CHAPTER 15
Elmer did show up that night, and he had his drink—whiskey—then claimed Penelope for his free visit.
But he wasn’t the only one who showed up. Cole Brennen also arrived with another man that neither Janey nor Maggie recognized.
“This here is Marvin Lewis with the Westport Landing City Marshal’s office. I’ve brought him with me to be a witness to what’s goin’ on here. However, if you treat us right, why, nothin’ will happen to you, ’n you can go on doing business just like you always have.”
“You are a pathetic excuse of a man, Brennen,” Maggie said.
Brennen’s malevolent smile stretched the skin tight across his face, giving his head the appearance of a skull. “I may be. But it seems to me like you got no choice but to be nice to us.”
* * *
By midnight, all the visitors were gone except for Elmer, who had opted to spend the night with Penelope, and Cole Brennen, who was in one of the downstairs rooms with a girl named Louise. Even Marvin Lewis, who had come with Brennen, was gone.
Janey and Maggie were alone in the parlor, sitting in front of the fireplace, drinking a glass of wine.
“I don’t usually pry into the past lives of my girls,” Maggie said. “Almost all of them have a story as to why they got into this business. Some of them share it and some don’t. Before I ask you to share your story, I’ll tell you mine.
“I’m the daughter of a preacher man. I married the son of a very rich Boston banker, but he treated me like dirt, so I left him. No divorce. I just left him. Because of who he was, I had to leave Boston.” She smiled. “But I took ten thousand dollars with me when I left. That’s how I was able to buy this house and start my business here.”
Janey thought of the two thousand dollars she had taken from Kirby, but before she responded, they heard a bloodcurdling scream coming from Louise’s room.
“What is going on in there?” Maggie asked, jumping up quickly, with an expression of anger and concern on her face. “Louise, what is it? What’s happening?”
Maggie ran to Louise’s room with Janey close behind her. She opened the door and they saw Brennen, his naked body shining gold in the light of the lamp. He was holding a bloody knife in his hand. Louise had her hand across a bloody cheek.
“He cut me!” Louise cried.
Maggie picked up a vase and held it over her head as she approached Brennen. “Get out of here!” she shouted angrily. “Get out of here now! And don’t you ever come back!”
Brennen suddenly thrust his hand forward, burying the knife up to its hilt in Maggie’s chest. With an expression of pain and shock on her face, Maggie stepped back from him.
“You’ve killed her!” Janey screamed.
Brennen turned to face her. He was nearly covered in blood, and the reflected flame in his eyes could have been the fires of hell. The smile was demonic, and he held the knife out toward her. “You’re next,” he said in a low hiss.
Janey backed away from him, stumbling into the chair where Brennen had put his clothes. She stuck her hand back to keep from falling and felt his pistol!
Instantly and instinctively, she pulled the pistol out of its holster and brought it around, firing just as Brennen lunged for her. The bullet hit him in the chest. The impact knocked him back against the fireplace, and he slid down to the hearth, leaving a smear of blood on the bricks behind him.
Elmer Gleason raced into the room with a gun in his hand. He didn’t have to ask what happened. In one all-encompassing look, he took it in. “Girl, throw what clothes together as fast as you can. We’re getting out of here.”
“I had no choice!” Janey said. “He killed Maggie and he was coming after me.”
“That’s true,” Louise said. “Abbigail didn’t have any choice!”
“I believe you, Louise,” Elmer said. “I believe both of you. But this feller is on the city council, ’n the man who come here earlier is a deputy marshal. They ain’t nobody goin’ to believe you. That’s why we got to get out of here now.”
“Elmer, no. If you run with me, they’ll be after you, too.”
“I need to get out of here, anyway,” Elmer said. “I made a few rides with a feller over in Missouri called Jesse James. So I expect my welcome here is goin’ to be wore out pretty quick.”
* * *
Smoke and Emmett were about to partake in an event that would be one of the last of its kind. It was called Rendezvous, a gathering of the breed of men civilization sometimes raised a dubious head toward and pushed the mountain men into history. The smoke of scores of campfires could be seen from some distance away. As Smoke and his father drew closer, they became aware of the sounds of Rendezvous and the aromas of roasting meat from the many cooking fires.
In the early days of trapping, before the war and the Western migration, Rendezvous would be the biggest city between the Pacific Ocean and St. Louis. Those days were over. The mountain men that remained were, for the most part, advanced in years, heading for the sunset of their lives. They had spent their youth, their best years, and the midpoint of their lives, in elements where one careless move could result in either sudden death or slow torture from hostiles.
Mountain men were not easily impressed, but those gathered were standing and watching as Smoke and his father rode slowly into the ruins of the old post, rifles across their saddles. Preacher had already spread the word about the boy called Smoke.
As did many boys of that hard era, he looked older than his years. His face was deeply tanned. His shoulders and arms were lean, but hard with muscle.
“I don’t know. He don’t look all that much to me,” an aging mountain man said to a friend.
“Neither did Kit Carson if you recall,” his friend replied. “Hell, he warn’t but four inches over five feet, but he were one hell of a man.”
“The boy is faster than a snake, Preacher says.”
The mountain man cocked his eye at his friend. “Yeah, but don’t forget, Preacher has been known to spin a tall tale ever’ now and then, when he thinks it might be a mite more interestin’ than tellin’ the truth.”
“Yeah, but not this time, I wager. Look at this kid. He’s got a mean look to his eyes.”
Smoke and Emmett sat their horses and stared. Neither had ever seen anything like the colorful assemblage. The men, all of whom were over sixty years old, were dressed in wild, bright colors—buckskin breeches and shirts, beaded leggings, wide red, blue, or yellow sashes about their waists. Some were wearing cord trousers with silk shirts shining in a rainbow of colors. All were beaded and booted and bearded. Some held long muzzle-loading Kentucky rifles. A few had lever-action repeating rifles. Many were decorated with colorfully dyed rawhide strings dangling from the barrel, the shot and powder bags decorated with beads.
It would not be the last, but nearly the last great gathering of the magnificent breed of men called mountain men.
When Emmett and Smoke spotted Preacher, they couldn’t believe their eyes. They sat on their horses and stared.
He was clean and his beard was well trimmed. He wore new buckskins, new leggings, and a red sash around his waist. His eyes sparkled with a light they had never seen. “Howdy,” he called. “Y’all light and sit, boys.”
“I don’t believe it,” Emmett said. “His face is clean.”
“There’s water to wash in over there,” Preacher said, pointing. “Good strong soap, too. But you’d best dump what’s in the barrel and refill it. It’s got fleas in it along with the ticks.”
* * *
Elmer took Janey to the one-room cabin where he lived, just on the edge of town. It had been the middle of the night when they left the Pretty Girl and Happy Cowboy House. Nobody had seen him sneak her into his place.
She stayed in the cabin for two weeks, not daring to show herself outside. The wisdom of that decision was borne out when Elmer brought a newspaper by a couple days later.
MURDER SO FOUL
Cole Brennen, a sterling citizen and member of the city council, was murdered on the 19th instant. Brennen and Deputy Marshal Marvin Lewis were investigating a residence on the suspicion that activity of an illicit nature might be taking place there. It had been reported that the owner of the house, Maggie Mouchette, was running not a boarding house for young women as her city license stated, but a bawdy house.
Deputy Lewis reports that, upon confirming that such was true, Brennen informed them that he would be reporting the true nature of the business to the authorities. That was when two of the occupants of the house attacked him. Although Brennen was able to subdue Miss Mouchette, the other woman, Abbigail Fontaine, managed to secure a pistol and shot at him. The ball, thus energized, struck Brennen in the chest, taking terrible effect.
Abbigail Fontaine has since disappeared, and authorities have asked that anyone who can give information as to her location should provide such to Marshal Kilgore.
“Lewis wasn’t even there,” Janey said after she read the story. “But Penelope was. Why didn’t they ask her what happened?”
“I’m sure she did tell them what happened, but bein’ as she is what she is, why it’s most likely they didn’t pay her no never mind,” Elmer said.
“Elmer, what am I going to do? I can’t stay here in your cabin forever.”
“How’d you like to go West?”
“Go West?”
“They’s a riverboat leavin’ first thing in the mornin’, headin’ up the Missouri toward a place called Montana. I figure to get us on it.”
“How am I going to get to the boat without being seen?”
“You let me worry about that.”
* * *
When Elmer returned to the cabin that night, he showed Janey the tickets for the riverboat Cora Two. “You’re Mrs. John Smith. I’m John Smith. I figured maybe we should go up river as husband and wife. Folks that’s lookin’ for you won’t be lookin’ for you to be travelin’ with a husband. Most especial since we’ll be usin’ names that ain’t our’n.”
“And John Smith is so original,” Janey said.
“Yeah, I thought it was pretty good my ownself. It was the first name I come up with,” Elmer said, failing to catch the sarcasm in Janey’s voice.
Janey smiled. Who was she to criticize this man who had made all the arrangements to get her away? And, she was pretty sure that once she was away from Westport Landing, she would be safe. The authorities would be looking for a woman named Abbigail Fontaine from New Orleans. She had never given her real last name to anyone, not even to Maggie, nor had she ever shared with anyone that she had come from Missouri, by way of Texas.
* * *
It was after dark when they left Elmer’s house, and they reached the river without arousing any suspicion. The Cora Two was tied up at the landing, a long, white stern wheeler with three decks and a pilot house. Two chimneys sprouted from just aft of the pilot house.
Once they were aboard, Janey stepped out onto the hurricane deck, which was between the boiler deck and the Texas deck, and looked out over the town of Westport Landing. It was quiet and dark, and she could hear a dog barking way off in the distance. The city was so peaceful at that hour of the night. The loudest sounds were the gentle lapping of the river against the hull and the creaking of the boat at its hawsers as it pulled at the current while at anchor.
She walked forward and stood against the railing to look out over the bow. Down on the boiler deck she could see neat stacks of cargo, ricks of firewood, and the men, women, and even children who held steerage tickets. They would be making the journey on that deck. They had no bunks, and would have to bed down wherever they could find room, unprotected against the weather.
A cool breeze came up and Janey shivered, then hugged herself. She thought of the river they would be following, stretched out before them for many miles. It was, she decided, a metaphor, not only bridging the distance she must travel, but reaching into her future as well. What did lie before her?
* * *
Smoke stood in front of the trading post at dawn. His pa was mounted; he wasn’t.
“You do understand my ridin’ off alone, don’t you, boy? I wouldn’t be leavin’ you, but I’ve seen you when you was up against it, ’n you come through just fine. You can handle them guns better ’n anyone I ever saw, so I ain’t worried none ’bout you bein’ able to take care of yourself. But there’s some things you’re goin’ to need to learn ’bout livin’ out here. I cain’t think of nobody more able to teach you them things than Preacher. Problem is, it’s goin’ to take you some time to learn all you need to learn, ’n me ’n you know that I don’t have that much time left. So, I aim to leave you here to get your learnin’ while I go out lookin’ for them men that kilt your brother. You got ’ny problem with that?”
“I reckon not,” Smoke replied quietly. “I know you’re doin’ what you feel you got to do.”
“You’re a good boy, Kirby. No, you’re a good man. I know that when you was growin’ up, you might sometimes thought I was favorin’ Luke. I warn’t. It was just that he was older and a mite easier for me to understand. But there ain’t no man ever lived who had himself a son he was more proud of than I am of you. I’m glad the Good Lord give us this time to be together, so’s I could find that out.
“Bye, Kirby.” Emmett smiled. “I mean, bye, Smoke. That’ll be your name from now on.”
He turned and rode away. He had taken only a little of the money with him, leaving the rest with Smoke. He rode for some distance, then stopped, turned his horse, and waved at his son. Then he was gone, dipping out of sight, over the rise of a small hill.
Smoke knew, at that moment, that he would never see his father again and tried to swallow the knot that was in his throat.
For the entire time of their good-bye, Preacher had sat on the porch of the trading post, watching, saying nothing.
Smoke turned away from the road and looked up at the man who was to become his mentor. “He won’t be back.”
Preacher spat a stream of tobacco off the porch and onto the dusty ground. “Some things, Smoke, a man’s just got to do before his time on earth slips away. Your pa has things to do. If you’re wantin’ to cry, I want you to know that there ain’t no shame in it.”
Smoke squared his shoulders. “I’m a man. I lived alone, I worked the land, and I paid the taxes all by myself. And I haven’t cried since Ma died.”
“Ain’t nobody ever goin’ to question whether or not you’re a man, Smoke. You’re as much a man as anyone I’ve ever knowed.”
Smoke put his foot on the steps. “Let’s get outfitted.” He climbed the steps and entered the trading post. He bought a new Henry repeating rifle, one hundred rounds of .44 caliber ammunition for it, and an extra cylinder for his left hand .36, then they rode out.
Preacher told him he knew of a friendly band of Indians up north of the post. He’d see to it that Smoke got himself a pair of moccasins and leggings and a buckskin jacket, fancy beaded.
“I ain’t got that kind of money to waste, Preacher.”
“Ain’t going to cost you nothing. I know the lady who will make them for you.”
“She must like you pretty well.”
Preacher smiled. “She’s my daughter.”
* * *
On board the Cora Two, a long, deep throated blast blew from the boat’s horn, then the captain stepped out of the pilot house. Lifting a megaphone to his lips, he called forward to the main deck bow. “Lead man!”
“Lead man, aye!” an unseen voice called back from the front of the boat.
“Sound the bottom!”
“Aye, Cap’n!”
“We must be in shallow water,” Elmer said.
Janey walked up to the front of the boat. The soundings had been taken frequently during the long journey upriver, and she was familiar with the routine.
“By the mark two!” the lead man called. To make certain that his call was heard in the pilot house, it was repeated by someone up on the Texas Deck.
The lead man continued to call his soundings, which were then echoed, both calls intoned so melodically that it was almost as if the men were singing. Janey had actually grown to appreciate them, and enjoyed listening to the calls as they played against the rhythmic slap of the paddlewheel in the water.
During the trip upriver the boat had to proceed very cautiously because of shallow water. Three times they had encountered sandbars with the water so shallow that it was necessary to “grasshopper” over them with long heavy spars carried vertically on derricks near the bow. The ends of the spars were dropped to the bottom, tops slanted forward, and with block, tackle, cable, and capstan, lifted and pushed the boat forward as if on crutches while the paddle wheel thrashed furiously. After each splash down, the spars were reset for the next “hop,” until the boat was free.
At the moment, they seemed to be proceeding upriver at a steady, brisk pace.
* * *
Seventy-one days after the Cora Two left Westport Landing, Janey stood on the hurricane deck and watched the bluffs slide by on the south bank as the boat worked its way up the Missouri River to Ft. Benton.
Elmer came over to stand beside her. “Well, our long journey is nearly over. The cap’n told me we’d reach Fort Benton today.”
“Elmer, I can’t thank you enough for helping me out the way you did. I mean, you gave up your job and everything.”
Elmer chuckled. “Ridin’ shotgun on a stagecoach ain’t that much of a job. It was about time I was movin’ on.”
The Cora Two beat its way against the current as it approached around a wide, sweeping bend. Smoke was pouring from the twin chimneys and the engine steam-pipe was booming as loudly as if the town were under a cannonading. With the engine clattering and the paddle wheel slapping at the water, it approached the Ft. Benton landing.
“Deck men, fore and aft, stand by to throw out the lines!” the captain called.
“Aye, Cap’n, standing by!” the first mate called back as two men rushed to the front of the boat and stood side by side, holding the ropes.
At the last minute, the engine was reversed, and the paddle started whirling in the opposite direction, causing the water to froth at the action. The reversing paddle wheel held the speed of the boat until the movement through the water was but a slow, gentle glide up to the dock. Waiting stevedores stood ready to receive the lines.
“Heave out your lines!” the first mate shouted, and both ropes were tossed ashore. One of the men on the boat deck walked his rope back to the stern where he wrapped it securely around a stanchion. The men ashore pulled on the lines—fore and aft—so that the boat was pulled sideways until it was snug up against the dock.
“Well, missy, we’re here,” Elmer said. “You got ’ny ideas as to what you might do next?”
Janey smiled. “Don’t worry about me, Elmer. For the next few years, at least for as long as I can keep my looks, I’ll always be able to make a living.”
Elmer laughed out loud. “I reckon you will.”
* * *
Janey checked into the Grand Mountain Hotel. Once she was in her room she went through her dresses and selected one that left little to the imagination. Donning the dress, she got out her powders and paints, and with an artistry developed over the last few years, she transformed her face, combining subtle eye shadows with bold lashes and mascara. A crimson smear across her lips completed the transformation, and when she walked through the lobby of the hotel a short while later, not one person would have connected her with the woman who had registered as Fannie Webber.
Exiting the hotel, Janey made her way to the largest and grandest saloon in town, the Gold Strike. She went inside, strode up to the bar, and ordered a drink.
“What kind of drink?” the bartender asked.
“I expect, if I’m going to be drinking with men all day, you’d better give me something that doesn’t make me drunk.” Janey fixed him with a penetrating stare.
“Uh . . . drinking with men?” the bartender asked.
The well-dressed man sitting at a table close to the bar got up and walked over to stand beside her. “Henry, I do believe this young lady is applying for a job.”
“I might be,” Janey replied, turning her charm toward the man. “If so, who should I see?”
“That would be me. The name is Andrew McGhee. And you would be?”
Janey thought for a moment, wondering if she should use the same name she used when she checked into the hotel. “The name I use will depend upon whether or not I can get a room here in the saloon.”
McGhee laughed out loud. “For you, my finest room.”
Janie’s smile broadened, and she stuck out her hand. “It’s nice to meet you, Andrew. My name is Fannie Webber.”