors streamed down the slope from the saddle notch in the ridge. Hooting and whooping, they set up rapid pursuit. Those at the rear of Pease’s disorganized column heard them even over the rumble of the hooves of their galloping horses. They cast apprehensive glances behind them.
When the swift Cheyenne ponies closed enough, those in the forefront loosed rounds from their rifles and trade muskets. Balls whined overhead and one took a chunk from the fat rump of Vern Beevis. His wail blended with the war cries of the Indians.
“You know, I think we’ve got ourselves in some deep cow plop,” Rupe Killian shouted over the pounding hooves.
“I don’t ’think’ no such thing,” Delphus returned the shout. “I damn well know it.”
“How we gonna get outta this?” Rupe wanted to know.
“You acquainted with foldin’ yer hands together an’ lookin’ up at the Almighty?”
“You mean pray? ” Rupe asked, astounded.
Delphus answered soberly. “Seems the only thing might work.”
* * *
Tension so thick she could almost taste it, Falicity Jones thought as she heard the call from the rear of the column. “Riders comin’!” Whatever did that mean? Would they be attacked again? She cut nervous eyes to the broad-shouldered figure of the man called Preacher.
“Dismount the wagons,” he ordered. “Up in them rocks until we know who it is.”
Quickly the refugees from the ill-fated wagon train halted the patched-up wagons and scrambled into the tumble of boulders at the uphill side of the trail they followed. While they did, Falicity observed Preacher checking the caps on his multitude of weapons and sighed with relief.
What a competent man he was. Had she not been so recently widowed, she might look upon him as handsome and dashing. Silly goose! she chastened herself. Preacher worked by feel, she noticed, while his eyes remained set on their back-trail. With that accomplished, he trotted his horse to the rearmost wagon and lowered the long-barreled Hawkin rifle to his saddle bow. From a pocket sewn into the saddle skirt, Preacher withdrew a compact brass tube. He drew it out to form a spyglass and peered through the single lens.
White men, Preacher detected at once. Only two of them, so far, his thinking progressed. Might be more of Pease’s trash and again, might not. Then he, too, left the trail, secured his horse and disappeared into the rocks.
* * *
A flight of arrows sailed their way overhead. Ezra Pease winced at the moaning sound and instinctively ducked his head. Three of the projectiles found sticking points in horse flesh. The animals turned frantic. They uttered nearly human squeals and groans. The men atop them flung about like stuffed rag bags. The Cheyenne fired their rifles in irregular order. Fortunately for Pease and his gang it was as equally hard for a Cheyenne to hit a moving target from a moving mount as for a white man.
In the lull to reload, following the discharge, the desperate white men put more distance between them and their pursuers. All form of order had disappeared. Their flight had become a matter of staying alive. Titus Vickers hung back, urging the men to get control of themselves. At last a few overcame their panic enough to offer some resistance. They reined in among some rocks and took careful aim.
Rifles cracked and two Cheyenne fell from their saddles. Hastily the empty weapons got reloaded while a handful of others took up positions and opened up on the charging Indians. Vickers looked forward to see the scattered riders disappear around a bend he did not recall from their approach. He had to find out what had happened.
“Hold them off as long as you can, then pull back,” Titus Vickers told Bart Haskel.
He spurred ahead to discover a terrible blunder. In their eagerness to evade their enemy, those in the lead had turned into a blind canyon. Sheer granite walls rose along a narrow stream, through which the unwitting men splashed, silver sheets of icy water spraying nose-high on their mounts. They could not be left behind, Vickers realized and held in place to direct those beyond to join the others. Their only chance remained with superior fire power.
When Bart Haskel and the last two thundered down the main trail, Titus Vickers waved his hat at them and drew them into the box canyon. “We didn’ come this way,” Bart observed.
“I know. Ride on to the others. I’ll be right with you.”
Vickers dismounted and led his mount away from the entrance to a place of safety. There he tied off the lathered roan and pulled a short-handled spade from his saddle gear. He rushed back to the mouth of the canyon and up a tallus-strewn slope to the base of a large boulder. Working cautiously at one side of the huge stone, he began to sling away shovel-loads of dirt. It didn’t matter to him why the Cheyenne had held back. While he labored on, an idea came to him.
This was their home country and they probably knew it better than anyone. They would figure out that the gang had trapped itself. No need to hurry. Take time, reload. Bind up any slight wounds, and come on at their convenience. Meanwhile, he had plenty to do. The dirt and decomposed granite flew faster. Finally the boulder rocked precariously with each solid chunk of the spade.
Carefully, Vickers worked his way to the upper inside edge of the big rock and put his shoulder to it. Flexing his legs he pushed with all his strength. At first it seemed as though nothing would happen. Then, with a loud, grating groan, the ponderous rock canted out over the excavation Vickers had made. He bunched his legs and shoved again. The top of the boulder rocked past the center point and the whole mass let go. Loudly it crashed down into the notch that defined the mouth of the box canyon. That would slow the Indians one hell of a lot, Vickers thought with satisfaction as he walked back to his horse. In minutes he joined the milling stew of misfits and high country trash.
“I’ve got the entrance partly closed off,” Vickers announced to a pale-faced Pease. “We can get out, single file, but the Injuns will have to come at us the same way. A few good shots can hold them off for long enough for them to lose interest ”
“Good thinking, Vic. You hear that, men?” he challenged. “All it takes is a little cool thinking and some determination and we’ll get out of this without any harm done. I want ten of you to go back with Vic and take up positions where you c
an keep the entrance under fire. Make every shot count. The rest of you settle down your mounts and someone, for God’s sake, start a pot of coffee.”
That last brought a grudging ripple of laughter from the thoroughly demoralized outlaws. By the time the dust settled and the horses had been wiped down and cooled out, a fire crackled in a stone pit, a coffee pot of chill stream water put in place and a tripod erected to hold a pot for beans. Noting this last, Pease nodded toward it with satisfaction.
“Good idea. We may be here awhile.”
His prediction proved all too true. The coffee water had yet to boil before sporadic gunfire came from the mouth of the canyon. Light and irregular at first, the output quickly increased in volume. Many of the hard cases in camp wore worried frowns. A wounded man straggled back into camp.
“Them damn Cheyenne must know another way into this place. They’re swarmin’ all over us out there.”
“We had all better get down there,” Ezra Pease decided aloud. “Check your powder and shot. If we hit them hard, they should pull back.”
With twenty guns roaring in action, the gang fought the Cheyenne to a stand-still. Then, as the muzzle-loading rifles and pistols ran dry, the bows and arrows of the warriors made up the difference. Ezra Pease was shocked to discover that less than a dozen braves had penetrated into the box canyon. Their bows had devastating effect, wounding men more often than fatal shots. Half a dozen rifles cracked again, soon followed by more, and stalemate returned. Fatigue must be playing with him, Pease thought as visibility seemed to lower in a gray haze. A quick count showed his men to be less than fifteen still on their feet. More Cheyenne had slithered up through the rocks and fitted shafts to bowstrings. What he needed, Ezra Pease concluded, was a miracle.
A crash of gunfire set them to ducking before the warriors could release their arrows. Ezra Pease blinked rapidly. It had grown noticeably darker. A new sound intruded on the intermittent battle. A seething hiss grew in volume as it raced down the canyon. Suddenly visibility dropped to less than a hundred yards. Icy rain began to pelt Ezra Pease in the face. Titus Vickers appeared on his left.
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