Beneath a Dakota Cross (4 page)

All four men and the packhorse rode past the constable, who now trotted down the dirt road beside them.

“But . . . but . . . what will I tell the sheriff of Coryell County?” he cried out.

“Tell him you chased me out of Texas and threatened to arrest me if I ever set foot in Fort Worth again.”

The deputy stopped his jogging. “Yeah . . . that's right . . . I did, didn't I? And don't you come back to Fort Worth again!” he shouted.

A slight grin broke across Brazos's face as he eased the hammer down on the carbine and kicked his spurs into Coco's flanks.

CHAPTER TWO

Near Lightning Creek, southern Black Hills, Dakota Territory, August 2, 1875

“Wake up, Brazos, I think I'm in love!” The voice rolled across camp like a gravelly serenade.

If it had been May or June, Brazos Fortune would have grabbed his Sharps carbine and yanked back the hammer before investigating the shout. Reaching the Black Hills unscathed, the quartet had been confident of rapid riches. In those early days, a big gold strike was just around the corner, untold wealth only hours away, and every disturbance a signal of a possible intruder, a thief . . . or both.

But now such enthusiasm was buried somewhere in the muck and the mud of western Dakota Territory.

Brazos slowly pulled himself out of his damp bed. For sixty-seven straight days he had risen to the sound of rain dripping from the roof of the dirty canvas tent onto his damp, mildewed bedroll.

On this day, it finally stopped raining.

It snowed.

Brazos briefly thought about combing his hair, then jammed his mud-caked-brown felt hat down on his head. His hair felt dirty and greasy. “You find yourself a woman, Grass?” The words broke out of his mouth like thin ice cracking underfoot after a light freeze.

“Not yet, but I got evidences,” Edwards shouted back.

“Evidences of a woman?” Brazos contemplated an image of a blue silk dress . . . a sweet, shy smile . . . and a sailboat ride on Galveston Bay.

“Yep. I've got evidence here in my hand. I'll build up the fire. You come on out, and I'll show ya the proof!”

The peace of the east Texas portrait faded from Brazos Fortune's mind.
Sarah Ruth, you always were one handsome woman!

With narrow, blue-gray eyes creased by nearly fifty years of outdoor work and worry, Brazos peered out at the snow-covered ground west of the creek. Their tents were pitched at the base of the rimrock on the west side of the gulch. Even though the sun was blocked by East Mountain, daylight had broken, and an inch of fresh, clean snow radiated light from the unseen sun. Still sleeping in the tent was a gaunt, black-bearded Hook Reed, his filthy, gray wool blanket pulled up to his chin. His eyes were so sunken, his cheeks so caved in, that he looked more like a corpse than a prospector.

Brazos squeezed his own right wrist with calloused fingers, trying to wrench the tightness out of his joints, then rubbed his beard away from narrow, chapped lips.
Darlin', I'm sure you got better things to do up there than torment my mind. Now, you run along and tell Veronica and Patricia “good mornin'” for me
.

In the neighboring canvas tent, Brazos heard the erratic gasps and snores of Big River Frank. The cascade of a little stream, bouncing through sluice boxes and over granite riffles, bubbled in the background. Across camp he heard the crunch of Grass Edwards's boot heels in the snow. Brazos pulled his own boots out from under the India rubber sheet that had almost kept them dry during the night. He sorted through a brown leather satchel and yanked out a pair of worn, slightly dirty socks, then sat on his bedroll and began to pull them on.

Now, Lord, I ain't arguin' with you. I followed your leadin' out of Texas to a place I didn't know. And I'm livin' in a tent in this promised land like a stranger in a foreign country. I haven't found my cross . . . I haven't found my ranch . . . we haven't even found Hook's Dakota cross. We're strugglin' just to survive day by day. If we would discover a little more color in the stream, we'd be rich enough to leave. This isn't exactly somethin' to write home about, let alone move your family to.

A sharp pain shot through Fortune's lower back. He stood and stretched just outside the tent flap. As usual, both his knees locked up stiff. It would take a half-mile of walking before they limbered up. He gingerly stooped back into the tent and plucked up his Sharps carbine, then hobbled over to the fire.

Both men had floppy beaver felt hats pulled down tight on unwashed hair. Edwards's long, full mustache drooped down past his chin and made him look permanently depressed. He was two inches shorter than Fortune and toted a Colt .44, hung by a wire loop to his leather belt. His hat forced his ears out, which widened his face and narrowed his round brown eyes.

Brazos tugged the coffeepot off the hook and plopped it down on the flames of the fire. “Now, what's this deluded shoutin' about being in love? Have you been isolated so long you're starting to believe your dreams? None of us has seen a woman in three months.”

“One hundred and six days, unless that includes the Chief's wife, but she was covered up by a blanket and don't count,” Grass informed. “Now, look at this!” He shoved a folded beige sheet of stiff paper into Fortune's hand. “What do you think?”

“A letter?”

“A notice,” Edwards said.

“Where'd you get it?”

“Down at the post office tree.”

“You're supposed to leave those notices posted,” Brazos reminded him.

“I ain't sharin' her with no one else,” Grass insisted. “And the only reason I'm tellin' you is because you're a widower and still consumed with your Sarah Ruth.”

“You're beginnin' to sound desperate, partner. I hope the chief doesn't bring his wife through here again.” Brazos handed the notice back to Grass Edwards. “I don't have my specs on, so read it to me.”

“You can see that fancy writin', can't you?”

“The penmanship is quite impressive.” Brazos rolled a stump over to the flames and plopped down to stretch out his legs and massage his knees.

Grass cleared his throat, then hooked his left thumb into the pocket of his tattered leather coat. “Listen to this.”

My dearest friends,

If you know the whereabouts of my brother, Vince Milan, please inform him that his baby sister is waiting in Cheyenne with a surprise for him.

With much sincere affection and gratitude,

Jamie Sue Milan

A wide, easy smile broke across Brazos's bearded face. “You fell in love with a notice like that?”

Edwards stared at the handbill and sighed, “I've fallen in love with Jamie Sue.”

“I believe you fell for her handwriting.” Brazos tugged suspenders off his shoulders, then leaned over to rub rough and dirty fingers above the campfire's flame. “Maybe she can't write and had the man at the train station pen that note.”

“Don't talk about my Jamie Sue like that,” Edwards snapped. “I just know she's well educated, slim, and has long, curly yellow hair . . . and freckles.”

“Where in that handbill does it say all that?”

“I'm readin' between the lines,” Edwards insisted.

Brazos felt his stiff denim trousers begin to warm. “How do you know she's not sixty years old and fat?”

Grass Edwards leaned forward, elbow on his knee, chin on his palm. “After one hundred and six days, sixty and fat don't sound all that bad,” he grinned. “Anyway, I'm keepin' this notice, and next time we're in Cheyenne, I'm lookin' up my Jamie Sue. The rest of you might want to live like hermits the rest of your lives, but I'm the marryin' type.”

“You waited a long time to decide that,” Brazos teased.

“How old were you when you married Sarah Ruth?”

“Twenty-two.”

“See, that proves it. Ever'body knows I'm twice the man you are, so I should wait until I'm forty-four.”

“Well, you'd better hurry. That leaves you less than a year.”

“I reckon I'll wait until the next time I'm in Cheyenne.”

“You figure Jamie Sue's the one?”

“It's destiny.”

“What were you doin' down at the message tree, anyway?”

“Lookin' for dry wood.”

“Did you see either of the Jims stirring around?” Brazos probed.

“Just Quiet Jim.”

“Did he say anything about fixin' my pick?”

“Quiet Jim don't ever say nothin'. But it's a good thing I went down there. There's a miners' meetin' at Sidwell's posted for today.”

“Today?” Brazos snatched up a tin cup with his left hand, and the coffeepot with his right, then poured himself a steaming cup. “That don't give us five days' notice.”

“Nope. Must be an emergency meetin'. You want me to go wake Big River and Hook?”

“Let them sleep until breakfast is fryin', anyways. With snow on the ground, it doesn't feel like August.”

Several of Grass Edwards's fingers poked through his leather gloves as he poured himself some coffee. “We done jumped from spring rains to fall snow. You reckon these Black Hills just don't have any summer?”

Brazos Fortune's canvas coat was nearly frozen stiff as he beat it against his legs to loosen the sleeves, then pulled it on. “It's bound to get better. Can't go on like this much longer.”

“That's what you've been saying ever since we left the Staked Plains,” Grass Edwards reminded him.

Brazos brushed his fingers through the hair hanging over his ear and picked out a pine needle. “Well, one of these days I'll be right.”

Edwards whisked some weeds off a stick of wood, then shoved it into the fire. He plucked up a weed and waved it at Fortune. “Did I tell you the
spartina pectinata
is starting to mold?”

Brazos took a slow sip of coffee and let the radiant heat warm his face. “I believe you've mentioned it, day and night, for two weeks.”

Edwards pulled off his dark brown hat and waved it at the picket line of horses. “Well, if we can't cut cordgrass for winter feed, them horses is goin' to have a rough winter.”

Brazos studied the low-hanging clouds. “Unless we have some sunlight in the sky, and more gold in the streams, we're all goin' to have a rough winter. I don't know how I let you three talk me into comin' up here anyway.”

Grass Edwards yanked off his stovetop boots and tugged off his dirty wool socks. “You figure we'll winter it out up in these hills? The Jims and some others are talkin' about pullin' out in November.”

“I was thinkin' about just cuttin' a swath across Wyoming and Montana. There's a cross waitin' up there for me someplace. And underneath it, there's a ranch.”

“What about that Dakota cross on Hook's map?”

“We haven't come close to findin' it.”

“Maybe we should go to Texas for the winter. I don't mind tellin' you a warm gulf breeze would feel mighty fine about now.”

“You all can go back, but I don't think anyone wants to see me in Coryell County, Texas. Or anywhere else.”

Grass Edwards's penetrating stare seemed to be locked onto Brazos's eyes. “I understand there's a young lady in McLennan County that wants to see you.”

Brazos Fortune felt extremely tired. “Yeah, you're right. I'd go back to Texas to see Dacee June.”

“Now, that's where you got us all beat, Brazos. Ever'one of us would give our right arm to have a daughter like that pinin' for us.”

“Don't get me in a sentimental mood, Grass. I'm liable to saddle that dark sorrel and ride south.”

“You wouldn't go alone. But if we weren't scalped, we'd probably starve to death before we got to Kansas.”

“I don't think I could ever leave her again. That's why I can't go back now,” Brazos admitted. “I need to find that ranch, then go fetch Dacee June.”

“Gold diggin's a disease. We barely find enough to survive, but it always seems like a big strike is just around the corner. So we keep holdin' on like the last leaf of winter,” Grass said.

“And this is summer.”

“That's snow on the ground, Brazos.”

“Well, it keeps the place from gettin' too crowded, doesn't it?”

Grass glanced up at the morning sun that was barely peeking over the east rim of the gulch. “Hard to imagine the Lord leading anyone to a place like this, ain't it?”

“I don't reckon this is the destination . . . just a rest stop on the journey.”

“Rest stop? I ain't ever worked harder than I have the last two or three months. Look at you. I've seen better lookin' specimens on the prairie after longhorns stampeded over them.”

Brazos rubbed his eyes. There was a deep, throbbing ache in his legs. “I didn't sleep much last night.”

“You ain't slept more than four hours a night since we left Texas.”

“Just old age, I suppose.”

“You ain't that old.”

“How many men older have we met in the Black Hills?” Brazos challenged.

Grass Edwards rocked back on the stump and studied the flames. “Well, there's Pop Richards, for one.”

“And?”

“Well . . . I'm, eh, sure there's others.”

“Pop's two years younger than me,” Brazos said.

“You don't say?” Grass Edwards stuck his little finger in his ear as if trying to improve his hearing. “Ever'one of us is going to age in a hurry if we have to go through the winter in these tents.”