Crow Creek Crossing (7 page)

He surprised himself by falling asleep soon after making his camp, waking only after the first rays of sunshine began infiltrating the mist rising from the river. Startled as he was by the fact that he had slept through the remainder of the night, his automatic reaction upon opening his eyes was to reach for his rifle to defend himself. His sudden move was met with bored indifference on the part of Joe, as the Morgan and the buckskin grazed peacefully on the riverbank. When there appeared to be no cause for urgency on his part, Cole decided to rekindle the fire and make some coffee.

When he had finished his coffee, he saddled the horses and rode back up the river to the site of the execution. Just as he had suspected, Smiley was only a few yards from where he had left him, no doubt having tried to crawl away from the spot. His corpse stared up at Cole in eternal agony, evidence of his final hours. With no feelings of compassion or conscience, Cole relieved the body of its gun belt and searched its clothing for anything he might have use for. The decision to be made now was whether or not to go upriver or down in hopes of finding Lem Dawson's trading
post.

Two entire days were wasted riding up and down the river, upstream on the first day, then downstream on the second. There was no trading post to be found, and he had to conclude that if Lem Dawson's place was on this river, then it had to be a hell of a way from the crossing where he now stood. Bitter frustration threatened to overcome him, because there was no reasonable way to decide which way to go, and no certainty that the trading post was even on this river. Maybe he hadn't gone far enough north. Maybe Dawson's store was on the Platte. That would make more sense, if the man was looking for more trade. There would be a lot more travelers on the Platte.

Reluctant to start out in the wrong direction, he decided to camp where he was, even though there were still a couple of hours of daylight left. So he unsaddled the horses and gathered wood for a fire. When his stomach suddenly reminded him that he
had forgotten to eat again, he unwrapped the major portion of the antelope haunch, which was all that was left of his kill. He had packed it in a sack filled with snow to keep it fresh, so he hoped it hadn't spoiled.

If it has,
he thought,
it'll just come back up and I'll have an empty stomach again, no worse off than I am now.
With that in mind, he fashioned a leaning spit out of green cottonwood branches to roast it over the fire.

•   •   •

He had no idea how long he had sat there by the fire, his mind lost in his loneliness for his wife. Somewhere in the darkness of the prairie, he heard the howl of a coyote, and it caused him to realize that he had become a relentless hunter as well. It was a role he had never wished to play, but driven by his grief, his every thought seemed to be a desire to kill.

“Hello the camp! Mind if I come in?”

Abruptly shaken from his trance, Cole dropped the strip of antelope he had been eating, grabbed his rifle, and rolled away from the firelight. He had been taken completely by surprise. There had not been a sound to alert him that he had company, not so much as a nicker from the horses. The voice had come from the stand of trees close to the riverbank, but as yet, he could not see anyone in the fading evening light. “Come on out where I can see you,” he yelled back, his Henry trained on the spot where he had heard the voice.

“You ain't aimin' to shoot me, are ya?”

“Not if you're peaceable,” Cole answered, surprised again when this time the voice came from another spot in the trees, close to the horses.

“I'm peaceable,” the man said, and stepped out from behind a cottonwood.

“Then come on in,” Cole said, still holding his rifle ready to fire.

Cole watched as his surprise guest approached the fire. A short stump of a man, he strode easily toward him on a pair of legs bowed as if they had been formed around a barrel. Clothed in animal skins from head to toe, he might have been mistaken for an Indian were it not for the heavy gray beard covering most of an elfish face burned red by the sun.

“Good evenin' to ya, friend,” the man said. “I caught the smell of that meat roastin' when I come up the river just now. Thought I'd best see who was doin' the cookin'. I almost run up on a Sioux huntin' party a ways up the river, and they ain't been too friendly lately.”

“You're welcome to share some of this antelope,” Cole offered. “This haunch is all I've got left, but it's more'n enough for both of us.”

“Why, thank you kindly,” he said. “My name's Harley Branch. Don't reckon you've got any coffee, have you? I ain't had no coffee in quite a spell.”

“I might,” Cole replied, thinking his brand-new coffeepot was obvious enough, sitting in the coals of the fire. “Cole Bonner,” he said. “You got a cup?”

“Sure do,” Harley said. “I'll go get it—left it on my saddle.”

Cole watched the odd little man as he walked back toward Joe and the buckskin, grazing near the water's edge. In the fading light, he could see that there was now an extra horse munching grass next to them.

Damn!
he thought.
It's a good thing he ain't a horse thief. If he was, I'd be on foot now
.

Normally sharp of ear, he scolded himself for not being more alert. In a few seconds, Harley returned with a tin cup. Without hesitating, he picked up the coffeepot and poured himself a cup. Swishing the pot around a couple of times before returning it, he said, “Feels a tad light. Reckon I got the last cup?” He gave Cole a wide grin. “Ain't a very big pot to start with, is it?”

“I don't usually have guests for supper,” Cole said. Looking the little man over carefully now, he could see that he was not wearing any weapons, so he decided he wasn't up to any mischief and was just intent upon taking advantage of free food and coffee. “I'll fill it with some more water. That was just the first pot with those grounds.”

“Here, I'll do that,” Harley said. “I reckon that's the least I oughta do since you're furnishin' the coffee.” He went at once to the water's edge and scooped more of the dark river water into the pot, being careful not to lose any of the remaining grounds. When he returned, he placed the pot in the coals again, pulled a strip of the roasting meat off the spit, and settled himself beside the fire to eat it with his coffee.

“'Preciate the hospitality,” he said as he helped himself to another strip of meat. “Antelope's good eatin'. I'm partial to elk, but there ain't no elk in this part of the country. Bighorns, there's elk up in them mountains. I need to get up that way again.” He finally paused in his rambling recitation to study his impassive host for a few moments. “I swear, young feller, I reckon I've been rattlin' on like a magpie, ain't I? It's been a while since I've had a human being to talk to. So, where are you headin', Mr. Cole Bonner? Fort Laramie?”

“No,” Cole replied. “Is that where you're headin'?”

“Oh, I don't know,” Harley replied. “Maybe I'll end up there or somewhere else. I hadn't thought about it that much. I got a little camp back up in the mountains, but I got tired of talkin' to myself. Thought I might go visit some Crow friends of mine before winter set in too hard to get through the passes. Sometimes I hunt down this way, and once in a while I'll ride on over to Fort Laramie. I can trade my hides there.” He poured himself another cup of coffee. “I need to get over to the fort pretty soon, though. I forgot how good coffee tastes, 'cause I've been out awhile.”

Cole figured he'd save Harley the trouble of asking for a handout. “I just bought some coffee beans in Johnstown. I can let you have some.”

“Well, that's mighty neighborly of you,” he said. “Maybe we can make a trade. You said this antelope was the last meat you've got. I've got a packhorse below the riverbank on the other side of your horses, and he's totin' two mule deer I was fixin' to skin and butcher just as soon as I could set up a camp and get me a fire goin'. Whaddaya say you gimme a hand and I'll share the meat with you, fifty-fifty?”

Harley's suggestion served to alter Cole's opinion of him. The little man was not a beggar after all. The offer of a supply of deer meat was generous indeed. “All right,” Cole quickly agreed. “How far have you been totin' those deer? I didn't hear any gunshots, and I've been here for a couple of hours.”

“'Bout five miles, I reckon. You didn't hear no gunshots 'cause these two deer was shot with bow and arrows.”

Cole was impressed. “And you managed to get close enough to shoot two of 'em? That's pretty damn good.”

Harley grinned. “I didn't say
I
shot 'em. Like I just said, I almost run up on a Sioux huntin' party. They was trailing a good-sized herd of mule deer. They killed two of 'em and left 'em while they went after the rest. The poor things looked so lonesome a-layin' there, I didn't have the heart to leave 'em.”

“You stole deer that a Sioux huntin' party killed?” Cole couldn't believe his ears. He unconsciously looked over his shoulder, half expecting to see a band of angry Indians bearing down upon them. “And now you led 'em straight to me?”

“Hell, they've done it to me before,” Harley said. “Besides, it'll save me some cartridges.” There was no mistaking the concern he saw in Cole's eyes, so he tried to reassure him. “If you're worried about me leadin' 'em here, there ain't no need to. I was real careful about not leavin' my trail—crossed over the river a couple of times. And dark as it is, they couldn't hardly follow a trail till mornin', anyway. That's the reason I was waitin' so late to make camp. I wanted to make sure I got far enough away from them Sioux before I went to work on them carcasses.” When Cole still looked a little skeptical, Harley continued. “Them boys are a little piece offa their usual range this far over on the Laramie. This is mostly Crow country, so they've got to mind they don't get caught too close to ol' Medicine Bear's village. That's where I was headin' when I saw your camp.”

That was even more news to Cole. “There's an Indian village near this spot?”

“Yeah, but they's Crow, friendly with white men,” Harley assured him.

“Damn,” Cole swore softly, realizing how lost he was, with no idea where to look for the three men he sought. “We might as well get started with that butcherin',” he said with a shrug.

Harley grinned happily. “Now you're talkin'. We'll cut out some fresh meat for a couple of days and smoke the rest of it for jerky.” He was still pleased that he had met someone to talk to. He had been a long time alone, and Cole Bonner seemed like a man you could turn your back on. Harley decided that right off. “I'll go get my packhorse,” he said, but paused a moment. “You never said where you was headin'.”

“I'm lookin' for Lem Dawson's tradin' post,” Cole said.

Harley hesitated, thinking that maybe he had been wrong about the broad-shouldered young man, and he remembered thinking that it was a little strange that there were two saddles lying near the fire.

What
,
he wondered, happened to the fellow who sat in the other saddle?

“Lem Dawson, huh? You a friend of Lem's?”

“Never met the man,” Cole answered. “I ain't really lookin' for him. I'm lookin' for the tradin' post. I've got some business near there, and I was thinkin' it might be on this river, but I ain't found it yet.”

“You won't, neither,” Harley said, thinking he might have jumped to the wrong assumption. Maybe Cole was a lawman. “This is the Laramie River. Lem Dawson's place is on the North Laramie.”

“You know where it is?”

“I know where ever'thin' is in this part of the territory,” Harley replied. “You help me get this meat cured, and I'll take you there.”

He knew he should not have doubted his instincts. There was no way this young man could be part of that murderous scum that hung out at Lem Dawson's place. “I'm thinkin' you're a lawman. Is that right?”

“Hell no,” Cole replied at once. “Whatever gave you that idea?”

“Just took a notion,” Harley said, still convinced he had guessed right.

Most likely one of them secret government detectives,
he thought.
Don't surprise me that he denies it. He don't want nobody to know his secret.

They worked late into the night, butchering the deer, roasting some of the meat and smoke-curing the rest until Harley determined it would not spoil. The next morning they packed the meat on the extra horses. Watching Cole trying to fashion a makeshift version of a packsaddle for the buckskin, Harley finally had to make an observation. “Don't usually see somebody usin' a ridin' saddle on their packhorse,” he commented dryly.

“It didn't start out as a packhorse,” Cole replied, but offered no further explanation.

“I figured somebody had to have been settin' in it, but I didn't say anythin' about it. Ain't none of my business.”

But you just did, didn't you?
Cole thought. The task that he had sworn himself to accomplish was no one's business but his, and he felt no desire to make it known to every person he happened to meet along the way.

“It was makin' do just fine,” he said, referring to the saddle. “I'll just have to rig up a couple more knots to tie this extra meat on. I reckon I'd best get it done so we can get the hell outta here.” He shot a sideways glance at Harley. “Just in case you didn't cover your trail as good as you said. I expect there's gonna be a party of angry Sioux hunters lookin' for the feller who stole their meat.”

“You might be right about that,” Harley admitted. “But we ain't but about five miles from that Crow village I told you about. We wouldn't have to worry about no Sioux huntin' party there in Medicine Bear's camp.”

“You said you could take me to Lem Dawson's tradin' post,” Cole insisted. “That's where I need to go.”

“I was just sayin',” Harley was quick to reply. “I'll take you to Dawson's, like I said.”

He studied the intense young man's face as he finished tying up his rough-fashioned packsaddle. Granted, he had known Cole for a very brief time, but he couldn't help noticing that Cole had never cracked a smile. There had to be something weighing heavily on his mind. And if it had to do with Lem Dawson and his kind, it might be serious trouble Cole was riding into.

Ordinarily Harley would think only about distancing himself from whatever trouble the intense young stranger was heading for. But he had a feeling about Cole Bonner, a feeling that basically he was a good man. Harley was not ready to give up the notion that Cole was a secret government agent, but maybe there was something more involved, something personal, and it had to do with Lem Dawson, or the rats
that hung around him. In good conscience, he couldn't hold his tongue any longer.