The Adventurous Life of Tom Iron Hand Warren: Mountain Man (The Mountain Men Book 5)

by Terry Grosz

  “I say we all get to cracking, pull the bullets from our pistols, dump the old powder and recharge them with fresh powder, buck and ball. I don’t want to go into a one-sided fight with pistols that may or may not fire when all the chips are down. So while those lads are drinking themselves silly, I say we get cracking. Let’s load up, prepare for the worst and by then, most of those ‘war-hoops’ should be good and liquored up so when we kill them, any critter that eats their miserable carcasses will get a bit loopy as well from all that they drank,” said Big Foot, with just a tinge of the thrill of the killing chase to come in his voice as well...

  “All right, here is what I propose we do. Since we will be outnumbered, I suggest we come at them from two sides but in such a manner we will not get ourselves caught in our own crossfires in case any of us over-shoot. That way, if any of them try to run away from the direction of the shooting, they can only run in such a manner that will present us the best shooting opportunity at killing every one of them! For to let any get away means they will more than likely come hunting us or other fellow trappers at a later date. Also, by attacking on two fronts, when we ‘run dry’ with our pistols and rifles, we can still throw our tomahawks and by being spread out like I am proposing, none of us will be in the way of the other when we get to throwing. After that, it will be every man and his sheath knife for himself in case I didn’t count right,” said Iron Hand, pleased over the fact that some of his previous military training was now coming into play...

  After making sure they were more than ready to take on a superior force of Indians, the men stealthfully moved out in two teams towards the Indians’ camp. A noisy camp of suspects that was now a madhouse of rum-soaked individuals, yelling, dancing and celebrating. Iron Hand and Crooked Hand sneaked into one side of the encampment and Old Potts and Big Foot took the other so they could set up a deadly crossfire once the shooting started. As they carefully approached the two campfires, each man was armed with a loaded rifle, three pistols, a tomahawk, a long-bladed sheath knife, a mountain of grim determination, and more guts than a boar grizzly.

  As was usual in most planned situations of such potential intensity, Iron Hand and Crooked Hand ran into a snag they had not planned on as they stealthfully sneaked into the Indians’ noisy camp. With Iron Hand in the lead, they chanced upon an Indian out in the brush urinating. The last worldly thing that man saw through his hazy rum-soaked eyes was the shadow of a huge man in the darkness reaching out, grabbing the top of his head and the bottom of his jaw and giving it a violent twist! His neck snapped with a dull sounding THUD, followed by a low groan, as Iron Hand let his lifeless body slip from his ‘bear trap’-like grip soundlessly to the forest floor at his feet... Now, there only appeared to be 18 men from the Indian raiding party left to face their maker and the rest of the Cloud People when they finally ‘arrived’!

  Positioning themselves off to one side of the wildly celebrating group of Indians, Iron Hand and Crooked Hand quietly waited partially hidden in a clump of elderberry bushes for Old Potts and Big Foot to get into position to shoot as well... Moments later, Iron Hand saw Old Potts and Big Foot slipping into position on the far side of the party of now well-liquored-up celebrants. When the two far side trappers finally stood up unobserved by the happy group around the campfires, Iron Hand and Crooked Hand quickly did the same. As the trappers rose to their feet for what was violently yet to come, a look skyward would have also shown that the Indians’ Cloud People were moving in closer to witness the deadly occasion as well...

  BOOMBOOMBOOMBOOM! went the roar of four Hawken rifles being fired into the wildly celebrating, unsuspecting group of Indians! When those four rifles were fired, huge clouds of black powder smoke blew into the area surrounding the dead, dying and the remaining living! Although they had been heavily drinking for a spell, many still had enough of their natural survival instincts that began taking over upon hearing the close at hand shooting and seeing the clouds of black powder smoke come rolling their way from the ends of the four rifle barrels! The entire group of men, seeing four of their number violently spun onto the ground from being shot at such close range with heavy rifles, still with 10,000 years of survival in their genes, tried to drunkenly respond. However, when they did, confusion ruled within their crowded ranks. The Indians had grouped up upon hearing the close at hand shooting and then the next four rapid pistol shots dropped four more Indians to the ground in a literal spew of red clouds and flying gray matter! The combination of the rum, acrid black powder smoke enveloping the Indians at such close ranges, four more of their kind dropping dead at their feet as snot, blood, pieces of bone and intestines blown apart from the buck and ball splattered all over those remaining in a standing position, did nothing but add even more confusion to their fast-thinning ranks! That confusion was further multiplied when four more of their kind spun crazily to the ground as a result of four more shots being fired at them with buck and ball from such close ranges! Then the remaining Indians, in total panic, finally broke and ran for their lives. As they began to scatter in total panic, four more were spun to the ground by the deadly close at hand firing pistols spewing tissue-rendering buck and ball into their depleted ranks once again! The last remaining Indian running from all the close at hand blazing rifle and pistol fire, raised his tomahawk and loaded with too many cups of ‘demon run’, wobbled right at Iron Hand, who was standing quietly at the edge of a large clump of elderberry bushes with his last empty pistol in hand.

  Singing his death song at the top of his lungs and fueled by adrenalin, a tall for his race and heavyset Gros Ventre warrior ran right at Iron Hand. Iron Hand dropped his empty pistol, sidestepped the Indian’s clumsy lunge with his upraised tomahawk, spun the man around with his own inertia, and snapped his neck with a hand movement that was so quickly executed that Crooked Hand standing alongside, tomahawk in hand to help, exclaimed in amazement, “Damn, Iron Hand! How the hell did you just do that?”

  With that, Iron Hand let the lifeless man slip from the grip of his right hand to the ground, looked over at his friend, saying quietly, “I don’t know. It just comes from within me and I do as I feel it necessary.” In that calm reply to his close friend, Crooked Hand just shook his head over his big friend’s quiet demeanor, after he had just killed a man with his bare hands who was trying to kill Iron Hand with a tomahawk...

  Then a single shot rang out and Crooked Hand yelled and fell to the ground! Quickly turning, Iron Hand saw a young Indian who had apparently been guarding the huge horse herd, upon hearing all the shooting back at the camp, come charging in with ‘blood in his eye’. Seeing Crooked Hand and Iron Hand near a number of his dead compatriots, the young Indian quickly fired his rifle at Crooked Hand, hitting him in his bad leg. Iron Hand, upon hearing the shot being fired, quickly turned and upon seeing the hard-charging Indian coming his way, stopped him in full charge with a quickly thrown tomahawk striking him full in the face with a bone-crushing sounding THWACK!

  Then turning to his downed friend, Iron Hand knelt beside him to see how badly he had been hurt. After a quick and worried look, he got to laughing over his friend’s mildly superficial leg wound. A leg wound in his bad leg, namely the one the grizzly bear had bitten into when they had surprised the critter living in their cave campsite back near Medicine Lake. Walking over to the now-dead Indian shooter, Iron Hand removed his tomahawk, wiped off its blade on the man’s sleeve, then cut off a piece of the dead Indian’s buckskin shirt, walked back to a still-howling Crooked Hand and patched up his painful but not serious leg wound. However, as he did, Iron Hand noticed that by the man’s dress just killed, he was a member of the Blackfoot Tribe and was not a Gros Ventre…

  With that bit of misfortune out of the way, the remaining three trappers quickly reloaded a single pistol apiece and then scouted out around the Indians’ campsite looking for any more of the living. Finding none, they began assessing what had been left by the deceased and got the surprise of their lives.

  The Indian
s had indeed been catching the unwary trappers on their trapping grounds or traveling towards Fort Union, killing and robbing them. The three trappers, aided by a now hobbling Crooked Hand, discovered huge numbers and assortments of rifles, pistols, tomahawks and knives that had apparently been taken from the now dead trappers’ hands by the renegade band of dead Indians. Additionally, they counted 36 horses and mules that had been taken from those now dead trappers by the Indians, in addition to the raiding party’s 24 riding and packhorses they themselves possessed! Then the surprise of their lives was discovered stacked up under a number of buffalo skins. Before it was all said and done, the trappers discovered in the surprise stack, in addition to their own 16 stolen packs of beaver plus, another 56 packs of plus, furs and pelts taken from those presumably now dead trappers as well...

  Knowing they could never return all those furs to their rightful owners, the four trappers realized they were rich beyond their wildest dreams, because they were now the owners of a small fortune in furs! However, there was little time for celebration. The men quickly reloaded all the rest of their weapons in case other Indians were on the way to the dead Indians’ encampment, and then all the dead were dragged off to the shores of the Missouri River and dumped into its currents. That way, if any of the bodies were intercepted later by other Indians as they floated by still fully dressed and they saw all of the bullet holes, they just might be warned away from any white trappers they came across. At least that was the thinking of the four victorious trappers. As for the four dead trappers filled with arrows, they were buried near the campsite and a fire built over their communal grave. That way, Old Potts and his group hoped the fire would remove the human smell and avert having wolves or bears digging up the four trappers’ bodies and eating the same.

  However, as the four trappers were coming down from their emotional high after the deadly battle, they failed to realize that another pair of dark eyes was now observing what had just transpired. That dark set of eyes, realizing he was too late arriving at the Indians’ encampment, slipped off into the darkness with a lasting evil in his heart over what he had just witnessed... Especially in the lasting identification of the one huge trapper-man his Blackfoot brethren called Iron Hand, who had just killed his brother with an accurately thrown tomahawk to his face...

  Then Old Potts and Big Foot returned to their hidden pack string and brought all of those horses into the Indians’ camp for safekeeping. Following that chore, the men helped themselves to one of the kegs of rum after they had cleaned out and bound up Crooked Hand’s leg wound. Soon, they were cautiously celebrating their good luck in surviving their latest ordeal and fortune as well, in all of the packs of furs and valuable livestock they now possessed...

  Early the next morning, in case there were more Indians en route to the campsite of death, the men were up early rounding up the horses and mules and loading the packs on the same. By noon, all the animals had been loaded for their trip to Fort Union and then the men slowly started out. However, because of the number of animals entailed, they were not brought down the trail in strings but in a loose herd with Old Potts leading the way with a string of fully loaded mares. That way, the animals could feed up along the way and with the four trappers herding them along the confines of the north bank of the Missouri River, progress en route to Fort Union was slowly being made.

  Two days later, the fortified structure of Fort Union hove into view. When the huge horse and mule herd numbering over 70 animals ambled into view, upon being sighted by the fort’s ever-present look-outs, great human activity could be seen emanating from within and around its log walls. Soon the huge horse and mule herd of fully loaded animals was positioned in front of the fort’s front gate, as an amazed Kenneth McKenzie, Fort Union’s Factor, stood there in absolute, head-shaking disbelief!

  “Potts, what the hell is the meaning of all of this? You guys left last summer with less than 20 head of horses and now you show up in front of my fort with over 70 horses and mules? Hell, your group didn’t even have any mules because you told me your three ‘mule-headed’ trapper buddies were stubborn enough for you to deal with, so you didn’t need any mules. Now you show up with a huge herd of such animals. I know all of those critters can’t belong to you men, and this is one story I have to hear on how they were acquired. Supper at my place at six and bring your eating and drinking appetites, because I have a feeling this is going to be one hell of a story and a like in kind evening to go along with it!” said an amazed McKenzie.

  “Me and my kind would be honored, Mr. McKenzie. But first, we need to run all these animals into your central square inside the fort for safe keeping. There we can unload all of these packs and your Company Clerks can begin grading and counting what we have brought you. At the same time, after we sort out all of the stock we may want for the next trapping season, we need to sell the remainder to you for your Company Trappers who have lost their horses and mules throughout their last trapping season,” said Old Potts with a big and damn proud grin on his face...

  Still shaking his head over the magnitude of what he was seeing, McKenzie began barking out orders to his now assembled staff, and soon the heavily loaded horses and mules were being led into the fort’s inner courtyard for the unload. Once the herd of horses and mules were inside the fort’s protective walls, a flurry of human activity around those heavily loaded animals began.

  Old Potts and Big Foot watched over the Clerks as they began grading, sorting and counting out all the various pelts, hides and plus being removed from the pack animals. Iron Hand on the other hand, met with the fort’s buyers of animals and kept records on what was being sold and what was offered for each and every animal the American Fur Company wished to purchase. Crooked Hand, still hobbling around more for sympathy than out of pain, selected out from the entire herd the riding and pack stock he and his fellow trappers would need for the coming trapping season, hobbled the lot for better control and walked them off to one side of all the activity inside the walls of the fort, so they would not ‘walk away’ in the hands of the many Indians camping around the fort’s walls and now watching all the latest activity from the inside.

  That evening the four Free Trappers, according to the custom of the times and tradition, were the honored supper guests of Kenneth McKenzie, Fort Union’s Factor for the American Fur Company. As the trappers entered the Factor’s residence, they were met at the door by a Chinese servant with brim-full cups of high proof rum. Then they were ushered off to the Factor’s dining room and seated along a long table with several high level Company Clerks and McKenzie. There they were treated to a supper fit for a king out on the frontier. Fresh roasted buffalo hump ribs dripping with oodles of fat, baked potatoes from the fort’s nearby garden slathered in real home-churned butter, pickled beets, Dutch oven biscuits with wild honey, and all the elderberry pie the men could ‘cart’ away, all supplied by McKenzie’s two expert Chinese cooks.

  After supper, the men adjourned to the sitting room in the Factor’s residence, and were plied with more rum as they discussed the business at hand. There McKenzie advised he would buy all of the horses and mules for his Company Trappers, and the 76 packs of furs, pelts, hides and plus for a total of $32,500! Additionally, he advised he would supply all of the provisions the four Free Trappers would need for their entire next trapping season as well as part of the pay-out for all of the furs they had brought into the fort for sale!

  When the trappers heard that figure and a free allowance for all of their needed provisions, their heads just swam and that wasn’t because of all the rum they had been drinking that evening... Here they had over $40,000 in American Fur Company credit waiting for them in St. Louis as a result from a previous year’s haul of furs and horses and now this in addition! Once those sums were combined and disbursed, each of the four trappers would be considered a rich man! Especially in light of the fact that a working man’s wages in that day and age ran about $300-500 per year!

  “Now, as all of you kn
ow, I don’t keep that kind of money on hand here at the fort, nor would any of you want to pack such a sum of money on your persons back out onto the frontier in the form of gold and silver coin. I will supply you with all the provisions you will need for the coming year, and the $32,500 of what you have coming will have to be supplied by the American Fur Company’s fur houses in St. Louis. Then when you four decide you have had enough of this life on the frontier, you can redeem your money at that time with your Certificates of Credit Due,” said McKenzie with a smile over the major purchases he had just made for his boss Mr. Astor, and his company.

  “We will have to mull that over,” said Old Potts. “Right now, we are talking maybe a trip out to the Porcupine River country and see what kind of trappings that neck of the woods will bring us. But that is jest talk at this stage in our lives, however it is purdy serious talk. So, we may have to take you up on your offer and redeem our Certificates of Credit Due at a later date, when all of us age out from this kind of living or get tired of protecting our ‘topknots’ at every turn in the trail or wading in the damn cold water and mud all of the time.”

  “That is fine with me and the company. Just let me know what you want to do and when, and then we can settle up. Now, you lads need to tell me the story as to how you came into so many horses, mules and packs of furs. Because it seems every time you four venture forth, you come back with a hatful of furs, a horse herd belonging to someone else and a tall tale to tell that beats all. I somehow suspect that a lot of those animals and furs used to belong to me and the American Fur Company. I suspect that, because I am losing to the frontier and all of its dangers, about 25% of my Company Trappers annually. Thank goodness, every year there are more and more trappers coming upriver and wanting to work for the company and replacing those trappers that I am losing. However, if my trappers are being killed and their furs are being taken by the hostile Indians and then you fellas come by them fairly by whatever means, I guess they belong to the four of you, fair and square. So, let me have all of your cups filled with some more of my high proof rum to loosen your tongues, and tell me how all of your new wealth came about. And damn your grouchy old hide, Potts, don’t leave out anything in the telling,” said McKenzie with a teasing smile, as he settled down in his huge overstuffed chair, waiting for the storytelling to begin.