by Zane Grey
At length the caravans reached the ranch, to pitch camp in the beautiful grove of cottonwoods. The leaves were turning gold.
Maxwell’s Ranch had reverted to the wild. In place of grazing horses and cattle, only buffalo and deer dotted the wide gray pastures. Clint climbed the slope, recalling what he had heard about the operations of the St. Louis Company that had purchased the ranch from Maxwell. They had taken over all the stock, but the object of buying was to work the placer mines. Half a million dollars had been spent there. A forty-mile canal had been dug, to fetch a two-foot stream down to the diggings. But the company found no gold and were ruined.
Clint surveyed the ranch house. What a change! Only a few years, yet the fences were all down, the windows were vacant holes, the doors gone, the walls crumbling. Not a living creature to be seen. The rooms were bare, cold, gloomy. Indians had scratched characters on the faded whitewash of the adobe walls. The dining-hall that had once been the Mecca for all frontiersmen, hunters, trappers, soldiers, and travelers, and the Indians, was now a den for wolves. Bones and piles of wolf dung! For Clint Belmet the hall of Maxwell’s banquets was haunted.
After supper he walked along the edge of the cottonwood grove to the spot where Couch’s camp had been located. He could have gone to it blindfolded. The grove at this point was comparatively lonely, as his freighters had not driven up so far. Beyond the clump of willows, precisely the same, stood the spreading cottonwood under which Couch’s wagon had stood. The leaves aloft were sighing. A golden glow from the reflection of the setting sun mellowed the glade.
Clint’s forehead was damp and his hands clammy. He plunged to the grass and lay back against the trunk of the cottonwood. The wagon had stood there. He remembered that the high seat, where he had rested with May Bell, was just under the spreading branch. He had held her in his arms there, had kissed her sweet lips and been kissed in return. Just here the tongue of the wagon had lain upon the ground. May Bell had sat about there—with a roguish devil in her dark eye. But he had not understood. He had been only a tortured youth. . . . Here Murdock had stood, sneering and cool, and there, close to Clint’s hand, he had lain, bloody-mouthed and senseless.
But that flashing heat of memory did not survive. Clint sat alone in the place of his dream. And his eyes grew dim. The hard years since that unforgettable hour had not killed the sweetness of memory. Never, though, since he had read May Bell’s crucifying letter had he permitted himself this weakness. He had not lived solely for revenge, but his search for Murdock and Blackstone had given the color and vitality to his trips to and fro on the Old Trail.
But now it was as if only a night had intervened. He had become a stern, ruthless frontiersman, surviving by wit and nerve and fierce resistance. Yet in this spot his heart seemed to burst, and slow salt tears burned his eyes. Regret, remorse, prayer were unavailing. The iron of the plains had cut deeply into his soul. Yet love lived there still, hidden, unquenchable as the fires of the sun.
The golden glow paled and faded. Lonely, silent twilight settled down. Far up on the ridge a wolf bayed, as if in resentment at the white man’s return. The grass was green, the leaves were beautiful, the willows gleamed, the stream babbled behind. But something was gone from the earth. The old cottonwood showed the wear and tear of storms. It had lost something.
Clint knew too much of the horror of frontier life to cavil at his fate, to bemoan it as something more bitter than had been the lot of other frontiersmen. That assumption would have been ignorance and folly. He did believe no man had ever been blessed by such love as May Bell had bestowed upon him, or had known such a sweet and lovely and willful girl. And no fortunate youth had ever been so stupid, so blundering, so jealous, so beset to destroy himself and the girl who worshiped him. But the brutal blows dealt him by the frontier had been no worse than had befallen thousands of men, far more deserving than he. Had not every rod of the Old Trail groaned with the travail of the freighter? How many lonely graves under the waving grass!
Fifteen years now had Buff Belmet held the reins across the prairie land. Few plainsmen had survived so many. The dream that he had treasured once, of giving up the overland toiling and of homesteading a little valley, safe near fort or town, had long been a mocking chimera, to return only in troubled slumbers, gall and wormwood.
Upon arriving at Santa Fé, to Clint’s surprise he was greeted as if he were a ghost.
“Buff Belmet?” exclaimed Buell, the agent, who could not believe his eyes.
“Why, of course I’m Buff Belmet!” replied Clint, testily.
“But you were dead!”
“Not quite.”
Buell was so astounded that he forgot to shake hands, but there seemed ample proof of gladness that equaled his astonishment.
“Buff, you haven’t been in Santa Fé for years. An’ you’ve shore been mourned as dead. I talked with a man who’d seen you dead in Kansas City, an’ another who’d seen your grave at some rocky point in the Old Trail.”
“Reckon he seen Uncle Jim Couch’s. No, my grave hasn’t been dug yet that I know of,” remarked Clint, dryly, and then an old query forged ahead in his thought.
“Have you seen Murdock an’ Blackstone since I left here?”
“Often. They ride in now an’ then, when there’s no caravan or soldiers around. The Indians keep them posted.”
“Ahuh! They must have a hidin’-place in these hills.”
“In summer. But they never show up in winter no more.”
Chapter Eighteen
CLINT BELMET’S fifteen winters on the frontier had been passed in study, reading, hunting, practicing with guns, manual labor, curing hides, and various other less important pursuits.
This winter he spent before the open fireplace, watching the flames, the opal glow, the red embers, thinking, mourning. After the visit to Maxwell’s Ranch he felt that he would never be his old self again.
But though sorrow made the days long, it could not hold them back. The winter ended. And spring came with its activities of preparation, its imminence of peril. Scouts and trappers predicted the bloodiest summer ever known on the frontier.
Barlow’s caravan departed first, on the way to Fort Lyon. Belmet and Hatcher again joined forces, this trip totaling one hundred and forty-three wagons. Heavily loaded and scarce of ammunition they started out, with their leaders full of apprehension. Tracks of Indian ponies filled the trail, but no other sign of the red men was noted.
“Reckon we’ll pay up for this later on,” remarked Hatcher, grimly.
“Looks too good to me,” replied Clint.
They rolled into Fort Larned without having experienced a single untoward happening, except the tiring of the oxen. Here, before undertaking the long overland journey across the plains, a rest was imperative, and the lightening of loads also. Fort Larned appeared unusually full of spring sellers of pelts and buyers and the hangers-on. Added to these the regular population of soldiers, Mexicans, Indians, and whites made of the town a busy, colorful place.
The first caravan from the east limped in, the freighters of which threw up their hands when questioned about the fun on the Old Trail.
Clint observed a pale youth of about sixteen, who came with the caravan. He carried a box under his arm and did not seem greatly impressed by the excitement at the fort. The freighters were washing up for dinner, but this pale lad sat down on a water-keg, opened his box and, taking out an accordion, he began to play. He played well and seemed to lose himself in the music. Finally Clint spoke to him:
“You get a pretty smart tune out of that. Did you play much comin’ across?”
“I played all the time so I wouldn’t hear the howling redskins,” replied the musician.
Clint wished Hatcher had been present to hear that remark.
“I’m Buff Belmet,” said Clint, kindly interested. “What’s your name?”
“George,” was the mild reply.
What a queer young fellow to journey west, among savage tribes and hard
ened men!
“Where you from, George?”
“La Crosse, Wisconsin.”
“Come west alone?”
“I’m alone now.”
“Ahuh! Where’s your father an’ mother?”
“Buried—back on the trail,” replied the youth, in strange calm.
Clint sustained a shock. The new freighters, pioneers, travelers, adventurers kept coming in endless stream across the plains. He sat down beside the young fellow, deeply moved. How long ago it seemed since he was like this! But then he reflected that at twelve he was a teamster, and at the age of this boy a full-fledged Indian-fighter.
“I’m sorry, George. The frontier is a bad place. I know how you feel. Tell me about it,” said Clint.
“We had several neighbors who wanted to move to Kansas. My folks didn’t care so much to go. We were doing pretty well on the farm. But father gave in, and persuaded mother to. We loaded wagons and started. It was cold and my mother took sick. The Mississippi River was frozen over. We had to cross on the ice. I walked over, sat down on a log, and played ‘Yankee Doodle.’ The six teams started across. Ours was the last and heaviest. One of the wheels broke through the ice, and then our horses, struggling and frightened, went through too, throwing mother and father into the cold water. The other men pulled them out. Their clothes froze stiff before they got ashore where I was. We built a fire and camped there. We lost everything we owned. I had this accordion. . . . Mother died that night. They buried her up on the high bank. . . . My father took it bad—lay in the wagon—I heard him moan. . . . And he died the third day. The neighbors who had coaxed us to come left me to shift for myself at Kansas City. I did not have a cent. I played my accordion to get a bite to eat. And the freighters fetched me along.”
“Well! Well! that’s a story,” ejaculated Clint, nonplused and stirred. “Come with me to dinner, George.”
Later Clint got the lad a job in Aull’s store and tried to give him some advice, such as he had once received from Kit Carson. But George did not seem to grasp the significance of the frontier.
That night Clint sat toasting his shins before a little red camp fire. Most of the freighters were at the fort, playing, drinking, talking. The early summer night was quite cool at that altitude. Out in the dark the coyotes were yelping. A wind fanned the red embers. Clint spread his big hands to the heat. Tomorrow at sunrise he would start the caravans on the move. Why did he feel a strange portent?
A moccasined footfall broke his reverie. An Indian, wrapped in a blanket, stepped out of the shadow and squatted beside the fire. Clint greeted him with a “howdy,” and then gave him a smoke. As he leaned over he recognized the Indian as a Kiowa, called Jim Whitefish, an outcast from his tribe because of his friendship toward the whites. He it was, indeed, who in 1854 had saved the life of the noted scout and trapper, Jim Baker. Clint had heard Baker tell that story. He had saved the Indian from his companions. Jim Whitefish lived in a shack on the edge of the settlement. And Clint had never yet passed through Fort Larned without remembering Jim. Probably this trip he would not have done so, as his mind was clouded. No doubt Jim Whitefish had called to remind him of this omission. Finally Clint went to his packs and got out sugar, coffee, tobacco, and a piece of buffalo meat—something not to be obtained every day now—and set them beside the Indian.
“There you are, Jim,” he said, cheerily.
The Kiowa made an impressive gesture which indicated more than any speech that he had not called on his white friend to beg. Then Jim finished his smoke. Presently he glanced stealthily all around, his inscrutable black orbs piercing as a blade in the moonlight. His lean, sinewy hand gripped Clint’s arm.
“White friend take soldiers,” he said, in low, guttural, but coherent English, and his other lean hand pointed eastward on the trail. “Blackstone come,” and here his hand described a meeting at some place he had in mind. “Charley Bent come,” and his flexible fingers drew an imaginary line from another direction. “Heap Kiowas. All meet place of rocks.”
Whereupon the Indian rose to stalk away into the gloom.
“Jim!” called Clint, as soon as he could catch his breath. But no answer came. “By thunder!”
It was a most extraordinary proceeding. Clint was so roused over its import that he denied for the moment the wolfish leap of his blood. He had not the slightest doubt but that in those few words Jim Whitefish had saved the Belmet and Hatcher caravans from massacre. The bloody frontier held an Indian here and there who could not let a debt go unpaid. It contained thousands who would give blow for blow. But such Indians as Jim Whitefish made it hard for Clint Belmet to think of killing any Indian, except in the heat of battle, and then that was the instinct of self-preservation.
After a moment of swift thought Clint got up, and in the action his boot kicked over the sacks of sugar and coffee that Jim Whitefish had deigned not to accept. If Clint had required any more significance to impress him it was here. He hurried away toward the fort to find Hatcher. At length some freighter told him the other train boss was playing cards in Horner’s saloon. Clint went there and found him.
“Jim, come out of that,” he said, and at his tone Hatcher leaped up, and the other three gangsters sat stiff in their seats.
“What the hell?” demanded Hatcher.
“Come out of here.”
When they were outside in the dark Clint gripped the brawny arm of his comrade and whispered: “Hatcher, we’re to be ambushed at Point of Rocks. Jim Blackstone comin’ one way. Charley Bent comin’ with Kiowas from another.”
“Wal, I’m damned! Shore wondered why the fort was so full of Kiowas. Did you notice thet?”
“Yes. But they were tradin’. I bought out one Indian myself. . . . Come to think of it, though, there are lots of them.”
“Buff, you can see white cunnin’ behind this. Who tipped you off?”
“Never mind who. We’ve got the hunch. What’ll we do?”
“Go on! We can’t stop. Not for the whole damn caboodle of redskins an’ rebels.”
“I didn’t think of holdin’ up. But we might plan somethin’.”
“Let’s ask the colonel for an escort. By Gad! he’ll drop dead, but let’s do it.”
“All right. But let me do the talkin’.”
Very soon they had audience with the commandant—a Colonel Bailey—fairly new to the extreme Western frontier. He listened coolly to Clint, his cigar tipped, and then he laughed.
“What’s come over you old scouts?” he returned, with derision. “It’d be more fitting for you to escort some of my soldiers.”
“Wal, Colonel, come to think aboot it, mebbe it would,” drawled Hatcher, as he withdrew.
Outside he cursed roundly. Clint was silent. Some of the army officers were dead wheels in a caravan.
“What’ll we do?” demanded Hatcher. “Take no notice of your hunch? I’ve had one now an’ then thet was no good.”
“It’s no hunch, Jim. It’s a tip an’ you can gamble on that. . . . Let’s figure what they’re up to. . . . Point of Rocks again! Jim, you know it’s the meanest hole on the whole trail. Indian scouts can sight us from the hills when we’re a day’s travel away. They can fire-signal or smoke-signal to their outfit below.”
“Wal, forewarned is forearmed. We’ve got a tried an’ true outfit. Let’s hang over another day—ring in more men—load up with more guns an’ ammunition.”
“No. That’d give us away. We won’t tell the men till we get out to Sand Creek, first camp. Then we’ll plan to wag along as usual, till we get to Cottonwood Flat, which is the last water this side of Point of Rocks. But instead of campin’ we’ll make an all-night drive—slip up to Point of Rocks in the night instead of daylight.”
“Huh! You mean surprise them yellow hombres an’ their redskins instead of lettin’ them surprise us?”
“Yes. It’ll be a thirty-mile drive altogether, but we can do it.”
“Hard on the stock. But, Buff, I lean your way. Let’s sleep o
n it.”
For all Clint could tell, sleeping did not help matters any. In the light of day, however, no venture had the same sinister aspect imparted by the blackness and mystery of night.
At sunrise the caravans rolled out of Fort Larned precisely as upon any ordinary trip. They made eighteen miles, a fair day, during which Clint often stood up on the wagon seat to sweep the plains, especially to the rear, with Jim Couch’s field-glass, which Clint always carried. He saw buffalo, but no Indians.
After supper Clint collected his men in a single group, and without betraying the source of his information, acquainted them with the extraordinary menace attached to this particular trip.
“You all know,” he concluded, “about the wagonload of rifles an’ ammunition I fetched from Kansas City to trade to the trappers an’ hunters at Fort Larned. That was last fall. Well, I picked up what was left—about seventy-five rifles an’ five thousand rounds. These are packed in the white wagon just behind mine. I want you all to get an extra rifle an’ ammunition, an’ keep them at your hand, day an’ night.”
“Buff, we may have hell, but they can’t lick us,” spoke up Henry Wells, the oldest frontiersman among them. Several more of the freighters of long experience expressed confidence in their number and equipment. And the gunner, Ireland, swore his cannon was equal to a hundred men.
“I’ve a plan to work out regardin’ the Point of Rocks ambush,” added Clint. “Meanwhile we’ll travel slow. Save the stock. An’ let every one of you be a scout an’ guard.”
Hatcher joined Clint later and expressed satisfaction with the way his men took the menacing news.
“Buff, we’re haulin’ the most valuable load of furs thet ever left Fort Larned,” said Hatcher. “Do you reckon Blackstone an’ Charley Bent got wind of thet?”
“You can just bet on it.”
“But how?”
“Some slick Indian, or more likely one of the many white men hangin’ round the fort. I saw a score I didn’t know. Mean-faced adventurers who couldn’t look you in the eye. . . . I’m also carryin’ important mail, an’ sixty thousand dollars for Aull an’ Co.”
