Jack Among the Indians; Or, A Boy''s Summer on the Buffalo Plains

  CHAPTER XIII.

  TO FORT BENTON AND BEYOND.

  Jack was at first pretty stiff and sore when he arose next day, but ashe moved about the camp, engaged in the work of helping to get breakfastand preparing to pack up, his stiffness wore off. He told Hugh that hefelt able to ride, and Hugh replied that it would be better for him tobe travelling than to lie in camp.

  Accordingly, soon after sunrise the little train moved off up the river,crossed without incident at the ford that Hugh had found two daysbefore, and started across the valley. Following up a little tributarythat flowed in from the north, they journeyed onward, seeing all throughthe morning numbers of antelope which astonished even Hugh. They werechiefly bucks, in considerable bands, and entirely fearless, as if theyhad not been disturbed for a long time. Sometimes a band would startfrom below them on the hillside, gallop out into the creek bottom, andthen turning parallel with the pack train would slowly gallop along notmore than forty or fifty yards distant, occasionally stopping andstaring, and then starting on again. Hugh declared that at this seasonof the year he had never seen antelope in such large bunches and saidthat he did not understand it.

  Their camp that night was on a little spring at the head of the smallcreek that they had been following up, and high hills, almost mountains,rose to the north of them. It seemed to be a country abounding in game,for at night when Jack rode out to round up the horses--since it wasthought best now for a little while to picket most of them--he startedfrom the underbrush about the camp no less than seven deer, and none ofthem seemed especially frightened but trotted off and stood looking athim as he gathered up his animals. After darkness had fallen and theywere sitting about the fire, Hugh smoking a last pipe before going tobed, Jack said:--

  "What does it mean, Hugh, our seeing so much game here? We haven't seenantelope or deer either as plenty since we have been out as to-day."

  "Well," said Hugh, "I don't know as I can tell you, but it appears to methat the Indians haven't been in this country for quite a while, andit's a sure thing no white men have. The only people that travel aroundhere are skin hunters, and when they're in the country we don't find thegame tame like it is here. There's lots of buffalo been here too, as youcan see, but I ain't seen any right fresh signs for two or three days.Likely we'll run on some though any time. We don't want to kill nothing,though, while we've got any of this meat left."

  "No," said Jack, "there'd be no sense in shooting these animals downjust to let 'em lie there. It's lots more fun to watch 'em when they'reright tame this way than it is to kill 'em."

  "That's so," said Hugh; "but most people don't think that way. I wishmore of 'em did. Most men when they see anything that's alive they wantto kill it, and they want to keep killing as long as there's anythingaround that moves."

  The next day the two passed over a low divide between high hills, andsoon came upon water running to the north. Hugh told Jack that this wasa branch of the Judith River, that runs into the Missouri from thesouth. "I don't know," he said, "whether you'd call this the main creekor not; it's lots longer than the other fork that rises in the JudithMountains, but it don't carry near so much water. The big creek is whatwe call Big Spring Creek; it flows a heap of water, and mighty nicewater too, and the stream is full of trout." As they were passing downthe stream Jack suddenly saw Hugh draw in his horse and look long andintently down the valley; then he went on again, and as Jack passed overthe ridge he saw half a mile ahead what looked like the poles of twolodges, as Hugh had described them, but they were not lodges for theywere not covered. When they had reached these poles they saw that theywere two large tripods about twenty feet in height, and from the legs ofthese tripods were hanging hundreds of moccasins. Some were plain andsome beautifully ornamented with beads or with porcupine quills; but thecurious thing about them was that they were all made for little feet; inother words they were children's moccasins. Hugh and Jack bothdismounted and walked around the tripods, looking at them carefully.Most of the moccasins were about three inches long, and none seemed morethan five inches.

  "What are these put here for, Hugh?" said Jack.

  "Blest if I know," said Hugh. "It's some offering; likely a present tothe sun; but why they're all children's moccasins beats me. I expectthey're put up here by the Crows, likely; but it might be the GrosVentres. You see, we're in a kind of a No-man's-land, here. All theIndians pass through on their way to the fort to trade, and yet none of'em has any rights here."

  For several days after this they travelled over the prairie but wereconstantly in sight of mountains which rose like great islands from therolling plain. Now they saw buffalo again, and once on crossing a woodedstream valley they started a little band of cow elk with their calves,which trotted swiftly away toward the mountains without being shot at.One night Hugh said to Jack:--

  "I expect, son, to-morrow we'll camp with some people that'll surpriseyou; you'll think they're curious when you look at 'em."

  "Why who are those, Hugh? I didn't know you expected to get into anyIndian camp now."

  "Well no," said Hugh, "I ain't said much about it, but if I ain'tmightily out in my calculations we'll strike a big camp to-morrow. Morethan that, you'll think the people that you meet pretty civilized. Theydon't live in lodges, and they wear shoes, and some of 'em have got justas good guns as you or me."

  "Why, who can they be, Hugh; the Red River half-breeds that I have heardyou talk about? I'd like to see their camp."

  "No" said Hugh; "to-morrow I expect we'll strike Fort Benton. Have youever heard of that place?"

  "Why yes," said Jack, "of course I have, but I didn't know we were goingto pass through it. Oh, that's what you meant by their not living inlodges, is it? How much of a place is Fort Benton?"

  "Well," said Hugh, "I don't rightly know how many people live there, butI expect it must be nigh onto a thousand. You take it when the furs andthe robes are coming in in the fall and Benton's a mighty lively place.It's the furthest point up the river, you know, where the steam-boatscan come, and all the robes are brought in there and taken down by thesteam-boats now. In old times they used to go down in flat boats,batteaux we used to call 'em. The river must be full now, and likelywe'll see two or three steam-boats tied up there, from down below,loading with furs. You see, they bring up grub and trade goods, and thenload up with robes and go on down again."

  "I don't want to stop there long; just over night, maybe; but likelywe'll find some Piegans in there, and if we do, they can tell us wherethe camp is. I'd like to have you see the old 'dobe Fort that's there,the first trading post built on the river up here."

  "My!" said Jack, "I'd like to see that. Then besides that, Hugh, theremust be lots of old mountain men at Benton, ain't there? I should thinkthey'd have interesting stories to tell of the old times."

  "Well," said Hugh, "I expect there is quite a few in there, but I'venoticed that a good many of these old timers don't seem to have much totell that's very interesting; the main things that they remember areabout some time when they came with a big load of furs and sold them ata big price, and then had a terrible fine drunk with the money. I don'tguess most of the stories they'd tell would interest you very much.Still, might be such a thing as we'd run across somebody that could giveyou a talk that was interesting and true, but I don't look for it."

  The next afternoon, shortly before sundown, Hugh and Jack rode into thestreets of Ft. Benton, and halting before a great log store andwarehouse, Hugh dismounted and went in. In a few moments he came outagain and riding a short distance down the wide street, turned in to alarge building which bore over the door a sign "Stable". Here theyunpacked, piled their possessions in a corner, turned out their animalsinto a corral, and gave them feed and hay, and then Jack and Hughstarted out to explore the town.

  "I reckon we'll sleep in the stable to-night, and make an early start inthe morning. The folks in the store where I stopped told me that there'squite a lot of Piegans in town, and if we can see them we'll find outwhich way to go to-morrow
. Now let's go down to the river and see theold fort."

  It did not seem to Jack as if very much of the fort was left, though thetumbled-down walls and one of the old bastions, washed and guttered bythe rains of many years, still stood upright in part. To any oneinterested in the old West or the fur trade, the ground on which Jackstood was historic, and he made up his mind that as soon as he got backeast he would find out from the books all that he could about FortBenton. Hugh could not tell him very much; he thought it was builtabout 1848 or '49, or maybe earlier, and he knew that it was the placewhere the Indians used to trade in the old days.

  Sauntering along the high bank of the river, toward the edge of thesettlement, Hugh's eye at length detected three or four buffalo-skinlodges standing among the sage-brush near the water. They walked over tothem and soon saw that they were in an Indian camp, and after a moment'shesitation, Hugh addressed a naked man who was lying in the shade,speaking to him in his own tongue. A sentence or two seemed to galvanizethe man, who sprang to his feet and shook Hugh's hand heartily, talkingvolubly in his own tongue. After a brief conversation Hugh turned toJack and said:--

  "They say the main camp is over on the St. Mary's River, quite a longway from here, and I expect we'll have to go over there to join them.Old Four Bears, here, says he is going back in three or four days, andwants us to wait for him, but I reckon we'll start on to-morrow morning,and get there as quick as we can. An Indian's three or four days islikely to spin out pretty long."

  That night, for the first time in weeks, Jack and Hugh ate their suppersitting in chairs at a table in the Fort Benton hotel. They slept thatnight in the stable, and the next morning replenished their stock offlour, coffee and other provisions, and immediately started northwest insearch of the Piegan camp. For several days they travelled northwardover the rolling prairie, without adventure. Buffalo were often insight, antelope were abundant, and sometimes on crossing importantstreams like the Teton, Birch Creek and Badger Creek, they started deerfrom the willows along the stream. Several times they came upon smallcamps of Indians, and Hugh usually stopped to inquire of these smallparties where the main camp was. All the people whom he spoke withagreed that it was on the St. Mary's River, and all said that they wereabout to start north to join it.

  Soon after they had left Fort Benton, the great mountains to thewestward had begun to be seen, and as they travelled northward theyseemed to draw nearer and nearer, until now always on their left thisgreat wall rose up, high, jagged and snow-covered far down towards itsbase.

  One day they made a long march, and toward night camped on the shores ofa little prairie lake, on the surface of which many water birds wereswimming. After they had made camp, Jack went down to the lake to get abucket of water. As he stooped to fill his bucket he noticed off to theleft a deep bay in which a number of large birds were swimming. Theentrance to this bay was narrow, and the birds were near its head, sothat it seemed to him that by going to its mouth he could cut them offand keep them from getting out into the main lake. He left his pailstanding on the shore, and running to the mouth of the bay found thewater there very shoal. The birds which were at the upper end of the bayseemed frightened but made no attempt to fly, though flapping clumsilyalong on the water away from him. He could now see that they were geese,and as he thought, young ones. He waded into the water which, at themiddle of the mouth, was not more than up to his knees, and began towalk toward the geese, and presently these walked up out of the wateronto the prairie and hid themselves in the long grass. Going slowlytoward them, Jack followed them out of the water and presently saw onecrouched on the ground, its head thrust in among the grass. He caught itand, lifting it up, found that it was a goose, nearly, or quite fullgrown, but as yet unable to fly, for the quill feathers of its wingswere soft and bent easily. These he thought would be pretty good eating,and looking about a little he found two more in the grass, and killingthe three, went back to his water bucket, filled that and took it up tocamp.

  "Well," said Hugh, "I was beginning to wonder what had got you. Wheredid you get them birds?"

  "Why," said Jack, "I got 'em in the grass down there by the lake, and Ithought they'd be pretty good eating, so I brought 'em along."

  "That's good," said Hugh; "they'll do right well for breakfast. I expectyou're getting a little tired of that dried meat, and I don't know butI'm ready for a little fresh meat myself. Better put 'em down there bythe saddles, and as soon as we've eaten supper we'll go out to leewardof the camp and pick 'em." While they were doing this, Hugh said toJack:--

  "It ain't but a short day's march now to where the camp ought to be, ifit ain't moved; and if it's moved it'll be easy to follow the trail.We're bound to catch up to 'em now in the course of two or three days,anyhow."

  "That'll be good, Hugh," said Jack; "I want to get into the camp; that'swhat we've been thinking about now for a good many days, and I'm gladit's so near to us."