Only the Brave: The Continuing Saga of the San Juan Pioneers

by Gerald N. Lund

  That idea sounded good to everyone until about eleven o’clock. Mitch and Edie were working together in the Deckers’ garden, with the children gathering up the weeds and putting them in a pile. Out of the corner of his eye, Mitch saw Edie stiffen and then jerk upright. “Mitch!” she hissed. “Look!”

  Mitch whirled around. Up on the south ridge, about seventy-five yards away, a solitary figure had appeared and was shuffling slowly down the wagon road toward them.

  “Is that an Indian?”

  “Yes, it is, Edie. Just walk slowly, don’t scare the children, but take them over to the wagons. Tell the bishop. And make sure all the children are with their mothers.”

  She turned. “Children, I need you to help me. Sarah, Morris. Come. I need you over at the wagons.” She was glad that they hadn’t seen the figure yet. As they walked back, she stepped between them and the ridge to block their view.

  Mitch turned and walked over to where he had taken off his jacket and pistol belt. As he buckled it on, he saw the bishop come around his wagon. He had his shotgun, which meant he’d already seen the Indian too. But he walked as though he were going out to hunt pheasants. He joined Mitch as he reached the wagon road. “Who is that?” he whispered. “Can you tell?”

  “I think it’s Old Wash. A Ute. He’s been down in Bluff from time to time.”

  Bishop Jones nodded. The man was now just thirty yards away and coming steadily. Both men were relieved to see that he carried no weapons. His face was so leathered and wrinkled he looked almost a hundred years old, but Mitch guessed he was more like forty or fifty. He was dressed in white man’s clothing—a tattered pair of Levi’s, a long-sleeved white dress shirt, which was heavily soiled, a dusty cowboy hat, and moccasins. He moved slowly, as if he had very little energy left, but he kept coming directly toward the two men. A moment later, Parley came out from behind his wagon, pistol on his hip as well, and hurried over to join them.

  As he did so, Mitch heard Edie’s voice. “Come, children. Come stand by Mama and Aunt Edie.” Which meant the children had seen him now too.

  The three men didn’t wait for Old Wash to cross the entire distance. They met him halfway. All three lifted their right hands, palms forward, in the traditional sign of greeting. “Mique wush tagooven,” Bishop Jones said. “Hello, my friend.”

  The Ute shuffled to a stop. “You know Old Wash’s name?”

  “We do,” the bishop said. “You are a friend to our people.”

  “Yes. Good friend to Mormons. I very hungry. You have food?”

  Mitch opened his mouth, but the bishop spoke first. “Yes, Wash, but you must work for food. That is our way.”

  His eyes moved from one to the other, expressionless. Then his lips pressed together into a tight line. “No work. Long walk. Two days. Old Wash very tired.”

  Mitch spoke up. “To work for food is our—” The old man raised his hand and cut him off.

  “Old Wash have information. Important for white brothers. You feed, I tell.”

  The three men exchanged glances. This was not a common ploy of the Indians.

  Behind them, Ency Butt had come over to stand beside Emma and Edie and the children. “I wonder if it’s about the boy,” she called.

  Her voice carried clearly to the three men. They turned in surprise. “What boy?” Mitch asked.

  “Jack,” Emma answered. “He didn’t come this morning for his milk, butter, and eggs like he always does.”

  “Or yesterday, either,” Edie added.

  Mitch was nodding. Of course they knew about Jack. There was an L. C. camp just a few miles west of Verdure. Their cook was a young lad, no more than sixteen or seventeen, named Jack Hopkins. He would come down to Verdure on some mornings to buy fresh food for his chuck wagon. He was a shy, gentle boy who seemed to enjoy the company of the women and children, though he barely spoke to the men. The sisters had all taken to mothering him a little. His coming was not an everyday thing, as far as Mitch knew.

  Ency called out to Parley. “Remember, I told you on Saturday that he didn’t want to leave. He hung around much later than usual. He said he had a bad feeling.”

  Evelyn Adams, who was now very heavy with child, joined the other women. “We invited him to stay the night. There was a thunderstorm coming and we thought maybe that was it. But he finally said that no, he had to go back or the cowhands would be angry with him.”

  Bishop Jones, thoughtful now, turned back to the Ute. “Is this information about Jack?”

  “Not know Jack.”

  “The young boy. The cowboy.”

  He nodded. “Yes, cowboy. You feed Wash, Wash tell you about boy.”

  “All right,” Parley said. “But you tell us first, and then you eat.”

  “Yes,” Bishop Jones said. “Tell us about the cowboy.”

  Wash hesitated, staring at the ground. “Boy dead!”

  “What!” The cry of horror had come from several of the women simultaneously.

  “Find him in Devil’s Canyon. He struck by lightning. Boom! Was on ridge with—” He held both hands up to his face, curling his fingers into two circles and putting them up to his eyes. “How you say?”

  “Binoculars?” Parley guessed. “Spy glasses?”

  “Yes, glasses. Was looking for horses, I think. Find his body facedown in mud. He struck by lightning.”

  “Where in Devil’s Canyon?” Parley demanded.

  The old man didn’t seem to understand.

  Bishop Jones tried. “What part of Devil’s Canyon?”

  “Ah. Near top. Where comes out by mountains.”

  “Which is right near the line camp,” Mitch said.

  “I find him by hogan.”

  “You mean by his tent?” Parley asked.

  “Yah. Tent. But he dead. Struck by lightning.”

  Ten-year-old Sarah Decker started to cry. “Is Jack dead, Mama?”

  “Hush, Sarah,” Edie said, pulling her close.

  Parley turned to the bishop. “I’ll saddle up.”

  “Me too,” Mitch said.

  The bishop grabbed his arm. “No, Mitch,” he said in a low voice. “I think it’s better if we stay here with the women. They’re pretty spooked right now.”

  Mitch turned and looked back at them. All of the women and several of the older children were crying now. “All right,” he said. Then to Parley, “But you watch yourself.”

  Parley did not return until almost sundown. By then, Ency was nearly out of her mind with worry. But he came riding in from the north shortly before five. Everyone gathered around him as he dismounted and took Ency in his arms.

  Finally he stepped back, looking at the children gathered around him. “All right, children,” he said, “you go play. I have to talk to your parents.”

  When they were gone, Parley turned to the bishop. “Hopkins is dead. But it wasn’t lightning. He had been shot in the back twice.”

  The shock of that rippled amongst the women like they had been struck.

  “Old Wash?” Emma Decker asked, her face white. “Did that old man do that? That’s horrible.”

  Parley shrugged. “There’s no way to tell. It certainly looks suspicious.”

  “I don’t know,” Bishop Jones said. “It seems odd that he would come and tell us if he was the one who did it.”

  “Maybe he was with another Ute, or a group of Utes. Who knows?” Mitch observed.

  Parley nodded. “With all the rain, I couldn’t make out many tracks or sign. But the field glasses were still there, right in front of him.” He fell silent and then blew out his breath slowly. “I went to the L. C. Ranch. Nearly got shot before I could convince them I wasn’t there to fight them. When I told them about the massacre in Disappointment Valley, I saw a couple men look at each other. They were really scared, so I’m guessing they were part of it. Finally, Carlisle sent some of his men back with me with a buggy. They promised to give the boy a good Christian burial.” He reached up and rubbed at his forehead. “But they’re rea
l angry, too. They really liked the boy, just as we did. They’re talking about going Ute hunting.”

  Bishop Jones shook his head. “If they do, they could set the whole country afire with war.”

  Suddenly, Mary Jones burst out. “Why the boy? He didn’t kill anyone.”

  “That doesn’t matter to the Utes. If the Utes think L. C. men killed their families, then L. C. will be their target,” Parley said. “That’s how they see justice being done.”

  “And while the Utes know the Mormons were not involved,” Mitch said, sobered by the thoughts going on in his head, “they believe the Mormons live in Bluff. And here we are, living right next to the L. C. outfit.”

  He turned to Bishop Jones. “I don’t think we can wait until tomorrow to start for Mancos,” he said softly. “I think we’re going to need help as fast as we can get it.”

  The bishop nodded. “I was just thinking the same thing.”

  No one moved. He turned to Mitch. “Can you be ready in fifteen minutes?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then we’ll meet back here in fifteen minutes and have a prayer before we depart.”

  It didn’t surprise Mitch to find Edie waiting for him when he came out of his wagon with his bedroll. She watched him without speaking as he tied it on the back of his saddle and checked his rifle and saddlebags.

  Satisfied, he turned to her and took her in his arms. She laid her head against his chest and for almost a minute he just held her, neither of them speaking. He wondered what was going through her mind. Was she disappointed that he was going? Was she frightened to be left with only one man to guard them? Did she wish she had never come? He had so many questions, and no time to ask them.

  Finally, she pulled back a little and looked up at him. Her eyes were sad but not troubled. “What are you thinking?” she asked.

  “Actually, I was just wondering the same thing about you.”

  “Okay, I’ll tell you if you tell me.”

  “All right. You first.”

  “I was thinking how glad I am that Parley is staying. Did you see Ency’s eyes? She was so relieved.”

  He nodded. “I saw how worried she was when Parley was gone all day.”

  “So, what were you thinking?”

  He reached up and brushed her cheeks with his fingertips. Which part should he share? He decided to take a safe route. “I was thinking how much I’m going to miss you.”

  Suddenly there were tears. She went up on tiptoes and kissed him. “Hurry back to me,” she whispered. “I’ll be anxiously waiting.”

  July 12, 1887—Verdure

  Edie had chosen a place up on the south hillside that gave her a clear view of the wagon road on the other ridge. Whenever she was free, she came up here to watch for Mitch’s return.

  Today was the eighth day since Bishop Jones and Mitch had ridden away heading east. It had been nine days since Mr. Carlisle had given his dark ultimatum and eight days since Old Wash had walked in to share his news about a dead boy.

  The signal fires were still burning on the mountains, but they had not seen anyone, white or Indian. Her mind wanted to worry about the danger they faced, but she refused to give in to it. There had been a lot of prayers and a day of fasting for their safety, and those had brought her some peace. What she could not get out of her mind was the realization that had hit her the day after Mitch and Bishop Jones left—the realization that the two of them were probably in much more danger than those in Verdure. If the Utes were on the warpath, two riders out alone would be easy targets. Try as she might, she couldn’t shake the growing pall of dread that hung over her.

  The sun was nearly behind Abajo Peak when Edie awoke with a start. Momentarily disoriented, she looked around, not sure where she was. Then her eyes focused on the children playing in the creek below, and it all came back to her. She yawned and stretched and got to her feet. And then she heard it. Or maybe felt it. Whatever it was, she knew instantly that this was what had awakened her.

  She stopped and cocked her head, listening intently. Now it was unmistakable. It sent chills up and down her back. Horses. A lot of them. And they were coming from the north, from the direction of the L. C. Ranch.

  “Parley! Parley!” She broke into a run, careening down the hill, waving her arms wildly.

  No. It can’t be. You said ten days. You said we had ten days. That’s not until tomorrow.

  Parley and Ency Butt came running out from behind their wagon. “Someone’s coming! Get the children into the shed. Hurry.”

  Parley froze for a moment, cocking his head to listen too, and then he started yelling. The rumble was fast turning into a roar. This was louder than when Carlisle came. There were a lot more horses. Her face went white. Could it be Utes? Finally coming for their revenge?

  She was halfway down the hill when she saw movement on the ridge above her. She pulled up. They were here. Below her it was pandemonium, women yelling at their children, children crying for their mothers. Edie skidded to a stop and watched the first horses appear on the wagon road above her. For a moment, her eyes refused to accept what they were seeing. Then with a shout of joy, she leaped into the air. They were wearing blue.

  Two more horsemen appeared, then two more. They were coming in columns of two, coming down toward them at a steady trot. And each man was wearing a blue uniform.

  Suddenly, a horseman shot past them. The man in the saddle was standing in the stirrups, shouting and waving his hat. His voice was the most wonderful thing she had ever heard. “Edie! Edie! We’re back. We’re home.”

  Notes

  Only Bishop Jones left the settlement to go for help. When he told President Hammond of the situation in Verdure, the two men went to Fort Lewis, near Durango, and they returned with fifty soldiers. They camped at a spring just west of the current site of Monticello, which came to be known as Soldier Springs. They stayed for several months, and their presence greatly stabilized the situation with both the Utes and the L. C. outfit (see Lariats, 85–87; Saga, 94–95).

  It was shortly after the arrival of the army that Evelyn Adams gave birth to a baby girl, before her husband, George, returned. This was the first white child born in the Blue Mountain Mission. Unfortunately, the little girl died the next day and was buried on a hillside at the Adams homestead (Lariats, 86).

  Chapter 19

  _____________________

  January 31, 1888—Mancos, Colorado

  Tuesday, January 31st, 1888. Happy birthday to myself.

  On this momentous day, I turn twenty years old. Sadly, I have no one to celebrate it with me here in Colorado, where I’m doing another freighting run. I think of my family and of Edie all the time and wish so much that I were with them. Edie keeps begging me to make this my last run.

  Just a brief summary of what took place in the Blue Mountain Mission since I last wrote. After the two very serious scares with the L. C. Ranch and a Ute Indian rebellion, things settled down into a more routine existence.

  We spent the summer clearing, plowing, and fencing land, digging ditches, etc. We built one log cabin and some other small buildings. We fenced more than 150 acres of rich bottomland. Our experiment with dry farming paid off handsomely.

  George and Evelyn Adams brought in some wild range cows and started a dairy. It was something to watch them trying to corner the animals and get them into a stall long enough to milk them, but they started to produce milk and cheese in abundance.

  Speaking of Evelyn, she was devastated with the death of her little girl last summer. But to my surprise, so was Edie. I expected her to be sad, of course, but she was almost as devastated as Evelyn was. She was inconsolable for days. I tried a couple of times to comfort her, but nothing I said seemed to help.

  In early November, we placed all of our bags of grain in the log house, secured it, and then paid one of the local cowboys to guard it from thieves. What a bitter disappointment it was when Charles Walton and his boy rode up from Bluff to Verdure in December and found that most of
the grain had been stolen and the cowboy was gone. A whole summer’s work lost! That was a blow.

  We are somewhat worried about the coming year. We are experiencing a severe drought. Cattlemen are losing their stock by the thousands, and many are selling out at a bargain price. That is part of the urgency for my freighting again. I hope to make enough money to add as many as ten more head to my herd. I will be taking them up north with me this spring as soon as the weather breaks. Not bad for a boy who at seventeen had nothing to his name.

  As for Edie, I have to admit that when she first came north with the other women, even though I rejoiced to see her, I had misgivings about her being there. There were times when things got very dangerous. She was just seventeen and still a girl in some ways. Or so I thought. She proved to be far more mature than I gave her credit for. The Decker children call her Aunt Edie and absolutely adore her. That answered any questions I may have had about what kind of a mother she will be. She will be wonderful.

  But it was even more than that. Though she was the youngest of the adult women, she fit right in. As I watched them interact, I saw that the other women viewed her as their equal in every way.

  Being up there together for three months really did confirm to me how much I love her. But—I don’t know. I guess I still have some reservations. Probably not about her so much as about whether we’re ready. I just keep feeling that we need more time—time for her to grow up a little more, time for me to get better established so I can care for her.

  Oh boy! What am I thinking? Why the doubts all of a sudden? I want to make this statement to myself: I want Edna Rae Zimmer to be my wife. There is no question about that in my mind. She is the woman I want to spend my life with, and eternity as well.

  So with that, I am resolved to do the following:

  I am going to buy a wedding ring while I’m here. Before I leave to go back up to Verdure in the spring, I am going to show her that ring and ask her if she will be my wife.

  She won’t be quite eighteen at that time, so maybe we can be engaged for one year and then marry on her birthday when she turns nineteen. That would be May 13th, 1889, about sixteen months from now.