Rocky Mountain Company

by Wheeler, Richard S.

  Fitzhugh studied the silent night, and decided then and there what he would do. Tomorrow, Christmas Day, would hold some surprises — for his men, and for others.

  * * *

  They harnessed the three crafty mules Chatillon left them to a frostbit Pittsburgh wagon with naked bows. The mules had known packsaddles, but not harness. Not even whip and blasphemy could move them much, but at last the wily Trudeau attached halter lines to their bridles and discovered they led easily, trained to come with the slightest tug. That would do. A man would walk ahead of the team and wagon.

  “Leave your pieces in the wagon,” Fitzhugh told them. “This hyar’s a Christmas visit.”

  He added a crockery jug filled with two-hundred proof grain spirits to the small items in the wagon, and they left, all of them except Bercier, who professed to be ailing, but was well enough to tend the fire. What better time than Christmas to share a cup with Hervey’s engagés and — he hoped — enlist them all in a peaceful transfer of the outfit from Cass to Fitzhugh’s Post.

  They rolled north easily over small crusted snow, the wheel hubs stuttering around cold iron axles, scaring up magpies along the way. The weeping snowblind mules considered these affronts just cause to sulk, and had to be whipped. In a while they found Fort Cass belching sour cottonwood smoke like a dragon, but otherwise benign on a warm day.

  Brokenleg saw no lodges at all pitched outside the post, and its gates lay open. A good sign on a day given to peace and goodwill among men. Within they’d find camaraderie. All fur posts hallowed Christmas, and made a great feast of it to break the monotony, and remind them of nobler callings than the commerce of skins. Even Hervey’s post, he thought. He hoped that by the time sunset severed the solstice afternoon in this latitude, all his outfit would rest snugly in his own trading room.

  “Drive on in and park the wagon next to the warehouse,” he instructed Samson Trudeau. “We’ll have us some doin’s and then get busy.”

  They drove the team and wagon through the toothed jaws of Cass, under a log blockhouse perched over the gates, and wheeled the wagon around in the yard, while Fort Cass’s men watched amiably. He counted about twenty of them, bearded Frenchmen like his own, gaudy in bright-dyed wool. Even as he watched, Trudeau and the others were greeting each other in voluble French, reminding him that the gallic fraternity of fur company employees was a closed society. English-speaking engagés were rare. The Indians themselves knew French better than English.

  Hervey emerged from the comfortable trading room, adorned in blue Christmas finery and fresh-trimmed black beard. He surveyed the arrivals and the wagon, bright mock behind his beard, enjoying the sight.

  “Ah, the Opposition. Stiffleg and young Straus and their bravos.”

  “Merry Christmas, Hervey.”

  “Come to share the feast and guzzle the spirits and holiday a while. With an empty wagon.”

  “Brung us some spirits,” Fitzhugh said, waving his jug.

  “The better to stupefy,” Hervey said.

  “I thunk to celebrate.”

  “Indeed, and brought your wagon to celebrate with.” Julius Hervey beamed effusively. “Well, come on in and we’ll pull the cork.”

  At one end of the comfortable window-lit Fort Cass barracks a cast-iron barrel stove radiated warmth upon the fort loafers, among them Abner Spoon and Zachary Constable, sprawled amiably on benches. Winter birds. Most forts collected them, and as long as the loafers earned their keep with a little hunting or work, no one objected. Meat cost nothing more than a ball and powder.

  “I declare, it’s the beaver times all over agin,” Constable bawled. “A reg’lar rendezvous.”

  Fitzhugh limped over and clamped an arm around the trapper, and then Spoon. “I brought us some spirits, if you got the cup.”

  “I never guzzle water before breakfast,” Constable said, while Fitzhugh poured.

  Engagés drifted in, both Cass’s and his, and Fitzhugh poured a couple of fingers for each. The French settled into their own circle, the language effusive on their tongues, while Hervey, Fitzhugh, Maxim and the rest gathered on the other side of the stove.

  Fitzhugh lifted his Fort Cass tin cup. “Well, hyar’s to you all, and the holy day, and lots of skins,” he said.

  Hervey grinned. “Lots of skins,” he echoed. “Yours in particular.”

  “I reckon they’s robes for all. Lots of bands hereabouts that haven’t been traded with since the beaver days.”

  “With osage orange sticks,” Hervey said, strange light flaring in his eyes. “Sticks for robes. I admire the Opposition. When it’s got nothing else to trade, it comes up with sticks.”

  It troubled Fitzhugh. How the hell did he know that? Was his outfit riddled with gossipers or worse? He sighed. He’d have only this trading season to try out the bow wood. If it worked, American Fur would have its own supply.

  “What’s that about?” asked Spoon.

  “Bois d’arc. Osage orange. A bright idea from the devious mind of Jamie Dance,” Hervey said. “How many will get you a robe, my dear Stiffleg?”

  Fitzhugh felt himself denuded by the man’s knowledge. Where had it come from? Who knew it had been Jamie’s idea? He glared darkly at Hervey, who yawned like a cat. “We haven’t tried it yet. Maybe after the first of the year.”

  “If anyone comes,” Hervey said. “You can’t count on the Cheyenne any more with Dust Devil gone.”

  “Bois d’arc. I think that’d go a finished bow for a robe, maybe three sticks for a robe,” Constable said. “They like that wood. I never figgered they had much of a shootin’ tool with juniper or chokecherry or willow.”

  “I had enough arrers whip into my hide so’s I dissent,” Spoon said. “I don’t reckon a osage orange bow’s going to pain me more than a juniper.”

  “More distance,” Hervey said. “Maybe thirty yards.”

  They argued it while Fitzhugh fumed, feeling naked before the spying of his powerful opponents. The whispering must have started in St. Louis, where someone knew Jamie Dance had thought up the idea. Still, this was Christmastide, and he settled back to bragging and hoorawing like the rest. A man could get right ornery worrying it around.

  A roasted haunch of buffalo hung near the stove, near a stack of wooden trenchers and a butcher knife. Men fed themselves that sunny day, sawing off thick slabs of tough meat to chew between their sipping. Fitzhugh felt minutes slide by, minutes when he could be loading up his outfit and hauling the first of it back to his post. But Hervey seemed amiable for a change, watching his guests with bright amusement, and Fitzhugh thought that with each passing sip of spirits, the chances of trouble lessened. So he bided his time. To be sure, Hervey played a catspaw game, sliding his barbs home the whole while, hoping to rile Fitzhugh. But he refused to be riled, and Chatillon’s warning hung in his mind, along with his own caution. Hervey would love to murder him.

  But the sun was fleeting, and he broached the topic at last. “Julius, I got to fetch my outfit before our agreement expires. We’re ready. I come with the wagon to fetch the loads.”

  “What’s left of it, Stiffleg. I’ve traded it away.”

  “I think you’re provokin’ me, is all. They’d be hell to pay with Chouteau and Culbertson.”

  “It’s a Christmas gift,” Hervey replied. Troubled, Fitzhugh clambered up and stamped life into his game leg. Men dozed in the warmth, joked, sipped the last of the fiery spirits. He limped out into the yard, intending to check the warehouse. Maxim, worried as always, followed. The sun had plunged so low that the yard lay blue in winter-shadow. He didn’t notice a difference until he got to his big Pittsburgh wagon, and then stopped abruptly. The mules had vanished, along with their harness. The wagon hulked naked beside the warehouse, a helpless giant, its doubletree sagging into frozen earth. Choking, he peered into the wagonbed looking for something else: his rifle and those of his engagés had vanished as well, along with the robe that contained them.

  “Ah, Stiffleg,” said Hervey from acros
s the yard. “Merry Christmas.”

  Twenty-Six

  * * *

  Brokenleg waited impatiently for the weather to moderate. For days brief boiling blizzards had swept over the post, interspersed with sunny interludes rimmed by mountainous clouds. A wicked wind howled out of the north. He intended to send an express to Culbertson notifying him of events on the Yellowstone, and demanding relief. But with three mules in captivity, the man would have to go on foot, two hundred miles through drifts in the bowels of winter. He wished he could go himself, but his bum leg prevented it.

  He kept the engagés busy, barking at them sometimes because of their lassitude. Things cried to be done: the trading window needed a counter and shutters. His own apartment and office had yet to be partitioned or furnished. The matter of dry firewood loomed large always, with two wide fireplaces eating their daily meals. The post armaments had been reduced to Maxim’s old rifle, Bercier’s rifle and one fowling piece, and these he assigned to his best hunters and sent them into the cold each dark day. They returned with what they could carry — a rabbit, a duck, once a quarter of a doe brought from a great distance. And all the while the reserves of hanging frozen buffalo diminished rapidly. Without the mules they lacked the means to reach the distant herd and pack more meat to the post.

  Something had drained away, and the men eyed him with long dark stares, and idled through their tasks. Trudeau looked worried, and did not press them when they gathered for a pipe, or just collected around a fireplace to stare into moody flames.

  Maxim sulked and avoided his duties, and no matter how much Fitzhugh railed at the boy, it yielded no improvement. Accusation filled Maxim’s eyes, but he said nothing, and confined his thoughts to his notebook.

  Hervey had escorted them all to the gates of Fort Cass on Christmas day, thoroughly enjoying himself. He’d been backed by all of his engagés, though they obviously despised the evil he did to guests on a sacred day. But none resisted, beyond a dark stare at their bourgeois, because to do so was to court death at his hands. Fitzhugh had itched to brawl, to pound them, but he’d gotten hold of himself, and with a nod to his own engagés, signaled them to leave peacefully.

  Nonetheless, at the gates of Fort Cass, he’d turned to Hervey with an accusation. “You’re a thief,” he said, his glare upon the amused man. And he’d waited taut for the blow, because Hervey had slid knives into men for lesser offenses.

  But Hervey had only chortled easily. “Stiffleg, dummy, you don’t understand. We’ll buy your entire outfit at cost — for the goods and for your transportation. At cost.”

  “You’re a thief,” Brokenleg had repeated.

  Hervey’d shrugged. “We’re just holding it for you. We’ll ship the whole outfit down the river on mackinaws in the spring if you want. That’ll cost you plenty for transportation, though. You’d be better off selling.”

  “This ain’t done yet, Hervey.”

  “I’ll remember that, Stiffleg. I never forget a threat. You and your men can pick up your rifles and the rest of your truck any time you quit the country. Or come work for me. I’m just storing them safely for you. A little Christmas service.” He’d smirked at that.

  Fitzhugh’s engagés had listened somberly. They understood English well enough, even if they didn’t speak it. After that, they’d trudged home in violet light, never speaking a word the entire four miles. And they’d hardly spoken in the six days since.

  This night would witness the passage of 1841, and the birth of 1842, but no one cared. He thought he’d offer them a gill anyway, even if it cut into one of the two trade items he possessed. It didn’t matter much. Or did it? He reminded himself that times changed, and half the battle was to endure the worst, take a loss this year and go onto the next. Maybe Jamie would reap a bonanza in robes down south.

  Samson Trudeau caught him outside, where he was pacing out the dimensions of a yard behind the trading post where someday they could keep horses inside of a palisade. Another snow squall blotted the timid sun while he calculated.

  Trudeau looked worried. “Monsieur Fitzhugh?” he asked, hesitantly. “I think — “

  Brokenleg waited impatiently as flakes melted on his neck.

  “I think some of the engagés — we are going to lose them.”

  Fitzhugh absorbed that, angering. “They signed on for a year,” he snapped.

  Trudeau sighed. “It is so. But I think some, they will leave tonight.”

  “How many?”

  “Six. They go to Fort Cass. They will work for Hervey. He’ll give them their rifles back, n’est-ce pas?”

  “Six! That leaves — “ He sighed, angrily. “Who?”

  Trudeau evaded the question. “They would like their wages. It is the end of the month, yes?”

  “They’re gonna break their agreement and want wages too?”

  Trudeau nodded, looking miserable.

  “They think we’re doomed, eh? Quitting? Well, we might be whipped this year but what about the next? And how’s Jamie Dance doing down south? I need them here. I got a post to build.”

  “They say you can’t feed them now.”

  “I’ve got casks of spirits in there, and three hundred osage orange sticks for bows. Do they think those won’t trade for ponies — lots of ponies of all sorts? Or buffalo meat?”

  “But you have to get to the villages — “

  “That’s right, we do. And I was going to send runners to bring them in as soon as we had a chinook or a break in this.” He waved at the heavy sky.

  “Some of us want to stay, Monsieur Fitzhugh.”

  “Who?”

  “To stay with you? Myself. I am a faithful man. Larue. Provost. Dauphin.”

  “Good men.” But one of the departing was Gallard, the one they’d suspected of ditching the Witney blankets; the one the engagés themselves didn’t trust. “Gallard going?” he asked.

  “Especially Gallard. He was itching to go.”

  “What do you think about him?”

  “I have no thoughts about Emile Gallard.”

  “I think you do. Bring them in when it gets dark. I want my chance to say my piece.”

  When early dusk sawed off the day’s toil the men gathered uneasily before the great fire in the barracks while Fitzhugh watched angrily. They avoided his glare.

  “You contracted for a year,” he accused, harshly. “You’re deserting when I need you most.”

  Some of them peered back sullenly. He knew he had no control over them. They had only to walk out the door and trudge four miles to escape him.

  “I can’t stop you from going. But things won’t go easy for you. Julius Hervey’s toying with you. He wants to break me down, make me abandon this post. Do you think American Fur’ll employ engagés who break their contracts? No. He’ll welcome you with that little mocking grin, and put you to work and pay you a wage — until the day we fold up here. And then he’ll discharge you and tell you American Fur doesn’t employ engagés who bust an agreement.”

  “You can’t feed us, monsieur.” It was Brasseau. “No horse. No rifle, eh?”

  That made sense to them, he knew. “See that?” He jabbed his finger at the casks. “You think that won’t trade for more ponies we can ever use? I figgered to send you out to the villages to drum up some trade, soon as the weather lets up.”

  “Always, the desperation, Monsieur Fitzhugh.” Brasseau had somehow made himself into a spokesman for the rest, and oddly, Brokenleg honored him for it. It took courage to get crosswise of the bourgeois.

  “Brasseau,” he said gently. “Hervey won’t keep you. Oh, you’ll git your pieces back, maybe. You walk into Cass and he’ll give ’em to you. And that’ll feel good. A man feels naked here without a firearm. Plumb naked. But he don’t need you none. He’s got all the men he needs right there, and a bunch of winter loafers to help out too. He don’t need none of you.”

  “We’d like our wages,” Brasseau said, determinedly.

  “You’re busting your agreement an
d want wages! I ought to just pitch you out.”

  “Sacre bleu! We have work hard.”

  Fitzhugh felt cornered. It wouldn’t do to mistreat them, not if he hoped to get enough back to keep his post open. Men were plumb scarce. And they’d worked; God knows, they’d worked themselves down to nothing. “All right. Usually we’d keep accounts and settle at the end of the season, wages on one hand, purchases in the trading room on the other. I’ll have to give you drafts payable in St. Louis on Dance, Fitzhugh and Straus. Hervey’ll honor them. So will Culbertson. If they don’t double their prices on you.”

  He’d lost them, he knew that. Angrily he dug into his possibles for the nib and some foolscap. Silently, Maxim handed him some ink in a little flask. Seven months wages. Times twelve dollars. Minus — what? He couldn’t remember what had been supplied them from stores. He began scratching angrily, eighty-four dollars for Gallard, eighty-four for Lemaitre, for Brasseau, for Bercier, for the rest . . . He signed them all. The signature was a valid assessment on company funds.

  They took their chits with averted eyes.

  “Now go ahead,” he snapped.

  They gathered their outfits and edged out silently into a black night, while the rest watched, mute. One of the post’s remaining rifles went with them. Maxim looked stricken. A hush settled in the room, save for the snap of cottonwood logs in the fireplace.

  “Happy new year,” Fitzhugh said dourly. “There’s a gill for any that want it.”

  But no one moved. They peered uneasily at each other: Fitzhugh, Maxim Straus, Samson Trudeau, Gaspard Larue, Jannot Provost, Corneille Dauphin, each lost in his own world.

  Until the odd, shuffling noises of an army outside alarmed them.