by Lou Bradshaw
Each time I broke the surface, I could hear that magnificent beast barking… he was running along the bank and coming downstream with me. I grabbed a boulder, but my lower body was swept out from under me and I shot feet first over a eight or ten foot drop, which felt like a hundred foot waterfall. Going down the cascade, I got caught sideways and rolled down. At the bottom the water was churning and roiling as it poured down on the lower level. The force of the water hit the bottom and turned back in a foaming fight with itself. But I was the big loser because it kept me rolling over and over. Fighting with arms and legs, I was able to get a leg against the lower tier of the cascade and push off.
A few quick gulps of air that I was able to grab here and there probably saved my life. I was in quieter water but without the strength to move my arms to swim. I rolled over in an effort to get my arms under me in hopes to grab hold of something… if I could even hold on to anything. The water was more placid but I was still moving along at a pretty rapid pace. My head was out of the water and turned to the side, but my legs were following and hanging somewhat below me.
A sudden burst of pain in my thighs told me that I was still alive… at least my thighs were. It took me a few seconds to realize that my hands could touch bottom. I must have been swept up on a protruding rock shelf because by then my legs were on an underwater surface too. My head and face were in about a foot of water and the shore was right in front of me. All I needed to do was push up and drag myself to dry land. Putting everything I had into getting my hands under me and my knees drawn up, I came out of the water only to have my knees slip on the slick surface and give way. My arms couldn’t support my weight, and I was once again under water, and I had nothing left to contribute to my own survival.
I lay there for a few seconds trying to get my arms out in front of me in hopes of dragging myself out, but they were pinned under my body. And my body was dead weight, or soon would be if I didn’t do something quick. I was able to lift my head and turn it enough to get my nose out of the water, but the strain was tremendous… I didn’t know how long I could hold it. Thought of coming down that churning stream only to wind up drowning in six inches of water was maddening.
My neck was aching, and my ears were full of water. I couldn’t hear a thing except the things that were going on in my head and neck, like the grinding of my teeth and the grinding of the bones in my neck. I would have to go under again and hope to be able to lift my head back up after a few seconds rest.
That’s when I felt the movement against my shoulder. Something was trying to get at my neck. My first thought was a grizzly. A big one could snap my neck with those crushing jaws. I was pretty much done for. I wouldn’t have a ghost of a chance to make a fight of it.
I could feel the teeth making tentative probes along the top of my left shoulder and to the back of my neck. I thought, Here it comes! And I held what little breath I had left. It had me by the collar of my buckskin shirt and was dragging me out of the water. I was moving to dry land in a series of short tugs.
My head came free of the water and one arm was free, and then the other arm. I was able to turn over and looked up at the muzzle of that big ugly dog, which was the most beautiful sight I’d ever seen.
There was no way of knowing how long I lay there, but it must have been at least half an hour just breathing and gathering my strength. I was sore all over and weak as a kitten, but I was alive. With great caution, I started moving my limbs. Everything hurt like hell, but it was all working. Nothing seemed to be broken, which was a miracle. Then I tried the fingers and toes, that’s when I learned that one of my boots was gone.
I lay there a bit longer and forced myself to sit up. At least two ribs were battered and possibly broken. Deep breaths were an episode in agony. My buckskin shirt was in rags. My pants weren’t much better, but they were better. At least they kept me decent, not that it mattered much at the time. I didn’t think I could get that other boot off without a good deal of grief, so I left it where it was.
Feeling around, I found that my six-gun was still in its holster thanks to the rawhide thong on the hammer. My Bowie knife was somewhere downstream, but I was surprised to find my tomahawk still in my belt. I had no idea where my hat could be.
Since I didn’t have even a single thread that wasn’t soaked to dry off my ammunition, I took the cartridges from my belt and laid them on a rock in the sun to dry. I didn’t unload my pistol at the time, thinking it was better to take a chance with some misfires than try and use an empty gun. When the ammunition was dry, I reloaded my Colt and checked it out. I wouldn’t really know if everything was all right until I had a reason to use it.
At this point I didn’t want to be making a lot of noise, in case my attacker was still close by. I’d just as soon Rita thought I was downstream washing into the Roaring Fork. I had no knowledge that Rita was my attacker, but I had no doubt it was anyone but her. What bothered me was the fact that I’d seen the smoke, but I never heard the report. Of course, I was pretty busy for a short spell trying to stay on my horse and trying to get off my horse all at the same time.
There wasn’t any evidence of cuts; I couldn’t find any blood. Of course I had plenty of raw places, and I couldn’t move anything without a pain of some kind. But I couldn’t sit here all day moaning about my problems, I had to get up and go back to the clearing and see how much of an outfit I left.
To get on my feet meant I’d have to turn over and get my knees under me, and then I’d have to try and make it the rest of the way up from there. With the help of a sapling, I was able to stand on my own two feet, although not very well. It was a few tentative steps at a time and then rest. With each step I would have to regain my balance. It seemed that my feet and legs were not connected to the rest of me by anything but pain.
I was able to find a stout stick, which I used as a staff. With the help of my new friend the stick, I was able to make it to the clearing in about an hour… it was roughly a quarter of a mile. Reaching the clearing, I stayed undercover long enough to give the bluff and surrounding forest a good going over with a careful eye. I saw nothing.
Moving out of my cover, I eased my way to the brink and looked over the edge. At first I couldn’t locate the roan, but finally I spotted the body. The only real problem I saw was the twenty five or thirty feet between the where I stood and where the roan was jammed in among some boulders along the shore. That short distance was straight down.
Moving back down the hill, I was able to locate a place where the bank had caved in and created a gentler slope. I was sure I could manage going down to the water level, but getting back up could be a problem. I had no choice but to do it. Almost everything I had need of was strapped to a dead horse.
Starting down with the aid of some willow saplings, I went about ten feet under my own control. The next ten or so feet were on my backside thanks to trying to be a mountain goat wearing one riding boot. I came to a painful but safe end to my slide, with the help of a boulder.
Getting to my feet this time didn’t seem to be as painful as the last time. Maybe I was getting better by moving around. Then again, maybe I was just getting used to it. My injured ribs seemed to sense my arrogance over pain and gave me a sharp reminder that all was not well.
My horse was laying on his right side, and I could see where the bullet had ripped through his neck. It was no wonder he had gone mad, and then I saw where another bullet had hit him in the mid-section just below the saddle… Yeah, that’s the way Rita shoots, and she wasn’t getting any better.
The first thing I retrieved was my rifle from the scabbard, and then I went about untying my bedroll, saddle bags, and the rucksack with the supplies. I hated to leave that good saddle there, but there was no way I could carry it out of these mountains let alone even get it up to the next level. In fact I didn’t know if I’d be able to get all this stuff up the bank.
That’s when I remembered my riatta, which was about thirty foot of braided rawhide rope. If it wasn
’t washed downstream, I could use it to get everything up on the bank. The riatta had been tied to the right side of the saddle out of the way. It would be underwater and maybe under the roan… if it was, I’d never get it out. Either way, I was going to have to crawl over the horse and endure some pain.
I found the riatta still tied to the saddle, but luckily it was free from the weight of the roan. With ribs and shoulder joints screaming at me, I loosened the tie and retrieved the rope. After a few minutes of trying to keep my breathing down to shallow gulps of air and trying to apologize to all the muscles and joints I had just offended, I stood up and made my way to the washed out bank.
Piling all my possessions together, except for the Winchester, I took a couple of turns with the riatta and made them secure. The rifle I stuffed down through the back of my belt, and then I tied the other end of the rope around my waist. Using a few young willows and some embedded rocks, I was able to pull myself up the bank and on to the upper level. When I got there, I just kept on walking and the cargo at the end of the riatta followed along.
When I got everything back into the cover of the trees, the first thing I did was check out my rifle and make sure the cartridges were dry. I re-loaded from my belt and set the rest out to dry. After that, I built a nice fire. I wasn’t cold but I’d found that sore muscles often recovered better with heat. Next I spread my bedding out on branches bushes to dry.
Going through my food stuffs, I found the flour and sugar weren’t much good, but the coffee had been wrapped in oil cloth, so it would be all right. Much of what I had was in cans, and wouldn’t be a problem. I still had plenty of jerked meat and some bacon. I wouldn’t starve. Painfully, I went about bringing in enough fire wood to last through the night. Aspens are self pruning, so there’s always plenty on the ground. It’s light weight and burns fast, so I needed a good supply. I just wasn’t up to going up into the pines and dragging deadfalls down.
When my blankets were dried out enough, I just rolled up into them and went to sleep. Somewhere along about midnight, a particularly cruel pain tore me from my fitful sleep, and I woke to a whole bunch of soreness. Looking around I saw Dog laying not two feet from me with his eyes open and watching me. The fire was down and needed some work, so I heaped on what was handy and hoped for the best.
The next morning, after I forced myself out of blankets, I rebuilt the fire and started coffee with water from my canteen. By the time the coffee water was boiling, I was feeling much better. Moving around and the warmth from the fire had loosened up a lot of tight spots. The ribs would be another matter. I’d had broken or bruised ribs before and knew there wasn’t much that could be done for ‘em. I’d just wake up one morning and they wouldn’t hurt.
I was able to bend and struggle enough to get that lone boot off and exchange it for a pair of moccasins. When I pulled my tattered hunting shirt off to put on my spare, I was shocked to see so much purple and blue decorating my skin… I’d sure ‘nuff taken a beating. There seemed to be an extra colorful bruising in my right shoulder where I’d been shot down in Pagosa Springs. Banging around those boulders probably tore something loose inside…. I’d just have to hope for the best. With so many aches, I couldn’t tell if that shoulder was hurtin’ or not.
The coffee was good and plenty hot, but I needed some real food, so I cut up some of that bacon with my clasp knife and laid it on a flat thin piece of rock and set the whole thing in the fire. Then I opened a can of peaches with my hatchet and drank the juice. After that I speared the peach halves and ate them. By that time, the bacon was sizzling and popping. I figured to stay where I was for the day and rest up. Tomorrow would be soon enough, since at this point surviving was foremost on my mind.
Chapter 21
The next morning I was ready to start up those mountains and go wherever the trail took me. My ribs were still touchy and deep breaths were out of the question, but most of the other aches were tolerable. As soon as I’d finished breakfast and drank the last of the coffee, I shouldered my pack, picked up my rifle, and started up the slope.
I don’t reckon I was quite as ready as I thought I was because some of those muscles were still complaining. Well, I’ve dealt with worse. And I didn’t want the trail to get too cold. A good steady rain would wipe out a lot of trail.
When I reached the top of the bluff, where Rita had been standing, when she drew down on me, I started looking for signs. There were plenty. It looked like she had spent more than a day there. Her cigarette butts were everywhere, and her camp was like all her others… trashy and poorly organized. Finding the spot where she had fired, I looked around and found five brass .44 cartridges that had been ejected. So her pattern of killing was the same, as was her poor marksmanship. She would throw as much lead as she could in a general area and hope she hit something or somebody.
There are a few things that really get my dander up… messing with my friends and their families, unnecessary killing or meanness of those who do no harm… and messing with me. She’d done it all. It had been personal when she took Ben and Patty Anne’s little boy. But now, she had ambushed me and killed a good horse. That made it real personal… I put one sore foot in front of the other and walked on.
I could see Lookout Mountain off to my right, and Rita’s trail was heading right. Right down the slope toward the lower basin. That could bring her … and me a bunch of trouble. The other side of the river was Ute territory, but the Utes like many other Injuns didn’t recognize boundaries. She was in no hurry, but she was definitely working her way around Lookout and down into the valley.
Her campsites were easy to recognize from the haphazard way she had of doing things and from the things she left behind. I found a frying pan in one and a dull knife in another. She seemed to be stopping early and leaving late, which was a good thing for me. I was gaining on her a little each day.
She did in fact, skirt around Lookout and went down a ridge onto the old floodplain. The centuries of high water and heavy flooding had scoured out a nice little basin that offered some great hunting grounds webbed with steams and plenty of tall grass and brush.
Dog and I were walking along one of those streams following her horse’s trail through the tall grass. I had my rifle at the ready, with my left hand on the action and the hammer cocked. Rita could be mighty sudden when she wanted to, so it was my intention not to give her an even break if I didn’t have to. I’d never thrown down on a woman, let alone pull the trigger on one, but she was a whole different breed of female. I knew what happened if a man her half a chance.
This part of the valley was broken by brush and trees… mostly cottonwoods with willows right close to water. The grass was near knee high and thick. Her tracks were fresh and easy to follow. Her horse had walked through knocking the stems down in front of it. The grass hadn’t come back up yet, so that told me, they were no more than a day old. She probably came through here yesterday evening.
Dog started sniffing the air and growling low in his throat. I laid a hand on his head to keep him quiet. Crouching low, I gave him the go ahead to follow. He sniffed and snuffed, and then he broke through the brush with me right behind. We’d found her camp. A small fire was burning and her bedding was there, but she and her horse were gone. My first reaction was to dive back into the brush and dig for any cover I could find. Expecting to have .44 slugs spraying all around, I kept my head down… way down.
Finally, I raised my head enough to peek through the brush and have a look around. Dog was going from spot to spot sniffing and snorting. I got into a crouch and circled the camp coming in from the opposite side between two cottonwoods. She’d have had a shot if she’d a wanted it, and if she’d a seen me she’d a wanted it. That told me she wasn’t nearby.
I dropped my packs at the base of one of those cottonwoods and started casting about for signs. It didn’t take long to pick them up. She had ridden out of camp heading down stream. Within a couple hundred yards, I found where she had gone. There was a nice little open
place with a gravel bar in the middle of the stream. The grulla was tied to some brush, but there was no Rita.
Dog was still sniffing. He went from the grulla to the water’s edge and stood looking downstream where it made a bend to the right. I was getting set to get my feet wet when I spotted something in the tall grass. Laying there almost hidden by the grass was her clothes complete with boots, hat, gunbelt, and Windchester.
“Well I’ll be damned.” I said to nobody but Dog. “She’s takin’ a bath! I guess that goose you gave her did some good.” He looked up at me but didn’t say anything.
I told Dog to stay there, and I got ready to go around the bend and arrest her or shoot her if she was still armed. But I wanted Dog to stay between her and that rifle.
That was when I heard a ruckus in the water. A horse went splashing through, and a man’s voice could be heard yelling. Then there was a scream… and more yelling… and more screaming. I grabbed her rifle and lit out for cover. I didn’t have any intentions of leaving that for her or that Injun that was giving her trouble.
Dog and me were safely out of sight when that pony came splashing around the bend in the stream. The man on the paint’s back was a Ute without a doubt. He had an old single shot carbine in one hand, and in his other hand he had a handful of black hair. That black hair was attached to the head of a mighty wet and completely naked Rita Dooly, and she was running as hard as she could to keep from being dragged through the water and gravel. He pulled her up on the bank and trotted her over to where her horse was tied.
