by John Legg
“Fine,” Melton nodded.
“No,” Strapp cried. “I have my things in there. My clothing. My toilette. That’s what makes this insufferable journey bearable.”
“Be quiet, William,” Melton ordered. “You have delayed us long enough with that thing. We will take the ledgers and a few small items. Nothing more!”
“Then I will stay with the wagon,” Strapp whined.
“So be it, William. But remember that we are hundreds of miles from the nearest settlement. You would be dead in a matter of days. ”
“But, Leander, to live like heathens!”
Squire had had enough of this. He pushed himself up and headed toward the wagon while Melton and Strapp still argued. He stopped at the left rear wheel and took several deep breaths, balling his massive right fist. He swung with all his might.
The splintering of a wheel spoke cracked out, and most of the men stopped working, looking around for its source. Melton and Strapp stopped arguing and snapped their heads around to look at him.
Squire’s mighty fist lashed out again, and another spoke fractured into several pieces. The other men dropped their work and began drifting over. Strapp sat with mouth agape, looking like a freshly caught fish.
“What’n hell’re y’all doin’?” Willis asked from where he stood near the horses.
Squire ignored him and smashed another spoke. Willis dropped the brush he had been using to curry a horse and leaped at Squire. The mountain man brushed him aside like a fly and shattered another spoke. Four should be enough, he figured, so he headed for the front wheel.
Willis jumped at him again, hopping onto Squire’s back and clamping a muscular forearm around Squire’s neck. “Leave off what y’all are doin’, Squiah,” Willis gasped.
Squire reached up with both hands and fastened his hard, calloused hands on Willis’s forearm. He yanked, pulling the arm away from his neck. He turned, twisting the arm as he did. Willis winced, and grunted with the pain. Squire, holding Willis at arm’s length with his right hand, brought his left back toward his ear. It curled into a tight, large knot and then flashed forward, smashing Willis flush on his just-recovered broken nose.
The cartilage snapped and blood spurted from the nose. Willis’s eyes rolled up until only white showed. Squire let him fall.
Then Squire turned his attention back to the front wagon wheel. Within a minute, four of its spokes were also broken.
He spun and strolled away. As he passed Melton and Strapp, he said with a grin, “Your wagon seems to have broken down, William. I reckon ye won’t have no more use for it.”
He wandered away, feeling happier than he had since they left St. Louis. Behind him, Strapp sputtered and crackled, anger suffusing his weasel-like face.
Chapter Thirteen
“How long we gonna stay here, Nathaniel?” Li’l Jim asked. After breaking up the wagon, Squire felt better. He had strolled over to where Bellows and Ransom had some of the men grooming the horses that had been ridden that day. He had taken over the working on Noir Astre from Benji.
“Not long, lad. Day or so. Mayhap three.”
“Ah, Nathaniel, my rump’s near rubbed raw.”
“Don’t ye be sassin’ me, boy.”
“And if’n I do?” Li’l Jim asked with an impudent grin.
“The way your rump feels now will be a pleasure once I take after ye with a willow saplin’.”
“You’d have to catch me first,” Li’l Jim taunted. He smiled insolently.
“Hush up, Li’l Jim,” Benji whispered, fearing for his friend. He had seen the glint of challenge in Squire’s eyes.
“Ye don’t think I could be catchin’ ye, lad?” Squire asked, the threat evident to all but Li’l Jim.
“Hell,” Li’l Jim snorted, digging his grave a little deeper. “Big, fat feller like you?”
“Who ye be callin’ fat, lad?” There was not an ounce of lard on Squire’s six-foot-seven, two-hundred-and-seventy-pound frame. “Well it sure ain’t Homer I’m talking to.”
“Dammit, Li’l Jim,” Benji said urgently. Once before, when they were still in St. Louis, he and Li’l Jim had been roaming around town, feeling their oats a little. Li’l Jim had decided to go in and get a beer in one of the saloons. The bartender hadn’t cared much how young they were, but once Li’l Jim started mouthing off to one of the voyageurs, they had barely escaped with their lives. It seemed to Benji that Li’l Jim would never learn.
“He didn’t mean nothin’, Mr. Squire,” Benji said.
Squire stopped rubbing the horse and glared at the young upstart. “That true, lad?”
“Hell, I said it, didn’t I?” Li’l Jim murmured, wondering if perhaps he hadn’t gone a little too far this time.
“I’ll tell ye what, lad. I’ll be givin’ ye a head start, say a hundred yards.” Looking beyond the edge of the copse, he pointed. “I’ll still beat ye to that there rise.” The small hill, covered in brown grass, was about a mile away.
“Are ya willing to bet on it?”
“Aye. My buff'lo sleeping robe agin your services to me for a week.”
“You got yourself a bet.” He was no longer concerned that he had gone too far. He was fast, and he knew it. There was no way this giant would be able to catch him. Li’l Jim ambled away in the direction of the ridge.
The other men gathered, already placing bets of whatever small personal possessions they could muster.
Squire stood silent, smiling as Li’l Jim shrank with the distance. Then he sprang forward.
Li’l Jim glanced back, figuring he had come all the distance he was going to get as a head start. When he saw Squire loping after him, he turned and ran, head bowed, arms pumping.
Squire’s feet covered the ground with deceptive speed. He ran with long, smooth strides as he rapidly cut the distance between him and Li’l Jim. When he was three-quarters of the way to the hill—and less than fifty yards behind the youth—he let himself go.
Li’l Jim cursed silently when he glanced over his shoulder and saw Squire racing after him like a wounded grizzly. He ran as hard as he could, chest heaving, lungs sucking desperately for air. But he knew, with a sour feeling in the pit of his stomach, that he would never beat Squire to the top of the ridge. Even so, he raced furiously, using his small reserve of strength.
Then Squire’s huge right hand grabbed him by the shirt collar. Without slowing, Squire lifted the youth off his feet and ran with him to the top of the hill. He plopped Li’l Jim down on his feet, but did not let go of the boy’s shirt.
“Well, I reckon you win, Nathaniel,” Li’l Jim said, smiling ruefully. “Beat me fair ’n’ square. Now let me be.”
Squire grinned. “Well, now, I ain’t so certain I be finished with ye just yet.”
“What’re ya gonna do?” Worry appeared in Li’l Jim’s soft brown eyes. He hated those eyes. With their long fringes of lashes, he thought they made him look like a girl.
“This.” Squire flung Li’l Jim over his shoulder with one deft move.
“Let me be, dammit,” Li’l Jim bellowed as he found himself hanging over the mountain man’s shoulder, his cheek rubbing against the man’s rough, high-smelling shirt.
“Oh, shit,” he hollered as Squire took off at a trot. The mountain man ignored Li’l Jim’s shout of protest, not caring in the least at the jostling the youth was taking. Before long they were back in the camp, where Squire unceremoniously dumped Li’l Jim on the ground. Before the youth could move, Squire scooped up a rope and was on the boy. Quickly Squire looped the rope around Li’l Jim’s chest and arms.
“What’re ya doin’?” Li’l Jim demanded, trying not to be too frightened. But he was not sure what this crazy man was going to do next.
Squire threw the loose end of the rope around a cottonwood limb and pulled. Li’l Jim swung into the air, and Squire grinned as he tied the rope, leaving the youth dangling a few feet off the ground.
“What’n hell’re ya doin’?” Li’l Jim howled, ears and
cheeks red as the other young men hooted and jeered at him.
“Just hangin’ ye up a bit so’s the wind can cool ye off some. Mayhap that breeze will be blowin’ a little sense into that thick head of yours, too.”
“You big, fat, ugly, goddamned horny toad,” Li’l Jim snarled fiercely among the laughter that had joined the catcalls. “Let me down from here!” He jerked around trying to free his arms, but all he succeeded in doing was to set himself swinging, tightening the ropes all the more. “Goddammit, let me down!”
Homer Bellows walked over and looked up at him. “Got no more sense’n a goddamn stone, do ya, boy?” He chuckled and strolled away.
“You ol’ geezer,” Li’l Jim shouted after him. “Ain’t no better’n that goddamn big, fat walkin’ tree Squire. Dried up ol’ man. Got no juices left in ya. Get me down from here!”
Laughing, Squire sat near one of the small cooking fires and grabbed some roasted meat. Though it was still half-raw, he ate it with delight.
“How long are you planning to leave him there?” the Colonel asked, unsure whether Squire was seriously trying to punish the boy, or just having a little fun. Squire was a hard man to read, he thought.
Squire laughed some more. “Not long. Soon’s he quits kickin’ and fussin’, I’ll let him free.”
Within a few minutes the camp had quieted down, with most of the men either eating or drifting off to see to their duties. Squire carried some of the fresh-cooked buffalo meat over toward the cottonwood and sat in full view of Li’l Jim. He stuffed a dripping hunk of meat in his mouth and looked up at Li’l Jim, one of the few times in his adult life he ever had to look up at anyone. “This be prime eatin’ here, lad,” he taunted.
“Let me down from here, ya bastard.”
“Ah, now, lad, that ain’t no fittin’ way for ye to be speakin’ to me, is it?”
“You just let me down so’s I can fill my belly before everybody else eats it all.”
Squire smiled up at him, thoroughly enjoying this. “Sorry, lad, but I doubt there’ll be any left for ye. After all, us big, fat coons got to be eatin’ a heap of food less’n we lose our strength and be set upon by others.”
“Come on, Nathaniel, ya know I didn’t mean no harm when I said that.”
Squire licked his lips as he tore into another chunk of meat. “Well, now, lad, I don’t believe ye’ve repented enough.”
“Goddamn you to hell and back three times, ya fat, ugly son of a bitch.” Li’l Jim jerked at the ropes some more, and once again set himself swinging. He stopped jerking and let himself spin slowly down until he was stopped. When he did, the feistiness was gone. He grinned. “You win, Nathaniel. I’ll not go callin’ ya names again.”
“Ye be promisin’ that?”
“My word, Nathaniel.”
“That be good enough for me.” He stood and wiped his greasy hands on the fringed buckskin trousers that were near black with smoke, dirt and grease. He untied the rope and eased Li’l Jim down. Before removing the rope, he asked, “Ye do remember our little wager, now, don’t ye, boy?”
Li’l Jim stared up at him gravely. “I ain’t ever gone back on a bet before, Nathaniel,” he said seriously. “I ain’t gonna start now.”
Squire shook off the rope and coiled it. “Go on and fill your meatbag, boy. You’ll be needin’ your strength for all them extra chores you’ll be havin’.”
“They’ll get done, Nathaniel. Now leave off your jabberin’ and let me eat.”
They walked to the fire where Melton, Bellows, Ransom and Train had gathered. They sat, and Li’l Jim tore into some meat.
“Where be Strapp?” Squire asked, a bit relieved that the priggish little man was not there. The man set him on edge, made him want to thrash hell out of him for no good reason.
“Tendin’ to Zeb,” Train said.
“And,” Bellows added with a chuckle, “most likely bemoaning the loss of his precious goddamn wagon.”
“Sure was reluctant to part with it, weren’t he,” Squire laughed.
The Colonel joined in the laughter. “Most assuredly. But I think he’ll get over it soon enough, now that he has no choice.”
After a pleasurable stretch of silence, Melton asked, “What’s it like out there where we’re going, Nathaniel?”
“Well, Colonel,” Squire said slowly, pausing to stuff some tobacco in his cheek. “It be some of the prettiest, nastiest, wildest land ye e’er set eyes on. Aye. Mountains risin’ up e’er whichaway. Tall’s can be, they are, reachin’ right up to the sky. And they be all purple-lookin’—when they ain’t covered in snow. Ye first see ’em and you’ll be thinkin’ they be next to near enough to touch. But you’ll be days, mayhap weeks away yet.”
He paused to chew some, and spit several times, watching the brown liquid sizzle in the fire for a few moments before sputtering out.
“And ye got to be watchful e’er minute. Aye. Them mountains can be plumb dangerous. Ye be gettin’ up too high in ’em and ye can’t be breathin’ right. Ain’t no wood. No feed for the horses. No game. Nothin’ but snow. All the year round in some places. Lower down, it still be colder’n hell. Then there be griz, painter, wolves. And all of ’em right short-tempered near winter’s end.”
“Them bears as mean as people say?” Li’l Jim asked, mouth still full of buffalo hump meat.
Squire straightened, his hands resting on his knees as he sat cross-legged. He shot a stream of tobacco juice into the fire. “Aye, lad. They be. Now I mind the time I run into this griz a few winters back.”
He paused, waiting to see if anyone had picked up the scent. He noted that Bellows had. The stockman hurriedly whispered to Li’l Jim, who jumped up and ran. Squire grinned. It was returned by Bellows.
Squire waited until nearly all the men in camp had gathered around, brought forth by the knowledge—carried to the camp by Li’l Jim—that a tale was about to be told.
Once more he spit before beginning. “Like I were sayin’ afore I were interrupted”—he glanced not very fiercely at Li’l Jim—“I mind the time I run into this griz a few winters back. Meanest, orn’riest critter that e’er set paw to ground. ’Twas the biggest b’ar the Lord Almighty e’er created, too. Stood a good twenty feet high, he did, once he rose full up. And he weighed more’n two full-growed buff’lo bulls.”
He took a sip of the coffee he had poured while waiting for the others to gather around. “I were ridin’ up in the Absarokas, headin’ down out of the mountains for a spot of tradin’. I was just moseyin’ along, peaceable as ye please, when all to a sudden this here b’ar was all a roarin’ up in my face.
“Well, I just looked that b’ar square in the eyes and I told him, ‘Ye’d best be clearin’ the trail, b’ar, for ye be facin’ Nathaniel Squire, the meanest, toughest son of a she wolf in these here Stony Mountains, and I’ll be havin’ no truck from any b’ar interferin’ in my path.’ Well, that ol’ b’ar just growled all the more fearsome. Aye, that he did. So’s I boosted up my trusty ol’ Hawken and placed me a shot there right ’twixt his eyes. Plumb center, I be sayin’ to ye.” Squire glanced around, and saw that every man there was gazing intently at him. He liked the feeling.
“But that b’ar was havin’ no part of it. Nay. That rifle ball bounced right off’n his skull. Didn’t e’en muss his fur. But it sure made that b’ar mad. Damn if’n he didn’t raise up one of his paws and wallop this ol’ chil’ harder’n hell. It like to knock me clear down to Greaser country. I landed on my ass in the bushes, rifle flung all away, horse runnin’ off like e’ery Crow and Blackfoot in the world was chasin’ him.”
“What’d ya do?” a wide-eyed Li’l Jim asked. So caught up in the story was he that he could not help but ask. Surprisingly, no one snickered.
“Well, lad, I were lyin’ there and I could see that ol’ b’ar be movin’ in to put me to an end. So’s I said to myself, ‘Ye be in a fine fix here, Nathaniel, and there ain’t no denyin’ it. Ye can’t be stayin’ here all the day just a waitin’ for
Ol’ Ephraim to make a meal out of ye.’”
He paused to squirt a mouthful of tobacco juice at the fire, savoring the rapt attention of his audience. “So’s I got to my feet and I says to that b’ar, ‘Mister Griz, ye be askin’ for a heap of trouble if’n ye be comin’ any closer. Now, ye done cost me my rifle and my hoss and my plews and all my plunder, so I be in the poorest of humors. It would bode ye well to be lettin’ me go on my way.’ “He stopped like he were thinkin’ it o’er, but then he shrugged and commenced movin’ toward me agin. ‘Well,’ I says to myself, ‘it seems like Mister Griz ain’t of a mind to be lettin’ ye alone, Nathaniel, so’s ye best be makin’ the best accountin’ of yourself as ye kin.’
“Well, lads, I just leaped up at the b’ar and set my fist agin his nose, sendin’ him a flyin’ backward. But he was quick on his feet, that ol’ b’ar was. He was up and at me agin afore I could collect my wits.
“It were the most ferocious tight that e’er was. We was growlin’ and snarlin’ and kickin’ and gougin’. We was rollin’ and tumblin’ in the dirt and the snow. Blood and hair and skin and fur was flyin’ e’er whichaway. With all these doin’s, I was a heap too occupied to be usin’ my knife.”
Squire looked around through eyes squinted against the smoke of the fire. Melton and Bellows each had a twinkle in his eye, but the others, the younger men, sat there believing. And if they didn’t believe, they certainly wanted to with all their young hearts.
“All this here rollin’ about was gettin’ me just the least bit weary,” Squire continued. “So’s I said to myself, ‘Nathaniel, ol’ coon, ’tis time ye was puttin’ an end to this here foolishment. ’ So’s I reached up and took to grabbin’ that b’ar by his short little ears. Gainin’ my feet, I took that b’ar and swung him round and round o’er my head. Two times I did so. Three times I did so. And the next time, I just sent that b’ar to flyin’.”
Benji gasped.
Squire kept a straight face. “Well, I went about dustin’ myself off, and then sought out my rifle. Then I went searchin’ for that b’ar. Spent the best part of three hours lookin’ for him. ”
