How do you bring a million dollars in gold down off a mountain? Mules, you say?
You've got to get mules or horses, and that starts people wondering what you want them for. And you may need help, but help can be greedy, often as murderous as you.
I tell you, gold is easier found than kept.
Chapter XVIII
Neb scouted ahead for us, and that was a canny dog. He was big enough to be kin to a grizzly and had a nose like an Arkansas coonhound.
We rode scattered out, not talking, wary for traps because this was Indian country, but wary for those coming down behind us, too. Pa's travois would have made an easy trail to follow, and I wondered if he, too, had feared what was behind him. When we came up to his camp we saw why he'd chosen it. That camp was well out in the open, among just a few trees and some brush, and there was a good field of fire wherever a body looked.
Of course, at first we weren't sure it was pa's camp. It was a likely spot, and there were stones blackened by fires in a clearing among the trees. We got down from our horses and, while the Tinker kept a lookout, we stood around and sized up the situation.
Nell found the grave. She had walked to the other side of the small clearing among the trees. It was there, south of the patch of woods and a small knoll.
Only one grave. Above it was a cross and the name, Pierre Bontemps.
Pa had walked away from here when he saw the horses, and that might be any place to the south, but he saw them from here. He'd made no mention of burying Pierre, so he must have come back ... but Pierre's killer could have buried him. And suppose pa lay in the same grave?
Neither Orrin nor me figured such would be the case, but scattered out around that little nest of trees to see what we could find. Others had been here since, and there would be nothing left unless pa had left some sign intentionally, or unless there was some item time had not destroyed.
We found nothing.
'Tell,' Orrin said, 'you were a mite older than any of us, and you knew pa a little better. What do you think he would have done at this point?'
'Whoever killed Pierre may have killed him,' the Tinker suggested. 'He may have laid by those horses waiting for your father.'
Judas objected. 'That is a possibility, of course. But it seems to me that whoever killed Mr. Bontemps was not one to take chances. He stabbed a wounded, helpless man three times. I believe he would prefer to wait, to catch Mr.
Sackett asleep or somehow helpless.'
'The way I see it, Orrin,' I said, 'knowin' the kind of man pa was, why he came west and all, I think, once he had the horses and no longer had to worry about Pierre, he'd go back after some of that gold.'
'I think he did go back,' Nell said.
'Well, maybe,' I said doubtfully. 'I think he would, but we don't know if he did.'
'I know,' Nell repeated. 'I am sure he went back.'
'Why?' Orrin asked.
'I think when he left the second time, having some gold and all, and remembering what happened to Mr. Bontemps, I think he would take another route,' she said.
'These mountains offer very few roads,' Judas objected, 'and this is the best way, obviously.'
'And the most dangerous. Best routes never meant much to a mountain-born Sackett, anyway,' she insisted. 'I want to tell you something.
'Just east of Silver Falls I found an old Indian trail. It heads off south along the shoulder above Quartz Creek. When I first settled in there to pan that creek I studied the country in case I had to run. I scouted that trail across the high-up mountains until I could see where it led.
'It goes right to Pagosa Springs, although there's a branch, looks like, that swings south. I've got a feeling it joins up with a trail I saw coming in from the south at Haystack Mountain.'
It surely made sense. Pa was never one to set himself up for somebody, and if he now had some gold he would be doubly in danger. He'd keep off the main trails, use routes where he could find cover from which to study his back trail, and he'd head west.
If anybody was lying in wait it would be along the trail east. Folks at San Luis might have talked, and there were always bad men around who'd lie up for a man and try to gather in what he had.
Pa had wintered out west and he liked that country. If he had taken his gold that way he could come by an unexpected way and likely would avoid trouble.
Still, any man packing gold was sure to be an uneasy man.
Seemed to me the only thing to do now was to cut out for Shalako, scout around there and talk to some of the Utes who might know something. Mighty few people travel through Indian country without being seen, and it was likely the Utes knew all that had taken place around Treasure Mountain--if they'd talk.
We headed west, rattling our hocks down the trail for Shalako. We knew that our cousins Flagan and Galloway had settled in that neighborhood a short time back, and we figured to meet up with them, then get our bearings. Galloway was a great hand to make friends, and chances were that he had Indian friends among them.
We Sacketts have fought Indians, camped with them, hunted with them, told stories with them, slept in their tipis and wickiups, and fought with them again. Sometimes all was friendly, depending on the tribe and how they felt at the moment. Pa had lived with Indians, too, and favored their way of life, and, of course, back there in the high-up hills of Tennessee and North Carolina, we'd had many a friend among the Cherokee, Shawnee, or Chickasaws.
They had their way of life and we had ours, and when the white man moved in he did just what the Indians had done before him. He took what land he needed.
There were mighty few Indians for the size of the country, and we crowded them like they crowded others.
Life had been that way from the beginning of time, and I could see no end to it.
Over there in Europe the Celts crowded the Picts, and the Saxons crowded the Celts, and then the Normans moved in and took over the country, and it was the same story all across the world.
Five days later we rode into Animas City which they were building into quite a town. Must have been twenty or twenty-five buildings there, most of them dwellings of one sort or another.
We rode up to Schwenk and Will's saloon, which was also a store. By the look of it, this place had just been opened, but business wasn't suffering. There were half a dozen men at the bar and this was just after midday.
The Tinker and Judas took the horses down to the river for water, Nell went with them, and Orrin and me decided to listen to what was being said and try to find out what we could.
A couple of men nodded as we came in, and one of them spoke. The rest just glanced around and paid us no mind. Nobody was talking very much. There was some talk of a railroad coming in, but it looked to me like that was nothing that was going to happen very soon.
The bartender came down our way and we both ordered rye. He glanced at us real sharp, then again. 'Travelin' through?'
'Maybe.'
'Pretty country,' Orrin commented, 'right pretty country. Much going on around?'
'Mining. Cattle. You a cattleman?'
'Lawyer,' Orrin said. 'But I've worked with cattle. Much ranching around here?'
'West of here, and south. Some good outfits. There's a new bunch over on the La Plata. Name of Sackett.'
'Heard of them,' Orrin said.
'There's other Sacketts around here. One of the first men in this country was Seth Sackett. He came in with the Baker outfit.'
'Good folks, no doubt,' I said.
'The best,' said the bartender. He was a shrewd, competent-looking man. 'You boys could do worse than to settle here yourselves.'
