Charles West - Day of the Wolf

A wide smile of enlightenment spread across Boyd’s face. “Damn,” he remarked, “I hadn’t thought about that. All them miners workin’ their sluice boxes back up in them gulches, that’d be mighty easy pickin’s, wouldn’t it?”

“That’s what I’m thinkin’,” Buck replied. “And sooner or later this Wolf feller is gonna show up somewhere. We might as well have ourselves a payday while we’re waitin’ for him to come out of his hole.”

Listening to the conversation between his brothers, Skinner silently nodded his approval, and thought, That’s why Buck calls all the shots. He was probably thinking about hitting those miners up in the Black Hills all along. Our cousins getting killed just gave him an excuse to go up there right now .

Behind them, Clem Russell stood at the edge of the clearing that surrounded his trading post, where he had been watching the outlaws as they departed. As usual, he had conflicting feelings about their visit, half of him glad to see them moving on, while the other half was wishing they had stayed long enough to spend a little more money. At least, this time they didn’t tear anything up, he thought. Then he remembered a little issue he wanted to address concerning Jewel, and her downright disobedience over the changing of her dress. He should have given her a good beating last night, but unlike his guests, he stayed with the bottle too long and passed out at the table. By the time he woke up in the middle of the night, he was too tired to think about anything beyond falling in bed. This morning, she was already up and in the kitchen before he was awake. But, by God, there ain’t nothing to save her from a whipping now, he thought, and turned back toward the store to tend to it.

He found her in the kitchen, her back to him as she stood gazing out the back window. “Turn your sorry ass around,” he commanded. “I’ve got somethin’ to settle with you.” When she did as she was told, he took a step backward, startled when he saw his shotgun in her hands. “Whoa!” he blurted. “What the hell are you doin’?”

“No more beatings,” she announced in her usual stoic manner. “No more whore.”

“Gimme that damn gun,” he demanded angrily, and stepped toward her, reaching for it. With the barrel no more than six inches from his stomach, she pulled both triggers, knocking him off his feet, the recoil from both barrels firing simultaneously almost knocking her down as well. Flat on his back, the mortally wounded man lay helpless as the life drained rapidly from his mangled body. “You’ve kilt me, you damn Injun bitch,” he managed to gasp. With a savage desire to finish the job, she got her butcher knife from the table and took his scalp before leaving him to die in the middle of the kitchen floor she had come to despise.

With no change in her dispassionate demeanor, she went about packing her things, along with all the supplies she could load on Clem’s two horses, as well as his shotgun and revolver. When she was satisfied that she had all she needed, she went out back and opened the gate to the hog pen. Taking a rope from the barn, she tied a loop around the necks of the two hogs and tied the other end to her packhorse. When all was ready, she returned to the house with one of the rails out of the hog pen. Using it as a lever, she turned the stove over, dumping flaming ashes on the floor, which she used to ignite the firewood and broken furniture she piled on top. Content with the result, she waited until the firewood was burning lustily. Then she pulled out a couple of pieces, went outside, and pitched them up on the shingle roof.

When it was all done, she climbed up in the saddle and started up the path, never once looking back at the blazing funeral pyre she had left. At the top of the ridge, she turned the horses toward the northwest and Powder River country, walking them slowly at the pace of the two hogs following along behind. Somewhere on the Powder, or the Tongue, maybe, she would find Crazy Horse or Sitting Bull and hopefully some of the Cheyenne people who had joined with him. It was time for her to return to her people and fight the white man.

Chapter 9

His first confrontation with a sizable gathering of gold seekers came after a couple of weeks near the base of a mountain that stood high above the neighboring peaks. A few days earlier, he had made his camp by a wide rushing stream, close up under a steep slope with rocky outcroppings jutting out from the forest of tall pines. Game was plentiful. The spot he had picked showed signs of a favorite watering place for deer, and proved to be just that. Hunting with his bow was a great deal more difficult than using his rifle, but he felt the need to conserve his cartridges. After a couple of days of hunting, he was able to thin out the deer population a little before they moved out of the valley.

Extending his range of hunting then, he rode to the far side of the mountain, where he found sign of elk, and immediately set in to stalk them. Their tracks led him beyond the next mountain to a narrow canyon bisected by a rapidly flowing stream. There were no elk, but it was obvious that they had been there. He had started to continue after them when he was stopped by the sudden report of a rifle. It sounded to be of small caliber, but he was at once concerned. He paused to listen, but no shots followed the first one. Although it had come from somewhere beyond the ridge west of him, and he was obviously not the target, it troubled him that he had once again come in contact with man. White or red, he could not say, but instead of retreating to his camp on the other side of the tall mountain, now to the east of him, he decided it best to find out who was crowding him.

Making his way up the slope, he let the bay find the easiest way to the top, skirting clusters of rugged rocks to weave his way through the pines. Upon gaining the top of the ridge, he was amazed to find a sizable settlement of prospectors, working away like busy insects over a carcass. His first reaction was one of despair, for the once beautiful stream was already looking very much like a carcass. He could see nothing that would explain the reason for the shot he had heard. Evidently someone had decided to take a shot at something, maybe a varmint of some kind. And the realization struck him then that there was no sacred place on the earth safe from the white man’s search for gold. His sense of curiosity demanded that he take a closer look at the collection of miners, however, so he guided the bay down the east side of the slope and up to the top of a lower rise that stood between him and the settlement.

He sat on his horse and watched the activity below him for a few minutes, noting the little city of tents with a few rough shacks scattered among them. Then he realized that not all of them were dwellings. Already, there were two tents that displayed rough signs advertising whiskey, and one of the shacks appeared to be a trading post. It was a town in the making, right in the center of ceded Indian lands. He knew at once that he would be moving his camp even farther north. He wheeled his horse to retreat, but then reconsidered. He was almost out of coffee beans, and he had become quite accustomed to drinking the black liquid, so why not see if the trading post had them? He felt in his pockets to make sure his two gold coins were still there. And some flour, too, if they don’t want too much for it, he thought.

Reuben Little glanced up when something blocked the sunlight coming in the door of his shack. “Come in, stranger,” he greeted Wolf cordially. “I thought you were an Injun when I first looked up.”

Puzzled, Wolf asked, “Why?” He thought it should be fairly obvious that he was not. It never occurred to him that his clothes made from animal skins, and sewn by himself, gave him a rather primitive appearance.