by Tim Champlin
"They sure did."
"How long have you been awake?"
"An hour or so, I guess."
A movement in the trees and a flash of color upstream caught my eye, and I jerked my Winchester up, my heart skipping a beat.
"Relax. It's just our pony. I checked on him earlier.
He's all right."
I stretched again and yawned, my heartbeat beginning to slow down after the sudden fright. I laid the rifle on the ground and stood up, feeling stiff and rusty.
"Have a wash in the river. It'll freshen you up."
"Good idea."
I went to the edge of the stream and splashed some of the icy water on my face, scrubbing it in vigorously and feeling the tingle. When I came back, dripping and running my fingers through the tangle of my hair, Curt was busy gathering some dry twigs to resurrect our small fire.
"Whew! That'll wake you up," I said. "What about the smoke from our fire? Aren't you afraid it'll be seen?"
"Not if we keep it small—just big enough to cook on. What little smoke it makes will be dissipated by these overhead trees."
When the fire began to blaze up from its hidden embers, I retrieved the meat we had slung from a halter in a nearby willow tree. The flies had already found it, but we were in no position to be squeamish.
Our breakfast was sizzling over the low flames before Cathy and Wiley awakened.
"Man, that smells good!" Wiley said, sitting up and looking around, obviously not quite sure where he was.
Cathy came awake quietly and completely in just a few seconds. She sat up, composed and ladylike, pushing her short hair back from her face, and reached for a piece of the roasted pony meat Curt handed her on a green twig. Even in her bedraggled condition, she was very pretty. As I watched her, I couldn't decide if this was because of her youth or if she had the bone structure and the classic type of beauty that would endure for years. In any case, she was Curt's girl, and I wasn't likely to be around twenty years from now to find out. In fact, none of the four of us might survive to middle age.
After we had eaten our fill again, Curt and I walked the hundred yards or so to the carcass of the butchered pony in the trees along the river downstream.
I was glad I had already eaten, or I probably would have lost my appetite. The bloody carcass was anything but inviting. Four black and white magpies and a big golden eagle flapped away as we came up. We carved some more meat from the hindquarters and carried it back to camp. Curt sharpened Wiley's knife on a rock and spent the next hour or two cutting the meat into thin strips and grilling it well-done over the fire.
"We won't be here long enough to smoke this stuff to make it keep. We should be in the Black Hills in short order, and it should stay good as long as we'll need it. I hope so, anyway."
Cathy excused herself and told us she was going for a bath in the river.
"Don't worry if I'm not back in a jiffy," she told us. "Now that I feel like I might live again, I'm going to get myself good and clean, and also see if I can wash these clothes. Then I'm going to find a good sunny spot and get everything good and dry. I've been wet so long, I may never get my skin unwrinkled."
"It would be tough to explain to people that I have a sister who is permanently pruned up," Wiley said, grinning. "Don't go far," he cautioned her.
"Okay. I'm just going up to about where the pony is tied. Sure wish I had some soap and a hairbrush."
"If wishes were carriages, we could all ride into Deadwood in style," her brother reminded her.
"Guess you're right," she sighed, moving off.
The rest of the day was spent resting, dozing, and eating. Every hour or so Curt and I would cautiously venture out from the tree line, keeping low in the grass, and survey the terrain as far as we could see, to guard against any surprises. We would also strip off our dry clothes and wade across the river to do the same thing on the opposite side. There were no good climbing trees in the vicinity, or we could have gotten a better view of the countryside. The willows were too small, and the cottonwoods were too large—with no limbs low enough on their huge trunks to be reached.
I slept again for about two hours in the late afternoon, and the others did the same at different times. Our fatigue was deep-seated. Even though I had always heard that older people didn't need as much sleep as younger ones, Curt and I seemed to need as much rest as Wiley—who was only about twenty-six and Cathy, who was only twenty-one. Curt and I were both in our early thirties. But maybe this phenomenon didn't show itself until a person reached his late fifties or sixties. By sundown, I, for one, felt pretty well rested.
"How far do we have to go?" Wiley asked, directing his question to no one in particular as the four of us sat around our fire at sunset eating more of the pony meat.
"If this is the Belle Fourche River, and I think it is," Curt replied, automatically assuming his place as leader, "then I'd guess we've got about twenty miles to the Hills proper, and then maybe another ten to Deadwood. We had Bear Butte in sight before the attack last night, so if we get out of this little valley before total darkness sets in, we should be able to guide on it. We should be almost due northeast from Deadwood."
Even though we were all getting tired of the same diet, we were glad to have it. Monotonous it may have been, but nourishing and strengthening it certainly was. We stuffed down as much of it as we could hold, knowing we would need the energy for the long night of walking ahead.
Just as dusk was fading into night, we gathered ourselves together and set out, Cathy taking the first turn on the pony and the rest of us walking. The moon gave us its light as we plodded along, hour after hour, in a general southwest direction. Since none of our watches was working, we could only guess at the time by the position of the moon. We took turns riding the pony and walking, and—with our dry clothes, food, and rest—we all felt a hundred percent better than we had felt after we made our escape from Slim Buttes.
Sometime after midnight we came off the rolling prairie and entered some low hills. The fresh scent of pine greeted our noses. The hills gradually grew steeper and higher, and we had to pause more often to get our bearings and be sure we were still headed in the right direction. Then, in the wee hours of the morning, the moon went down and we had to stop, knowing that we were likely to walk off some steep drop-off in the rugged, rocky hills. The darkness enveloped us like a velvety black curtain. The only stars that could be seen were directly overhead between the tall conifers.
We tied the pony to a small tree and we all sat down to rest and await the coming of daylight. Now that we had the hills and trees around us, we all felt more secure, even though the danger from Indians was not past. At least there were more places to hide.
On a soft carpet of pine needles, I dozed, then slept. When I woke, another clear dawn was just breaking. The others were already awake, and we started out again, after chewing on some of the well-cooked pony meat Curt had packed. Traveling the ridges of the hills as much as possible, we soon sighted what looked like a raw mining camp below us in a canyon.
"If that's Crook City, then we're on course," Curt said. "I was talking to some of the miners who were with the cavalry, and they told me it was just a few miles down the same canyon from Deadwood."
We pushed on, following the ridge. We could see miners working their sluice boxes in the creeks below us as we went along. The gulch was ripped and torn by picks and shovels all up and down both sides. Here and there, in odd places, we saw small piles of white quartz, looking like snow, where it had been dumped by the prospectors.
By late morning we spotted what had to be the new town of Deadwood ahead of us through the trees. We stopped on the crest of the hill and looked down.
"Well, there she is," Curt said. "It's got to be Deadwood."
Cathy slid off the pony's back and came up to stand by his side.
"I wonder what's waitin' for us there?" Wiley said, as if thinking aloud.
"Whatever it is," Wiley said, "we've beaten the army to it by a
t least twenty-four hours."
CHAPTER 3
With the end of our marathon in sight, the fatigue and danger of the past few days faded like a bad dream.
"Deadwood Gulch! By God!" Wiley exclaimed aloud more than once as he led the pony down the steep hillside through the birch and fir trees toward the ramshackle settlement.
After he had said this for about the third time, Cathy said, "Wiley, you sound like you're looking at the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, instead of a raw mining town."
A grin cracked his handsome face—the old, familiar, boyish grin we hadn't seen in several days. "I've lowered my sights some. Anything that smacks of civilization would look like heaven compared to what we've seen since Cheyenne last spring. Besides, from what I've heard about the gold around here, this may be the pot at the end of the rainbow."
"Hold up a minute." Wilder stopped us. "Give me your knife, Wiley."
Curt proceeded to slit the stitching from the top of the yellow facings on his trouser legs. Then he ripped the stripes down and off. He cut the remaining brass buttons from his tunic and took a look to make sure no more identifiable markings of the army uniform were still visible. He had no hat. He removed his jacket, rolled it up, and handed it to Wiley.
"If we're going to walk in there in broad daylight, I don't want any questions asked about me being with the army. A lot of ex-soldiers wear pieces of uniforms, so we probably won't be noticed."
When we finally reached the bottom of the gulch and came up on the lower end of the town, I could see what a really raw camp it was. As we ambled slowly up the street leading the pony, I'm sure our stares compared to those of some country hicks seeing a big city for the first time. Cathy, in the travels with her late father, had probably seen more of these frontier boom towns than any of us. As for me, it was the first time I had ever been in a mining camp during the first few months of its existence. And the impression was one of chaos. People were swarming everywhere, like bees in a hive. Mostly there were muddy, bearded miners, with merchants, bullwhackers, and men of every description thrown in. And men were all I saw; not a woman was in sight.
Two long, twelve-oxen bull trains with tandem wagons had apparently just pulled in with several tons of freight and were half turned, blocking the entire upper end of the winding, hard-packed dirt street. Two wagon drivers were yelling and cursing the bullwhackers to move their teams. The street itself was fifteen to twenty yards wide and it curved back and forth, following the bottom of the gulch. The thoroughfare was jammed with buckboards, Studebaker wagons, piles of fresh lumber, men on horseback and afoot.
There was a sawmill somewhere in the vicinity. I could hear the protesting whine of saws ripping lumber over the general din of voices, mules braying, hammers banging, harness jingling, the hollow thudding of boots on boardwalks, and a cacophony of other sounds. The main and only street of town was lined with wooden buildings, and the sides of the gulch that sloped steeply up behind each of these rows of structures had been almost denuded of trees to build the town, leaving thousands of stumps on the barren hillsides. The lower end of the street contained some large, white-walled tents set on log foundations. The rough spruce, pine, and fir boards that formed the fronts of the unpainted buildings were still oozing sap. The more pretentious establishments were two storied and sported coats of paint, and even cornices and brick chimneys. They also had glass windows and, amazingly enough, even had the appearance of permanence. Considering that nearly everything except the wood had to be freighted in by wagon over many miles of very rough roads—through hostile territory from Cheyenne to the south or Pierre to the east—I was astonished at how all of this could have sprung out of the virgin wilderness in a matter of only a few months. It was all a monument to the glittering yellow metal the white man coveted. I could see signs advertising a bakery, two dry-goods stores, two hotels, a bank, a telegraph office, two or three restaurants, a couple of grocery stores, and a large stagecoach office and stable. Some enterprising dentist had even hung out his shingle in this remote frontier town.
It seemed every second or third building we passed was a saloon or liquor dealer.
"A man with cash sure wouldn't go thirsty here," Wiley remarked, licking his lips as though he were already tasting his first drink in weeks. Loud arguments drifted to our ears over the bat-wing doors of one saloon as we went by. A crash of glass, some yells, and a splintering of wood in another one told of a real disagreement in progress. Tings were in full swing, and it wasn't yet noon.
The sun was directly overhead and beating down into the windless gulch, bringing out the smells of manure and pine resin. I was beginning to sweat under my ragged corduroy jacket. But it was a pleasant feeling after being cold and wet for more than a month.
"Well, what do we get first?" I asked. "Food, drink, bath, or bed?"
"All. And in about that order, for me anyway," Cathy replied, sliding her hat back to let it hang by its cord from her neck and tossing her head to shake her hair loose. It fell just to the collar of her doeskin jacket.
Several men on the sidewalk nearby just then noticed that Cathy was a woman and stopped their conversation to stare in our direction.
"Stay close," Curt told her quietly. "I have a feeling women are pretty scarce in this town—decent women anyway."
"How much money have we got?" Wiley asked. "Cathy and I have about one hundred and thirty dollars Dad had when he was killed." He was matter-of-fact, giving no indication that he was still being torn by guilt and grief from the death of his father at the Battle of the Rosebud back in June.
"Well, I think I've got nearly three months' pay," Curt said, digging into a side pocket. "They didn't bother to take anything but my side arms from me when I was arrested." He pulled out a damp leather billfold and counted out something over four hundred dollars.
"Looks like I'm low man on this money tree," I grinned, holding up two bills. "Thirty dollars. I worked all summer for the Chicago Times Herald, and then decided to skip. out without going back East for my pay."
"Don't worry. We've got plenty for the four of us for the time," Curt said. "Why don't we all go get a good bath, then some food and some new clothes? And no drinking until we're settled in," he added as he noticed Wiley tying up the Indian pony to a hitching rail and eyeing the Union Brewery Saloon just across the boardwalk.
Wiley's amiable expression froze and he started to make some retort, but checked himself. In a moment he relaxed and snorted gently. "Yeah, I guess you're right. I can be thirsty a little longer."
We turned the pony into a livery stable and then turned ourselves into a barber shop that advertised a bathhouse in the rear section. We all soaked and scrubbed and luxuriated in the hot, soapy water for some three-quarters of an hour. One small section of the room with one tub had been partitioned off for the use of any infrequent women customers, so Cathy was able to enjoy complete privacy. It was the first real bath any of us had had since early summer. When we finally climbed out of the wooden tubs and dressed, we three men went out front into the tonsorial parlor and got shaved and our hair cut while Cathy waited for us. Wiley kept his sand-colored mustache. It did give his youthful face a slightly more mature look, even though the mustache was several shades lighter than his wavy brown hair.
"Hell, Wiley, I can't even see it from here," Curt chided him, backing away about twenty feet.
Even though we had to put our old, dirty, ragged clothes back on, we came out feeling renewed and refreshed. We wore the clothes only long enough to get down the street to a store that advertised Hobson's General Merchandise. And general it was: light and heavy clothing, hardware, tinware, mess pans, camp kettles, harness, saddlery, blankets, india rubber boots, ponchos, garden seeds, canned and dried fruits, sardines and yeast powders, lanterns and nails. There were goods of all kinds crammed into every comer and hung from all the walls. Bigger equipment hung from large hooks embedded in the ceiling beams. There was hardly room to walk among the piles and stacks and shelves o
f merchandise. Apparently, the storekeeper had just received a Shipment or two and he was stocking up for the winter.
Deciding what to buy was no problem; finding the right size was, at least for Cathy. She was finally able to find a man's small shirt and a pair of canvas pants that fit her fairly well, as well as a pair of long cotton underwear.
Nowhere in town, the lanky clerk told us, did he know of any place that stocked women's underclothes. There was simply no demand for them as yet.
"I assume," he said, his face reddening slightly, "that the girls at Myra's Golden Bell brought their own."
"Myra's Golden Bell?" Wiley asked.
"It … it's a place—uh, sort of like a red-light house down on the lower end of Main Street," he answered, trying to keep Cathy from overhearing. "It's a saloon on the first floor."
"I see."
We all outfitted ourselves from the skin out, buying stiff new overall pants and plaid wool shirts. We also picked up some soft corduroy pants. Curt and I replaced our lost hats with two low-crowned felts with brims of medium width. The stock of clothing was plentiful, but not too varied in styles. Our boots had been soaked and dried so often that they were shrunken and falling apart. We replaced them with low-heeled, round-toed leather boots similar to the standard issue cavalry boot, except that these had shorter tops. Again, Cathy had difficulty finding some small enough, but after much searching, the blushing young clerk finally fitted her with a pair that she could wear. The whole time he was helping her slip the boots off and on, he was casting admiring glances at her.
Before paying for our new outfits and leaving, we also stocked up on such items as combs, handkerchiefs, and socks. We were even able to find toothbrushes. As we pulled out our greenbacks to pay, the clerk's eyes opened wide. "You must be new in town," he said.
"Sure. Isn't everybody?"
"I mean, real new. You've got paper money. You get five-percent discount on all our merchandise for this."
