Journey of the Mountain Man Read online

  “Depends on what kind of work you’re lookin’ for,” a man with a long scar on the side of his face said.

  “Punchin’ cows,” Smoke told him. “Breakin’ horses. Ridin’ fence. Whatever it takes to make a dollar.”

  Smoke had packed away his buckskin jacket and for a dollar had bought a nearly wornout light jacket from a farmer, frayed at the cuffs and collar. He had deliberately scuffed his boots and dirtied his jeans.

  “Can’t help you there,” the scar-faced man said.

  Smoke knew the man, but doubted the man knew him. He had seen him twice before. His name was Lodi, from down Texas way, and the man was rattlesnake quick with a gun.

  “How come you don’t pack no gun?” Royce asked.

  Smoke had met the type many times. A punk who thought he was bad and liked to push. Royce wore two guns, both tied down low. Fancy guns: engraved .45 caliber Peacemakers.

  “I got my rifle,” Smoke told him. “She’ll bang seventeen times.”

  “I mean a short gun,” Royce said irritably.

  “One in the saddlebags if I need it. I don’t hunt trouble, so I ain’t never needed it.”

  One of the other gunhands laughed. “You got your answer, Royce. Now let the man eat.” He cut his eyes to Smoke. “What be your name?”

  “Kirby.” He knew his last name would not be asked. It was not a polite question in the West.

  “You look familiar to me.”

  “I been workin’ down on the Blue for three years. Got the urge to drift.”

  “I do know the feelin’.” He rose to his boots and started packing his gear.

  These men, with the possible exception of Royce, were range-wise and had been on the owlhoot trail many times, Smoke concluded. They would eat in one place, then move on several miles before settling in and making camp for the night. Smoke quickly finished his beef and beans and cleaned his plate.

  They packed up, taking everything but the fire. Lodi lifted his head. “See you, puncher.”

  Smoke nodded and watched them ride away. To the north. He stayed by the fire, watching it burn down, then swung back into the saddle and headed out, following their trail for a couple of miles before cutting east. He crossed the North Platte and made camp on the east side of the river.

  He followed the Platte up to Fort Fred Steele, an army post built in 1868 to protect workers involved in the building of the Union Pacific railroad. There, he had a hot bath in a wooden tub behind a barber shop and resupplied. He stepped into a cafe and enjoyed a meal that he didn’t have to cook, and ate quietly, listening to the gossip going on around him.

  There had been no Indian trouble for some time; the Shoshone and the Arapahoe were, for the most part, now settled in at the Wind River Reservation, although every now and then some whiskeyed-up bucks would go on the prowl. They usually ended up either shot or hanged.

  Smoke loafed around the fort for a couple of days, giving the gunhands he’d talked with ample time to get gone farther north.

  And even this far south of the Little Belt Mountains, folks knew about the impending range war, although Smoke did not hear any talk about anyone here taking sides.

  He pulled out and headed for Fort Caspar, about halfway between Fort Fetterman and Hell’s Half Acre. The town of Casper would become reality in a few more years.

  At Fort Caspar, Smoke stayed clear of a group of gunslicks who were resupplying at the general store. He knew several in this bunch: Eddie Hart, Pooch Matthews, Golden. None of them were known for their gentle, loving dispositions.

  It was at Fort Caspar that he met a young, down-at-the-heels puncher with the unlikely handle of Beans.

  “Bainbridge is the name my folks hung on me,” Beans explained with a grin. “I was about to come to the conclusion that I’d just shoot myself and get it over with knowin’ I had to go through the rest of my life with everybody callin’ me Bainbridge. A camp cook over in the Dakotas started callin’ me Beans. He didn’t have no teeth, and evertime he called my name, it come out soundin’ like Beans-Beans. So Beans it is.”

  Beans was one of those types who seemed not to have a care in the world. He had him a good horse, a good pistol, and a good rifle. He was young and full of fire and vinegar ... so what was there to worry about?

  Smoke told him he was drifting on up into Montana. Beans allowed as how that was as good a direction as any to go, so they pulled out before dawn the next day.

  With his beat-up clothes and his lip concealed behind a mustache and his hair now badly in need of a trim, Smoke felt that unless he met someone who really knew him, he would not be recognized by any who had only bumped into him casually.

  “You any good with that short gun? ” Smoke asked.

  “Man over in Utah didn’t think so. I rattled my hocks shortly before the funeral.”

  Now, there was two ways to take that. “Your funeral or his?”

  “He was a tad quicker, but he missed.”

  ’Nuff said.

  On the third night out, Beans finally said what he’d been mullin’ about all day. “Kirby ... there’s something about you that just don’t add up.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yeah. Now, to someone who just happened to glance over at you and ride on, you’d appear to be a drifter. Spend some time on the trail with you, and a body gets to thinkin’.”

  Smoke stirred the beans and laid the bacon in the pan. He poured them both coffee and waited.

  “You got coins in your pocket and greenbacks in your poke. That saddle don’t belong to no bum. That Winchester in your boot didn’t come cheap. And both them horses are wearin a brand like I ain’t never seen. Is that a circle double snake or what?”

  “Circle Double-S.” As his spread had grown, Smoke had changed his brand. S for Smoke, S for Sally. It was registered with the brand commission.

  “There ain’t no ‘S’ in Kirby.” Beans noted.

  “Maybe my last name is Smith.”

  “Ain’t but one ‘S’ there.”

  “You do have a point.” Beans was only pointing out things that Smoke was already aware of. “How far into Montana are you planning on going?”

  “Well,” Beans grinned, “I don’t know. Taggin’ along with you I found that the grub’s pretty good.”

  “You’re aware of the impending range war in Montana?”

  “There’s another thing that don’t ring true, Kirby. Sometimes you talk like a schoolteacher. Now I know that don’t necessarily mean nothin’ out here, but it do get folks to thinkin’. You know what I mean?”

  Smoke nodded and turned the bacon.

  “And them jeans of yours is wore slick on the right side, down low on the leg. You best get you some other britches or strap that hogleg back on.”

  “You don’t miss much, do you, Beans?”

  “My folks died with the fever when I was eight. I been on my own ever since. Goin’ on nineteen years. Startin’ out alone, that young, a body best get savvy quick.”

  “My real name is Kirby, Beans.”

  “All right.”

  “You didn’t answer my question about whether you knew about the range war?”

  “I heard of it, yeah. But I don’t hire my gun. Way I had it figured, with most of the hands fightin’, them rich ranchers is gonna need somebody just to look after the cattle.” He grinned. “That’s me!”

  “I’d hate to see you get tied up in a range war, Beans, ’cause sooner or later, you’re gonna have to take a stand and grab iron.”

  “Yeah, I know. But I don’t never worry about bridges until I come to them. Ain’t that food about fitten to eat?”

  They were lazy days, and the two men rode easy; no reason to push. Smoke was only a few years older than Beans—chronologically speaking; several lifetimes in experience—and the men became friends as they rode.

  Spring had hit the high country, and the hills and valleys were blazing in God’s colors. The men entered Johnson County in the Wyoming Territory, rode into Buffalo, and decided to hunt up a hot bath; both were just a bit on the gamey side.

  After a bath and a change of clothes, Smoke offered to buy the drinks. Beans, with a grin, pointed out the sign on the barroom wall: “Don’t forget to write your mother, boys. Whether you are worth it or not, she is thinking of you. Paper and inveelopes free. So is the picklled eggs. The whiskey ain’t.”

  “You got a ma, Kirby?”

  “Beans, everybody has a mother!” Smoke grinned at the man.

  “I mean ... is she still alive?” He flushed red.

  “No. She died when I was just a kid, back in Missouri.”

  “I thought I smelled a Missouri puke in here.” The voice came from behind them.

  Smoke had not yet tasted his whiskey. He placed the shot glass back on the bar as the sounds of chairs being pushed back reached him. He turned slowly.

  A bear of a man sat at a table. Even sitting down he was huge. Little piggy eyes. Mean eyes. Bully was invisibly stamped all over him. His face looked remarkably like a hog.

  “You talking to me, Pig-Face?” Smoke asked.

  Big Pig stood up and held open his coat. He was not wearing a gun. Smoke opened his jacket to show that he was not armed.

  Beans stepped to one side.

  “I think I’ll tear your head off,” Big Pig snorted.

  Smoke leaned against the bar. “Why?”

  The question seemed to confuse the bully. Which came as no surprise to Smoke. Most bullies could not be classified as being anywhere close to mental giants.

  “For fun!” Big Pig said.

  Then he charged Smoke, both big hands balled into fists that looked like hams. Smoke stepped to one side just at the last possible split second and Big Pig crashed into the bar. His bulk and momentum tore the rickety bar in half an
d sent Big Pig hurling against the counter. Whiskey bottles and beer mugs and shot glasses were splintered from the impact. The stench of raw whiskey and strong beer filled the smoky barroom.

  Hollering obscenities and roaring like a grizzly with a sore paw, Big Pig lumbered and stumbled to his feet and swung a big fist that would’ve busted Smoke’s head wide open had it landed.

  Smoke ducked under the punch and sidestepped. The force of Big Pig’s forward motion sent him staggering and slipping across the floor. Smoke picked up a chair and just as Big Pig turned around, Smoke splintered the wooden chair across his teeth.

  Big Pig’s boots flew out from under him and he went crashing to the floor, blood spurting from smashed lips and cuts on his face. But Smoke saw that Pig was a hard man to keep down. Getting to his feet a second time, Pig came at a rush, wide open. Smoke had already figured out that the man was no skilled slugger, relying on his enormous strength and his ability to take punches that would have felled a normal man.

  Smoke hit him flush on the beak with a straight-from-the-shoulder right. The nose busted and the blood flew. Big Pig snorted away the pain and blood and backhanded Smoke, knocking him against a wall. Smoke’s mouth filled with the copper taste of blood.

  Yelling, falsely sensing that victory was his, Pig charged again. Smoke dropped to his knees and drove his right fist straight up into the V of Big Pig’s legs.

  Pig howled in agony and dropped to the floor, both hands cupping his injured parts. Still on his knees, Smoke hit the man on the side of the jaw with everything he could put into the punch. This time, Big Pig toppled over, down, but still a hell of a long way from being out.

  Spitting out blood, Smoke got to his feet and backed up, catching his breath, readying himself for the next round that he knew was coming.

  Big Pig crawled to his feet, glaring at Smoke. But his eyes were filled with doubt. This had never happened to him. He had never lost a fight; not in his entire life.

  Smoke suddenly jumped at the man, hitting him with both fists, further pulping the man’s lips and flattening his snout.

  Pig swung and Smoke grabbed the thick wrist with both hands and turned and slung the man, spinning Big Pig across the room. Pig crashed into the wall and went right through it, sailing across the warped boardwalk and landing in a horse trough.

  Smoke stepped through the splintered hole in the wall and walked to the trough. He grabbed Big Pig’s head and forced it down into the water, holding him there. Just as it appeared the man would drown, Smoke pulled the head out, pounded it with his fists, then grabbed the man by his hair and once more forced the head under water.

  Finally, Big Pig’s struggling ceased. Smoke wearily hauled him out of the water and left him draped half in, half out of the trough. Big Pig was breathing, but that was about all.

  Smoke sat down on the edge of the boardwalk and tried to catch his breath.

  The boardwalk gradually filled with people, all of them staring in awe at Smoke. One man said, “Mister, I don’t know who you are, but I’d have bet my spread that you wouldn’t have lasted a minute against old Ring, let alone whip him.”

  Smoke rubbed his aching leg. “I’d hate to have to do it again.”

  Beans squatted down beside Smoke. When he spoke his voice was low. “Kirby, I don’t know who you really are, but I shore don’t never want to make you mad.”

  Smoke looked at him. “Hell, I’m not angry!” He pointed to the man called Ring. “He’s the one who wanted to fight, not ” me.

  “Lord, have mercy!” Beans said. “All this and you wasn’t even mad.”

  Ring groaned and heaved himself out of the horse trough.

  Smoke picked up a broken two-by-four and walked over to where Ring lay on the soaked ground. “Mister Ring, I want your attention for a moment. If you have any thoughts at all about getting up off that ground and having a go at me, I’m going to bust your head wide open with this two-by-four. You understand all that?”

  Ring rolled over onto his back and grinned up at Smoke. One eye was swollen shut and his nose and lips were a mess. He held up a hand. “Hows ‘bout you and me bein’ friends. I shore don’t want you for an enemy!”

  Three

  The three of them pulled out the next morning, Ring riding the biggest mule Smoke had ever seen.

  “Satan’s his name,” Ring explained. “Man was going to kill him till I come along. I swapped him a good horse and a gun for him. One thing, boys: don’t never get behind him if you’ve got a hostile thought. He’ll sense it and kick you clear into Canada.”

  There was no turning Ring back. He had found someone to look up to in Smoke. And Smoke had found a friend for life.

  “I just can’t handle whiskey,” Ring said. “I can drink beer all day long and get mellow. One drink of whiskey and I’ll turn mean as a snake.”

  “I figured you were just another bully,” Beans said.

  “Oh, no! I love everybody till I get to drinkin’ whiskey. Then I don’t even like myself.”

  “No more whiskey for you, Ring,” Smoke told him.

  “Yes, sir, Mister Kirby. Whatever you say is fine with me.”

  They were getting too far east, so when they left Buffalo, they cut west and crossed the Bighorn Mountains, skirting north of Cloud Peak, the thirteen-thousand-foot mountain rearing up majestically, snow-capped year round. Cutting south at Granite Pass, the men turned north, pointing their horses’ noses toward Montana Territory.

  “Mister Kirby?” Ring asked.

  “Just Kirby, Ring. Please. Just Kirby.”

  “OK ... Kirby. Why is it we’re going to Montana?”

  “Seeing the sights, Ring.”

  “OK. Whatever you say. I ain’t got nothin’ but time.”

  “We might find us a job punchin’ cows,” Beans said.

  “I don’t know nothin’ about cows,” Ring admitted. “But I can make a nine-pound hammer sing all day long. I can work the mines or dig a ditch. There ain’t a team of horses or mules that I can’t handle. But I don’t know nothin’ about cows.”

  “You ever done any smithing?” Smoke asked.

  “Oh, sure. I’m good with animals. I like animals. I love puppy dogs and kitty cats. I don’t like to see people mistreat animals. Makes me mad. And when I get mad, I hurt people. I seen a man beatin’ a poor little dog one time back in Kansas when I was passin’ through drivin freight. That man killed that little dog. And for no good reason.”

  “What’d you do?” Smoke asked him.

  “Got down off that wagon and broke his back. Left him there and drove on. After I buried the little dog.”

  Beans shuddered.

  “Dogs and cats and the like can’t help bein’ what they are. God made them that way. If God had wanted them different, He’d have made ’em different. Men can think. I don’t know about women, but men can think. Man shouldn’t be cruel to animals. It ain’t right and I don’t like it.”

  “I have never been mean to a dog in my life,” Beans quickly pointed out.

  “Good. Then you’re a nice person. You show me a man who is mean to animals, and I’ll show you a low-down person at heart.”

  Smoke agreed with that. “You born out here, Ring?”

  “No. Born in Pennsylvania. I killed a man there and done time. He was a no-good man. Mean-hearted man. He cheated my mother out of her farm through some legal shenanigans. Put her on the road with nothin’ but the clothes on her back. I come home from the mines to visit and found my mother in the poor farm, dying. After the funeral, I looked that man up and beat him to death. The judge gimme life in prison.”

  “You get pardoned?” Beans asked.

  “No. I got tired of it and jerked the bars out of the bricks, tied the guard up, climbed over the walls and walked away one night.”

  “Your secret is safe with us,” Smoke assured him.

  “I figured it would be.”

  They forded the Yellowstone and were in Montana Territory, but still had a mighty long way to go before they reached Gibson.

  Smoke and Beans had both figured out that Ring was no great shakes when it came to thinking, but he was an incredibly gentle man—as long as you kept him away from the whiskey. Birds would come to him when he held out his arms. Squirrels would scamper up and take food from his fingers. And he almost cried one day when he shot a deer for food. He left the entrails for the wolves and the coyotes and spent the rest of the journey working on the hide, making them all moccasins and gloves.