The Darkest Winter Read online

  “Damn it, you big galoot,” he said, “if you’re not a sight for sore eyes! I sort of expected you before now.”

  Breckinridge pounded Morgan on the back, too, then had to catch him to keep him from being knocked to the floor by the exuberant greeting. Breck took hold of Morgan’s shoulders and set him upright, then said, “I ran into a little fracas on the way here tonight.”

  “Well, that doesn’t surprise me, but I didn’t mean tonight in particular. I just thought you and Dulcy might reach St. Louis before now.” Morgan frowned slightly and leaned to the side to peer around Breckinridge’s looming form. “Where is Dulcy? Did you leave her at a hotel or a boardinghouse? I wouldn’t blame you. Red Mike’s is hardly the sort of place you’d want to bring a woman you plan on marrying!”

  The grin that had appeared on Breckinridge’s rugged face as he and Morgan exchanged greetings vanished in an instant.

  “She ain’t with me,” he said.

  Morgan’s frown deepened. “What? She’s all right, isn’t she? That bullet wound she got—”

  Breckinridge shook his head. “That healed up just fine. Last time I saw her, she was hale and hearty. It’s just that her and me . . . well, we ain’t gettin’ married after all.”

  “Not getting married? Breck, what the hell? You love that girl, and I’m pretty sure she loves you, too.”

  “Maybe so, but that ain’t all there is to it.” Breckinridge pulled out one of the chairs at the table. “I don’t plan on talkin’ about it, Morgan, and I’d sure appreciate it if we could just leave things at that.”

  “Well . . . well, sure, Breck.” Morgan was visibly flustered, but he shook his head and went on, “We’re partners, and if that’s the way you want it, that’s the way it’ll be.” He went back to his chair. “We’re still heading for the mountains, though, aren’t we?”

  “Derned right we are. You got an outfit put together for us?”

  “I sure do. Two fine canoes that we can bring back down the river in the fall stacked high with pelts. I have plenty of supplies for us, too.”

  Breckinridge sat down and reached for the jug that sat on the table. “I sure appreciate you doin’ all that. I reckon you probably had to pay more than your fair share for all of it, since I didn’t have a whole heap of money to leave with you when I headed back to Tennessee.”

  Morgan waved a hand and said, “Don’t worry about that. The money I inherited from my father would last us a long time even if we weren’t making more trapping. But we had a decent season last year, and I’m sure this season will be even better. If we keep it up, you’ll be a rich man one of these days, Breck.”

  Breckinridge shook his head. “I don’t care a lick about bein’ rich. I never seen anything to make me think a lot of money really makes folks happy. I just want to get back to the high country, breathe some of that air, and see an eagle soarin’ way up in that blue sky, free as he can be.”

  He tipped the jug to his mouth and took a long swallow of the fiery liquor it held. The whiskey kindled a small fire in his belly, but other than that he didn’t feel any effect from it. With his size, he could drink all night and not get drunk.

  Morgan picked up the jug when Breckinridge slid it back across the table to him.

  “To the high country,” he said. He downed a slug of the liquor, too, coughed a little, and wiped the back of his hand across his mouth. “When do you want to get started?”

  “The sooner the better,” Breckinridge said.

  * * *

  The next morning, Breckinridge sold the horse he had ridden to St. Louis to the livery where he had stabled the animal. Morgan had rented some space in a shedlike warehouse near the waterfront for the canoes and supplies.

  He and Breck carried the sturdy but lightweight craft to the river, one at a time, and tied them to one of the docks. Then they went back to fetch the supplies and toted them to the canoes. Sugar, flour, salt, coffee, and salted pork were the staples they were taking with them.

  They also had some tobacco, although Breck didn’t use the stuff and Morgan puffed on a pipe only occasionally. It was good for trading with friendly Indians, though.

  They also had a few bolts of cloth and some assorted knickknacks and geegaws to use as trade goods. Many of the tribes were hostile to the white trappers coming into what they considered their lands, but often such wrath could be turned aside by something shiny or colorful.

  And for the times when that didn’t turn out to be the case, Breckinridge and Morgan were taking along plenty of powder and shot, too.

  The previous summer they’d had a couple of partners, but this year it would be just the two of them. They wouldn’t be able to take as many pelts that way, but they would have to split the profits only two ways.

  Breckinridge intended to see to it that Morgan recouped every bit of his investment before they started divvying up the rest of the money. Morgan would probably argue about that, but Breck intended to stand firm.

  Morgan hadn’t mentioned Dulcy again. Breckinridge was thankful for that. He didn’t want to dwell on what had happened between them, and it would be easier to put the whole thing behind him if he didn’t have to go around explaining it.

  He wanted to look forward instead of back.

  As always, the riverfront was a busy place this morning. Dozens of steamboats were tied up at the wharves that stretched for more than a mile along the western bank.

  Scores of burly dockworkers loaded the boats with cargo to be carried back downriver to New Orleans. Later in the day, northbound vessels would be arriving, and they would be heavily laden with cargo that had to be unloaded.

  Breckinridge watched the men—a mixture of white, black, and even a few Indians—struggling with the crates and was glad he didn’t have to work at a job like that.

  The labor wouldn’t bother him much; he was big and strong and could carry heavy loads all day without getting too tired. But being stuck there, going back and forth between the wharves and the decks of the riverboats all day, would drive him mad. Going back and forth, plowing the rows in a field, had affected him the same way. Something inside him had to be up and moving, but he wanted to actually get somewhere.

  He and Morgan weren’t the only ones preparing to head for the mountains. About fifty yards up the riverfront, a group of men in buckskins and homespun were loading supplies onto half a dozen canoes.

  Some wore felt hats like Breckinridge and Morgan, while others sported coonskin caps or knit toques like northern backwoodsmen Breck had met in the Rockies. They were armed to the teeth with rifles, pistols, knives, and tomahawks. Trapping was dangerous work.

  A man with a bushy black beard extending halfway down his chest seemed to be the leader. He wasn’t very tall and gave the appearance of being almost as wide as he was high.

  None of his bulk appeared to be fat, though. Thick slabs of muscles coated his arms, shoulders, chest, and back, and bulged against the tight buckskin shirt he wore. His stubby legs were as big around as tree trunks.

  When he’d skinned the raccoon to make the cap he wore, he had left the creature’s head on, so its snout pointed the same way as the bearded man’s face was turned, and its dead eyes peered the same direction as its owner’s deep-set, beady ones.

  A steady stream of shouted orders and profanities made its way past the huge chaw of tobacco that distended the man’s cheek. His voice was deep and powerful enough to carry up and down the riverfront, over the normal hubbub.

  Breckinridge looked at the bearded man and asked Morgan, “Who’s that big bag o’ wind over yonder? I don’t recollect seein’ him last year.”

  “I think his name’s Carnahan. I’ve heard a few men mention him. He’s supposed to be quite the ring-tailed roarer.” Morgan chuckled. “If you don’t believe me, you can ask him. I’m sure he’d be happy to tell you.”

  “No, that’s all right. I’ve never been that comfortable around fellas who like to beat their own drum. That’s a pretty rough-lookin’ bunch he’
s got with him.”

  “They look like cutthroats and brigands to me. I’d just as soon not run into them, once we’re out there hundreds of miles from anywhere.”

  Breckinridge’s broad shoulders rose and fell in a shrug. “I never worried overmuch about such things. They leave me alone and I’ll leave them alone.”

  “That’s the way I’d like it, too.”

  Carnahan, if that was actually the bearded man’s name, had climbed into one of the canoes, which were larger than the ones Breckinridge and Morgan were using. Each held three men, except a lone canoe with only two occupants.

  A man came hurrying along the dock at the last minute and climbed into that canoe, filling out its complement. Carnahan yelled something at him, causing him to turn half around and lift a hand in acknowledgment of what sounded like a reprimand, although Breckinridge couldn’t make out the words this time.

  Breckinridge frowned at the sight of the newcomer. The man was dressed in black and had an old-fashioned tricorne hat on his head. His craggy, lantern-jawed face was made even more striking by the black patch over his left eye.

  There was something else about him that had really caught Breck’s attention, though, and he pondered it as he watched the men begin to paddle, sending the canoes arrowing out into the broad, sluggish stream.

  The latecomer wore a scabbarded saber that had bounced against his thigh as he hurried along the dock.

  Chapter 3

  Breckinridge had no way of knowing if the man who had joined Carnahan’s party at the last minute was the same one who had attacked him the previous night. Certainly, it was possible that more than one man in St. Louis carried a saber.

  The man with the eye patch, though, looked like somebody who would try to rob and kill a stranger. And Morgan had said that Carnahan’s men were cutthroats.

  If the situation had been different, Breckinridge might have confronted the man and tried to find out the truth, just to satisfy his own curiosity, if for no other reason. But if his hunch was right, such a confrontation might have afforded him the opportunity to finish that fight, and he would have welcomed that.

  The other canoes were well out of sight by the time Breckinridge and Morgan pushed off from the dock. Better to just forget about it, Breck told himself.

  Anyway, they were all headed in the same direction. They were liable to encounter each other somewhere out there on the frontier. Breckinridge didn’t think it was very likely he would forget a fella who looked like that and carried a sword.

  For the moment he was content to be out on the great river, the muscles in his arms and shoulders working smoothly as he stroked with the paddle he held.

  Switching from side to side with each stroke, he propelled the canoe against the current. Its sharply pointed prow cleaved the muddy water and sent it bubbling and splashing past the craft. A few yards to Breckinridge’s right and slightly behind, Morgan paddled his canoe.

  Time meant little in a situation like this. The hours drifted past, much like the landscape on both sides of the river. By midmorning, Breckinridge and Morgan had made the turn into the Missouri River, where the Big Muddy flowed into the Father of Waters.

  The banks on both sides of the broad stream were low and covered with trees and brush. Away from the river, the terrain rolled away endlessly in gentle hills.

  This was the heartland of the continent, and it beat in a slow, steady rhythm . . . just like the paddles wielded by the two men dipped into the water and propelled them onward.

  Now and then they put in to shore and stopped to rest. Breckinridge didn’t need the respites so much, but Morgan did. The months he had spent on the frontier had toughened him, especially compared to his previous soft existence back East, but he still didn’t possess Breck’s almost supernatural strength and stamina and never would.

  During one of those breaks, Breckinridge could tell that Morgan wanted to ask him about Dulcy. Morgan frowned, started several times to say something inconsequential without finishing, and seemed generally uncomfortable.

  Breckinridge didn’t want to talk about it, though, so after a few minutes he went to his canoe and got ready to shove it back into the water.

  “Let’s get goin’,” he said. “Them beaver ain’t gonna trap and skin themselves.”

  “That’s true,” Morgan said. He seemed almost relieved that he hadn’t forced the issue. As they paddled back out into the river, Breckinridge hoped Morgan would just put the past completely out of his thoughts.

  That’s what he was trying to do.

  They camped that night in what seemed like a vast, dark emptiness. Breckinridge knew that in another day or so, they would start seeing Indian villages along the river. Other trappers would be making their way toward the mountains, too, but on this night, no other campfires were in sight.

  Breckinridge was a mite wary of kindling one himself, but Morgan wanted hot food and coffee. Anyway, they hadn’t come very far from St. Louis. There shouldn’t be any real danger along this stretch of the river.

  He kept his rifle close at hand, regardless. The pistols behind his belt were loaded and ready to belch fire and leaden death.

  Breckinridge’s blue eyes narrowed in concentration and searched the darkness intently every time he heard the faintest sound. A man could grow weary of being so cautious all the time, he thought, but if he ever let his guard down, sure enough that would be the time when he needed to be most alert.

  The prospect of death didn’t bother him as long as he could go out fighting, as he knew he was meant to, but to be taken by surprise was unacceptable.

  The night passed without incident, and the two canoes were back on the river when the sun came up the next morning.

  Two more days went by in much the same fashion. On the fourth day after leaving St. Louis, Breckinridge spotted a tendril of gray smoke rising into the sky ahead of them and pointed it out to Morgan.

  “Injun camp,” he called across the water. “Ioways, most likely. You remember, we spent a night with one band of ’em last fall, somewhere upriver.”

  “That’s right,” Morgan replied. “Are we going to stop again?”

  Breckinridge thought his friend sounded hopeful that they would stop and visit with the Indians. Three days of not seeing anyone else probably had Morgan a little restless. He was a fella who genuinely liked being around people.

  For the most part, Breck could take ’em or leave ’em.

  “We’ll put in and visit for a spell,” he said. “The Ioways are friendly folks. As I recollect, they’ve moved around a lot. Every time the whites start crowdin’ in where they live, they up and move instead of fightin’. One of these days they’re liable to have to do the same thing here.”

  “Do you really think civilization will expand past St. Louis? I had the idea that that might be the end of it, despite any talk about manifest destiny.”

  Breckinridge shook his head. “Reckon it’s only a matter of time. One of these days, there’ll be people shovin’ in all over the dang country, until there won’t be room for a fella to spit. I’m just glad I probably won’t live to see it.”

  They came within sight of two dozen earthen lodges scattered on the left-hand bank of the river. The Ioway were horse Indians who did a certain amount of wandering and hunting, but they built semipermanent villages like this one, too, where some of them lived year-round and planted crops. When they were on the move, they lived in buffalo-hide tipis like their cousins farther west. In the villages, they dwelled in these moundlike lodges made of mud and brush.

  As Breckinridge and Morgan angled their canoes toward the shore, dogs gathered and began to bark at them. That commotion drew a large number of the Indians, who stood watching the two white men paddle closer.

  Most of the men had feathers sticking up at angles from their greased topknots. Colorful blankets were draped around their shoulders over their buckskins.

  The women, squat and round-faced, chattered among themselves. Excited children whooped and
hollered. Added to the dogs’ barking, it made for quite a racket.

  When the water was shallow enough, Breckinridge and Morgan stepped out of the canoes and dragged the craft halfway up onto the shore. Breck lifted his right hand, palm out, and said, “Howdy, folks.”

  This was a different village from the one where he and Morgan had stopped the previous fall. He didn’t see anyone he recognized. He wondered if any of the Ioway spoke the white man’s tongue.

  That question was put to rest quickly by an older man who stepped forward and said in good English, “Welcome to our home, my friends. I am Mohasca, the chief of these people.”

  “Breckinridge Wallace,” Breck introduced himself. “This is Morgan Baxter.”

  Morgan nodded and said, “I’m mighty pleased to meet you, Chief.”

  Breckinridge heard some giggles coming from the young women of the tribe. He knew they were looking at Morgan and whispering to each other about him. Gals always seemed to think he was a right handsome fella.

  Most females didn’t react the same way to him. Other than his red hair and blue eyes, he bore a distinct resemblance to a grizzly bear, or at least he figured that was so.

  “You are on your way to the Shining Mountains?” Mohasca asked.

  “That’s right,” Breckinridge said. “We’re fur trappers and traders.”

  The chief still looked solemn, but Breckinridge thought he saw amusement twinkling in the man’s dark eyes.

  “What will you do when the beaver are gone?”

  “Oh, that day won’t ever come,” Morgan said. “There are millions and millions of them up in the mountains.”

  “There is an end to everything,” Mohasca said. “But come, visit with us. We will smoke and eat and talk.”

  The crowd parted when Mohasca turned and walked toward the largest of the lodges, accompanied by the rest of the older men and several young, brawnier warriors. Breckinridge and Morgan fell in with them.

  Some of the women reached out and poked fingers against Breckinridge and Morgan as they walked by, then laughed. Breck grinned back at them. He knew they didn’t mean any harm.