Ride the High Range

Virginia City was a proper town in 1866, with schools and churches and stores for respectable citizens, a newspaper, and more than a thousand buildings—all mushroomed up from Alder Gulch and Daylight Gulch from the first strike of gold in 1863. Gone were the lawless times of the vigilantes. There was law and order now in Virginia City and the town had recently been designated the Territorial Capital of Montana Territory. Just this year, the town boasted the first telegraph in Montana. Much to Johnny Hawk’s relief, the other face of Virginia City was still evident—the bawdy houses and saloons. It was an amazing sight to Jim Moran’s eyes. Virginia City was a proper town, all right, but it was a dying town. Placer mining had all but played out, and the gold strike in Last Chance Gulch near Helena was pulling even the die-hard miners away from their claims. It was only a matter of time before the whole place would dry up.

That Virginia City was in her death throes was plainly seen by Harvey McGowan, an observance that was immediately verified by his uncle’s boarded-up store on Wallace Street. Easily discouraged, Harvey felt his hopes draining into his boots as he stood staring at the empty windows of the store, for he had counted totally on his uncle’s help in establishing a successful living in what had been a boomtown. Never prone to despair as a rule, Tessie stood beside him wringing her hands, the air of bravado she had shown before leaving Fort Reno having faded. Of the three, Lucy Taylor remained the determined tower of strength she had willed herself to be.

“We’ll go to Helena with the rest of the people,” she said. She stepped up on the boardwalk and peered through a crack in the shuttered window. “There’s a lot of stuff in there. I don’t think your uncle has left town yet, or if he has, he’s left an awful lot of inventory here.” She turned back to her sister and her husband, who were still in deep despair. “We’ll find your uncle’s house. He sent for you, Harvey, so he’ll damn sure welcome you to help him build a new business. Snap out of it.” She then told her sister, “I didn’t come all the way out here to be poor.” She stepped away from the window to stop a passerby. “Excuse me, sir. Do you know the man who owns this store?”

Ralph McGowan was a self-made man. He had built his store in the summer of 1864 when Virginia City was still at her peak. Losing no time, he accumulated his fortune while the town was desperate for dry goods and prices were high, mining his gold from the men who labored to extract it from the mines and streams. For that reason, he was disappointed, but not surprised, when the gold petered out, and certainly not discouraged. A single man, Ralph had no ties to keep him in any spot he didn’t deem promising to his financial possibilities, so he promptly turned his closed sign to face out, and locked his door, and looked forward to new prospects in Helena.

The one thing he had not been sure of was the arrival of his nephew. When things were booming, he wrote that he would put Harvey to work for him if he came out to Montana, but to be honest about it, he wasn’t certain Harvey had the gumption to uproot and make the journey. And since that was sometime back and he had received no word from Harvey, he had all but forgotten his offer. So he was somewhat taken aback when his nephew pulled a wagon up to his house, accompanied by his wife and her sister. “Harvey?” he questioned in disbelief.

“Howdy, Ralph,” Harvey responded. He never called him Uncle Ralph even though Ralph was almost twelve years older than he. “Well, we made it,” he announced, then climbed down from the wagon. “This is my wife, Tessie, and her sister, Lucy,” he said as he helped each one down.

Ralph was temporarily suspended in a moment of indecision, but only for a moment, before he responded appropriately. “Why, good Lord,” he managed, “I see you did. I was beginning to wonder.” He hurried down the porch steps to greet them, pumping Harvey’s hand enthusiastically, then a hug for each of the ladies. All the while his mind was working over his reaction to the unexpected appearance of his nephew at a time when he was set to move on to another prospective spot. Always one to see the silver lining around every dark cloud, and a firm belief that the silver was there for him to mine, he quickly concluded that Harvey’s arrival was a good thing. He was positive that he would be as successful in Helena as he had been in Virginia City, and he would need a good man to help with the expansion of his business. He remembered his nephew as an honest, hardworking individual, although short of ambition. Just the kind of man Ralph figured he needed, someone who could run his business, but unlikely to press for a partnership. There was also the added attraction of Tessie’s younger sister, a fine-looking woman who graced him with an engaging smile.

“Excuse my manners, ladies,” Ralph went on. “Come on in the house. You must be hungry. I’ll have Pearl fix you something to eat. It’s a little past suppertime, but I’m sure she can rustle up some coffee and a little something to go with it.” When Harvey raised an eyebrow, Ralph explained, “Pearl’s a Shoshoni woman who cooks for me. I can’t pronounce her real name so I just call her Pearl.”

“You must have seen the stables at the foot of the hill,” Ralph said. “You came right by them. You can unhitch ’em and leave your wagon right where it is, and take your mules down to the stables.” When Harvey seemed to be taking a moment to think that over, Ralph guessed his indecision. “Tell Percy at the stable that I’ll pay for their feed and board.”

“Not at all,” Ralph said. “We’re gonna need those mules when we pack up and head for Helena.” His remark caused raised eyebrows in all three guests. In answer to their unspoken question, he explained, “We’ll load everything up in the next couple of days, and take our business to Helena. That’s where the gold is flowing now, so you folks got here at just the right time.” He stood aside then and waved the women up the steps while Harvey unhitched the team. “You take those mules on down to Percy and I’ll take this opportunity to get acquainted with these lovely ladies you brought with you.”

The reaction to the news that they were going to Helena was varied among the three new arrivals. Harvey was relieved that his uncle showed every indication of including him in his plans. He had been concerned about his future ever since learning of Virginia City’s decline. Tessie was dismayed that another long trip was in the immediate offing after just having survived the long trek from the east. Helena was about one hundred miles away. Lucy, on the other hand, was eager for the new adventure to begin, and felt fortunate to have an alliance with someone who had material and financial backing. Her ambitious eyes saw only opportunity.

His young friend was in pain. It was not necessary to ask what had happened upon his profession of affection for Lucy Taylor. The results were written in Jim’s face, and as was his habit, he withdrew to a place inside himself, but this time it was a deeper room inside his mind in which he permitted no entry. Johnny tried to get him to talk about it several times, but Jim would only shake his head and respond that it was a bad idea from the beginning. For three days, they camped at an abandoned claim by a stream near the town while Johnny satisfied his cravings for strong spirits and loose women. Jim remained in camp, declining the little man’s invitations to accompany him and wash away his hurt with whiskey and a go with one of the many available whores. Finding it difficult to believe that this remedy did not tempt his young friend, he finally stopped trying and left Jim to wrestle his demons alone.

After the third day Johnny had to admit that his capacity for rotgut whiskey and mattress grappling was exhausted, along with his money, and much like his partner, he was in need of the solitude of the wilderness. “I know what you need,” he said one evening as he looked across the campfire at his morose companion. “We need to get outta this place and head for Helena where the boom is going on now. I don’t know how much longer I can stand to look at that droopy face of yours without gettin’ the melancholies myself.” When Jim started to speak, Johnny interrupted him. “I know what you’re fixin’ to say, but you ain’t heard what I’m talkin’ about yet. I ain’t talkin’ about goin’ where the people are. I’m thinkin’ you need to get up in the mountains with the hawks and the deer and the badgers, where the country is still like the good Lord made it. We can do some huntin’ and trappin’ in a place I know that ain’t many souls seen. It’s a place where I made a camp a long time before there was a place such as Helena in what some folks call the Big Belt Mountains. We won’t even go into Helena. Whaddaya say?”

The suggestion struck a chord in Jim’s bruised mind, reminding him of his early quest to embrace the high mountains. Johnny was right. This was what he needed—to let the solitude of the high country heal his heart. They left for Three Forks the next morning, following the Madison River north. There were plenty of signs that the trail had been well traveled of late, both horses and wagons, attesting to the exodus out of Virginia City. “Looks like we’re always a day late and a dollar short,” Johnny opined over the profusion of tracks. “I’d like to get in on a new strike once, but it don’t look like it’ll ever happen.”

After a while, Johnny grew tired of talking and they pushed on in silence, a state that Jim favored. The stubby-legged little man had thought to take his friend’s mind off his disappointment by jawing away, but nothing he said was able to penetrate the stony silence of the man following along behind him. But Jim’s mind was not resting, for he had learned that he could be hurt by having feelings for someone, and he made a silent promise to himself that he would never let himself be put in that position again. In fact, he decided that the less contact he had with people, the better off he was, so he rode on, anxious to reach the place Johnny had talked about and vowing to put Lucy Taylor out of his memory.

When they camped that night at Three Forks where the river they had followed combined with two others to form the mighty Missouri River, Johnny was in a high state of concern, worrying that his partner had withdrawn into a state of melancholy from which he might never recover. I ain’t never seen a man take rejection so hard, he thought. “You know, I hope there ain’t no hard feelin’s agin’ me for tellin’ you to go talk to that gal,” he finally said.

Much to his relief, Jim smiled, although sadly as he told himself that he had moped around long enough. It left a scar, just as the bullet wound had left in his shoulder, and like the bullet wound, his heart would heal. “No, partner,” Jim replied softly. “It ain’t your fault I don’t have sense enough to tell when a woman ain’t got no use for me. I expect I’ve learned a lesson.”

The next morning, they stocked up on the basic supplies they needed to start out for Helena—using the last of their money, a small sum that Johnny had given Jim to hold on to to ensure that it did not contribute to some prostitute’s or bartender′s gain. Starting out once more, they were in the saddle for a long day before reaching the wide valley between two mountain ranges and making their camp by a slow-moving stream. “It ain’t very big, but it tastes all right,” Johnny said after sampling the water. “I reckon it won’t kill the horses,” he joked. “I still got so much of that damn whiskey in me that it’ll kill anythin’ that crick’s got in it.”

After the fire was made and they had eaten, Johnny sat back and gazed at the mountains in the distance. “Yonder’s where we’ll head in the mornin’,” he said, pointing toward the northeast, “Big Belt Mountains.” Then he made a sweeping motion with his arm. “When I was last in this valley, all that ahead was home to a couple of villages of Blackfeet. I’ve been to that place they named Last Chance Gulch—wish I’d had enough sense to pan some of that gold—but, hell, I thought pelts was my gold and there were too damn many Injuns near that gulch to be healthy for a lone trapper. Blackfeet never have been partial to white men. It’s best to avoid ’em whenever it’s possible, and that’s a fact—jaybird.”

Jim shook his head slowly, amused by the little man’s ramblings. Looking away toward the mountains Johnny called the Big Belts, he could feel an excitement inside himself over the prospect of riding deep into the bosom of their solemn peaks. It was what he needed at this time of his life, and already thoughts of Lucy were gradually fading to gray, although they would never be gone completely. He fell asleep that night thinking of the mountains, feeling that he had no place in what man called civilization. He thought about White Fox and Deer Foot, and Morning Flower—and wondered if he would ever see them again. Perhaps, he reasoned, when Johnny developed another yearning to visit his “wife.”

As Johnny had said, his old camp was not easy to find, even for him after all the years since he was last there. In fact, they climbed deep into the mountains, following steep ravines and narrow passes through slopes covered with thick pine forests, searching for some familiar sign that would put Johnny on the right path. Jim felt an immediate peace as he guided the buckskin over rocky areas with rocks so small they reminded him of gunpowder, to huge magnificent boulders protruding from grassy meadows near the tops of the mountains. The ground seemed dry, but there were springs everywhere, even this late in the summer, with grass growing in the bottom and moss covering the rocks on the sides. Looking off to the east, he could see some peaks softened by grass. Other mountains had no trees at all except near the bottom, where he saw antelope sign. Higher up there were scarred trees that looked like elk had rubbed antlers there. It was a good place, he decided.

“If I can just find that little notch near the top of the mountain,” he said. “There’s a tall pine bent like an S right at the edge of a stand of trees in front of a cliff of solid rock. Leastways it looks like solid rock, but behind that screen of trees there’s a notch just big enough to let a horse through. ’Bout thirty or forty feet in, it opens up to a space big enough to keep a small herd of horses, with a strong stream that runs all year.

“I wouldn’ta found it the first time if I hadn’t shot a mountain lion and didn’t kill it.” He hastened to explain. “I didn’t have time to draw a bead on him, and he jumped at the same time I pulled the trigger—got him in the hind leg. I followed that cat halfway around this mountain, and he woulda got away if I hadn’t seen him crawl between those trees in front of that cliff. Let me tell you, I was mighty careful when I pushed through those trees, expectin’ to find him between them and the rock face of that cliff. But he had dragged hisself through that notch. I was tickled to find that place.”

“Yeah, there was,” Johnny replied, “but there was no crooked-shaped pine at the edge of it, like at my camp.” He leaned back and tried to recall the morning he had shot the mountain lion. After thinking about it for a while, he started from the beginning when he crossed over the foothills and went up into the thickest of the pines. The more the image of that day came into focus, the more he suddenly remembered until it came to him what was different. “Son of a bitch!” he blurted. “We’re on the wrong damn mountain. That place we saw this mornin’ was the right spot. It’s just growed up more since then. But there weren’t no crooked tree.

They got an early start the following morning, retracing their steps of the previous day. When they reached the rock cliff about three-quarters of the way to the top of the mountain, they stopped while Johnny took another hard look, trying to spot something that would tell him this was the right place. Jim, meanwhile, led his horse over to the edge of the belt of pines and dropped the buckskin’s reins while he went into the trees, where he found what he searched for. “Here’s your crooked tree,” he called to Johnny, and waited beside a fairly large stump about waist high until Johnny made his way into the trees to join him.

The secret camp of Johnny Hawk was much the way he had described it. Formed by rock walls on all four sides, nature had formed an enclosed meadow with a stream coming up from the ground and running through the center of it to disappear underground again at the lower end. Looking up, Jim could see that the camp was protected overhead by trees and boulders. He could not imagine a more ideal camp for a man alone in hostile country.

The grass on the floor of the enclosure had grown so thick that it concealed any signs that anyone had been there recently, but Johnny scratched around in it until he was able to uncover remains of his campfire. He looked up at Jim and grinned. “Ain’t nobody found this place since I left it,” he said. Then his grin grew wider, his one sentinel tooth protruding prominently from his lower gum, and he declared gleefully, “Ain’t this somethin’? Two Crows smack dab in the middle of Blackfoot country—Little Thunder and Rider Twelve Horses!”

Although they had not sighted any Blackfoot hunters, or seen sign that any had been in the area recently, there was still cause for caution. The Indians had left the broad valley west of the Big Belt Mountains to the thousands of gold seekers that rushed into the gulch. But they had not gone far away, settling in the valleys to the north and east of the Big Belts, and were certain to hunt in these mountains. Of concern then, to the two white intruders, was to find a way to disguise the entrance to their hidden camp. The sharp eye of a Blackfoot hunter would no doubt discover an oft-used trail to and from the thick stand of pines, but Johnny showed Jim a clean apron of stone and shale on the far end of the trees where careful entry would leave no sign. Once they were in the pines, the floor was so thick with needles that even horses, when led slowly, would leave no trail.

Their camp secure, they now had a good deal of work to do in order to supply it with firewood and build a lean-to for their horses before winter came, as well as construct a hut of some kind to protect them in foul weather. There were plenty of pines close at hand, but pine was not good firewood. It burned too quickly and it produced too much smoke for people who did not want to be discovered. To further complicate the issue, they chose not to cut trees for firewood too close to their camp, also to prevent anyone from knowing they were there. So it was necessary to scout the lower foothills for hardwood to supply their fuel. The lean-to and hut were problems also due to the fact that they could not snake large logs through their screen of trees without leaving a clear trail for anyone to follow. To solve this problem, smaller pines were hewn at some distance from their camp, and through Jim’s skill with hatchet and vine, a small but sturdy shelter was constructed. Johnny counted himself a keen judge of men for having picked young Jim Moran for a partner, for he was not afraid of hard work. What Johnny failed to understand was Jim’s motivation was sparked by the notion that he was building his home and not just a camp to soon be abandoned.

After several weeks in their mountain camp, life had become more enjoyable for Jim Moran. There was abundant game close at hand and there was no lack of anything the two of them needed except coffee, flour, and salt. Jim could do without any of the three, but he missed coffee, so he welcomed Johnny’s proposal to go into Helena to see if he could trade some of the hides they had dried. They were not prime since they were summer pelts, but he figured they should be at least worth some coffee beans and maybe a little flour. Since Jim was still reluctant to have anything to do with civilization, Johnny volunteered to make the trip into town alone. Jim quickly accepted the offer. “I ’preciate it, Johnny,” he said. “I’m thinkin’ about scouting up through the northern end of the mountains to see what kinda game I can find.”

After Johnny disappeared down through the wooded ravine leading away from the camp, Jim strapped his bow on his back, picked up his rifle, and made his way on foot down the slope toward the adjacent mountain. He was not looking for large game, planning to use his bow for anything worth shooting, but the rifle was always with him for emergencies. Walking along a high ridge that connected two mountains, he found sign of elk, but no sighting. Beyond that ridge and up the next mountain, there was sign of deer, but he was not looking for deer on this day. Still, he was glad to see plenty of sign, for they would need a lot of meat put back for the winter.

Descending the ridge, he slowed his pace to keep his balance on the steep slope. Just before reaching the bottom where a strong stream cut a ribbon in the narrow pass, he suddenly came to a halt. He was sure he had heard something and he stood still to listen. There it was again, and this time he identified it as the warning growl of a grizzly. He could see nothing in the direction the growl had come from, and not certain if it was him who was being warned or something else, he inched forward cautiously to see if he could spot the source. Now the growl came again, this time louder and more of a roar. He decided he wasn’t the cause of it, so he made his way down to a large boulder close to the stream, and there he saw the problem. Below him, a young Indian boy stood on the near side of the stream, frozen by the ferocious spectacle of an angry grizzly with its ears pinned back and its head and neck thrust forward. He had evidently crossed between the bear and her cubs. Seeing the boy, the cubs had scattered in three different directions, leaving the sow confused and agitated because she was unable to make an orderly retreat with all of her cubs in tow. Growing more agitated by the second when the boy remained frozen with fear, she began to shift her weight back and forth from one forepaw to the other.

Jim knew she was about to attack. He roared as loud as he could, hoping to distract her. Still, she was about to launch her attack on the petrified boy. Jim lifted his rifle and aimed at a boulder inches from the bear′s nose. He was reluctant to kill the bear and orphan the cubs, so he squeezed the trigger, sending a slug to ricochet off the rock, whining as it grazed her fur. It had the desired effect. Startled, she jumped backward and ran back down the stream. In a few seconds, her cubs ran after her. He watched for a moment to see the mother and children reunited and bounding across a meadow leading up the mountain.

He turned his attention back to the stream in time to see the boy sink to his knees, wavering as if to fall over any second. Jim hurried across to catch him before he collapsed. “Boy,” Jim said, “you’re all right now.” The boy made no response, staring with blank expressionless eyes, showing no indication that he understood what was being said to him. It occurred to Jim then that his fainting was not all due to fright. Something else was wrong—maybe some kind of sickness. Then he remembered several boys in Two Bulls’ village who went into the forest alone, seeking their medicine. They fasted for days, waiting for a dream that would tell them the path they must walk. He looked closely at the boy he was holding up. He was about the same age as the Crow boys. He must have been too long without food and water. What to do with him was now the question. He couldn’t take him back to his camp, but he didn’t want to leave him unconscious in the woods. Finally, he decided to take him to the edge of the foothills and leave him there. Johnny had said there was a Blackfoot village in the valley beyond the mountains. Maybe he could leave him where they would find him.

He picked the boy up and followed the stream down to the hills below near the valley floor. It was a walk of about a mile before he came to the edge of the trees at the base. Johnny was right—he could see tipis in the distance. “This’ll have to do, boy,” he said as he laid him gently on the grass and propped him up against a tree trunk. Then he aimed his rifle up in the air and fired it three times in rapid succession. “That oughta get their curiosity up,” he said, looking at the boy again, who had registered no more than a quiver when the shots were fired. He waited to see if there was going to be any response from the Blackfoot camp. In a few minutes time, he saw a party of about a dozen riders leaving the village. “All right, boy, here come your folks, so I’d better get the hell outta here.”

Moving quickly, he made his way back through the trees and started up a hill, pausing at the top to see if anybody was coming after him. He could see the riders approaching the boy, and he waited just long enough to see them crowd around him. Then he turned and descended the other side of the hill, heading for the ravine he had found when he came down the mountain. As he hurried up the slope at a trot, he wondered what the Indians would make of the rifle shots. As far as he could tell, the boy was still not conscious when he left him. He had to wonder if he had just caused some future trouble for himself by firing the shots. At any rate, he decided it might be best to confine his hunting to the southern end of the chain of mountains for a while.

“Ain’t this somethin’?” Johnny remarked to his horse as he rode along the busy main street of Last Chance Gulch. The town was unfolding like a flower opening its petals, spreading out from the creek where four prospectors from Georgia had first found gold. Only this flower was far from beautiful. Already rough buildings were being hastily erected on every piece of land available. There were hundreds of tents and brush shelters crowded among log cabins half finished while their owners were turning every foot of dirt over to shovel into the sluice boxes, looking for the precious metal. The main street followed the windings of the creek as it snaked its way along the gulch, and side streets were already forming with no plan other than to follow the haphazard paths made by the miners on their way to the creek. Johnny nodded to the grim-looking men as he rode slowly past with barely a responding nod, as the rough-clad, bearded miners labored over their sluice boxes. “By God,” he muttered, “I ain’t ever been to a circus, but I bet it would have to go some to beat this.” Seeing one of the miners pause for a moment and lean on his shovel while he spat out his chaw and bit off a fresh one, Johnny reined his horse to a stop. “Say there, neighbor, is there someplace here where a man can trade for some supplies?”

The miner responded with a grin, “Hell, mister, look around you. If you stand in one spot for five minutes, there’ll likely be one where you’re standin’.” He motioned toward a board structure recently under roof a few dozen yards farther up the street with three large freight wagons beside it. “Yonder’s one fixin’ to open pretty soon. If they ain’t ready to trade, you can try that tradin’ post back down around the bend of the creek.”

Pulling up to the store, he noticed a smaller farm wagon on the other side that he felt he had seen somewhere before, but dismissed the thought when a man walked out of the building to get something from one of the freight wagons. “Mornin’,” Johnny greeted him. “You open for business?”

Johnny shook his head. “Nah, he’s back up in the mountains yonder way,” he said, motioning with his head. “He ain’t likely to come into town.” Then he gestured toward the store. “Looks like you ain’t wastin′ no time gettin’ started. This your brother you was comin’ to see?” He nodded toward Ralph, who was standing by the wagon, marveling over the chance meeting.

“Uncle,” Harvey replied. “This is Ralph McGowan. He’s the owner of the business. I’ll be working for him.” Turning to his uncle, he explained, “Ralph, this is Johnny Hawk, one of the scouts I told you about. If it wasn’t for Johnny and his partner, I might not be standing here today.”

Ralph stepped forward then and offered his hand. “Pleased to meet you, Mr. Hawk,” he said. “Step down and have a cup of coffee. We don’t have the stove hooked up yet, but the women have a pot on a fire behind the building.” He stepped back then after a quick glance at the pack of hides behind Johnny’s saddle, knowing that there was no business to be done with him. He had no interest in trading for hides. Gold dust was the currency he operated with. The show of hospitality was only for Johnny’s part in helping his nephew on the trip out.

“Why, that’ud be mighty good,” Johnny replied to his invitation. “I don’t mind if I do.” He dismounted then, ignoring Ralph’s sudden look of surprise when he discovered Johnny’s head was not as tall as his saddle when he got on the ground. He looped his reins around a wagon post and inquired, “You say the ladies are inside?”

“Lucy,” Harvey answered sheepishly. Ralph had begun calling the women by their formal names, feeling a need for more dignity, since they were going to help in the creation of his merchandising empire. He didn’t attempt to explain it to this rough-hewn dwarf of a man.

“Why, I come to visit you ladies,” he replied grandly, and bowed as they both came forward to meet him. Neither thought to give him a welcome hug or even a handshake, but the thought never occurred to him. Morning Flower was the only woman who had ever offered Johnny a hug. “Somebody said somethin’ about a cup of coffee.”

Startled, Johnny was rendered speechless for a long moment, a condition rarely encountered in his life. He almost spilled his coffee. Glancing at once at Lucy, he detected a slight flush of embarrassment, and he guessed that she had not planned to announce it. Glancing then at Harvey and Tessie, he saw similar expressions on their faces. After another moment, he found his voice. “Well, congratulations,” he said. “I reckon that’ll make her your aunt Lucy, won’t it, Harvey?” Still in the discomfort that Ralph’s announcement had seemed to settle upon Harvey and the two women, Johnny could not resist the urge to say, “I know Rider will be tickled to hear the news.”

“Me and Rider are runnin’ a little low on coffee beans and flour, so I brought some pelts in to see if I could trade for some. They ain’t really prime, but they’re worth more than that.” He looked at Ralph then to gauge his reaction. It was as he had already surmised. Ralph’s expression said as much.

In his best business manner, Ralph attempted to explain. “I’m sure I don’t have to tell you that the fur trade is long gone. I won’t be dealing with any hides because I have no market for them. Our business will be mostly in hardware and tools, some feed stock maybe, but we won’t be selling food staples like coffee and flour.” Johnny nodded his understanding without replying, and drained the last of his coffee while Ralph continued. “There’s an old fellow who runs a trading post about a mile up the gulch. He’s probably the man you’re looking for.”

“It may not always be that way,” Lucy was quick to interject. “I plan to make the lower section of the store a place where women can shop without coming in through the hardware store. They’ll be able to buy just about anything they need for the kitchen and the house.” Johnny nodded his head thoughtfully, and Lucy went on. “Later on, we’ll build onto the other end of the building and put a saloon in there. When we finish, folks will just have to go to one place to get everything they need.”

“That sure does sound grand,” Johnny said. He was beginning to get a clear picture of the attraction between the engaged couple and he recalled Lucy’s oft-quoted declaration, “I didn’t come west to be poor.” She stumbled upon a grubstake and she’s gonna marry it, he thought. It won’t be long after the wedding before he’ll know who’s the boss. “I’d best be on my way,” he announced, “see if I can find that tradin’ post you’re talkin’ about. Good to see you all again. Good luck with your store.” This last, he aimed squarely at Lucy. “And thank you for the coffee.” He placed the cup carefully down on an unfinished counter and with a wave of his hand, took his leave.

Grover Bramble ran the little trading post on the lower end of the gulch, and he agreed to trade with Johnny for the pelts. He had coffee beans and a small quantity of salt and sugar, but no flour. “Everythin’s scarce as hen’s teeth,” Grover remarked, “but flour′s been the scarcest of all. Feller last month brought in a wagon-load of flour and put it up for sale at a hundred dollars a barrel for a hundred-pound barrel. He sold part of the load before folks got so mad at the price that they got up a committee to go after him to lower the price on his flour.” He shook his head for emphasis. “Damn cold day in hell before I’d pay that price.” Then he chuckled and said, “So, no, I ain’t got no flour to sell.”

Johnny took care of his horse before returning to the campfire to recount the happenings of the day. He was anxious to see Jim’s reactions when he informed him of Lucy’s upcoming marriage to Harvey’s uncle, but he was also a little hesitant about inflicting damage to a healing sore. He knew it was news that he would be unable to keep, so he came out with it. “I ran into Harvey McGowan and the girls in town,” he finally blurted. “They’re settin’ up a new store with Harvey’s uncle.” The announcement caught Jim’s attention right away, but did not invoke the familiar screen that descended over his friend’s face whenever that subject was broached. “That ain’t the best part,” Johnny went on. “Lucy’s gonna marry Harvey’s uncle.” There, it was out, and Johnny paused to watch his friend intently as Jim’s expression never changed. He ain’t showing a sign, he thought, but it’s got to feel like I just drove a knife through his gut.

Johnny was only partially right, for Jim was struck by the news that Lucy had so quickly taken a husband. But his heart had been hardened by the scar tissue over his wounded soul, and the impact of the words could be felt against the shield he had built around his emotions, but they could not penetrate. Consequently, he had trained himself never to be wounded by attacks upon his heart again. The fact that Lucy would marry so quickly seemed to slam the final door on his young life, the life he knew as Jim Moran. He no longer wanted to remember anything about that life, and he no longer wanted to be called by that name. His name was Rider Twelve Horses. Jim Moran was dead.