A Big Sky Christmas (4 page)

Jamie didn't know whether to laugh or let out a disgusted snort, but he did neither. “I told you, Moses, I'm not looking for work.”

“I'll wager that you've guided wagon trains before, though, haven't you?”

Jamie's broad shoulders rose and fell in a shrug. As a matter of fact, he
had
guided several wagon trains to where they were going, but that didn't mean he wanted to do it again, especially under these circumstances.

“And you know the country,” Moses went on. “You told Mr. Ralston you'd been up there.”

“I've been to Montana Territory,” Jamie admitted. “Where are the homesteads you people are claiming?”

“They're in a place called Eagle Valley. Do you know it?”

Jamie frowned slightly. “I know it, all right. It's a beautiful little valley with plenty of decent land for farms and ranches. The last time I was there, though, it was covered with buffalo. The Sioux and the Blackfeet considered it part of their hunting grounds and fought over it now and then.”

“Mr. Hendricks was assured that the Indians in the area had been pacified.”

Jamie snorted disgustedly. “Who's this fella Hendricks?”

“The captain of the wagon train. His name is Lamar Hendricks.”

Jamie knew that wagon train captain was an elected position, making Hendricks the leader of the immigrants, but it was a title without much real power. The wagon master was really the one in charge.

And this bunch didn't have one, since, as Moses had correctly pointed out, Jamie had broken the son of a gun's leg.

“Who told Hendricks the Indians weren't a threat?”

“Someone with the government. The Bureau of Indian Affairs, I believe. I don't really know the details.”

That answer didn't surprise Jamie. There must be something in the water in Washington, D.C., that made all those bureaucrats think they knew better about everything than everybody else. Darned fools was what they really were.

“I wouldn't go so far as to say that the Indians are pacified. From what I hear, there hasn't been much trouble up there lately, but that's because the big buffalo herds have moved north into Canada and most of the bands have followed them. They could come back any time, and then it's liable to start all over again.”

“Captain Hendricks and his people just want to live peacefully. I'm sure they'll make every effort to get along with the Indians.”

Jamie didn't say anything in response to that. All across the frontier, settlers had risked their lives moving into areas where the Indians didn't want them. Running such risks was just part of being a pioneer. The choice was up to them.

He was curious about something else, though. “You mentioned Hendricks and his people. Aren't you one of 'em?”

Moses smiled and pushed his spectacles up on his nose. “Not really. I'm just traveling with their wagon train, and they agreed to let me stay with them in Eagle Valley until the spring. But when winter's done I'll be moving on to Oregon. I'm supposed to take over a synagogue in Portland.”

“That's like a Hebrew church, isn't it?”

“That's right. I'm a rabbi.”

Jamie grunted. “First one I've ever met, I reckon. I figured you were a farmer like most homesteaders are.”

“I am. It's just the crop I help to cultivate consists of people's souls. It's a calling that I've followed all the way from my home in Poland.”

“From Poland all the way to the American frontier. That's quite a journey.”

“And it's not finished yet,” Moses said quietly. “But I need your help to get where I'm going, Mr. MacCallister. All of us with the wagon train do.”

“Eagle Valley, eh?” Jamie mused.

“Yes. If you could find it in your heart to at least talk to Mr. Hendricks and meet the others . . .”

“Well, I suppose that wouldn't hurt anything.” Even as he said it, Jamie wondered if he was making a big mistake. He wasn't the sort of man to brood over such things, though, so he put that uncertainty out of his mind. All he'd agreed to do was talk to Lamar Hendricks. He could try to convince Hendricks that it would be best to lay over in Kansas City until the spring. By then, they ought to be able to find another wagon master.

Shoot, if it came right down to it, he could help those pilgrims out with enough money to tide them over. He'd never miss it. As long as he had enough for food and ammunition and a few other supplies, that was all he needed while he was on the drift.

Moses had a big grin on his face. “That's wonderful, Mr. MacCallister. Come with me and I'll introduce you. You'll stay for supper and get to know everyone. You'll see what a fine group it is.”

“I need to fetch my horses first and find a livery stable for them.”

“Bring them with you,” Moses suggested. “You can put them in with our livestock. I'm sure you'd all be welcome to spend the night.”

“You're bound and determined to rope me into this, aren't you?”

“It just seems like such a fitting solution. I mean, since you're the one responsible for Mr. Ralston's injury—”

“He brought that on himself,” Jamie said.

“I know, I know. I'm just saying that everything works out for a reason. Like tonight, when Captain Hendricks asked me to look for Mr. Ralston and I had a feeling I'd find him in that saloon—”

“I was wondering what you were doing there.”

“I was looking for the man who's going to lead us to the promised land.” Moses chuckled. “And I think I found him, just not the one I intended.”

As they started walking along the street, Jamie scowled. “If I remember right from reading the Good Book, it was an hombre named Moses who led the Israelites to the promised land. Maybe your name is the Lord's way of saying that
you
should have the job.”

“Me?” Moses said with a squeak in his voice. “The biblical Moses took the Israelites to Canaan, all right, but he never set foot in it himself. All he could do was look across the River Jordan at it and see that it was good.” A worried note came into his voice. “Do you think that's a bad omen for me, Mr. MacCallister? That I'll make it to Montana but never set foot in Eagle Valley?”

Jamie didn't know how to answer that. His ideas of faith and spirituality came more from the Indians than from any of the so-called organized religions.

He slapped a big hand against Moses's back hard enough to make the smaller man stumble a little. “Don't worry about that. For now, let's try to figure out the best way to get there.”

“Does that mean—”

Jamie shrugged. “It means I'll talk to those folks and think about it.”

Inside the Bella Royale Saloon, people were still talking about the brutal fight between Jeb Ralston and Jamie Ian MacCallister. It wasn't every day folks got to see a brawl involving a legendary frontiersman like MacCallister who was known from one end of the West to the other. It was something many of them would tell their grandchildren about.

Eldon Swint didn't seem too impressed. He sat at one of the tables with several of his men, a bottle and glass in front of him. He filled his glass again, then leaned back in a chair and stretched out his long legs. “People talk about that fella MacCallister like he was Davy Crockett and Jim Bowie and Kit Carson all rolled into one. He didn't look so dang special to me. Just another old man who ain't had the sense to die yet.” Swint downed the drink and licked his lips.

“You must be joshin', boss,” Three-Finger Jake Lucas said. He was a handsome young man with a quick, cocky grin and a full head of brown hair under his tipped back hat. The last two fingers of his left hand were gone, pinched off cleanly when he got them trapped between his rope and saddle horn as he took a dally to stop a runaway steer during a drive up the trail from Texas. It was a mistake many cowboys had made, which was why many of them were missing a finger or two.

Jake had taken the accident hard. It had embittered him, and when the herd he was with reached Abilene and the Texas crew started home, Jake hadn't gone with them. He had stayed in Abilene, spent all his wages on a monumental drunk, and vowed never to return home in his mutilated state.

In the four years since then, he had fallen in with bad company, as they say. His best friend Bodie Cantrell knew that . . . because he was a member of that so-called bad company himself.

Bodie was sitting at the table with Swint, Jake, and three other men, all of them drinking heavily. Bodie had a pretty fuzzy glow going from the liquor. He didn't like to get drunk as much as some of his companions did, but from time to time he gave in to the urge, anyway. The whiskey usually helped him forget what had happened in Kansas a couple weeks earlier.

It wasn't helping so much that night.

 

 

“
It's just a little flag stop out in the middle of nowhere,” Eldon Swint said. “There's only one man on duty at night. He's the telegrapher, ticket agent, and baggage clerk, all in one. When we throw down on him, he'll put that flag up, you can bet a hat on that.”

Swint's
haw-haw
of laughter made Bodie's guts clench. He was well aware that he wasn't riding with a bunch of choir boys, but Eldon Swint making a joke out of cold-blooded murder rubbed him the wrong way.