The First Mountain Man (9 page)

“How far do we ride tonight?” Melody asked. “I'm really very tired.”

“I don't know that I
can
ride,” Richard said.

“You'll ride. And you'll all ride just as far as we dare push it,” Preacher told the group. “Unless you'd rather be dead. People, I don't think this was just a chance attack. Something's got the Blackfeet all riled up and they're on the warpath. We all best close up the distance 'tween us and the fort. Now stop flappin' your gums and get to work. I got things to do myself that might buy us some time.”

Preacher went to work dragging all the bodies to the center of the camp and lined them up neatly. He put their war axes on their chests and tidied up as best he could.

“Whatever in the world are you doing?” Richard asked, eyeballing the work.

“Showin' them Blackfeet that'll shore come back here this night that these here bucks fought bravely and we all respect them for it. We'll leave the rabbits cookin' on the spit and some of the supplies we got left we'll set out for them. I'll arrange it so's they'll know it's an offerin'. Injuns set a mighty lot of store by that. It might not help us, but then again, it might. You just never can tell about Injuns. It's best to cover all your bets out here.”

He looked at the fat rabbit cooking on the spit. Preacher smiled and reached out and tore off a hunk and popped it into his mouth. He chewed thoughtfully for a moment. “We don't want them to think we're too respectful, though.”

9

When they finally stopped and made a cold camp, Preacher figured it was about near midnight. And he had him a group of tired, butt-weary pilgrims. They were all asleep moments after crawling into their blankets.

Preacher checked his pistols and his Hawken and wrapped up in his buffalo robe, his back to a tree. He would sleep there, and sleep very lightly. Just before he closed his eyes, Preacher reminded himself that he'd better stock up on copper caps for his rifle at Fort Hall.

He slept well, but lightly, and was up long before the others. He made a small fire and used up the last of their coffee. With the distance they'd traveled during the night, Preacher figured to see the walled stockade called Fort Hall by late that afternoon.

Providing the Blackfeet didn't make another appearance.

Richard rolled out of his blankets and joined Preacher by the small fire. “Not far now, right, Preacher?”

“As the crow flies, just about two hours. It'll take us eight or ten. Did I teach y'all anything out here, Richard?”

Richard smiled and poured a tin cup full of coffee. “More than any of the others will probably ever admit. At least to you. This is the last of the coffee?”

“That's it. Enough for everyone to have a cup and then some. We're sitting right on the western slope of the Blackfoot Mountains. The Snake makes a big curve not too far ahead. We'll cross it and then about ten miles further, they's a crick where the ladies can bathe and get all gussied up. I know a spot where they's plenty of privacy. After that, it's the fort.”

Richard studied the man for a moment, peering at him over the rim of his cup. “You'll be glad to be rid of us, won't you, Preacher?”

The mountain man sighed. “Tell the truth, yeah, I will. We been lucky, missionary. I can't tell you just how lucky we've been. Y'all must have God ridin' on your shoulders. This ain't no place for pilgrims.”

“Maybe God sent you to us?” Richard suggested.

“Doubtful,” Preacher said with a shake of his shaggy head. “I ain't set foot in a church in nigh on twenty-five years.”

“Of course you have, Preacher. All this,” he waved a hand at the lonesome splendor, “is God's work. His cathedral. My word, but I can feel His presence out here more strongly than I ever experienced it in my life.”

“Are you a minister?”

“Yes, but not a practicing one. I graduated seminary. But administration is my field. Edmond is the one who was called.”

“How much money are you carryin', Richard?”

“We're each carrying several thousand dollars.”

Preacher whistled softly. “That's a fortune. Don't let no one on the train know you're totin' that much. But now you're gonna have to use some of it to get outfitted. You know that, don't you?”

“We have a fund for that purpose. Don't worry.”

“I'll help you choose the mules, if they got any at the fort. Some folks prefer oxen, but I'll take a big red over an ox any day. It'll be easier goin' for y'all over the others. You ain't tryin' to haul no heavy family heirlooms. As I'm sure you seen comin' out here, the trail is littered with possessions folks tried to bring along and was forced to leave along the way. Once you leave the fort, Richard, y'all is on your own. They's damn little 'tween here and the blue water. Miles and miles of nothin' but wilderness and Injuns and bears and puma and danger. But you folks has toughened up considerable. You'll make it, I'm thinkin'.”

“After we leave the fort, how far to the next settlement?”

“Fort Vancouver, 'less they's others built that I don't know about. Long, long way. I keep hearin' 'bout a mission of some sort that was built up near where the Snake and Columbia meet. In the Blue Mountains. But I ain't talked to nobody yet that's been there and seen it. So don't count on it.”

The others began rising stiffly from their blankets, and Preacher noted with some amusement that they were a bedraggled-looking bunch. A lot of the haughtiness had been drained right out of them. The wilderness can do that to folks who try to fight it. You can't fight the wilderness. You got to work with it. You got to know the rules and stick by them. But men and women and whole families was pushin' west, and they was bringin' their civilized Eastern ideas out into the wilderness. That's why so many people was already buried alongside what was being called the Oregon Trail.

And they'd be hundreds, maybe thousands more buried along the way 'fore it was all said and done, Preacher figured.

Preacher noticed that the hands of the ladies was all cut and dirty and the nails broken. But that was all right, it showed the females had toughened and that's what it took to make it out here. And they'd get tougher 'fore they reached Oregon Territory. They'd either get tougher mentally and physically, or they'd die—and that was all there was to it.

Preacher watched as the ladies poured coffee and sat down quite unladylike by the fire. They just plopped down on their rear ends. He hid his smile as Penelope reached out and tore off a leg from one of the rabbits he'd snared during the night and was now cooking over the fire. It wasn't quite done, but she didn't seem to pay that no mind.

Melody, too, ripped off a hunk of meat and fell to gnawing, eating with her fingers. Even prissy-pants Edmond was eating with his fingers just like he'd been doin' it all his life and it was the natural thing to do. And maybe it was, Preacher thought. None of us was that far removed from the dog-eat-dog ways of our ancestors, and it sure didn't take a body long to fall back on those ways.

He'd miss these folks; he admitted that to his mind. It had been right pleasant to have folks to palaver with—at least part of the time. And Preacher was some sorry he hadn't taken Melody into the blankets for a night or two. But that would have only complicated things and he'd probably have never gotten shut of her if he'd done that.

She'd make someone a good wife; but that someone would not be Preacher.

She lifted her blues and looked at him across the fire. She reached out and cut off a hunk of meat and offered it to him. He nodded his thanks and took the offering.

Preacher ate the rabbit and then abruptly left the fire and walked to his horses, holding the bit of his good riding horse under his coat to warm it 'fore he tried to put it in Hammer's mouth. How'd you like to have an ice-cold hunk of steel jammed into your mouth?

He spoke to his horses for a moment, then saddled up Hammer and fixed the frame on his pack horse. He glanced back at the forlorn-looking group. “Fifteen minutes, people. Then we ride.”

* * *

The day turned warm and pleasant, the miles passed quickly and uneventfully, and by the time Preacher led the group up to the creek several miles from the fort, he figured the water would be plenty warm enough for a bath. For the others, not for him.

“Y'all go on,” he told them. “I'll stand watch.”

Before the women did anything, they shook out their dresses and hung them up on bushes to get some of the wrinkles out. Then they peeled right down to the skin and hit the water, rag and soap in hand.

Preacher hadn't heard such gigglin' and carryin' on in his life. Richard and Edmond wasn't no better. They was duckin' and dunkin' each other and altogether the whole bunch was actin' like a gaggle of schoolkids.

Be a hell of a time for a bunch of Blackfeet or Arapaho to show up.

The pilgrims showed up about forty-five minutes later lookin' a whole hell of a lot better than the last time Preacher had seen them. The men was all duded out in suits and white shirts and ties and the women was gussied up to the nines. Then damned if the men didn't grunt and strain and work to arrange the women proper on the saddle, with one leg hooked around the horn.

“Ain't that uncomfortable?” Preacher asked.

“I will not ride into the fort astride this mount like some common whore,” Penelope said.

“Nor will I,” Melody echoed.

“If we have to make a run for it, y'all are gonna fall off smack on your behinies,” Preacher told them.

“We shall cross that river when, or if, the need arises,” Penelope informed him.

“Oh, my God!” Preacher pointed, jumped about a foot off the ground, let out a wild whoop and ran for his horse. “Injuns!” he squalled.

Penelope and Melody jerked up their skirts and undercoats—exposing some right shapely ankles and knees and a lot of milky white skin that was further up and wasn't never seen by no man—and was astride their horses before Preacher could reach Hammer. Preacher lay down on the ground and kicked his feet up in the air and hoo-hawed with laughter.

“Fooled you!” Preacher said, wiping the tears from his eyes. “That was a right good sight to see, ladies.”

“You, sir, are no gentleman!” Penelope said.

“Eh, eh, eh,” Preacher chuckled, getting to his feet. “No, I reckon I ain't. I been called a lot of things, but never no gentleman. I ...” He looked up the little valley. “Oh,
shit!”
he hollered, leaping onto Hammer's back. “Come on, people, rake them cayuses! Here comes a whole passel of Injuns. Move, dammit, this ain't no joke.”

“Now, see here, sir!” Edmond protested. “I must insist that this sophomoric behavior you are displaying cease immediately. It's crude and disgusting. You are frightening the ladies and I—” He looked behind him as a wild savage yell reached his years. His eyes widened. “Son of a bitch!” the missionary bellowed, and kicked his pony in the slats.

About a hundred braves were thundering toward the creek, their war cries and the pounding of hooves filling the warm spring air.

“Stay on the trail!” Preacher hollered. “It'll lead you straight to the fort.” He made sure the others were ahead of him and wheeled Hammer, cocking his Hawken and bringing it to his shoulder. He compensated for the distance and squeezed off a round. The ball struck a lead rider and knocked him off his pony and under the hooves of the other hard-running horses. If he wasn't dead when he hit the ground, the hooves finished him.

Preacher gave Hammer his head and the horse took off like shot from a cannon. Hammer didn't like the sound of those wild screamin' Injuns no better than Preacher. And the pack horse, light-loaded now, after weeks on the trail, was keeping up all his own. He didn't like what was coming up behind him either.

Preacher tied the reins on the horn, turned in the saddle, and pulled his other Hawken from the boot, booting the empty rifle. “Give me a nice steady run, old hoss,” Preacher said, “So's I'll know when to pull this trigger.”

The horse seemed to understand and steadied down. Preacher let the muzzle wag up and down a few times, to get the rhythm of it, then fired.

He hit a horse right in the head and the animal dropped, creating the biggest pile-up Preacher had seen in many a year. “Sorry, hoss,” Preacher muttered. “I musta lost the rhythm.”

He turned around in the saddle, but not before he saw a dozen or more Injuns all crippled up and sprawled around both sides of the trail after their mounts piled up.

“The fort!” he heard Edmond shout, after a couple of miles of hard riding.

Preacher put the reins in his teeth and pulled out both .50 caliber pistols and let them bang to warn those in the fort that trouble was coming hard on the hoof.

The gates swung open and they were inside.

“Yee-haw!” Preacher heard the call just as he was jumping from his horse. He grinned and turned around to face a grizzled mountain man, looking to be much older than he was.

A huge bear-like man, dressed all in skins and fur, lumbered toward Preacher. “Preacher, you old hoss, you! You bring all this trouble down on us?”

The defenders of the fort—more civilians than soldiers—were on the ramparts, blasting away at the attacking Indians. Most of the Indians were armed only with bows and arrows and the guns of the defenders were swiftly driving them back. But all knew that come the night, it would be a much different story, for the Indian was a master at stealth.

“Wagh!” Preacher shouted. “Greybull, you old bear, you. How come you ain't down on the Popo Agie?”

The two men bear-hugged each other while the pilgrims looked on. The battle raged around them and these two were behaving as if nothing were happening.

Greybull held Preacher at arm's length. “Did you find these poor lost children in the woods?” he asked, glancing at the four missionaries.

“Wagon train attack over crost the Tetons,” Preacher said. “The Good Lord delivered them into my hands.”

Greybull glanced at the nattily dressed men. “You shoulda throwed 'em back. What are they?”

“We are under attack, gentlemen!” an Army officer shouted at the men. “We must defend this post.”

“Aw, keep your britches on,” Greybull told the young man. “This ain't nothin'. Wait 'til the night comes. Then you'll see trouble lookin' you in the face.”

“Wild Indians do not attack at night,” the young officer said.

Greybull and Preacher grinned at each other. “He's new out here,” Greybull explained. “He knows ever'thing there is to know 'bout Injuns. Just ask him. He gradeeated from Sandhurst.”

“Do tell. What's a Sandhurst?”

“Some fancy soldier school. Teach 'em how to walk nice and give orders in a military manner.”

“I say, sir,” Richard butted in. “My companions and I survived an attack on our wagon train. We—”

“What happened to your ear, sir?” the officer asked.

“Injuns cut it off,” Preacher told him. “He was defenden' the honor of these ladies here.”