Falconer's Law Read online

  Falconer's

  Law

  Jason Manning

  Copyright © 2015, Jason Manning

  To

  My son, Connor—

  this novel, and all else I do,

  is done for you

  ROLL CALL OF

  THE MOUNTAIN MEN

  There was Bearclaw Johnson, more than a match in a one-on-one fight with the mighty grizzlies he hated with a vengeance. There was Bordeaux, better known as French Pete, a famous Indian fighter and the product of the union of a voyageur and an Arikara princess. There was "Doc" Maguire, an Irish-born physician wanted for murder in Great Britain, a man who liked strong drink and kept his set of pearl-handled throwing knives as sharp as a surgeon's scalpel. There was Cotton Phillips, a runaway slave as talented as any Indian when it came to reading signs and the weather. There was Sixkiller, the Nez Perce warrior who could be trusted only to follow his own cruel code of honor. There were Silas and Eben Nall, brothers as different as Cain and Abel.

  "Finest set of misfits, scoundrels, and outcasts ever assembled," said Rube Holly, as he joined the brigade of mountain men who shared one thing and one thing only.

  A leader named Falconer.

  FALCONER'S LAW

  CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Epilogue

  Chapter 1

  He came down from the mountains, from the wild granite crags of the high lonesome with their shoulders cloaked in deep virgin snow, where the eagle soared and the grizzly roamed, and where he ruled like a king in splendid isolation. The solitude of the wild, raw reaches at the timberline was his solace, and seldom in recent years had he strayed down into the valleys that the summer splashed with the rainbow colors of wildflowers, where the creeks, fat and sassy with snowmelt, pranced and plunged down their rocky courses. So seldom, in fact, had he come down from the rugged realm that among his peers, the mountain men, speculation on the subject of whether he was still "above snakes" had become a prevalent topic of conversation around the cookfires.

  Eben Nall was the first white man to lay eyes on him in three years—a distinction of which Eben was blissfully ignorant, as he sat with his back to a lodgepole pine, feet warming near a smokeless fire, striving to put into words in his journal his feelings as he stood one day shy of experiencing his very first rendezvous. He was excited, but it was a bittersweet anticipation, because Eben feared that this rendezvous might well be the last of its kind. The fur trade was on the decline. The days of the mountain man were numbered. Eben was sorry he had missed so much of a unique era.

  This was Eben Nail's first season as a free trapper. He found the life much to his liking, as he had known, somehow, that he would on the very day he left the family store near Kaskaskia and headed west in the company of his brother, Silas, fleeing the drudgery of life as a dry goods clerk. West they went, across the mighty Mississippi, across the trackless plains, to the Shining Mountains, which had haunted Eben's every waking hour and indeed even his dreams since his uncle had returned from participation in the famed Ashley expedition of '25 to regale his nephews with tales of high adventure on the frontier. Uncle John's topknot now dangled from a Blackfoot scalp pole, but this had failed to dampen Eben's ardor for the wild, free life of the mountain man. Still, he could not shake the feeling that he was too late. One season of poor trapping in the year 1837—could it really be over so soon?

  This gloomy thought distracted him from his journal, and when he looked up to cast a morose gaze across the valley to the majestic peaks of the Wind River Range, he saw the lone rider, leading a heavy-laden packhorse, emerge from the stand of white-stemmed aspen across the way. It was only natural for Eben to sit up and take sharp notice. Rarely in the high country did one come across another human being.

  "Rube?"

  His partner, Rube Holly, was cleaning his rifle, sitting cross-legged on the other side of the fire, with his back to the valley. Rube's squaw, the Nez Perce woman called Luck, was frying up some beavertail in bear grease. That was Rube's favorite dish. Luck was Rube's favorite pastime. When first Eben had laid eyes on Luck he had judged her to be singularly unattractive, with a short stocky build and coarse features, but Rube thought highly of her, and after eight months alone in the wilderness without seeing another living soul, Eben thought she was looking a little less ugly. It was nice having her around; in addition to being a passable cook she was adept at cleaning plews. Of course, Rube liked having her around for something else. Scarcely a night passed that the two of them didn't play around under their buffalo robes. At first their amorous activities had embarrassed Eben, but he had gradually grown accustomed to it. A lot of things that once upon a time had bothered Eben Nall didn't anymore—things like being cold and wet and hungry and falling-down tired and risking life and limb just to collect the pelt of a rather large rodent.

  "What is it, lad?" Rube didn't look at Eben—his attention was drawn to Luck, who was bending over the cookfire, and a boyish grin split his bearded, weathered face.

  "Rider comin'."

  That got Rube Holly's attention. He peeled his gaze off Luck's prodigious derriere and swept it over the valley, locking in on the horseman, whose shaggy dun mountain mustang was plodding through sodden marsh grass browned by the summer sun.

  "It's not an Injun," said Eben. Then, deciding that perhaps he was being far too unequivocal for a tyro with just a single season under his belt, he added, "Is it?"

  "Hell, no, it ain't no Injun," rasped Rube, whose voice, even on the best of days, sounded like an overworked and rusty gate hinge. "By thunder! It cain't be!"

  Eben figured Rube had seen sixty winters if he'd seen a day. Rube himself wasn't exactly sure how old he was. But he was a graybeard, that much was certain. Older than dirt. Plagued by rheumatism and slightly stooped, he tended to walk with a jerky hitch. Nonetheless he could be as spry as a younker when the occasion required—under the blankets with his Nez Perce squaw, or in a scrape with hostiles. Now, to Eben's surprise, he bounced to his feet, stared a bit more at the distant rider, then danced a nimble little jig, his beaded moccasins scuffing up the pine needle carpet.

  "Hot diggity!" he exclaimed to the mountaintops. "I told 'em he warn't dead. No, not that one!"

  Eben could scarcely believe Rube was really able to identify the rider at such a great distance—a feat made more remarkable by the fact that Rube had only one good eye. The other was made of glass. Sometimes Rube used that glass eye to good effect, plucking it out for the purpose of spooking Indians, who were susceptible to being spooked by such things. Among the Indians, Rube's glass eye was big medicine, but it was of no use to him when it came to seeing. Yet Rube Holly could see things with one eye that Eben c
onsistently overlooked with two.

  "Who is it?" asked Eben.

  "Why, that's none other than Hugh Falconer, boy, or I'll eat my hat."

  "Falconer!"

  Of course Eben knew the name. Mountain men were a rare breed, but even so there were a handful who ranked a cut above the rest. Colter, Bridger, Old Man Williams, Jedediah Smith, Beckwourth, Walker. And Hugh Falconer. A catalog of the legends of the fur trade would be incomplete without Falconer.

  Eben had heard of Falconer even before he had taken one step west of the Father of the Waters, and now he tried to remember all the stories about this living legend that had reached his young and impressionable ears.

  No one knew for certain where Hugh Falconer had come from originally—Falconer himself had never seen fit to enlighten a single soul on that particular point. Truth be known, Falconer never said much about anything. If he strung two words together he felt as though he had been speechifying like a damn fool politician. Perhaps the most widely accepted rumor on the subject of his origins was that he was the black sheep of Scottish nobility, forced to seek his fortune in America. If he spoke at all, they said, it was with the hint of a Highland brogue.

  Whatever his roots, Falconer had been blessed with those attributes most essential to a mountain man's success. He was such a splendid marksman that critters just gave up the ghost and fell down dead when they saw him aim his rifle at them. This saved Falconer a great deal in the way of powder and shot—precious commodities singularly hard to come by in the high country. The only real shooting he had to do anymore was on the occasions that he ran afoul of hostile Indians—which didn't happen all that often, since most Indians had the good sense to keep their distance, as it was said that there was one dead red man for every bullet Falconer had fired in anger.

  Not to say that Hugh Falconer was an inveterate Indian killer, like Liver-Eating Johnson. No, Falconer got along passably well with most tribes, except the Blackfeet, who made a virtue of not getting along with anybody. He respected the Indians and their ways. With Falconer it was live and let live. Long as you left him alone, you would prosper. But if you muddied up his water you'd live just long enough to regret your rash behavior. It was better, folks said, to die and shake hands with the devil in hell than to be on Falconer's bad side. When Falconer got mad he was worse than a wildcat after a turpentine bath.

  Ever since coming to the mountains Falconer had been a loner, a free trapper who shunned ties with any of the fur companies. In the old days he would show up once a year, at summer rendezvous, to trade in his furs for a mountain man's necessities: powder and shot, tobacco, sugar, coffee, and a few books if any were attainable. That was one of the peculiar things about Hugh Falconer—unlike many of his peers, he was well-read, an educated cuss who could quote the Bible or the Bard at the drop of a hat. He always brought in packs of fine plews, and it was said that he seldom had to bother with steel traps. No, he just shot the beavers in one eye at such an angle that the bullet exited through the other eye, killing the critter outright while avoiding any damage to the plew.

  But Falconer had failed to appear at the two most recent rendezvous, and so the speculation had begun, with everyone wondering what had befallen him, puzzling over it, since Falconer was about as indestructible as a mortal man could hope to be. Had Injuns done him in? No, Falconer was too wise in wilderness ways for that. Maybe a grizzly? No, Falconer wrestled grizzlies with his bare hands just to get some morning exercise. Maybe he'd packed his possibles and made tracks for greener pastures, though it was hard to believe that Hugh Falconer would turn his back on the mountains he knew so well and loved so ardently.

  "We got any coffee left, lad?" asked Rube Holly.

  "A little."

  "Best give it to Luck to brew up. We want to be good hosts."

  Journal forgotten, Eben did as he was told, then rejoined Rube at the edge of the camp to monitor Falconer's progress across the valley.

  "Reckon we ought to let him know we're here?" asked Eben.

  Rube spared him a smirky look. "Boy, he knows damn well we're here."

  Eben couldn't see how that could be. Their camp was well hidden in the trees, the campfire produced no smoke, and they were downwind of Falconer's position in the valley. This was both the time and the place for caution—they had crossed the sign of several Blackfoot war parties the past few weeks.

  Turned out, though, that Rube Holly was right. In a quarter of an hour Falconer was coming up the slope through the pines. Years later, Eben Nall would think back to that moment when Hugh Falconer arrived in camp as the beginning of the most extraordinary adventure of his life.

  Chapter 2

  FROM THE JOURNAL OF EBEN NALL

  July 3, 1837. Late yesterday Hugh Falconer arrived at our camp on a shaggy mustang and I do not know which looked wilder, the man or the horse. I had never seen a horse that looked vicious, but this one did. When I ventured too close it tried to bite the side of my face off. Falconer warned me to stay well clear of the animal unless I was weary of this life and ready to throw off the mortal coil. It was not a threat, but rather friendly advice. Apparently Falconer is the only human being the creature will tolerate.

  I find it difficult to describe Hugh Falconer. He is a powerfully built man, standing six feet six in his moccasins, with a tawny beard and dark brown eyes that seem to pierce to the very core of the unfortunate soul impaled upon his gaze. He speaks softly and sparingly, and I do think I detect a faint brogue. Surprisingly for a man of his size, he moves with the grace of a panther. What is difficult to put into words is the aura that surrounds the man. He strikes me as someone who belongs to this country as no one else does, as though the mountains made him in their own image. He belongs in the same way that the grizzly belongs, and he would seem completely out of place in any other environment. He is a man not so much in the wilderness as of it, as integral a part of it as lightning is of a thunderstorm . . .

  "We've danged near trapped out the beaver," Rube lamented as they sat around the campfire with their backs to the quick-fallen night, supping on beavertail and coffee. "It's gettin' harder 'n' harder to find the brown gold, Hugh. I hate to say it like the devil hates holy water, but by thunder I think these shinin' times are just about thrown cold."

  Falconer, drinking coffee, offered a noncommittal grunt by way of response. In the dancing yellow light of the fire his features seemed to Eben Nall as though they had been carved out of the hard granite crags of the Wind River Range whence he had come. He wore fringed buckskin leggins, and red leg gaiters held up "half breeds" below the knees. Beneath his fringed coat was a muslin shirt, once white, now gray with woodsmoke and sweat stain. Shoulder bands of colorful quillwork on the coat appeared to be of Shoshone origin. There was quillwork on his possibles bag as well. Rube had asked Falconer how Touches the Moon was faring, and Falconer had answered, "She's dead." Those two words were the sum total of Falconer's offering on the subject. Eben wondered if Touches the Moon had been the source of that splendid quillwork.

  Hugh Falconer's weapons consisted of a Green River knife and a Sam Hawken Percussion .41 pistol in his leather belt, as well as the .50 caliber Hawken mountain rifle. Eben admired the latter immensely. It put his old Harpers Ferry flintlock to shame for looks, not to mention reliability and range. Lucky indeed was the mountain man who possessed a Hawken. The Hawken brothers, in their St. Louis gun shop, could not manufacture enough of their famous product to even come close to satisfying demand. The Hawken could drop a bull buffalo in its tracks. Its accuracy at long range and its sturdiness were legendary.

  As headgear Falconer wore a wolfskin cap, with the animal's head preserved and displayed in the front, like a visor, and riding low over Falconer's eyes. His beard was full, his light brown hair long to the shoulders, so it was hard to tell about his features. He appeared to be in his mid-thirties. Eben Nall had expected a much older man, considering all the things he was reputed to have done.

  "Just about the only prime bea
ver left that I know of is up smack-dab in the middle of Blackfoot country," continued Rube. "Iffen I was alone, why, I'd risk it. But I got Luck and now this younker to think about."

  "You ought not to let me being along stop you," said Eben. He didn't like to think that Rube Holly, or anyone else, for that matter, was mollycoddling him on account of his age or inexperience. "I can take care of myself. And I'm not afraid of any Blackfeet."

  Rube grinned at him. "He don't know enough to be skeered of the Blackfoot, Hugh, but he's game."

  "I see," said Falconer, with a glance at Eben so intense it made the young man uncomfortable.

  "I just don't want anyone to think of me as a burden," muttered Eben. "That's all I mean."

  "Yep, he's game, sure nuff," repeated Rube. "And it's good to have a younker along. My ol' bones don't take to wadin' around in them ice cold criks settin' traps and such. When he's a little more seasoned he'll do to ride the river with. Only wish he wouldn't keep his nose stuck in that diary of his so much. Some Injun's gonna sneak up on him one day and lift his hair iffen he ain't keerful."

  "Diary?" said Falconer, an eyebrow raised.

  Eben blushed furiously. "It's a journal." Only girls kept diaries. "I'm keeping a written record of my adventures on the frontier." Eben realized belatedly that Rube Holly was engaged in a little good-natured ribbing at his expense.

  "I get to wonderin' sometimes what he puts in there about yours truly," said Rube. "But he won't let me read it."

  "Sometimes a journal is a very private matter," said Falconer. "Especially when there's no one around to share your innermost thoughts. Besides, since when could you read a lick, Rube?"

  Rube laughed. "True words, Hugh. True goddamn words."

  Falconer brandished a clay pipe and proceeded to pack it with kinnickinnick, but Rube offered him a few pinches of honest-to-God tobacco. Falconer gratefully accepted. Eben figured Rube had to hold Falconer in mighty high esteem to share the last of his honeydew tobacco with the man. Rube prepared his own pipe and they fired the bowls with a brand extracted from the fire.