West Of The War

by L. J. Martin

  More good news, the Indians who seemed interested in our presence from across the river must have returned to the shelter and warmth of their lodges.

  If we had a pot we could make a broth for breakfast, but the fact is kitchen implements have yet to be found. So as the men spread out to recover what we might, the ladies go to broiling more meat.

  And I head out to see what I might kill to add to the larder. I think about riding, but am without saddle, so I decide to go afoot. The hunting is easier than yesterday as every animal has left tracks in the snow, and it’s easy to determine recent tracks from those early on in the fresh snow. I am pleased to find some that are split hoof, like a deer, but much larger. I top out the cut above where the wide river flows and follow track upriver across the plain almost a mile.

  The next ravine leading down to the river is covered in evergreen, some pine and some of what I believe to be larch, or tamarack, as the needles are golden and beginning to fall. I move quietly into the pines and soon discover what the trappers have called wapiti, but I’ve seen drawings of and know to be elk. Twice the size and weight of a mule deer, they’ll fill our larder nicely.

  Not only do I see them at only two hundred yards, but they lay under some pines. Had it not been for the antlers of a large bull, I’d never have spotted them in the shadows. There’s a cow standing so my first shot fells her. As I’m reloading I’m surprised to see more than two dozen appear out of the pines, and due to the ravine and it’s echoes, they are confused about where the shot came from and are running down the ravine side and back up my side...directly at me. I quickly reload and stay hidden in the shadows of a pine until I can draw a bead on the bull and my shot knocks him down, but he’s up quickly and disappears into the trees, heading down toward the river. I know I hit him solidly and hope he won’t go far.

  I take the bird-in-hand and drop to the bottom of the ravine, cross a small trickle of water, then up the other side and find the cow stilled in the inch of snow. Two large elk. We could hardly be more fortunate. It’s only then that I remember the trappers advice, never shoot twice. The first shot, unexpected by someone in earshot, is impossible to trace. But the second they’re listening for.

  Hoping no savages are within earshot, I go on about my business, but with an ear cocked for the sound of anyone approaching. I soon have her gutted and skinned and the heart and liver laid out on her hide which I’ve spread under a nearby pine which has kept the snow from the ground.

  She’s far more than I can carry, so I roll the heart, liver, and loins in the hide and head out for camp to fetch some help and some animals to pack the rest of the meat home. The bull will keep in this cold, wherever he’s fallen. The snow has almost stopped so I’m sure I’ll have no trouble tracking him, both blood and prints.

  I swing down to where I thought he was when I fired and sure enough, there’s a decent blood trail and still clear tracks heading downhill toward the river.

  A big smile lights my face as I come back into camp as I see a whole pile of supplies that have been gathered, and in such short order. There are bottles of pie fruit, pickles, sacks of grain, oats, and even a hundred pound sack of flour along with two more broken but partially filled bags. A twenty-five-pound keg of salted cod is a godsend, as even if we don't find salt elsewhere, we can scrape away enough to last a good part of the winter. Ian and I tie a couple of Spanish hackamores so we can ride the saddle horses, bareback, but riding, and lead two of the big mares. I foresee problems ahead, and ask our camp seamstress, Pearl, to fashion two sets of pack bags and two padded saddle blankets from the sailcloth—our best possible substitute for leather saddles. In the future, packing and riding the horses will be much easier should she be successful.

  Ian and I set out to retrieve the meat, both of us well armed with both sidearms and long guns, and it's a good thing as we're only a half mile out of camp when we cut the trail of a half dozen unshod horses in the light snow. And, unfortunately, they're headed in the same direction we are.

  As we near the remains of the cow, still alongside the tracks of the unshod horses, I wave Ian into a heavy stand of pine and we dismount, scaring off a dozen crows. I caution Ian with a hush, as the crows have given away our movement in the forest. We remain unmoving for several minutes.

  Whispering, I wave him to follow. "Let's stay quiet."

  As I worried, when we get to the edge of the trees and can see down into the ravine, the same group of savages I saw earlier are butchering the rest of the cow.

  "Damn," Ian says quietly, "they got our meat. We could drop two or three and I'd bet the rest would hightail it."

  "I don't think it wise to shed the blood of some old boys who are cleaning up after us—"

  "It's our damn meat."

  I lay a hand on his shoulder. "True, but as you said earlier, it's our damn scalps. Even if we ran 'em off, we don't know they won't come back with two dozen more. Besides, they got the cow, we got the prime cuts already and a bull and lots more meat back aways. Let's slip out of here and not pick a fight."

  "It was them picked it," he mumbles.

  "Nope, it was them came on some free meat to feed some hungry folks. Damn, if they aren't skinny. In fact, I got a better idea."

  "What the hell are you doing?" Ian asks, his mouth hanging open as I walk out onto a rock outcropping in plain view of the working Indians a hundred yards down the slope.

  I yell out. "Hey there," and they all look up. Four of them take cover and the other two stand with rifles to their shoulders. I smile and wave, and give them a magnanimous sign by spreading my arms wide, my rifle hanging loose in a hand.

  Giving them a bow like I'd just finished a three act play, I turn and move away. I got to tell you, there are some confused savages down the hill. I wave Ian on and we move back, mount up, and head out to find the bull.

  We are not pursued, I'm happy to say. I don't know if it is due to my earlier killing of the wolf at over four hundred yards, and they fear being in my sights, or because they think I'm a mad Englishman, too long out in the cold.

  Still, after we track the big bull, one of us stands guard while the other skins and butchers the big animal. We trade off, as it's plenty of work. I hang the forequarters over one mare, and one hindquarter between two racks of ribs on another. The heart, lungs, and trim meat from the neck is tied as closely as possible and stuffed wherever we can. I’m sure we can find use for the large antlers, so they are also packed.

  I string the two mares together and get another jaw drop from Ian as I hand him the lead rope. "You head back to camp. God willin' and bein' merciful, I'm going to use this hindquarter to make some new friends. I think we already done the preliminaries."

  He shakes his head. "You're crazy as a peach orchard boar, boy."

  "My daddy always told me it was good business to make friends with your neighbors. You get that meat back to camp. I'll be along, God willin and the creek don't rise…or my scalp don’t."

  "May you be in heaven an hour before Beelzebub knows you done died of stupidity."

  I laugh at that. "You may be right, but better dying face on with weapon in hand than getting an arrow in the back while you got your pants down and your butt hanging over a log."

  Now it's his turn to laugh. He reins away and waves over his shoulder. "I'll come back to bury your remains, should there be anything left after the crows and buzzards get done pickin’ at ya,...and after I'm sure them ol' boys have done gone."

  It only takes me fifteen minutes to be where I can look down to see the savages cooking some trimmings over a low fire. They look up to see me, and stop what they're doing. I wave, smile, and gig my gray down the hill, the hindquarter tied across the back of my saddle.

  I'm smiling, they're not.

  Chapter 17

  As I stroll down the ravine slope, leading the gray, I casually lay the Sharps across my shoulder, holding it by the barrel, upside down, as non-threatening as I can make it. The two Indians with rifles lower them but
do so carefully. I stop twenty paces from them and lean the Sharps on a rock while I remove the hindquarter from the rump of the gray and move forward, offering it to the man I thought of earlier as leader...the man with the paint horse. I nod my head, encouraging him to take the meat.

  His suspicious look softens, and he moves forward, takes the hindquarter, and speaks to the others. He waves me forward to the fire and I take a seat on a rock. One of the men, a stout Indian who unlike the others doesn't look as if he's been missing any meals, takes a limb that's been staked near the fire, a stake that skewers a slab of elk the size of my hand, and hands it to me. I remain seated while I devour the meat. Then I rise, and place a hand on my chest, and inform them. "Brad." They give me a curious look, but the leader seems to get it. I pat my chest again and repeat a couple of times. “Brad. I’m Brad.”

  He places a hand on his own chest and gives me a guttural word I don't understand, but presume is his name. I repeat it as best I can. I give each man a nod in turn, then move back to my rifle, pick it up, and remount the gray. I hear him say to the others, "Shamus," and wonder if that's not the name of someone, as others shake their head in agreement.

  I wave again, and gig the gray and we move up the slope.

  I'd give myself a pat on the back if it didn't look so silly.... I'm alive, and hopefully have gained some trust.

  When I ride into camp Ian moves away from where he's been stacking firewood gathered from the hillside and stands with hands on hips, shaking his head.

  "I still think you're a damn fool," he says as Pearl and Madam Allenthorpe walk over to join him.

  "We were about to form up a party to come find you," Madam says.

  "You could have joined us for lunch," I say, and laugh.

  "I'm glad they didn't have you for lunch," Ian says, his laugh a little sardonic.

  I get serious. "I've still got my hair and I'm hoping they'll look on us with more favor."

  Pearl walks over and gives me a hug, laying her head on my shoulder. Then she raises her head and gives me a tight smile. "I'm glad you're safe."

  "Me too," I say, happy to have a hug from her.

  Our relationship has been tenuous from time to time as we both have tried to find our footing in a totally new situation. I was her "masser", even though I most times thought of her as friend, and sometimes wished she were more than that. I hope things settle to at least friendship.

  As I watch Ian go back to work, and see some of the others walking back to camp each with a six-foot log over their shoulders, I get an idea. More and more steam driven boats will be heading upriver, and they’ll need firewood. Within a mile of this camp are hundreds of acres of pine, much of it standing dead, over a hundred acres dry and ready for the campfire or boiler, where a fire passed through a year or more ago. This spot, where the Eagle easily tied up, can be our gold discovery, at least for a while. There are already five cords of wood stacked and there must be twenty more spread over the hills, already limbed and cut to length.

  I’m sure all the rest of our party, including the ladies, will board the first passing riverboat—probably the Emilie—which should be passing anytime. I’ll hate to see them go, but then again, it’s fewer to share with should my new found project prove fruitful.

  It’s snowing again and if it keeps up my immediate problem will be making sure the stock has plenty of graze. Until it gets two feet or deeper they’ll paw their way to grass, but I’ll have to turn them out to roam free and turning them out means risking making a gift of them to any passing savages.

  It’s a bit of a quandary, as I don’t have the tools to harvest meadow grass and get it to camp, even if I could which I can’t in snow cover. I’m sure the snow will let up and melt off a time or two before real winter sets in.

  We work the day away, gathering wood and whatever we find of use. A jagged sheet of iron blown from a boiler will serve as a fry pan, and an iron sink with a rock driven into its drain hole will make a fine kettle. A bit on the large size, but far better than none at all.

  We’ve earned our elk steaks for supper and a dollop of pie cherries each for desert. Again we leave night guards up the ravine a ways, just in case our neighbors decide they might be in need of scalps.

  I’m disappointed to discover with the morning that we now have six inches of snow, and it’s still falling. Ian and I drive the stock up to the flats above the river where the wind has blown some hilltops free of snow and they can graze.

  It’s midday—the snow stopped midmorning—when I spot two riders coming our way. I scan the horizon for more, but the two are all I see. Ian has returned the mile back to camp to fetch us some chow, so I’m alone. I check the loads in my Colt and the Sharps, and move out to meet them. From a distance I can see that one rides the paint, and as they near I am more than a little surprised to see the other has on the fringed coat of a mountain man, and sports a full beard. He yells out when he gets within shouting distance, “Howdy. Mind if we ride in?”

  Damn if he’s not a white man, wearing a hat of skunk fur over a full head of gray hair that hangs to mid back.

  He dismounts, but his riding partner, the Indian who seemed to have led the six, stays mounted.

  “Got time to palaver?” the mountain man asks, and I nod and dismount as well.

  “Friend,” I say, “I got nothing but time.”

  He extends a hand. “Shamus Carbone.”

  “Brad McTavish,” I say, and we shake.

  “You survive that blow up of the smoke boat down on the river?” he asks. The man is not only white, but at one time I’d guess blond. Now he’s mostly gray, skin burned brown and as craggy as a walnut, and I’d guess the better part of sixty. He has ice blue eyes, but his accent seems a little French, but long ago.

  “I did, if you mean the Eagle. There’s most of a dozen of us.”

  “In one piece?”

  “Most. A few breaks and bruises, one burned pretty bad but I think he’ll mend.”

  “Don’t imagine you got coffee?” he asks.

  “Lucky we got our hides. Got a bit of flour, some pie fruit, and other things…but no coffee.”

  “Damn the luck,” he says. “I ain’t had a cup of mud in most a year.”

  “How’d you happen to be way out here, Mr. Carbone?” I ask.

  “Shamus, if you would, son. Been here and over the mountain the most part of twenty-five years…best I can recall.”

  “With the savages?”

  “What savages, son. These are fine people. My woman is one of them. This here is Many-Dogs, he’s a war chief of the Lakota.”

  “These are Lakota?”

  “That they are, and you’re lucky you got your hair. This is Lakota land and they don’t take kindly to other’s taking their game. You’re lucky the lodges hang full of buffalo.”

  “I shared with them—”

  “And a damn good thing you did. Who’s that?” Shamus asks, and I look over my shoulder to see Ian riding slowly up. His Spencer’s butt resting on a thigh, the barrel pointed at the overcast above.

  “That would be Ian Hollihan. He and I will likely be here a while, until we get a mind to head on upriver.”

  “Everything okay here?” Ian asks.

  “You bring some grub?” I ask, and he nods.

  “Well, climb on down and let’s share it with our neighbors. This is Shamus Carbone and that’s Many-Dogs.”

  Carbone says something in Lakota, and the war chief dismounts. Ian unties a packet of food wrapped in a scrap of sail cloth and breaks a couple of pieces of salted cod in half, handing each of us a chunk. I’m a little amused to watch the Lakota as he bites into it, makes a face, then spits the bite on the ground. He hands it back to Ian, who nods and gives him a smile. It’s not returned. However when Ian pours out a palm full of pie cherries and hands them over, he gets a nod, then after a taste, what must pass for a smile.

  We plop down on some rocks now surrounded with mud from the melting snow.

  “So, the
Lakota have a village near?” I ask.

  “Yep, quarter day to the north. There’s damn nigh fifty in this band, another couple of villages near, a day’s ride both east and west. I’ll try and spread the word about y’all and ask they fight shy of you. You the one done shot the wolf a couple of days ago?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You got their attention. A fine shot as I hear it. But there are plenty of other tribes around, and they won’t have heard of Wolf-Long-Shot…which is how you’re known in my village.”

  “Wolf-Long-Shot, eh? I guess that’s better than Pile Of Wolf or some damn thing?” I have to smile at that.

  I’ve been called a damn sight worse from time to time.

  Old Shamus Carbone stands with hands on hips, seeming happy to be giving the tenderfoot some knowledge. “Yep. You met up with Falls-From-The-Sky, Many-Dogs, Wife-With-No-Nose, Crooked-Finger, Hands-Children—“

  “Falls-From-The-Sky?” I ask.

  “Yep, the night he was born there was a meteor shower, so that’s his handle. They think he’s got big magic.”

  “Many-Dogs I think I get, but Wife-With-No-Nose?”

  He laughs. “Yep, his woman likes to sleep around and when a Lakota woman cheats and gets catched, she loses a chunk of her nose. His wife has a couple of chunks gone. She used to be a pretty one….”

  “Crooked-Finger is pretty obvious, but Hands-Children?”

  “Yep, he done got ten children, as many as fingers on his hands. He’s had four wives.”

  “And if he has another child?”

  “Then I guess it’ll be Hands-And-A-Toe-Children.”

  “I guess that makes sense,” I say.

  “Names is important to these folks, Wolf-Long-Shot.”

  I laugh again. “I can see that,” I say. “There will be more boats passing. You check with me in a few days and I’ll get you some coffee, luck has it.”