William Johnstone: Battle of the Mountain Man

At the top of the ridge, Ned’s mule stopped suddenly and snorted, pricking its ears forward. On a mountain slope across the valley, he saw a giant brown grizzly ambling slowly among tall ponderosa pines. Ned glanced down at the Henry rifle booted to his saddle… he was an expert marksman and this would be an easy shot… until he recalled what the old scout at Glenwood Springs told him.

“If you aim to find yourself a mountain man or two you’d best remember a couple of things.”

“What’s that?” Ned had asked.

“If they’re close by, they’ll be watchin’ you, to see how you handle yourself. When you come across a wild critter, don’t shoot it ’less you aim to eat it or wear its hide to stay warm. Those critters are as much a part of the high lonesome as them mountains themselves. Don’t kill nothin’ you ain’t gotta kill to stay alive.”

Ned had digested this bit of news. Hunting only for sport was frowned upon by mountain men. “What’s the other thing? You said there were a couple…”

The old man had almost laughed. “Learn to sleep with one eye open, son, or you’ll be the one who gets a taste of lead. I done told you where to look for ol’ Puma Buck an’ Huggie Charles an’ some of them others. Could be you won’t be so happy if you was to find ’em. Depends on the mood they’s in, an’ how you go ’bout handlin’ yourself whilst you’re up there. An’ watch yourself real close ’round Smoke Jensen. Be my advice you act real polite. If he don’t care to talk about his high country days, or tell you ’bout Preacher, you’d be well advised to clear out of Sugarloaf as quick as that mule can carry you.”

Ned watched the grizzly, discarding any notion of shooting it simply for the sake of proving he had good aim.

“No sense buying into trouble,” he muttered, urging the mule forward with his heels.

Turning north, Ned had ridden only a quarter mile before he caught sight of a tiny log cabin nestled in a grove of pines that overlooked a ravine choked with brush. Even from a distance he could tell the cabin hadn’t seen much use lately, or any repairs to its mud-chinked logs. But the cabin was a starting place, and he rode toward it. His mule still seemed uneasy even though he had left the grizzly moving in another direction.

A voice from a stand of pines to his left made his heart stop beating.

“Them’s mighty fancy duds you’s wearin’ fer a man travelin’ empty spaces!”

Ned jerked his mule to a halt, looking in the direction of the voice, finding nothing but tree trunks and shadows. He took a deep breath to calm himself. “You scared me. I wasn’t expecting anyone else to be here.”

“Coulda killed you if’n I took the notion.”

Ned felt fear forming a ball in his belly. “I hope you’re not a killer, whoever you are. My name’s Ned Buntline and I’m looking for a couple of mountain men… men by the name of Puma Buck, Huggie Charles, or Preacher.”

A dry laugh came from the trees. “Puma’s dead. Got killed nigh onto a year ago. Huggie runs traps east of here. As to the feller you called Preacher, ain’t but one man livin’ who knows where he is, an’ that’s Preacher hisself.”

“Then Preacher really does exist? He’s not just a campfire tale?”

A silence followed. Ned was still nervous, wondering if he was in the man’s gunsights now.

“Maybe he does an’ maybe he don’t,” the voice replied. “You ain’t said what you want with a mountain man.”

“Just to talk to them. To hear tales about what it’s like to live up here. I’m a writer. I write books for people back in the eastern states who’ll never see this beautiful country. They love reading my stories about the West.”

Another silence, shorter. “What makes you think Huggie’ll talk to you anyways? He ain’t inclined to use no oversupply of words.”

“I was only hoping he would. I didn’t think it would hurt to ask him. No one told me Puma Buck was dead. I’d also planned to talk to Smoke Jensen.”

A laugh. “He’s worse’n Huggie when it comes to waggin’ his tongue. To say he’s quiet would be like sayin’ a beaver’s got fur.”

“I thought I’d try. I was warned he was dangerous.”

“Fer a man who claims to make a livin’ with words you sure as hell ain’t been usin’ the right ones. Smoke’s a peaceable man when he ain’t pushed, but he don’t take kindly to gents who try an’ ride roughshod over nobody. There’s men buried all over these here mountains who figured they could take what they wanted from gentler folks who knowed Smoke Jensen.”

“I only wanted a chance to talk to him about some of his exploits so I could write about it. If I may be so bold as to ask, who might you be? I can’t see you from here.”

“If I’d wanted you to see me I’d have showed myself. You got a rifle, an’ there’s a pistol under that fancy coat. Till I knowed what you was after, I was stayin’ right where I’m at. As to my name, there’s some who call me Griz. That’s short fer a grizzly bear, case you didn’t know. I go by Grizzly Cole when I git asked my full handle. I’m acquainted with Huggie Charles an’ Smoke Jensen, if it matters, an’ I knowed ol’ Puma Buck as well as I knowed my own name. But till I know more about who the hell you are an’ what you’re after, climb down off ’n that mule an’ keep yer hands where I can see ’em. You reach fer that pistol an’ I swear I’ll kill you, mister. Now git down.”

Ned was careful to keep both hands in plain sight as he swung down to the ground, holding the mule’s reins. He wondered if this might be a piece of luck. Was he having his first encounter with a real mountain man? Five

“I assure you, Mr. Cole, that I mean you no harm,” Ned told him as he stood in front of his mule with his palms spread. “I only want to talk to a few mountaineers, the man who opened up this territory.”

A shadow moved behind a pine trunk deep in the forest, and there was the brief glint of sunlight on a rifle barrel. A thin figure clad in buckskins came silently between the trees in Ned’s direction.

“I kin assure you, mister, that I wasn’t worried ’bout you doin’ me no harm… not the way you rode up here in plain sight like a damn greenhorn. If a bunch of them Utes or Shoshoni was still huntin’ white men’s scalps, yer hair’d have been decoratin’ some warrior’s lodgepole tomorrow mornin’. It was the other way ’round when it comes to bein’ in harm’s way, Mr. Buntline. Any time I wanted, I coulda killed you quicker’n snuff makes spit.”

Ned hadn’t realized he’d made such a target of himself, yet neither had he expected to run across a mountain man so soon, figuring they’d be higher up in summertime, farther from the closest settlements. “I was told the Indian troubles were over in this part of the Rockies, so I felt I had nothing to fear if I rode out in the open.”

The buckskin-clad outline of Grizzly Cole came to the edge of the forest. Ned could see a snowy beard surrounding his face and white hair falling below his shoulders. A rifle was balanced loosely in his right hand, and a huge pistol, probably a Walker Colt .44, was stuck in a belt fashioned from animal skin strips. While not one of his sources on the subject of mountain men had ever mentioned the name Grizzly Cole, Ned had a feeling Cole was one of the old-time mountaineers he’d been looking for.

“That’s mostly true,” Cole agreed, at last stepping out into slanted sunlight so Ned could see him clearly. “The Utes are at peace with the white man now, an’ them Shoshoni don’t range this far south no more. But a man had oughta practice bein’ careful with his hide no matter how much he knows ’bout a stretch of the country. Things can change real sudden-like.”