The Blackfoot Trail

by Charles G. West

  It was not lost on Malcolm that Joe Fox had evidently looked through their packs when he first found their horses. He could see no point in commenting on it, however. “Where does this river lead?” he asked, thinking it looked to be a possible passage through the solid mountain range before them.

  “It leads to some waterfalls about halfway up the mountain on the other side of this one we’re lookin’ at,” Joe answered. “Your friends thought the same thing you’re thinkin’. They followed it till they had to turn back at the falls. There’s a way around the falls, but I reckon they couldn’t find it.” He shrugged his shoulders. “Wouldn’ta done ’em much good if they had. They’da probably got lost. Those mules woulda had to have wings to get over the mountains on the other side of the falls.”

  Malcolm nodded, then asked, “So they headed north from here, along the base of these mountains?”

  “After they tried a couple more places,” Joe replied, “both of ’em box canyons.”

  Almost surprised that their tight-lipped guide could actually talk beyond a few short words, Pete asked, “Think you can track ’em?”

  “Maybe,” Joe replied, “but it ain’t likely. It’s been two months since then. I doubt there’ll be any tracks to follow.”

  Confused by his answer, Pete sputtered, “Then how the hell are you gonna . . . ?”

  Joe shrugged his shoulders again, his expression never changing. “All I can do is show you the way to get through the mountains. I can take you to a couple of trails the Kutenai and Flatheads use to get to the buffalo country over on this side. If your friends were lucky, they mighta took one of those.”

  Obviously dismayed by the news, Pete looked at Malcolm and commented, “I was thinkin’ he might be able to track ’em. They coulda wandered off anywhere in them mountains, and we might never find ’em.”

  “Maybe you changed your mind about goin’ with me,” Joe said, seeing his dismay.

  “No, no,” Malcolm was quick to reply. “We ain’t got a chance in hell on our own.”

  It was settled then, and they went about making their camp by the river. Pete sliced some of the salt pork they had brought while Malcolm filled the coffeepot with water and set it on the fire Joe had built. There was little conversation after their supper, and all three were soon in their blankets. Malcolm lay awake for a while after he first heard Pete’s lusty snoring. As when fully awake, their new partner was silent in his slumber, but Malcolm speculated that he would be alert at the slightest sound. Malcolm thought about the happenings of the day as he lay there staring up at a moonless sky, wondering about the strange man he and Pete had taken on as a guide.

  Malcolm was not the first person to wonder about Joe Fox. No one really knew where he came from, not even Joe Fox, and there was some uncertainty about his exact age. He was two or three, or maybe four when he was found by an old Blackfoot woman named Crying Woman. The boy was sitting beside the body of his mother on the bank of Gray Fox Creek. His dead mother looked to be Piegan, and Crying Woman speculated that she was possibly a casualty of the bloody war between the Piegans and the Gros Ventre. But the boy looked more white than Piegan, causing Crying Woman to further speculate upon the heritage of the father.

  Childless, Crying Woman took the boy home to her village, where she and her husband endeavored to rear him as a Blackfoot warrior. At first the child would not speak beyond a single word. Whenever he was addressed by either his adoptive mother or father, he would respond with the word Joe. Crying Woman decided that it was his name that he repeated. When it was time to give him a proper name, his new father decided to call the boy Joe Fox because he was found beside Gray Fox Creek. The boy seemed satisfied with his name.

  A gangly youngster in his early years, he was often the butt of many of the other boys’ jokes. His Blackfoot father was not pleased by the development of his son, but Crying Woman never lost faith in Joe’s promise. She saw a quiet courage in the youngster that she believed would one day reveal itself. By the time he reached the age of thirteen or fourteen, the gangly youth had disappeared, justifying his mother’s faith. A leader among his peers in the village, he was soon allowed to accompany war parties into Crow country, an honor for a boy of his age.

  It was about this time in his life that a Jesuit priest built a mission on the Teton River. Along with some of the other boys who were curious about the white man, Joe visited the mission and became friends with the priest. Realizing Joe had a latent knowledge of English from his early childhood, the priest encouraged him to practice it. Thinking it a game, Joe participated in the lessons until he decided the priest was too focused on saving his soul.

  The visits to the mission ceased when Joe was around eighteen years of age. While he was visiting the priest, a Crow war party, seeking revenge for an attack on a Crow hunting party, raided the Blackfoot village, killing many, among them Joe’s adoptive mother and father. Consumed by grief and guilt, he blamed his parents’ death on himself. He had not been there to protect them. He knew their deaths called for retaliation on his part, so he rode with a war party that caught up to the Crows near the same creek where he had been found by Crying Woman. A fierce battle ensued with warriors killed on both sides. Joe accounted for two of the Crow dead.

  After the battle, there was much singing and dancing about the Blackfoot victory, but Joe could not eradicate his feeling of guilt for the loss of his parents. Seeking help, he went to an old medicine man named Hears Thunder. The old man listened while Joe recounted the turmoil with his inner demons of guilt. Then he told him he must go to the mountains, fast for three days, and ask Na’pi to send a vision. “You must stay and meditate until Man Above visits you and shows you your path,” Hears Thunder had said.

  Joe’s fast lasted for four and a half days before he fell, exhausted and weak, into a deep sleep. Many unrelated things flew haphazardly through his mind, but upon awakening, one vision remained in his memory. A man came to him, a white man. He did not say so, but Joe felt certain it was his father. Neither white nor red are you, but a man alone, the vision said. You must go your own way and follow the voices of the trees and rocks.

  The young man was certain then that he was neither Blackfoot nor white. He abandoned thoughts of going in search of his white father, as well as returning to the village of his adoptive parents. Many years had passed since then, but Joe remained in the mountains. In time, he became a legend, talked about by the young men of the tribe when they sat around their campfires, telling of finding sign of the tall warrior on this mountain or that river. But few could boast of actually seeing the lone warrior with their own eyes. In fact, Joe was not totally aware of his image as a phantom until visiting the trading post to trade some hides. The Frenchman who ran the store had been surprised to find that the legend called Joe Fox was, in fact, a real man. By that time, Joe was resigned to remain in his beloved mountains, accustomed to his solitary existence, content to live without the company of other men, and unconcerned what image his brothers had created for him. And now, upon the arrival of Malcolm and Pete, he found it hard to explain why he had not avoided these two white men. He could have, easily.

  Morning found Malcolm tangled in his blanket, and nearly as tired as when he had turned in the night before. He had tossed and turned, sleeping in fits, hearing noises in the night, noises in addition to Pete’s snoring. Finally wide-awake, he sat up to look around him, and noticed at once that Joe Fox was gone. His first thought was to look toward the bank where the horses had been tied, and was immediately relieved to see his and Pete’s horse right where they had left them. He reached over and gave Pete a kick on the leg. “You awake?” Pete answered with a grunt, but remained wrapped in his blanket. “Looks like Joe Fox decided not to help us after all.”

  Pete sat up, and just as Malcolm had, looked to see if the horses were still there. When it was apparent that they had not been robbed, he blinked away the sleep and continued to stare toward the river. After a moment, he said, “Well, if that’s so, he
left his packhorse.”

  “Damn . . .” Malcolm sighed contritely, embarrassed by his initial suspicions. “I reckon I spoke too soon.” No more than a moment after he said it, they both turned at the sound of a horse climbing up from the river. Uncomfortable with having been caught still in their blankets, both men scrambled up out of bed.

  “I was lucky,” Joe remarked as he rode into camp with a small deer draped across the paint in front of his saddle. “Caught this little doe coming outta the river.” Malcolm was about to remark that he had not heard the gun shot when he noticed the arrow still embedded just behind the deer’s front leg.

  After a breakfast that was a welcome departure from the salt pork and beans that had sustained Pete and Malcolm for several weeks, they broke camp and Joe led them north along the base of the mountains. Unknown to them, the missing party they sought to find was camped less than forty miles away as the hawk flies.

  Chapter 2

  “We’re gonna have to decide what we’re gonna do,” Jake Simmons insisted. “That son of a bitch don’t have no idea where the hell we are, and we’re gonna be settin’ here in the middle of these mountains all winter.”

  Bradley Lindstrom nodded his head solemnly, knowing what Jake said was probably true. They had been encamped there for three days, resting the mules and waiting while their guide purportedly scouted the cuts and valleys, searching for the trail he claimed to be there. That it had probably been covered up by a hard winter was what he had offered as an excuse for the delay, one of many such delays on this ill-fated journey.

  Bradley felt responsible for their troubles. He had accepted the man’s word when Skinner claimed to have traveled through these mountains to Walla Walla before, and the guide had been hired primarily upon Bradley’s judgment. I should have listened to Malcolm and waited until next spring to take the old wagon route to the west, he thought.

  There were other factors to consider, however. The old wagon trail led through country that was still threatened with Sioux and Cheyenne war parties. Bradley had deemed it safer to avoid that area altogether. Making their way up to Bismarck in Dakota Territory, the small party of settlers had embarked on a more northerly route to the west. Glancing up now at the worried gaze of Jake Simmons, he said, “I reckon you’re right. We’ve got to do somethin’ to protect our women and children. We can’t sit here in this valley all winter.”

  “Maybe we oughta think about tryin’ to build some kind of shelters,” the third member of the discussion, Raymond Chadwick, suggested. “Bad weather’s gonna be here before you know it, and there ain’t nothin’ but more of these damn mountains every way you look.”

  “Hell,” Jake snorted. “We can’t stay here. We’d freeze to death in these mountains, if we didn’t starve to death first.” During the last few days, when they had been lightly blanketed by an early-spring snow, there had been several mentions of the legendary Donner party. And that had not helped the general morale of the party of settlers.

  “Jake’s right,” Bradley said. “We can’t stay here. One thing I think we’re all agreed on, though, we’ll be better off without Skinner leadin’ us. I’m the one who hired him. I reckon it’s up to me to fire him.”

  “Don’t go puttin’ too much of the blame on yourself,” Raymond said. “We’ll back you up. Won’t we, Jake?”

  “Yes, sir,” Jake replied, “the three of us will tell him we’re done with him.” He gave Bradley a reassuring nod of the head, then added, “If he ever shows up again.”

  A few minutes before dusk, Skinner appeared, emerging from the trees to the south of the camp. Unlike the majority of the train he led, Skinner rode a dark brown Morgan. He always sat slightly slumped in the saddle as if constantly tired, wearing a surly expression, except when forcing a belligerent smile. Nancy Lindstrom said Skinner looked like he was measuring everyone he met, and found them all lacking. Cora Simmons said he looked like a weasel with always an eye on the women on the train, especially her daughter, Callie. At any rate, his popularity with the eight families had begun a diminishing spiral from the first day he addressed the group and announced that he knew the way West better than any living man. As the weeks piled one upon another, confidence in his ability waned, but by then the die had been cast. So they felt they must tolerate him since not one of them knew the way, and he still maintained that he would lead them to the Willamette Valley, where their friends and relatives waited. Now, after this evening’s discussion between the three unappointed but accepted leaders of the group, it seemed the time had come to rid themselves of Skinner and his surly attitude.

  “Maybe we oughta talk this over with the rest of the train to make sure ever’body’s thinkin’ the same as we are,” Raymond Chadwick said as he watched Skinner approach. “There’s been some talk about turnin’ back while we still got the chance.”

  “They’ve already said whatever we think is best,” Bradley said. “We’ve been goin’ around in circles so long, I ain’t sure anybody knows the way back to Three Forks, includin’ Skinner. It’s time to face up to him. He don’t know where we’re at any more than we do. We’ve already throwed away good money on him. It don’t make sense to pay him to wander around these mountains hopin’ to find a way out. I reckon we can do that for ourselves.”

  “Bradley’s right,” Jake said, “ain’t no use in puttin’ it off.”

  The three settlers climbed slowly to their feet as Skinner drew his horse up before them. “Damned if I ain’t ’bout to starve,” he announced as he dismounted. “I hope you got some coffee left in that pot.” When no one answered and no cup was offered, he paused to cast a suspicious eye upon the three. “What the hell’s wrong with you fellers? You look like you smell a fart.”

  “We’ve been talkin’ over some things,” Bradley spoke up.

  Knowing at once that he didn’t like the sound of that, Skinner shot back, “What kinda things?”

  “Well,” Bradley replied, looking at Jake for support, “for one thing, we was wonderin’ where you’ve been all day.”

  Certain now that he didn’t like the way the three were looking at him, he became immediately suspicious. His reaction was one of anger. “What the hell do you think I been doin’?” he barked. “Wearin’ my horse out scoutin’ for that trail outta this valley. That’s what I been doin’, by God. Tryin’ to lead you and your families to Oregon.”

  “Did you find the trail you’ve been talkin’ about?” Jake asked.

  “I found a couple of trails that might be it,” Skinner lied. When Jake and Bradley exchanged doubting glances, Skinner fumed, “It ain’t no fault of mine if the trails was covered by a bad winter.” Again, there was no response to his claims. “But I know the way to go,” he insisted. “Tomorrow mornin’ we’ll pack up and follow the river.”

  “I don’t see how that’s gonna do much good for us,” Bradley said. “Looks pretty much like this river runs north and south. I never claimed to be much of a guide, but I don’t see how followin’ this river north is ever gonna get us west—which is what we paid you to do.”

  Understanding clearly now what was in the offing, Skinner began to rankle. The heavy brows lowered like two black veils, casting a dark cloud over his eyes, and he spoke slowly in a voice more closely resembling a growl. “Just what are you gettin’ at, Lindstrom?”

  Bradley looked toward his two compatriots for support, but there was no indication of help from that quarter, so he pressed on. “There ain’t no polite way of sayin’ it, so I’ll just out with it. We’ve decided it best to try to find our way outta here ourselves. We don’t think you know where we are, or how to get us where we wanna go.” He paused a moment for Skinner’s response, but for the moment the irate man was speechless, never figuring the meek pilgrims had the grit to fire him. “We paid you half the money before we started out. We don’t figure you earned it, but we’re willin’ to forget it and part, no hard feelin’s.” He cast a quick glance in Jake’s direction. There had been no discussion regarding t
he recovery of money already paid to Skinner. Jake never even blinked, so Bradley went on. “We think that’s more’n fair for both sides.”

  Skinner’s reaction was what Bradley had feared. The deep eyebrow-knotted scowl warned of the volcanic rumblings inside his wiry body, and Bradley braced for the eruption that was bound to follow. Instead, Skinner’s stormy features relaxed to form his familiar contemptuous sneer. “Well, ain’t that a fine howdy-do?” he snarled, glancing back and forth between the three leaders of the party. “Just decided to fire me, didja? And while I’m out riskin’ my neck to keep you from gettin’ slaughtered by Injuns.” He glared at Bradley Lindstrom then. “We’ll just part company, and no hard feelin’s,” he mocked. The storm returned to his face and he pointed a bony finger at Bradley. “Well, that ain’t the way it works. We shook hands on it. Two hundred and fifty dollars when we left Bismarck, and two hundred and fifty when we get to the Willamette Valley—a deal’s a deal. Now, after I took you more’n halfway, riskin’ my neck, you wanna back outta the deal. Well, you can back out if that’s what you wanna do, but I’ll have the rest of the money you owe me—and then we’ll part company with no hard feelin’s.”

  Bradley could not respond at once, and while he stood flustered for a moment, Jake Simmons finally made some effort to back him. “Listen, Skinner,” he said, “all you did was get us good and lost. We don’t owe you nothin’. Thanks to you, we’re likely to get caught here by winter storms. You oughta give us back the money we already gave you.”

  Skinner’s brows lowered again to form the sneer so prevalent in his features. “You and your bellyaching bunch of pilgrims can go to hell for all I care, the whole lot of ya.” He dropped his hand to rest on the handle of his pistol, daring any one of them to protest.