Wilderness Giant Edition 4

by David Robbins

  “They won’t put arrows into us when we show up?” Clark inquired, thinking of the attacks by the Blackfeet and the Diggers.

  “They wouldn’t dare.” Shakespeare snickered. “Didn’t you hear me? The Chinooks are traders. They’ll give their eyeteeth for any supplies we’d care to part with, because they know they can turn around and get three to four times as much from other tribes for the same goods.”

  “Just so they have horses,” Porter said with his typical single-minded persistence.

  The sentry brought their conversation to an end by groaning. Winona had cleaned his wound with a wet cloth and bandaged it. His eyelids fluttered, then snapped open as he sat bolt upright in fear. Winona’s smile and calm demeanor had a soothing effect on him. Shaking, he laid back down.

  Shakespeare and Nate went over. “Up to talking a little?” the older man asked.

  “Oui,” the man said. “English mine but much poor.”

  That struck McNair’s funny bone. “Lordy, son. You speak it worse than LeBeau, and that takes some doing.”

  “I heard that, monsieur ,” LeBeau said, joining them. He had stayed near Hestia Davin until assured she was unhurt by Blue Water Woman. Now he knelt beside his fellow riverman and questioned him in French. When he was done, he faced the free trappers. “Pierre says he did not see man who hit him.”

  “Wonderful,” Shakespeare said dryly. “The way these coons keep getting the best of us, you’d think we were dealing with ghosts.”

  The jingle of spurs attended the arrival of Chavez, who appeared out of sorts. “My friends, one of us is missing,” he announced.

  “Who?” Nate asked, and the moment he did, he knew. “Two Humps!” he exclaimed, realizing there had been no sign of the old chief since the raid.

  “Si,” Chavez said. “I wanted him to help me look for tracks. He is a fine tracker. Better than I am.”

  “Tarnation. Don’t be so humble,” Shakespeare said. “We still remember that night you tracked us from one end of the Rockies to the other, and you without a torch.”

  “You exaggerate, amigo,” Chavez said. “It was not more than twenty miles.” He grinned slyly. “And it was not as hard as you believe. Two of your pack animals had horseshoes, did they not?”

  “I seem to recollect they did. I never bother shoeing my animals, myself, but that pair had been traded to me by Bill Williams, and he’s finicky about his stock. So?”

  “So one of them was losing a front shoe. It dug big clods of earth from the ground, which were easy to see even in the dark. That is how I followed you.”

  “I’ll be dogged,” Shakespeare said.

  Nate couldn’t believe they were standing there idly discussing something that happened months ago when Two Humps might be lying in the woods somewhere, scalped and mutilated. He mentioned as much.

  “The reason I’m not flustered,” Shakespeare said, “is because I have eyes and know how to use them.” He pointed.

  Trotting toward them from the rear was the warrior, his lance in his right hand. He wore only leggings; he had been sleeping when the attack came and had not bothered to put on his shirt or robe. For a man of advanced years, his chest and arms rippled with muscle. “I followed them,” he signed without preliminaries. “They have stopped and made camp. If we hurry, we can bring back the horses they stole.”

  “Question. How many?” Nate signed.

  “Six.”

  “What tribe are they?” Shakespeare was curious. “Columbias? Spokans? Wenatchis?”

  “They are white.”

  Something in the expressions of the mountain men prompted LeBeau to ask, “What is wrong, mes amis?”

  Shakespeare told him, adding, “The only other whites I know of who might be in this area are British trappers. You saw for yourselves back at Fort Hall that the Britishers don’t like Americans much, but I never figured them for this.” He rubbed his belly and sighed. “Goes to show you the deplorable state this old world of ours has come to when a man can’t go halfway across the country without being robbed.”

  They informed Porter. He was all for setting off after the culprits with Clark and half the men, but Shakespeare prevailed on him to only send four. So, dressed and armed to the teeth, McNair, Nate, Chavez and Two Humps entered the gloomy, foreboding forest in the dead of night and headed to the northwest. Chavez let Two Humps handle the tracking.

  Progress was slow. The undergrowth was dastardly thick, denser than any in the central Rockies. The slopes were steeper, too. A man had to be half bighorn just to get around.

  The night was vibrant with sounds; the guttural coughs of bears, the high-pitched shrieks of painters, the hooting of owls, the howling of wolves. Especially the latter. It seemed to Nate that he had never heard so many wolves in full throat at the same time.

  Shakespeare was having a grand time. Having always been an adventurous soul, in his younger days he had craved excitement as children craved sweets. The rush of blood in his veins was like a tonic, reminding him of many glorious times he’d had. His sole complaint was that his Nez Percé friend was taking the hardest shortcut any man ever took in order to reach the camp of the horse thieves quickly. Shakespeare knew it was a shortcut even though he didn’t ask, because no horse alive could have negotiated the terrain they were covering.

  Five miles fell behind them. Suddenly, a flaring point of light stood out in stark contrast to the wilderness, serving as a beacon that drew them to the edge of the British camp.

  The stolen horses were all there, strung out in a line, tethered securely. None of the thieves were asleep yet. Seated around their small fire, they passed a jug back and forth and bragged of their part in the enterprise.

  Nate King was shocked. Not by the pleasure the English felt in having crippled the expedition, nor by the talk he heard, but because he recognized the man who had led the raid.

  It was none other than Andrew Smythe-Barnes.

  Eighteen

  A dozen questions popped into Nate King’s mind: What was Smythe-Barnes doing there on the Columbia? Had the man followed them all the way from Fort Hall, awaiting an opportunity to steal their stock? Was there any link between this theft and the previous two attempts made before they reached Fort Hall?

  Nate studied the faces and recognized the man named Dinkus and those other ruffians who had given Winona such a hard time. He glanced at Shakespeare, who was looking at him. McNair motioned for him to go to the left. Nate complied, placing each foot carefully, his moccasins making no noise on the layer of pine needles. When he had circled partway around the camp, he halted and snaked forward on his belly until he was a mere twenty feet from the fire. The HBC men were gabbing so much, they never even noticed.

  Nate wasn’t particularly worried. He doubted Smythe-Barnes would make a fight of it over a bunch of horses. Rather, the weasely company man would concoct a bald-faced lie to explain the horses being there and try to snivel his way out of the fix he was in.

  But events proved Nate wrong.

  Shakespeare had crawled across the open space between the Britishers and the woods, freezing whenever one happened to glance in his direction. He held his face low to the ground so the firelight would not reflect off his skin. The Hawken he held in front of him, flush with the earth. When he was close enough, he laid still another few minutes to give everyone else time to get into position. The conversation of the HBC men interested him greatly.

  “—raid them again before they reach Fort Astoria,” Smythe-Barnes was saying in his clipped, impeccable English. “If we can make off with another fifteen or twenty head, the bloody Americans will have no choice but to turn around and go home.”

  “That’s right, guv,” Dinkus cackled. “We can’t have them blighters comin’ here and overrunnin’ the country. Worse than a plague of locusts, they are. Makin’ us go to all this trouble.”

  Smythe-Barnes lowered the jug and smacked his lips. “Might I remind you that we wouldn’t be here if you had done your job back at the for
t?”

  “I tried, guv,” Dinkus said. “As the Lord is my witness, I tried. But that King character was on us before we knew he was there. We had no time to shoot.”

  “The failure is your fault, not his,” Smythe-Barnes said in disgust. “All you had to do was get him to go for a gun and shoot him dead. That’s all. Then I could have blamed him and ordered their so-called expedition out of Oregon Country for violating the terms of the agreement between our two countries. But no. You and your mates couldn’t beat one American trapper.”

  “He’s tough, I tell you,” Dinkus persisted. “And his punch is like the kick of a mule. I never been hit harder in all my days.”

  Another ruffian chimed in, “Seems to me we could have saved ourselves all this skulkin’ about if we’d sent a rider on to Astoria and let them deal with the Americans.”

  “There would have been no guarantee the rider made it safely,” Smythe-Barnes said. “The job was ours to do, and since we failed at Fort Hall, we’ve got to keep trying until it’s done.”

  “I don’t see why this bunch has those higher up so worried,” commented another man. “What’s one more party of Americans?”

  “This one is special,” Smythe-Barnes said, then took a healthy swallow.

  “Special how?”

  “One of them is a spy, sent by Washington, D.C.,” Smythe-Barnes said.

  “Why?” the man pressed.

  “When I’m told I can pass on the information, I will.” Smythe-Barnes passed on the jug instead. “As it is, I’ve babbled too much already. It’s this damn beer.”

  “Begging your pardon, sir,” said yet another, grinning. “But this drink wouldn’t addle a child. It’s all arms and legs. Give me whiskey any day.”

  “You’re worse than the Americans, Peeves,” Smythe-Barnes groused. He noticed a spot of dirt on his coat and brushed at it with the back of his hand. “God, this miserable land. I can’t wait to see London again.”

  Shakespeare had waited long enough. Rising slowly so as not to startle any of the HBC men into doing anything rash, he leveled his Hawken and advanced several strides. “You’ll be lucky if you see Fort Hall again, let alone London,” he said matter-of-factly.

  Those Britishers with their backs to the mountain man spun, one spilling the jug in his haste. Those on the other side of the fire, including Smythe-Barnes, half rose, some reaching for their weapons.

  From out of the night rushed Nate, Chavez, and Two Humps. The sight so shocked the HBC outfit that those who were rising sat back down and the ones who had whirled turned to stone.

  “Glad to see you gents have some common sense,” Shakespeare said, going nearer. “Not enough to keep you from stealing horses, but enough to keep you from being shot.”

  “McNair,” Smythe-Barnes said in an awed tone that inferred he couldn’t believe Shakespeare was there.

  “Is that the best you can come up with after you’ve just been accused of being a horse thief? Tarnation, and here you British are supposed to be such wits.”

  Dinkus hissed like the serpent he was, then snapped, “Don’t be insultin’ us, Yank. We won’t stand for it.”

  “Any more than we’ll stand for having our stock taken,” Shakespeare said. He made a show of studying them as if trying to make up his mind what to do. “The question is, do we shoot you outright or make you suffer a spell?”

  Actually, McNair had no intention of doing them real harm. He’d shoot anyone in cold blood who affronted his wife, but not a pack of dim-witted horse thieves. Maybe he’d crack a skull or two to repay them for the sentry, but that was all.

  The British trappers didn’t know that. They exchanged anxious glances, Smythe-Barnes the most anxious of all. The administrator coughed and said, “What’s this about us appropriating your animals? We found this lot wandering in the forest and tethered them so they wouldn’t wander.” Nate laughed. It was exactly as he had expected. “Sure you did,” he said, “and you just happen to be along the same stretch of the Columbia we are. Did you go out for an evening stroll and lose your way?”

  “What we’re about is our business.” Shakespeare clucked like an irate hen. “Oh, please. I just heard you brag about taking them, so don’t be so dumb as to try and deny it.” He wagged his rifle. “On your feet. We’ll let Porter vent his spleen on you so we don’t have to listen to him bellyache for the next two weeks.”

  “Were not going anywhere with you, Yank,” Smythe-Barnes said, producing a small pistol.

  It was all so unexpected. Shakespeare had no intention of harming them, yet there was that pocket pistol swinging toward him, leaving him no choice but to whip the Hawken higher and fire from the hip. The recoil jerked his arms.

  Smythe-Barnes was flung backward by the impact of the heavy ball, his arms flung out, a red stain spreading over his chest. His men were glued in place, but only for a few seconds. Venting snarls and curses, they swept to their feet and brought their weapons into play.

  Nate King was mere yards from the one named Peeves. The man turned toward him, drawing a pistol. Nate shot him through the throat. He meant to shoot higher but in his haste didn’t quite raise the Hawken high enough. Peeves collapsed, spurting like a geyser, blubbering like a baby.

  At the same time, a pair of HBC men spun on Chavez. Both had rifles in hand. Both were fast. But neither was faster than the Mexican. Chavez drew his dueling pistols ambidextrously, and his two shots cracked simultaneously. He sent a slug tearing through each man’s forehead.

  Even as the tracker fired, Two Humps charged, his lance arm flinging far back. He was a single stride from a burly trapper armed with a large pistol when he hurled the lance, which tore clean through the trappers body. The man tottered, squeezing a shot into the ground out of pure reflex. Then he collapsed.

  Five of the six had been dispatched in as many seconds. Ironically, only Dinkus remained, and he showed his true colors by fleeing into the woods instead of fighting.

  The Nez Percé saw him go and drew his tomahawk. He started to give chase but stopped when Shakespeare called his name.

  “There’s been enough killing. Let the coward go.”

  “Cowards make vengeful enemies. It is a mistake. I should scalp him now so he will not cause us trouble later.”

  “That worm?” Shakespeare walked to Smythe-Barnes and stared at the dead man’s features. “Why art thou than exasperate,” he recited the bard, “thou idle immaterial skein of sleeve silk, thou green sarcenet flap for a sore eye, thou tassel of a prodigal’s purse, thou? Ah, how the poor world is pestered with such water flies, diminutives of nature.”

  Nate hardly heard his friend’s recital. He stood over the man he’d shot in the throat, who thrashed and whined and kicked empty air but wouldn’t die although he bled enough to fill two washtubs. “Someone should put you out of your misery,” he said without thinking.

  Two Humps’s lance streaked out of the dark and caught the man in the center of the chest. He heaved off the ground once, gurgled, and expired, his tongue sticking over his lower lip.

  The warrior walked up. In a smooth motion he yanked the lance free and wiped it on the dead man’s shirt. “Kill clean, kill quick,” he said in his broken English. “Best way, Grizzly Killer.”

  “I tried,” Nate said lamely. In the heat of battle it was easy to misjudge and make a mistake, but he still felt a twinge of guilt for having missed the head.

  The Nez Percé took it upon himself to go from body to body, verifying that each man was dead. Only one other stirred, but not for long. With a swift slash, Two Humps slit the man’s throat.

  Shakespeare was reloading his rifle. “I don’t make it a habit to bury those who try to kill me,” he commented, “but in this case I’ll make an exception. I don’t want the scavengers to get them.”

  The Britishers were buried in shallow graves. It took most of the night, since the ground was as hard as iron and they had to improvise digging implements. Nate used an axe, McNair a jagged limb. Chavez merely watch
ed, while the Nez Percé occupied himself cleaning the scalps he had lifted.

  Because the hour was late and they couldn’t very well try to lead the horses back over the mountains in the dark, they made camp right there. The mountain men stayed up after their friends had dozed off, sipping coffee. Nate fed fuel to the flickering fire while listening to a painter screech high off in the mountains. “What do you make of all this?”

  “As near as I can figure, we went and got caught in the middle of a squabble between our government and England,” Shakespeare answered. “The two have been feuding for years over who gets to keep the Oregon Country, as you well know.” He opened his possibles bag, removed some kinnikinnick, and filled the bowl of his pipe before going on. “You heard Smythe-Barnes. There’s more to this expedition than we’ve been told. Someone is working for the people in Washington. Why, I have no idea.”

  “It shouldn’t be hard to figure out who it is,” Nate said. He began ticking off the suspects. “The rivermen are just who they claim to be, and so is Chavez. That leaves Porter, Clark, and Hughes. Hughes was hired on in St. Louis, which leaves him out. Since Clark is a flash in the pan, my guess would be Porter.”

  “I don’t know as I agree.”

  “Think about it a moment. The expedition was his idea, supposedly because he was fired up to find his daughter. But he never acted very upset about her welfare, not like I would do if Hestia were mine. Even Zach noticed, remember?”

  “I do.”

  “So Porter is our man.”

  Shakespeare finished tamping the tobacco and took a tiny burning brand from the fire to light it. He puffed until smoke wafted from the bowl, then leaned back and remarked, “I think it’s Clark.”

  “You must have been knocked on the head during the fight and not noticed. Clark is as worthless as a man can be and still go on breathing. Why pick him?”

  “For that very reason. No man can be that incompetent. Maybe it’s all an act.”