After the third day Johnny had to admit that his capacity for rotgut whiskey and mattress grappling was exhausted, along with his money, and much like his partner, he was in need of the solitude of the wilderness. “I know what you need,” he said one evening as he looked across the campfire at his morose companion. “We need to get outta this place and head for Helena where the boom is going on now. I don’t know how much longer I can stand to look at that droopy face of yours without gettin’ the melancholies myself.” When Jim started to speak, Johnny interrupted him. “I know what you’re fixin’ to say, but you ain’t heard what I’m talkin’ about yet. I ain’t talkin’ about goin’ where the people are. I’m thinkin’ you need to get up in the mountains with the hawks and the deer and the badgers, where the country is still like the good Lord made it. We can do some huntin’ and trappin’ in a place I know that ain’t many souls seen. It’s a place where I made a camp a long time before there was a place such as Helena in what some folks call the Big Belt Mountains. We won’t even go into Helena. Whaddaya say?”
The suggestion struck a chord in Jim’s bruised mind, reminding him of his early quest to embrace the high mountains. Johnny was right. This was what he needed—to let the solitude of the high country heal his heart. They left for Three Forks the next morning, following the Madison River north. There were plenty of signs that the trail had been well traveled of late, both horses and wagons, attesting to the exodus out of Virginia City. “Looks like we’re always a day late and a dollar short,” Johnny opined over the profusion of tracks. “I’d like to get in on a new strike once, but it don’t look like it’ll ever happen.”
After a while, Johnny grew tired of talking and they pushed on in silence, a state that Jim favored. The stubby-legged little man had thought to take his friend’s mind off his disappointment by jawing away, but nothing he said was able to penetrate the stony silence of the man following along behind him. But Jim’s mind was not resting, for he had learned that he could be hurt by having feelings for someone, and he made a silent promise to himself that he would never let himself be put in that position again. In fact, he decided that the less contact he had with people, the better off he was, so he rode on, anxious to reach the place Johnny had talked about and vowing to put Lucy Taylor out of his memory.
When they camped that night at Three Forks where the river they had followed combined with two others to form the mighty Missouri River, Johnny was in a high state of concern, worrying that his partner had withdrawn into a state of melancholy from which he might never recover. I ain’t never seen a man take rejection so hard, he thought. “You know, I hope there ain’t no hard feelin’s agin’ me for tellin’ you to go talk to that gal,” he finally said.
Much to his relief, Jim smiled, although sadly as he told himself that he had moped around long enough. It left a scar, just as the bullet wound had left in his shoulder, and like the bullet wound, his heart would heal. “No, partner,” Jim replied softly. “It ain’t your fault I don’t have sense enough to tell when a woman ain’t got no use for me. I expect I’ve learned a lesson.”
The next morning, they stocked up on the basic supplies they needed to start out for Helena—using the last of their money, a small sum that Johnny had given Jim to hold on to to ensure that it did not contribute to some prostitute’s or bartender′s gain. Starting out once more, they were in the saddle for a long day before reaching the wide valley between two mountain ranges and making their camp by a slow-moving stream. “It ain’t very big, but it tastes all right,” Johnny said after sampling the water. “I reckon it won’t kill the horses,” he joked. “I still got so much of that damn whiskey in me that it’ll kill anythin’ that crick’s got in it.”
After the fire was made and they had eaten, Johnny sat back and gazed at the mountains in the distance. “Yonder’s where we’ll head in the mornin’,” he said, pointing toward the northeast, “Big Belt Mountains.” Then he made a sweeping motion with his arm. “When I was last in this valley, all that ahead was home to a couple of villages of Blackfeet. I’ve been to that place they named Last Chance Gulch—wish I’d had enough sense to pan some of that gold—but, hell, I thought pelts was my gold and there were too damn many Injuns near that gulch to be healthy for a lone trapper. Blackfeet never have been partial to white men. It’s best to avoid ’em whenever it’s possible, and that’s a fact—jaybird.”
Jim shook his head slowly, amused by the little man’s ramblings. Looking away toward the mountains Johnny called the Big Belts, he could feel an excitement inside himself over the prospect of riding deep into the bosom of their solemn peaks. It was what he needed at this time of his life, and already thoughts of Lucy were gradually fading to gray, although they would never be gone completely. He fell asleep that night thinking of the mountains, feeling that he had no place in what man called civilization. He thought about White Fox and Deer Foot, and Morning Flower—and wondered if he would ever see them again. Perhaps, he reasoned, when Johnny developed another yearning to visit his “wife.”
As Johnny had said, his old camp was not easy to find, even for him after all the years since he was last there. In fact, they climbed deep into the mountains, following steep ravines and narrow passes through slopes covered with thick pine forests, searching for some familiar sign that would put Johnny on the right path. Jim felt an immediate peace as he guided the buckskin over rocky areas with rocks so small they reminded him of gunpowder, to huge magnificent boulders protruding from grassy meadows near the tops of the mountains. The ground seemed dry, but there were springs everywhere, even this late in the summer, with grass growing in the bottom and moss covering the rocks on the sides. Looking off to the east, he could see some peaks softened by grass. Other mountains had no trees at all except near the bottom, where he saw antelope sign. Higher up there were scarred trees that looked like elk had rubbed antlers there. It was a good place, he decided.
They were not successful in finding Johnny’s one time camp, however, much to his chagrin. “Well, I told you it was a hard one to find,” he said. “With nobody but Blackfeet warriors ever′where, I had to have a good place to hide.”
“We’ve got plenty of time,” Jim told him. “Maybe we’ll find it tomorrow.”
“If I can just find that little notch near the top of the mountain,” he said. “There’s a tall pine bent like an S right at the edge of a stand of trees in front of a cliff of solid rock. Leastways it looks like solid rock, but behind that screen of trees there’s a notch just big enough to let a horse through. ’Bout thirty or forty feet in, it opens up to a space big enough to keep a small herd of horses, with a strong stream that runs all year.
In the spring, it’s so full of snow runoff it makes a little waterfall.” He shook his head, perplexed. “I swear, I wish I could find it, but nothin’ looks the same as it did then.”
“Maybe we’ll find it tomorrow,” Jim repeated. It sounded like the perfect place he was looking for.
“I wouldn’ta found it the first time if I hadn’t shot a mountain lion and didn’t kill it.” He hastened to explain. “I didn’t have time to draw a bead on him, and he jumped at the same time I pulled the trigger—got him in the hind leg. I followed that cat halfway around this mountain, and he woulda got away if I hadn’t seen him crawl between those trees in front of that cliff. Let me tell you, I was mighty careful when I pushed through those trees, expectin’ to find him between them and the rock face of that cliff. But he had dragged hisself through that notch. I was tickled to find that place.”
“There was a cliff like that on the mountain we were on this mornin’,” Jim said.
“Yeah, there was,” Johnny replied, “but there was no crooked-shaped pine at the edge of it, like at my camp.” He leaned back and tried to recall the morning he had shot the mountain lion. After thinking about it for a while, he started from the beginning when he crossed over the foothills and went up into the thickest of the pines. The more the image of that day came into focus, the
more he suddenly remembered until it came to him what was different. “Son of a bitch!” he blurted. “We’re on the wrong damn mountain. That place we saw this mornin’ was the right spot. It’s just growed up more since then. But there weren’t no crooked tree.
Maybe it got struck by lightnin’ or somethin’, although I didn’t see no sign of a fire. Did you?”
“Nope,” Jim replied. “It’s too late now, but we can go take another look in the mornin’.”
They got an early start the following morning, retracing their steps of the previous day. When they reached the rock cliff about three-quarters of the way to the top of the mountain, they stopped while Johnny took another hard look, trying to spot something that would tell him this was the right place. Jim, meanwhile, led his horse over to the edge of the belt of pines and dropped the buckskin’s reins while he went into the trees, where he found what he searched for. “Here’s your crooked tree,” he called to Johnny, and waited beside a fairly large stump about waist high until Johnny made his way into the trees to join him.
“Damn,” the little man muttered when he saw the rotted, twisted log lying on the ground between the trees. “Wonder what knocked it down?” He looked around the ground in search of signs of a fire, but there was none.
Inspecting the stump, and then the log, Jim said, “Looks to me like the tree was sick and some kinda borers got to it.” He pointed to another tree not far from where they stood. “Looks like they’re workin’ on that one now.”
With no interest in tree borers, Johnny started weaving his way through the thick belt of pines toward the rock wall. “Come on,” he called to Jim. A minute later, he exclaimed, “Here it is! By God, we found it!”
The secret camp of Johnny Hawk was much the way he had described it. Formed by rock walls on all four sides, nature had formed an enclosed meadow with a stream coming up from the ground and running through the center of it to disappear underground again at the lower end. Looking up, Jim could see that the camp was protected overhead by trees and boulders. He could not imagine a more ideal camp for a man alone in hostile country.
The grass on the floor of the enclosure had grown so thick that it concealed any signs that anyone had been there recently, but Johnny scratched around in it until he was able to uncover remains of his campfire. He looked up at Jim and grinned. “Ain’t nobody found this place since I left it,” he said. Then his grin grew wider, his one sentinel tooth protruding prominently from his lower gum, and he declared gleefully, “Ain’t this somethin’? Two Crows smack dab in the middle of Blackfoot country—Little Thunder and Rider Twelve Horses!”
Jim had to smile. “I reckon,” he said.
Although they had not sighted any Blackfoot hunters, or seen sign that any had been in the area recently, there was still cause for caution. The Indians had left the broad valley west of the Big Belt Mountains to the thousands of gold seekers that rushed into the gulch. But they had not gone far away, settling in the valleys to the north and east of the Big Belts, and were certain to hunt in these mountains. Of concern then, to the two white intruders, was to find a way to disguise the entrance to their hidden camp. The sharp eye of a Blackfoot hunter would no doubt discover an oft-used trail to and from the thick stand of pines, but Johnny showed Jim a clean apron of stone and shale on the far end of the trees where careful entry would leave no sign. Once they were in the pines, the floor was so thick with needles that even horses, when led slowly, would leave no trail.
Their camp secure, they now had a good deal of work to do in order to supply it with firewood and build a lean-to for their horses before winter came, as well as construct a hut of some kind to protect them in foul weather. There were plenty of pines close at hand, but pine was not good firewood. It burned too quickly and it produced too much smoke for people who did not want to be discovered. To further complicate the issue, they chose not to cut trees for firewood too close to their camp, also to prevent anyone from knowing they were there. So it was necessary to scout the lower foothills for hardwood to supply their fuel. The lean-to and hut were problems also due to the fact that they could not snake large logs through their screen of trees without leaving a clear trail for anyone to follow. To solve this problem, smaller pines were hewn at some distance from their camp, and through Jim’s skill with hatchet and vine, a small but sturdy shelter was constructed. Johnny counted himself a keen judge of men for having picked young Jim Moran for a partner, for he was not afraid of hard work. What Johnny failed to understand was Jim’s motivation was sparked by the notion that he was building his home and not just a camp to soon be abandoned.
After several weeks in their mountain camp, life had become more enjoyable for Jim Moran. There was abundant game close at hand and there was no lack of anything the two of them needed except coffee, flour, and salt. Jim could do without any of the three, but he missed coffee, so he welcomed Johnny’s proposal to go into Helena to see if he could trade some of the hides they had dried. They were not prime since they were summer pelts, but he figured they should be at least worth some coffee beans and maybe a little flour. Since Jim was still reluctant to have anything to do with civilization, Johnny volunteered to make the trip into town alone. Jim quickly accepted the offer. “I ’preciate it, Johnny,” he said. “I’m thinkin’ about scouting up through the northern end of the mountains to see what kinda game I can find.”
“Sounds like a good idea,” Johnny replied, “but you better keep a sharp eye. You’ll be gettin’ awful close to that Blackfoot village.”
“I will,” Jim said. “I’m more worried about you. You know they don’t sell coffee and flour in a saloon, don’t you?”
“Why, Rider, now you’ve gone and hurt my feelin’s,” Johnny replied, feigning insult.
After Johnny disappeared down through the wooded ravine leading away from the camp, Jim strapped his bow on his back, picked up his rifle, and made his way on foot down the slope toward the adjacent mountain. He was not looking for large game, planning to use his bow for anything worth shooting, but the rifle was always with him for emergencies. Walking along a high ridge that connected two mountains, he found sign of elk, but no sighting. Beyond that ridge and up the next mountain, there was sign of deer, but he was not looking for deer on this day. Still, he was glad to see plenty of sign, for they would need a lot of meat put back for the winter.
Descending the ridge, he slowed his pace to keep his balance on the steep slope. Just before reaching the bottom where a strong stream cut a ribbon in the narrow pass, he suddenly came to a halt. He was sure he had heard something and he stood still to listen. There it was again, and this time he identified it as the warning growl of a grizzly. He could see nothing in the direction the growl had come from, and not certain if it was him who was being warned or something else, he inched forward cautiously to see if he could spot the source. Now the growl came again, this time louder and more of a roar. He decided he wasn’t the cause of it, so he made his way down to a large boulder close to the stream, and there he saw the problem. Below him, a young Indian boy stood on the near side of the stream, frozen by the ferocious spectacle of an angry grizzly with its ears pinned back and its head and neck thrust forward. He had evidently crossed between the bear and her cubs. Seeing the boy, the cubs had scattered in three different directions, leaving the sow confused and agitated because she was unable to make an orderly retreat with all of her cubs in tow. Growing more agitated by the second when the boy remained frozen with fear, she began to shift her weight back and forth from one forepaw to the other.
Jim knew she was about to attack. He roared as loud as he could, hoping to distract her. Still, she was about to launch her attack on the petrified boy. Jim lifted his rifle and aimed at a boulder inches from the bear′s nose. He was reluctant to kill the bear and orphan the cubs, so he squeezed the trigger, sending a slug to ricochet off the rock, whining as it grazed her fur. It had the desired effect. Startled, she jumped backward and ran back down the stream. In a few secon
ds, her cubs ran after her. He watched for a moment to see the mother and children reunited and bounding across a meadow leading up the mountain.
He turned his attention back to the stream in time to see the boy sink to his knees, wavering as if to fall over any second. Jim hurried across to catch him before he collapsed. “Boy,” Jim said, “you’re all right now.” The boy made no response, staring with blank expressionless eyes, showing no indication that he understood what was being said to him. It occurred to Jim then that his fainting was not all due to fright. Something else was wrong—maybe some kind of sickness. Then he remembered several boys in Two Bulls’ village who went into the forest alone, seeking their medicine. They fasted for days, waiting for a dream that would tell them the path they must walk. He looked closely at the boy he was holding up. He was about the same age as the Crow boys. He must have been too long without food and water. What to do with him was now the question. He couldn’t take him back to his camp, but he didn’t want to leave him unconscious in the woods. Finally, he decided to take him to the edge of the foothills and leave him there. Johnny had said there was a Blackfoot village in the valley beyond the mountains. Maybe he could leave him where they would find him.
He picked the boy up and followed the stream down to the hills below near the valley floor. It was a walk of about a mile before he came to the edge of the trees at the base. Johnny was right—he could see tipis in the distance. “This’ll have to do, boy,” he said as he laid him gently on the grass and propped him up against a tree trunk. Then he aimed his rifle up in the air and fired it three times in rapid succession. “That oughta get their curiosity up,” he said, looking at the boy again, who had registered no more than a quiver when the shots were fired. He waited to see if there was going to be any response from the Blackfoot camp. In a few minutes time, he saw a party of about a dozen riders leaving the village. “All right, boy, here come your folks, so I’d better get the hell outta here.”
Ride the High Range Page 11
