A Big Sky Christmas (23 page)

Even though the encounter with the Indians hadn't resulted in any fighting, the immigrants were more nervous as the wagon train continued on its way. It took a week for them to stop looking over their shoulders and expecting to see painted, war bonneted savages intent on scalping them.

Of course, the more prudent among them continued being watchful as the wagons rolled northward, but that was a good thing. The more alert they were, the better, Jamie thought.

They reached the Platte River and crossed the broad, shallow, muddy stream without incident. From there, the route diverged from the Oregon Trail, which headed west toward South Pass. The wagon train would keep going north for several more weeks.

They spotted their first buffalo herd a few days later. Jamie had expected to run across the shaggy beasts much earlier. The great herds always moved south for the winter, but other than that one cold blast, the weather had been unseasonably warm.

“Good Lord,” Bodie exclaimed as he and Jamie reined in atop a ridge and looked at the vast sea of brown in front of them. The herd stretched as far as the eye could see.

Jamie grinned and rested his crossed hands on the saddle horn, shifting his weight forward to ease weary muscles. “You haven't seen buffalo before?”

“Well, yeah, of course I've seen them,” the young man replied. “But never that many in one place. There must be a million of them!”

“I wouldn't doubt it. Maybe more than that. I've seen herds go by all day, all night, and all the next day before they finally got out of the way.”

“We're going to have to stop and wait for this one to go past, aren't we?”

Jamie took a pair of field glasses from one of his saddlebags and studied the herd. “They're moving southeast. They'll miss us and ought to be out of our way by tomorrow.”

With a worried tone in his voice, Bodie asked, “What if they were to turn and stampede toward the wagon train?”

“It wouldn't be good,” Jamie replied. “A buffalo stampede is just as much a force of nature as floods, fire, and cyclones. Every bit as destructive, too. You can't stop it, so you just have to get out of its way if you can.”

The big frontiersman turned in his saddle to look behind them. “The wagons are about a mile back. Go tell the cap'n to stop right where he is and don't come any closer. Teams stay hitched to the wagons until those critters are clear of us, in case we have to light a shuck and make a run for it. I'll stay here and keep an eye on the buffalo for now. We'll have scouts watching them all the time, just in case something makes them turn toward the wagons. We'll need as much warning as possible if that happens.”

Bodie nodded, wheeled his horse, and galloped away.

Jamie turned his attention back to the buffalo. He had hunted the creatures many times, sometimes with his Indian friends using lances and bows and arrows, sometimes with groups of white hunters armed with Sharps rifles.

Even though the sight of a herd like this made it seem as if the buffalo were endless, Jamie knew that wasn't the case. Many of them had been killed already for meat to feed the crews building the transcontinental railroad several years earlier.

They continued to be slaughtered for their hides. Back in southern Kansas, Jamie had seen stacks of those hides piled so high that they looked like shaggy brown hills. It was wasteful and shameful, the unknowable number of carcasses skinned and left to rot, their bones littering the plains. The Indians, at least, used every bit of the buffalo, instead of just taking one part and throwing away the rest.

It was such slaughter, he mused, that would spell defeat for the natives in the end. Without the animals they had depended upon to feed and clothe and shelter them for centuries, they would have no choice but to turn to their white conquerors and change their entire way of life.

Jamie believed in manifest destiny, but at the same time he could share a moment of sympathy for those swept aside in the inexorable tide of progress.

The enormous buffalo herd moved on without menacing the wagon train, and as Jamie had predicted, by the middle of the next day the route was clear again. But they had lost a day to the delay, and with December almost upon them, every day was becoming more and more crucial.

A couple days later, they saw something unexpected: cattle. Not wild cattle, but what appeared to be well-grazed stock with wide, spreading horns.

“Dadgum it!” Jake exclaimed when he saw them. “Those are Texas longhorns. I've seen 'em down in Kansas at the railheads. What are they doing up here?” He and Bodie and Jamie were scouting ahead of the wagon train.

Jamie said, “Some of the ranchers from Texas are moving their herds up here and starting spreads. I've heard tell there are even some in Wyoming and Montana. I'm a little surprised we haven't run across any before now.”

“I guess it makes sense,” Bodie said. “There's plenty of grassland up here. That's about all there is, in fact.”

“Since the farmers haven't gotten this far west yet, it's all open range. I expect that'll change one of these days, but for now this is some of the best ranching country in the world . . . if you don't count the Indians and the blizzards, of course. But you've got problems like that wherever you go, I reckon.”

“Those are some fine-looking beef cows,” Jake mused as he studied the grazing animals.

“Don't get any ideas in your head,” Jamie said sharply. “If we slaughter any of those critters for meat, we'll buy them from their owners first. There won't be any rustling.”

“Never said there would be,” Jake replied.

Jamie had a hunch that was what had been in the young man's mind, though. His instincts had told him all along that Jake Lucas wasn't the same sort of upstanding young hombre as Bodie Cantrell, even though the two of them were friends.

Where there were cows, there were cowboys, and later that afternoon Jamie spotted riders coming toward them. He reined in and motioned for his companions to follow suit. A few minutes later the horsemen rode up, their chaps and big hats telling him that they were from Texas as he had suspected.

“Howdy,” one of the men called. “Mind if we ask what you fellas are doin' riding on Slash M range?”

“That's where we are?” Jamie asked.

“Have been for the past five miles,” the puncher replied. “This is Mr. Owen Murdock's spread. I'm Jim Haseltine, his foreman.”

“Jamie Ian MacCallister.” Jamie nodded. He leaned his head toward the other two and added, “Bodie Cantrell and Jake Lucas. We're scouting for a wagon train that's coming up about a mile behind us.”

One of the other cowboys, a lean man with a dark, hawklike face, leaned to the side and spat. “Wagon train,” he repeated scornfully. “That means a bunch of damn sodbusters. You better not be intendin' to stay on Slash M range, mister. You'll get a hot lead welcome if you do.”

Anger darkened Jake's face.

Jamie knew the young man was a hothead, so he snapped, “Take it easy. I'm handling the talking here.”

He turned back to the cowboys. “I'm not going to argue the idea of open range with you. As a matter of fact, the people with those wagons are bound for Montana Territory, so they shouldn't be any concern to you boys at all. We'll just pass through and go on our way.”

Jim Haseltine had a speculative look on his face. “Seems like I've heard of you, Mr. MacCallister. You wouldn't be the one who tangled with the Miles Nelson gang, would you?”

“That was me,” Jamie said heavily, recalling the bloody months he had spent avenging his wife's murder.

“Doss, don't go makin' threats against this man,” Haseltine said to the hawk-faced cowboy. “He chews up and spits out two-bit pistoleers like you.”

Doss exclaimed, “By God, Haseltine, you can't talk to me like that!”

“I just did,” Haseltine said coldly. “You can draw down on me if you want. I know you're faster than me. But I don't reckon you'll last long if you do.”

“You've just been lookin' for an excuse to run me off.”

“I don't need an excuse other than bein' sick and tired of you. Go back to the ranch and draw your pay. You're done on the Slash M.”

For a moment Jamie thought Doss was going to slap leather, but the man jerked his horse around and galloped off.

“Looks like we caused you some trouble after all,” Jamie said to Haseltine.

The ranch foreman shook his head. “No, that's been buildin' up for a while. I just got tired of that hombre's blusterin' around all the time. Maybe he's right and I was lookin' for an excuse to tell him to rattle his hocks.”

“Is he fast on the draw?” Jake asked.

“Fast enough to have killed three men in fair fights,” Haseltine answered. “Fast enough to get a swelled head and make a blasted nuisance of himself.” He changed the subject. “You need any help gettin' through our range, Mr. MacCallister?”

“You don't have any of it fenced off, do you?”

Haseltine made a face like he had just bitten into a rotten apple. “You won't find any fences within five hundred miles of here, Mr. MacCallister. And that's just the way we like it in these parts.”

You'd better enjoy it while you can, Jamie thought, because it won't last. “Then I reckon we'll be fine. Obliged for the offer, though. We might cut out one of these steers and butcher it, if you'll tell me what price your boss would want for it.”

“Don't worry about that,” Haseltine said. “We can spare one of the critters. And the boss'll back me up on that.”

Jamie nodded again. “Obliged.” He lifted a hand in a wave of farewell as the cowboys rode on.

“Tough-looking bunch,” Bodie commented.

“Texas cowboys,” Jamie said. “They're tough, all right. Let's take Haseltine up on his offer and cut out one of these steers.”

“Steaks tonight!” Jake said with a grin.

The fresh meat lifted the spirits of the immigrants, even though longhorns tended to be a little tough and stringy. The wagons had been on the trail for a long time, and sometimes it seemed like Montana was still as far off as it had been when they started.

Jamie knew they had made good progress, but there was still a long way to go.

He was standing beside Moses's wagon that evening, sipping from a cup of coffee, when he heard hoofbeats approaching the circle of wagons. He set the cup on the lowered tailgate and turned toward the sound.

The horse came to a stop, and as Jamie walked toward the gap between two of the wagons, a tall, lean figure appeared in it. The cowboy called Doss stepped into the glow from several nearby campfires. When he spotted Jamie coming toward him, he stiffened and his hands curled into claws poised above the black butts of the Colts holstered on his hips, ready to hook and draw.

“There you are!” he called. “They tell me you're one of the big he-wolf gunfighters, MacCallister! Well, I'm here to call you out!”

And with that, his hands streaked for the revolvers.

There were too many people around. A group of women stood a few yards behind Jamie, talking. Off to his right several kids were chasing each other around, and one of the big yellow mutts that accompanied the wagon train ran after them, barking. It was a peaceful scene. A stray bullet could alter it suddenly, tragically, and irrevocably.

There was no time to do anything except kill the troublemaker.

Faster than the eye could follow, Jamie's big hands swept down and back up. Even though Doss had already cleared leather before Jamie started his draw, the man never got a shot off. Jamie's Colts crashed, the two shots coming so close together they sounded like one.

The pair of .44 slugs punched into Doss's chest and drove him backward. The back of his calves struck a lowered wagon tongue, and he flipped over it. His guns finally roared as his fingers contracted in death spasms, the shots going harmlessly into the heavens. Doss thudded onto his back and his arms fell out loosely to the sides.

He didn't move again. One of Jamie's bullets had ripped through a lung. The other had pulped his heart. He was already dead when he hit the ground.

The chatter that had filled the camp a couple seconds earlier stopped short, leaving a stunned silence. As the echoes of the shots rolled away, the silence was broken by shouted questions and running footsteps.

Jamie holstered the left-hand Colt and began reloading the expended chamber in the other revolver. Bodie Cantrell, Hector Gilworth, and Jess Neville came pounding up to him with their own guns out and ready.

Bodie asked, “Jamie, are you all right? What happened?”

Jamie leaned his head toward the fallen gunman, whose legs were still visible hanging over the wagon tongue. “That fella Doss came looking for me, I guess he figured he'd add to his reputation by killing me.” Jamie paused. “It didn't work out for him.”

Hector took a lantern from one of the settlers who had come to investigate the shooting and carried it over to shine its light on the dead man. “It sure didn't. Looks like you drilled him dead center twice, Jamie.”

“And the man already had his guns out before Jamie drew,” Moses added, having joined the group, too. “I saw the whole thing. It was amazing.”

Jamie leathered the right-hand gun and set about replacing the spent cartridge in the other weapon. He turned his head to listen as he picked up the sound of more horses coming toward the wagon train. “I don't know if Doss had any friends, but just in case he did, all these kids and womenfolks ought to get inside where it's safer.”

Moses and several of the men hurried to spread the word and hustle the women and children into cover. Jamie, Bodie, Hector, and Jess moved to get ready for whoever was galloping toward the wagons. Jake Lucas, Clete Mahaffey, and Dave Pearsoll hurried up as well, and Jamie waved them into position around one of the wagons. They were a formidable group and if the night riders were looking for a fight, they would get it.

Instead, the hoofbeats stopped, and a man's voice called, “Hello, the camp! Hold your fire! We're friends!”

Jamie grunted as he recognized the voice. “That's Jim Haseltine, the Slash M ramrod.” He raised his voice. “Come on in, Haseltine, unless you're hunting trouble!”

“No trouble,” Haseltine replied. The man walked his horse forward into the light, trailed by several more members of Owen Murdock's crew. “In fact, we came to warn you. That varmint Doss may come looking for you, Mr. MacCallister. There's a trading post a few miles west of here, and Doss was there earlier tonight gettin' liquored up. He was bragging about how he was gonna find you and kill you, and to warm up for it he shot one of my men who tried to talk some sense into his head.”

“Kill him?” Jamie asked curtly.

“No, thank the Lord. Just wounded him.”

“Well, Doss won't shoot anybody else.” Jamie holstered his guns and pointed. “You want to bury him, or should we take care of the chore?”

Haseltine swung down from his saddle, walked over to where Doss's body lay, and looked down at it. He let out a low whistle of admiration. “He's got his guns in his hands. I hate to admit it, but he was mighty fast. I guess he ran up against somebody faster, though.”

“There's always somebody faster,” Jamie said. “About planting him . . . ?”

“We'll do it. Shoot, we owe you that much. He was always causing trouble. I'm sorry he came here and caused more.”

“Not your fault,” Jamie said with a shrug.

“Maybe not, but I hope the rest of your time on the Slash M is a mite more peaceful.”

A short time later, the Texas cowboys rode off, taking Doss's body with them, draped over the saddle of his horse. The commotion caused by the gunfight settled down quickly. The immigrants knew that come morning, Jamie would have them up before first light, getting ready to push on toward their destination.

 

 

A chilly rain started a couple days later. There was no wind, so it came straight down from a leaden sky, steady but not hard enough to turn the landscape into a quagmire. The wagons were able to continue their journey, although the rain made everyone cold, wet, and miserable.

The sickness started a couple days after that.

Some of the immigrants had been sick at times, but none seriously. As the rain continued to fall, fever raged through the train with little warning. So many people were ill, Jamie knew there was no choice but to stop until the outbreak ran its course.

Around the clock, the sound of the constant drizzle was punctuated by coughing, wheezing, and gagging from half the wagons. Those fortunate enough not to catch the sickness stayed well away from those who had fallen ill . . . with a few notable exceptions.

Moses Danzig seemed to be everywhere at once, doing whatever he could to comfort the afflicted and nurse them back to health. As he explained to Jamie, “For a while back in Poland, when I was younger, I thought I might become a doctor. I even had a little medical training before I accepted the calling to attend rabbinical school. Unfortunately, there's not much even a real doctor could do for these poor people. I just keep them as comfortable as I can and try to help them let their own bodies fight the sickness.”

A lot of the time, Savannah McCoy was at Moses's side, helping him despite Bodie's objections. Bodie just wanted her to be safe and not come down with the fever herself, so he urged her to avoid those who were sick.

“I can't do that, Bodie,” she told him. “These people . . . they took me in when I had nowhere else to go. They protected me, gave me a new home.” She smiled sadly. “Why do you think I haven't gone back to the troupe? When we left Kansas City, I didn't plan to stay with the wagon train all the way to Montana Territory, you know.”

“I know,” he said softly as they stood under a canvas cover rigged at the back of the Bingham wagon and watched the rain fall.

“I couldn't leave. I waited until I thought enough time had passed that it might be safe, but by then . . . I just couldn't. I love Edward and Leticia. They're almost like a second set of parents to me. And I've made so many other good friends, like Moses and Mr. MacCallister and the Bradford twins. Alexander and Abigail had been spending a lot of time with me before this rain started, you know, even though they had to sneak away from their father to do it.”

Bodie's jaw tightened at the mention of Reverend Thomas Bradford. “Do you know what I heard that so-called preacher saying yesterday?”

“I don't have any idea,” Savannah replied. “I think he's capable of saying almost anything.”

“He said the rain, and folks falling sick from it, were because we'd offended God by harboring too many sinners among us.”

“I'm sure that as an actress I'm one of those sinners he was talking about.”

“That's crazy!” Bodie exclaimed. “You're about the best person I've ever known, Savannah. The way you and Moses have tried to take care of everybody—”

“Reverend Bradford probably thinks that Moses being here is another reason the wagon train is being punished.”

“Let him think whatever dang fool thing he wants. All I really care about is you taking care of yourself, Savannah. If anything happened to you . . . if you got sick and . . . and . . . I don't know how I'd stand it.” Bodie reached out, drew her into his arms, and cradled her against him.

She rested her head on his chest and sighed. The two of them clung to each other in the gloom as the rain continued to drizzle down.

 

 

Four people—two children, a man, and a woman—died during the outbreak of fever. Considering the number of immigrants who had fallen ill, Jamie was surprised the death toll wasn't higher. As he told Moses, “I figure it would have been a lot worse if not for what you and Savannah did.”

“I just tried to help,” Moses replied with a shake of his head, “and so did a lot of other people. Not just Savannah. Bodie pitched in, and Hector and Jess and so many others. We're past the worst of it now, I think. People are on the mend again. Another few days and we might be able to travel again. That is, if this blasted rain will ever stop.”

The rain did stop. And the wagon train moved on, leaving four new graves behind it.

Christmas was less than a month away.