“Sir”–I held it reverently as a father holds his firstborn child–“I cannot accept it. My mother would not permit it.” “Take it, lad. I shall be gone and there will be no way to return it.” From his saddlebags he took a bag of shot and another of powder. “Do you take these too. You surely need them more than I, and before many hours are past, I shall be where there is little else.
“Care for it, son, and it will care for you. I ask only one thing. Keep it always, and never use it against the king.” When he had disappeared around the bend, I walked back to the cabin. When I showed it to mother, she reproved me gently. “You should never accept a gift unless you can return one of equal value, but when a gift is given, it should be accepted with grace.” She leaned back on her pillow, happier than I had seen her in many weeks. We had few visitors, most of them country people. Good, honest folk they were, but with few social graces, and none of them from the cities beyond the sea.
A few weeks later, we heard of the Battle of King’s Mountain, and of the death of Major Ferguson.
We heard much of him later, for he had admirers on both sides of the line. He came of a distinguished Scottish family, was only thirty-six when killed, and had been in the service for twenty-one years.
The Ferguson rifle, which might have won the war in a matter of months, had been taken from his command and put into storage by General Howe after Ferguson had been wounded at Brandywine.
The rifle he left with us helped us through those bad times. Its accuracy was scarcely to be believed, and I became skilled in its use, acquiring speed in reloading. Each time I used it, I blessed the major.
When spring came at last, mother received a small legacy from a distant relative in Ireland and we moved to the vicinity of Boston and I took the Ferguson rifle along.
The woods lay not far from our home, and often I hunted there. The education I received and enriched by my own reading was an excellent one, andfora year I read law, but a meeting with Timothy Dwight convinced me I should become an educator and a writer of history. Yet now I rode westward into a wild land where the only education needed was that the land could provide.
The sun was gone, although light remained. With darkness near, I still had no camp, and the bald plains promised nothing.
Suddenly, as if born of a wish, there appeared a fold in the low hills. A grassy slope dropped away to a cluster of trees, dark now with evening, and I thought I detected the sheen of water.
Many were the warnings I had received. Water holes were few, used by all, and at any such place death might await. I had not hunted through my boyhood years for nothing, nor had scholarship robbed me of my senses. My nostrils caught the scent of woodsmoke, and I drew rein to listen.
At first I heard nothing, then the faint sound of horses cropping grass, and a crackle as from a fire. Standing in my stirrups, I peered through the leaves, but could see only the shine of light reflected from the seat of a saddle.
It was unlikely a saddle would be used by an Indian, but there were many dangerous men on the prairie, not all of them Indians by any means.
Rifle in hand, I walked my horse forward, calling out, as was the custom. “Hallooo, the camp!” “Come in with your hands empty!” The voice was matter-of-fact. “Or take a bullet through the brisket.” I drew up. “When I come in, gentlemen, it will be with my rifle in my hands, and if you want to start shooting, just open the ball!” Somebody chuckled, and then said, “All right, all right! Come on in!” Several men sat about a fire, and two of them had rifles in their hands. All wore buckskins; all had the appearance of frontiersmen. My dress alone would add a discordant note, for I wore a brassbuttoned blue coat, gray pantaloons with straps under the arches of my Hessian boots, and a starched white cravat. My hat was of the English round variety such as was worn by the young gentleman of fashion. Yet their eyes were on my rifle.
The Ferguson I carried was but thirty inches long; their own rifles looked to be forty-four inches at least.
“‘Light, stranger. Looks like you’ve come a fur piece.” “That I have.” Rifle in hand I dismounted, keeping my horse between them and me.
One of the men chuckled. “Now that goes right with me. I like a careful man.” Tying my horse, I walked around him.
“Possibly I am less careful than you suspect. My friends told me I was foolish to come out here alone.” “You’re alone?” Startled, they stared at me.
“Now that’s hard to believe. You’re four days ride from a settlement, mister.” “Three… on this horse. You’re the first living things I’ve seen, other than birds and insects.” My palm slapped the rifle. “Anyway, as long as I have this, I’m not quite alone.” The first man to speak indicated the rifle.
“Don’t know’s I ever seen the like. Mind if I look?” It was my turn to chuckle. “Gentlemen, if I allowed a chance acquaintance to take my gun from my hand, I’d be a lot greener than I am … and I am green.” Moving up to the fire, I held it for them to see. “This is a Ferguson rifle, given me by the inventor when I was a lad. It is a remarkably accurate, fast-shooting rifle.” A slim, dark young man seated near the Indian nodded. “I heard tell of them. Heard it said they can shoot six times to the minute.” “Eight, gentlemen, eight times if one is practiced.” I glanced around at the group.
“I’m Ronan Chantry, and I’m riding west to the Rockies. If you’re going my way, I’d like to join you.” The lean dark man got to his feet. “I’m Davy Shanagan. Are you from the old country, then?” “My mother was, and my great-grandfather, too.” “Sit, then, Ronan Chantry, and we’ll talk of the western lands and what we’ll do there. A man with a rifle that can be shot eight to the minute is welcome at any fire in the west.” The others agreed, but my eyes went to the Indian, whose eyes were on the rifle in my hands.
With a rifle like that, an Indian would be a big man among his own people.
It was something to remember.
CHAPTER 2
Davy Shanagan glanced critically at my costume when I joined him at the morning fire.
“You surely ain’t dressed for the country.” He glanced up at me as I warmed my hands.
“Chantry, do’ you have any idea what you’re up against? We’re westward bound, after fur. No tellin’ what we’ll find yonder.” “I trapped some, as a lad.” “You heard tell of this Lewis and Clark outfit? We figured if they could go west, we could, too. We won’t be crossin’ trails with them. They’ll be much farther north, but James Mackay crossed this country we’re ridin’ into, and he trapped fur there.” “It won’t be easy,” I admitted. “There was a Spanish army outfit marched north from Santa Fe to the Missouri, but Indians wiped them out when they got there.
“The Mallett brothers and six others went back the other way. It’s said they named the Platte. It’s rough country, but I’ve a notion we can make it.” Shanagan poked sticks into the flames. “Just about anywhere a man goes, he’ll find somebody has been there before him.” He glanced up at me again. “You up to that kind of travel?” Squatting on my heels, I said, “I believe I am, Davy. I left nothing behind me, nothing at all.” “Then you won’t go to p*’. A p*’, yearnin’ man is no good on the trail. When there’s Injuns about, a man keeps his eyes open or he dies… an’ sometimes he dies, anyway.” He impaled a chunk of meat on a sharpened stick and leaned it over the coals. “You’ll need an outfit. Those clothes won’t last no time.” “When I shoot some game, I’ll make a hunting shirt and leggings.” Davy looked doubtful. “You can do that? Of your ownself?” “Well, I haven’t done it since I was a lad. There was a time when we were very poor. I often made moccasins and once a hunting shirt.” Davy chuckled. “I never seen the time when I wasn’t poor.” He indicated the sleepers. “They’re good men. The long, tall one is Solomon Talley, from Kentuck.
Bob Sandy lyin’ yonder is from the same neck o’ the woods. The stocky, square-shouldered one is Cusbe Ebitt. I never heard him say where he was from, but Degory Kemble is from Virginny, and Isaac Heath is a Boston man.” “What about the Indian?” “He’s an Otoe.” “Known him long?” “I ain’t known none of them long. Deg Kemble an’ me, we rafted down to New Orleans, one time. I trapped a season in Winnebago country with Talley. The Otoe comes from the Platte River country… knows the river.” One by one, the others drifted to the fire to roast chunks of meat and drink the strong, black coffee.