Bendigo Shafter (1979) (16 page)

To preach the word of Christ, Sampson said dryly, a man should have a little forgiveness in him. I nave no doubt Mr. Morrell has had his difficulties, but so have we.

John, Cain said, I have been thinking about the north forty. Why don't we sow oats? I've seen some wild oats growing around, and I think it would do well, and well have stock to feed.

Lorna, Ruth Macken, and Helen settled down to making paper ornaments for a Christmas tree, and as Cain talked to John he worked at making nails. Opening my book, I began to read, and from time to time I would look up from Locke and listen to the soft rumble of conversation in the room, the quiet crackling of the flames, and the sound of working hands. It was an evening like many another, one of those evenings I was to treasure in the long years to come. Fortunately, I knew it then.

Reading what John Locke had to say on knowledge and judgment made me think again of Drake Morrell and our discussion with the Reverend Finnerly.

It was like the sudden flight of the bird that warned me of Stacy Follett's presence in the brush. I did not know for a certainty that anything was there. On the evidence of the bird's sudden flight I merely presumed it a possibility. With Drake Morrell we had only his present conduct and his risking his life to aid two children by which to judge him, so I would accept him as the kind of man he appeared to be while reserving judgment until there was more evidence.

Looking up again from my book, I watched those in the room with me and was lonely within myself, for there was in me a great reaching outward, a desire to be and to become. I looked upon Cain and John Sampson and thought of Ethan Sackett, each in his own way a man, and a complete man, or so it seemed.

Ethan was the hunter and the mountain man, as much a part of the mountains and the wilderness as any wolf, beaver, or deer. My brother Cain, the master craftsman, turning the steel in his hand, striking surely and honestly, and when the striking was finished he would have created a tool. And John Sampson, a kindly man, secure within himself, a God-fearing man who was tolerant, forgiving, yet strong. And I?

I had been given certain flesh and certain brains susceptible of shaping, and the shaping was mine to do. Of course, I would be influenced by heredity, by the world in which I lived, and by the contacts, abrasive or otherwise, but still and all, the shaping was in my hands.

What kind of man was I to be? What sort of thing must I do to become that man?

Chapter
13

Christmas Eve was clear and cold. There had been a light snow earlier in the day, covering some of the bare places left by the chinook or blown away by the winds.

The Reverend Moses Finnerly and his two friends had turned to, and with help from Neely Stuart had built a half-dugout cabin in the side of a knoll not far from the town.

Ethan, Webb, and I had put in a lot of time hunting, and had brought in meat for the Christmas tables. Ollie Trotter proved a good hunter, too, and brought in an elk and a deer. So there was meat in plenty for the holiday.

Working every moment we could spare, Cain, Sampson, and I had roofed the mill, added a big fireplace, and we would use it for meetings, socials, and such until spring came when the mill went into operation, and we could afford to build a school. The school would be the church, too, until we could build one.

Drake Morrell took part in everything. He worked with us on the mill, trimming logs of their branches, stacking brush, and gathering firewood so we who were good with tools could work

Shortly after the Reverend Finnerly arrived, I mentioned him to Morrell. He gave me a kind of amused look. I am not surprised that he doesn't like me, and he has reason.

What happened?

He shrugged. You haven't seen it yet, Bendigo, but sometimes I take a drink too much, and when I do I am apt to be unpleasant. Oh, I don't mean violent! Nothing like that. But sarcastic sometimes, and inclined to prick balloons that are better left to float away.

Moses Finnerly, he added, is everything I don't like. He is to my thinking narrow, bigoted, and basically mean. He puts on a pious manner, preaches a kind of so-called Christianity with which I have never been in sympathy.

He's a gospel shouter of the fire-and-brimstone school. Everybody is hell-bound but him, and their only chance of being saved is by him.

Well, that was my opinion, too, but I didn't say so. I just asked, What about Pappin and Trotter?

Ollie Trotter? He's a bad man. Finnerly got him away from a lynch mob so he stays with him. He's a dry-gulching murderer, a horse thief, and a troublemaker. He's good with a gun, but you'll wait a long time before he faces anybody with one.

Since Finnerly saved his neck he claims to be a changed man, but I don't believe it. Not for one minute.

Pappin is the smartest one of the lot. He passes the collection plate when they have meetings and always has his eye out for the main chance.

The three of them have been run out of a half dozen camps. They start by preaching, end by trying to rule, and you can be sure they'll try it here, too.

Finnerly doesn't like me because I started questioning him about religion.

I didn't know you were a religious man.

I'm not. At least I don't fit into the usual pattern. When I was a child I studied the Bible with a very fine man. He was a truly great scholar who read Hebrew and Greek or Latin better than I do English, and he enjoyed reading and discussing the Bible. We were much together, and I learned a lot ... without really wanting to, at that age.

Men like Finnerly irritate me, but when I am sober I am tolerant. I know it is better to ignore them as long as one can. Unhappily, when I have a drink there is a devil in me that makes me want to prick the balloon of their assumed righteousness.

Well, he won't stay long. That's one thing.

Don't you believe it. Finnerly will stay if he can. West of here he got into too much trouble. They'll stay if they can.

Later, talking to Cain and John Sampson, I repeated what Morrell had said.

Sampson said, All that may very well be, but they shall have their chance. It is simple justice. And so far, although their views are not mine, they have conducted themselves well enough.

A week before Christmas, Drake Morrell disappeared. He had been gone for three days before we realized it, but when I mentioned it to Ruth Macken she said, He stopped by on his way out and asked if Bud would take care of his cabin, so Bud has been sleeping over there and loving it.

On that clear, cold Christmas Eve, Drake Morrell returned, leading two pack horses. He had ridden all the way to Fort Bridger and its trading post, and only then did we discover that he had ordered, weeks before, presents for the lot of us from Salt Lake.

Cain had built a roaring fire in the mill, and we gathered there for the services, and without allowing Moses Finnerly any opportunity to take charge, John Sampson quietly took over. He had conducted prayer meetings back in the States, and on the wagon train west he had usually taken charge and conducted services naturally and easily.

He was a fine-looking man with white hair, and he spoke easily and with sincerity. We had come to find comfort in his words; he was truly a good man, and they were few enough, here or elsewhere.

Finnerly did not like it. Sitting behind him I could see him fidgeting, wishful to take over and conduct the meeting himself. We had talked among us, and we did not want a meeting of brimstone and fire and somebody calling down the anger of the Lord upon us for our sins. We wanted a meeting of thankfulness and gladness, for we were lucky to have survived so far.

We sang the old hymns and some songs that were only loved and were not religious, and Ninon sang Home, Sweet Home again for us. We went to our homes happy and awaiting Christmas morning.

As the others were bedding down, I walked to the stable to see how the animals were faring and to listen into the night. I saw nothing and heard nothing, yet there was an uneasiness upon me. We had met our difficulties and faced them down, and the price of our success had been vigilance. Walking out from the town, I climbed the hill to look around, and far off saw a glint of something that might have been fire.

I waited a moment, then looked again. Hie light was still there, and it must be a fire.

What would a fire be doing in such a place, on such a night? It was not a good place to camp, if my memory served me, but the fire might be further off than I believed.

After a moment, I walked back to our town. Already the light was out in Cain's house but I needed my rifle. I tiptoed to the door, opening it softly. There was a rush of warm air ... the fire had been banked, only a few tendrils of flame wove a weird dance among the shadows on the wall.

What is it, Bendigo? Lorna sat up, whispering to me. There's a fire ... it's far out, toward the plains.

A campfire?

It's in no good place for a camp. I paused, thinking it over. It might be a signal.

Who'd be out there?

I grinned at her in the half-light. Santa Claus. Maybe one of his reindeer broke a leg.

Be serious. She got up and came to me in her nightgown. Bendigo, can I go with you?

Who's going anywhere?

You are. I can tell.

It's no place for a girl. We don't know what's down there ... it might be a trap.

The thought had not occurred to me before, but now it did, a way to lure a few of us away into what might be just that. Yet it was near the trail, and it might be some woebegone traveler, and this was Christmas Eve.

I pulled off my boots, I wanted moccasins for this. A man makes less noise in them.

When I stood up, Lorna was half-dressed. I'm coming, Bendigo. Now you wait.

Well, why not? I was a damned fool to take her but she was a good shot with a rifle, and I might need somebody to stand off and cover me. Still, I didn't like it.

She bundled up in a hurry and was ready to go before I was. We slipped out, but before I left I scratched out a little note for Cain and Helen, just in case. It was still and cold. The stars hung low in the sky, and the snow sparkled with a million tiny flecks of diamond. We went to the barn for horses, and I almost heard them groan as I reached for a saddle.

Hurriedly, we saddled up, and again Lorna was ready almost as soon as I was. She had brought her rifle, and she led her horse out and got into the saddle. I was riding the buckskin we had taken from the renegades at the time of their raid.

Lorna was excited. Bendigo? What do you think it is?

Might be a trap, I repeated, and it might be somebody hurt and in trouble. We'll not ride right straight up to that fire. You come along easy, now.

We rode out of the town and into the scattered trees along the bench, then, holding to partial cover of trees and brush, we rode toward the fire. Several times I paused to study the area, but could see no movement ... only the fire, whose size seemed to grow less as we rode nearer. Perhaps from lack of fuel.

The trees grew fewer, cover less. It was harder to keep out of sight, and still nothing stirred. And then we saw something we had not seen before ... a black spot on the snow some fifty yards from the fire.

It's a horse, Bendigo, Lorna said. I am sure it's a horse.

Then there's a rider close by. It's a cinch that horse didn't build the fire.

We walked our horses closer, circling wide. It was a horse, all right, and there was a man ... or his body ... lying near the fire.

It looked like whoever it was had set fire to a low-growing bush of some kind to get a fire started. It must have flared up about the time we saw it, and then as it died down he had fed sticks into it.

Sometimes dried leaves and broken twigs will pile up under a bush like that, and in an emergency a man might get something going when he had no strength to rustle materials to build a fire properly.

Better warm your hands, I said, but go easy. We don't want to shoot anybody lest we have to.

Shoving my own rifle down in its scabbard, I drew a pistol and walked my horse closer and closer.

The man lay still, unconscious or sleeping. I could see where he had crawled from his horse toward the creek, his trail plain enough in the sprinkling of snow. His fire was doing him little good now, as he was lying on the frozen ground. Most of the snow had been melted or blown from the spot where he lay, and he had evidently passed out trying to get to a deadfall for more fuel.

I got down from my horse and walked the last few yards.

It was an Indian, and he had a broken leg.

Keeping an eye on him, I fed some sticks into the fire, then called to Lorna.

My movements or the call brought him out of it. He pushed himself up to arm's length and turned to look at me, and I knew that face.

It was a face I'd not soon forget. It was the young warrior who had wanted to keep Mae Stuart and kill young Lenny Sampson.

He grabbed for his rifle and I kicked it out of his hands. You better forget that, I said, you're in bad shape.

There was blood on the front of his quilled hunting shirt, too, so he'd been shot.

And then I saw why.