Trail to Devil's Canyon Read online

  ‘The redskin goes nowhere!’ Anton’s former step-son snapped, keeping his Hawken rifle trained on the old Indian warrior. ‘He was caught stealing white man’s property, and he needs to be taught a lesson.’ He jerked his chin, and four uniformed riders emerged from the thicket. ‘I would say a permanent one. . . .’

  The troopers rode closer. Lean, sly-faced Tuck Gravens came first. Behind him rode Trooper Ben Copeland, a scar-faced professional with receding yellow hair and cold eyes. Hal Yacey was just as Anton Kozlov remembered him from Fort Bighorn – fat and balding with a pencil-thin mustache which looked like a third lip had been drawn. The fourth rider, Loomis, drifted in last.

  Anton walked deliberately to stand beside the Indian’s shaggy pony. The Northern Paiute remained motionless, his old eyes reading death in the circle of troopers.

  ‘I will say this just once, dear stepson,’ Anton Kozlov told the cavalryman. ‘It is my trap the Indian stole from and I have decided to let him go. You’re not wearing a tin star, so this is none of your damn business.’ He lifted the rifle. ‘Looks At The Bear is going now, and I will kill the first blue-belly soldier who fires on him.’

  Anton slapped the pony’s rump, and the old man started to ride slowly across the canyon. The four troopers on the rim sat saddle, bewildered, their rifles aimed at the Northern Paiute Indian as they awaited the lieutenant’s order. Anton just looked straight at his soldier ‘kin’. He saw Judd’s eyes narrow to twin slits. He heard the crunch of hoofs in snow as the Indian moved away. Judd’s lips curled into a twisted, frosty smile.

  ‘You always was an Injun-lover, Old Moscow,’ the cavalryman sneered softly. ‘That is why you quit the army back in Russia.’

  ‘Is this a social call, Judd?’ Anton demanded.

  ‘Not exactly,’ Judd Reed muttered. ‘I am here to hire your services.’

  Kozlov watched old Looks At The Bear ride past Trooper Hal Yacey and vanish safely into the dusk.

  ‘You are wastin’ your time,’ Anton said flatly in response. ‘I am not interested in bein’ an army scout again. I reckon you will remember the stories I told you and your mother.’

  There was a moment’s silence between the two men.

  ‘I am not here on Major Peabody’s account,’ Judd told him. ‘I want to hire you for myself, for something personal.’

  The old man eyed his once stepson intently. ‘Go on, you have my attention.’

  ‘Anton, you’re not being exactly hospitable,’ Judd complained. ‘We rode all day to get here. I reckon the least you could do is to offer us grub and coffee.’

  Anton walked to the second trap and retrieved the dead fox. Keeping the five uniformed riders waiting, he set the traps again.

  ‘C’mon, follow me back to the cabin,’ he said finally as he returned to his horse.

  He should have been pleased to see Judd – it was the first time in almost two years. It helped remind him of Beulah. Instead, Anton considered the soldiers as intruders. Maybe their very uniforms reminded him of a part of his life he wanted to forget. There was a full moon rising as Anton headed into the canyon he had made his home. He saw the lights of the settlers’ cabins. The timber-wolves which ranged along the stark ridges, bayed in the distance. He forded the creek, and his mongrel dog barked a greeting. Kozlov spoke quietly to the ugly-faced dog he had inherited when mountain man Cassius Stoddard died from a snake bite about nine months earlier. Anton dismounted and then motioned the blue-coats to tether their horses and come inside.

  Cassius Stoddard had enlisted as a private with ‘The Lewis and Clark Expedition’ in the autumn of 1803 at Maysville, Kentucky. He was stipulated five dollars a month pay after answering the ad for ‘good hunters, stout, healthy, unmarried men, accustomed to the woods and capable of bearing bodily fatigue in a pretty considerable degree’. Cassius had told Anton of the hardships and triumphs of the expedition, as well as routine adventures in hunting, starving, Indian diplomacy, and getting chased by grizzly bears. In August of 1806 the expedition reached the Mandan villages. It was there that Cassius was granted permission by the explorers to take his leave and he next joined two trappers from Illinois, Forrest Hancock and Joseph Dickson, bound for the Yellowstone River.

  It was told that Cassius Stoddard alone paddled canoe down the Missouri to the mouth of the Platte where he found keelboats of the Missouri Fur Company of St. Louis, led by Manuel Lisa. He was promptly recruited and went with this expedition up the Missouri and the Yellowstone to the mouth of the Bighorn River, where he eventually made his home. This is where he had first met Anton Kozlov, teaching him the tricks of the trade of being a frontier mountain man.

  Anton had built a cabin of three rooms. Its main room was a parlor with a potbelly stove right in the middle, its chimney through the roof. A door in the western wall opened into his bedroom. The third room was used for pelt storage.

  ‘Make yourself at home,’ he said, as he lit a flint-glass, kerosene lamp.

  Lieutenant Judd Reed straddled a chair. He was not even thirty, and already was sporting a few gray hairs. They sprouted from his temples. Once lean and rangy, the lieutenant now had a roll of fat hanging over his belt. Trooper Yacey stood behind the lieutenant, probably aware that Anton Kozlov had never liked him. Gravens and Copeland found chairs and waited for the coffee to heat. The youngest soldier, Alan Loomis, was still in his teens. His clean-shaven face was boyish and his eyes relatively innocent. Maybe he had been spared what Anton had once seen, so far at least.

  ‘Get straight to the point, Judd,’ Anton said, as the cavalrymen drank their coffee and ate his cold biscuits.

  The lieutenant lit a cigar and then said, ‘Anton, I want you to ride west to Bear Creek Pass and collect a woman.’

  ‘I reckon you need to explain that a bit further,’ Anton said.

  ‘It ain’t complicated,’ Judd said. ‘A woman named Miss Lucy Doniphon is coming to Bear Creek Pass on the Cheyenne & Black Hills Stage Line. She arrives exactly a week from today. She is expecting me to meet her at the stage depot, but due to circumstances, I can’t do that. . . .’

  ‘Major Peabody sent us out on patrol,’ Trooper Hal Yacey mumbled into his coffee mug.

  ‘My orders are to track down and bring back three army deserters,’ Judd hastily supplied.

  ‘You will enjoy that,’ Anton remarked wryly.

  ‘I would rather be meeting Miss Doniphon,’ Judd snapped irritably.

  ‘What is this Lucy Doniphon to you?’ Kozlov asked.

  Judd Reed blew smoke into the air before he said, ‘She is to be my bride.’

  The cavalryman’s pronouncement hung like the cigar smoke between them.

  ‘I reckon congratulations is in order, Judd,’ Anton said mildly.

  ‘I will invite you to the wedding,’ the soldier stated flatly.

  The man known as Old Moscow to most, glanced back at the blue-clad trooper. ‘Where did you meet her?’

  ‘Well, I haven’t met her, as of yet,’ Judd told him reluctantly. ‘She is what is known as a mail-order bride.’

  ‘Mail-order?’

  ‘White women are in short supply out west,’ the lieutenant said stiffly. ‘I reckon you know that, Old Moscow.’ He snickered. ‘For instance, I don’t see a bed-warmer in your place! Time to move on from my mother.’ He exhaled more smoke. ‘Some men might settle for Injun squaws, but that is not good enough for an officer in the United States Army. I paid money to McQuarry’s Matrimonial News in San Francisco. They specifically run personal ads. for men and women seeking marriage. They helped me find my bride.’

  ‘A woman you have never seen before?’ Anton said, shaking his head in disbelief.

  ‘McQuarry’s sent me a portrait of her,’ Judd said defensively. ‘She happens to be quite beautiful.’

  ‘And has she seen your picture, Judd?’ Anton asked, with a hint of a smile.

  ‘Um . . . no,’ the lieutenant said, flicking ash from his cigar tip. ‘There are no cameras in Fort Bighorn.’

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bsp; Old Moscow leaned back in his chair and sipped his coffee. ‘Uh-huh. . . . It is a long trail to Bear Creek Pass,’ Anton added without further comment.

  ‘I don’t expect you to do this out of the kindness of your Russian heart,’ Judd assured him. ‘I am gonna pay you. I am offering you one hundred dollars to fetch my bride and escort her back here. You can hand her over to me in exactly two weeks’ time, right here at this here cabin. By then, we will have those damn deserters and she can ride to the fort with all of us.’

  Anton Kozlov downed his coffee. He didn’t like being away from his cabin for too long of time, but a hundred dollars was a lot of money, and he could certainly use it. The fur trade was declining. Shorter and less dangerous overland routes were established from the trapping areas to the larger markets, thus driving down their worth. The whims of fashion were also beginning to dictate that silk hats replace beaver hats. Anton had also heard of a new process being created to make good felt, cheaper than using fur. And to top all of that, beaver was getting mighty scarce. He’d had no regular employment or pay since he had quit scouting for Fort Bighorn. Not that he had ever felt any regrets. It had been his choice. He glanced at the lieutenant. Judd was still blowing smoke and looking around the little cabin with disdain. Anton didn’t particularly want to work for this cavalry officer, but one hundred dollars would be a big help.

  ‘I will fetch your mail-order bride for you,’ Kozlov decided.

  ‘I will pay you fifty dollars now and fifty on Miss Doniphon’s safe delivery,’ Judd said in a very businesslike manner.

  ‘Um . . . sure . . . suits me just fine,’ Anton mumbled.

  ‘She arrives on the noon stage one week from today,’ Judd informed him as he pulled an envelope from his pocket. ‘You will need to know what she looks like.’ He opened the envelope and pulled out a faded photograph which he handed to the old fur trapper. ‘This is my woman, soon to be bride.’

  The pallid lantern light played over the glazed surface of the portrait. Lucy Doniphon’s face was young, and a spark of defiance showed in her wide eyes. She had full lips and long, unruly hair which apparently had not been combed, not even for the studio photographer.

  ‘You have done well for yourself, Judd,’ Anton complimented him.

  Judd flicked more ash from the tip of his cigar as he said, ‘You should get yourself a woman too, Old Moscow It is not good for a man to live alone. Leastways, that is what the preacher who is gonna marry us quoted to me.’

  ‘I will have her here in two weeks from today,’ Kozlov said, accepting the officer’s down payment of fifty dollars.

  The men had nothing more to say, and Judd stood up to go.

  ‘Let’s go find those lousy deserters,’ Judd said to his men.

  ‘Hell’s bells, it is night already!’ Trooper Tuck Gravens whined.

  ‘There is bright moonlight,’ Judd snapped, as his eyes ranged over the four cavalrymen. ‘I want you all in the saddle – on the double!’

  As the troopers leapt to obey, Judd smirked in satisfaction. He enjoyed giving orders. The army was a perfect career choice for him.

  ‘Old Moscow . . . um . . . Anton. . . .’

  The old man eyed the cavalry officer. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Keep the portrait,’ the lieutenant said. ‘You might need to identify her.’

  ‘Sure . . . as you wish.’

  ‘One more thing,’ Judd Reed said, his eyes narrowing. ‘She is mine. Keep your dirty, old paws off her.’

  ‘So long, Judd,’ Anton replied softly.

  When the cavalry riders were gone, Anton Kozlov made fresh coffee and looked again at Lucy Doniphon’s portrait. There was more than a hint of defiance in those fiery eyes. There was resentment, even anger.

  Chapter 2

  Old Moscow Meets Lucy Doniphon

  The trip to Bear Creek Pass had been fairly eventful for Anton Kozlov. He arrived at Lewis’ fork along the Snake River, one of the largest rivers in the area. It took him all day to cross. It is half a mile wide, deep and rapid. The way he managed was this: he unloaded his mule – which he had bought to replace the one he lost, and to use to haul Lucy back – and swam across with his horse – Socks. In returning, the new mule, by treading on a round stone, stumbled and threw him off, and the current was so strong that a bush which he was able to catch hold of, saved him from drowning.

  Then finally, a week later and a couple hours before noon, Anton came out of the bluegrass prairie, forded Grapevine Creek and headed his sorrel stallion into Bad Pass. The pass had earned its name from other mountain men and was part of a much larger web of commerce and interaction between the native people and traders. It was a rough and unpleasant route to most unseasoned travelers, but not to men like Anton Kozlov. It wasn’t just the terrain that caused problems; many a mountain man had encountered grizzly bear, Crow, Paiute, Shoshone and Blackfoot Indians along the trail.

  He was almost at trail’s end.

  It was a cool, gray day and yesterday’s storm clouds still hung in the sky like rumpled curtains. Anton – Old Moscow – rode faster when he reached the wagon trail on the high side of the pass. He passed a cabin and raised his hand to greet the first white man he had seen since leaving Devil’s Canyon. The trail circled an unprosperous-looking Indian camp and a clump of spruce trees. Then it passed the signboard announcing:

  BEAR CREEK PASS – pop. 141

  Approaching the town limits, Kozlov noticed two men loading a rocking chair into the back of a wagon. The slight wind whispering down the pass, made the hooped canvas tremble. A tall woman with a baby in her arms, watched as the men, one silver-bearded and the other half his age, secured the chair with ropes. Finally, she gathered her skirts with one hand, and climbed on to the wagon seat. The family was almost ready for the long westerly trek as Kozlov drew alongside.

  ‘Good morning, mister,’ the silver-bearded man greeted him.

  ‘Howdy,’ Anton replied.

  After appraising him in a kindly way, the man said, ‘Looks as if you have traveled a long way. . . .’

  ‘For sure,’ Anton responded. ‘From past Devil’s Canyon, near the Bighorn Mountains.’

  ‘That is on our map, Seth,’ the woman said, rocking the stirring baby gently.

  ‘Hush . . . I know that, Maude,’ the man replied as he looked back at the rider. ‘We are headed west of there, to the new settlement of Medicine Flats,’ he paused. ‘How the trail, mister?’

  ‘No trouble between Devil’s Canyon and here,’ Anton politely told him.

  ‘No Indian sign or trouble?’ the younger man asked impatiently.

  ‘Sure, but no war paint,’ Kozlov told him.

  ‘Good! Praise the Lord!’ the woman exclaimed.

  ‘But west of Devil’s Canyon is Northern Paiute country,’ Anton added, ‘and that is another story. I would make sure to travel with other wagons there.’ He looked at the woman and her baby. ‘In fact, I will give you a piece of advice. I wouldn’t even go that far without company if I was you. The Indians in these parts aren’t on the warpath, but there is always the risk that a few young bucks will be tempted by the sight of a single wagon.’

  ‘I have faith, mister. The good Lord will protect us,’ Seth said with confidence.

  Anton nodded. ‘I sure hope so.’

  ‘We leave in a few minutes,’ Seth smugly proclaimed.

  ‘So long, safe travels,’ Kozlov said, riding past the wagon and turning into town.

  Bear Creek Pass was a disorderly mass of delicate structures and a few wagons converted into temporary living quarters. It stretched along both sides of the wide, deeply-rutted main street. The big hanging clock outside Le Tourneau’s Trading Post showed ten minutes to noon.

  There was a new church, the Divine Tabernacle. A group of women tightly wrapped in woolen shawls stood outside, chatting to the young preacher. Old Moscow passed the law office. It was closed. Sometimes Bear Creek Pass had a resident lawman, sometimes not. Last time he had been to the town, Sheriff Tony S
tinson had been wearing the badge. From the look of the cobwebbed windows and padlocked front door, the lawman had either left or was resting in a pine box or off chasing some fugitives. The town boasted two saloons, one oddly named Prudence Hotel. The other, a more flashy and raucous establishment, was called The Babylon House. He glanced down the street. Past the stock corrals and the half-finished schoolhouse stood Ma Boyle’s Rooms. Right opposite the rooming house was the austere Cheyenne & Black Hills office and depot. The long planks of the raised platform fronting the office appeared to be deserted – there seemed to be no towners awaiting the incoming noon stagecoach.

  Anton Kozlov rode right up to the platform, swung out of the saddle and looped Socks’ and the mule’s reins over a tie rail. He climbed the platform steps and looked east for the expected cloud of dust. His eyes caught no movement. He was about to build a cigarette when the office door slapped open. The Cheyenne & Black Hills Stage Line clerk looked him over and grimaced.

  ‘You here for the noon stage, mister?’ the clerk guessed.

  Anton nodded. ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Didn’t you read the plain notice I pinned on the Prudence wall?’ the man snapped.

  ‘I didn’t stop for a drink. I haven’t been to the Prudence,’ Kozlov said. ‘I rode straight here.’

  ‘No doubt to meet a passenger?’ the clerk guessed again.

  Anton nodded again. ‘That’s right, her name is Lucy Doniphon.’

  ‘Well, mister, I hope you have time on your hands. Wire came early this morning.’ He sniffed as he explained. ‘Bear Creek Pass is almost civilized now; Western Union’s arrived.’

  ‘And what is your point?’ Kozlov demanded.

  ‘OK, OK, mister,’ the clerk said, shuffling his papers. ‘The wire came from Lacey’s Station. There has been trouble along the trail. Seems the westbound threw an axle and hit a boulder. It is a wreck. Horses snapped out of harness and stampeded off, leaving everyone stranded. The driver has a broken leg, and the passengers are shook up but no worse for the wear. The guard walked back to Lacey’s to send the wire, but the passengers and the driver went to Sylvester Earhart’s to wait for the next stage, a week from now.’