Chapter 5: Ghosts of Mountain View

Michelle Tanner made a go of it until late in the night. With people around her all through the day, many thanking her for her actions, she kept up her brave front. No one thought killing the two outlaws bothered her at all. Earlier, US Marshal Holloway had bought her dinner and talked to the young woman about her new duties in Golden. Following the confrontation with the two bank robbers, Meeker had been handpicked to run the new marshal’s office in Golden, Colorado Territory. Michelle was to be his deputy, and Henry would be the jailer. They had all accepted their positions.

Buffalo Head was worried about Michelle, as was Meeker, but the two men knew better than to say anything. Being considered a dangerous person had drawbacks—you could never let your guard down, and you could never show that doing bad things bothered you.

She managed to brush Sarah’s hair one hundred strokes. Sarah was more than happy to return the favor; it was their nightly ritual. Once she managed to get Sarah tucked into her bed, the girls yakked. They gabbed for some time until eventually Sarah drifted off to sleep. This left Shell alone with her thoughts. Alone was a hard place for her to be—it gave her the opportunity to dwell on what happened. Michelle recalled every moment of that awful clash. Even though the dreadful thing had occurred all those hours before, it moved through her mind more clearly than when she lived it.

The bullets zipped by her. Some zinged past her head; others struck the ground next to her or in front of her. Marshal Uriah Holloway slumped down on his knees in the street. Blood covered his white shirt and brown vest as he fought the pain, trying to reach his gun lying in the grimy street. Finally, one of the assailants, Slim, died in a hail of bullets fired by Michelle. He plunged hard to the sidewalk. Red knelt on the walkway next to his friend, one of Shell’s bullets buried deep in his arm, and another in his leg. The bastard still grabbed his gun. His body shook with excitement as he proclaimed Shell was out of bullets. He raised his weapon, pulled the hammer back. Making up her mind in a flash, Michelle pulled the trigger, and the ball struck him dead center in his chest. The look on his face haunted her, with his eyes wide and his mouth gaped open, disbelief and confusion painted across his face.

“A LeMat holds up to nine rounds, you addle-head!”

Red Wilson fell face down, dead on the curled sideboards outside the First Bank of Colby. Shell remembered the dead banker and the guard lying in pools of blood. Then there was Marshal Cord Connelly’s wife Brenda, shot in the back through the wall. The woman bled to death in her husband’s arms. She remembered seeing Mary Todd standing in the street waiting for her, having followed her from the stable to the bank. Her saddle was not cinched, and the leather straps hung down to the muddy, grimy street. Michelle had just finished a morning ride when the gunplay started.

Michelle held it in for thirteen hours. Her brave, grave face showed no emotion for everyone to see, proving it didn’t matter to her that she had killed two no-account bandits. Just after midnight, the smokescreen vanished. Alone in the dark in the middle of the night, it did matter. As she sat on the edge of the bed, her tears started. At first just a dampness around the eyes, then a stream running down her face, until finally, she could contain it no more. Shell blubbered into her pillow, trying to muffle the noise. Michelle Tanner had killed two men. It didn’t matter that they were worthless, no-account bandits. They were no more and she had taken their lives from them—what more could one person take from another?

A diminutive soft hand started patting her on the back. A gentle voice breathed words in her ear as Sarah comforted her. The girl’s mouth so close to Shell’s ear she could feel Sarah’s breath as she soothed her.

“It’s alright, Shell, you only done what you had to do. They made you do it for they would have killed ya if you didn’t kill them.” Sarah reassured her, telling her she wasn’t to blame. Eventually, Sarah and Michelle curled up in the bed as Sarah held her. Something that Michelle had done before when Sarah had a bout of sadness over the murder of her parents. In due course, sleep overtook them both.

Michelle Tanner dreamed of the gunfight and Brenda Connelly. The woman in the store with Brenda had told her of the woman’s last words, and those words burned into her brain. She could see her in her husband’s arms telling him, “It don’t hurt darling, I don’t feel nary a thing. I’ll be waiting just over on the other side. I wouldn’t dare go in without you. I think God will under...,” Brenda Connelly died mid-sentence.

Over the weeks to come, Shell endured the memory of her new friend dying. It would occupy her thoughts often. At night, she would dream of her friend. Though she had known her less than a month, she had developed an attachment, a deep caring for the woman. While killing the two men sickened her, the loss of Brenda devastated Shell.

One peculiar quirk of Michelle’s personality was how fast she developed bonds. When Shell favored someone, her feelings ran deep. It did not matter that they had known each other only a short time. All that mattered was that the woman had been taken from her. The event was even more unbearable to Michelle, due to the freakish way that Brenda was shot. The bullet passing through a wall of an adjoining building and into her friend was an unusual event, which challenged her faith. How could such a thing happen? Just what did it say about the nature of the God that Buffalo Head worshiped?

The pair rose early in the morning and prepared for departure. When Michelle and Sarah walked out of the hotel, the wagon and horses were waiting for them. The old Indian sat on the right side of the wagon’s bench seat. Meeker sat on his horse, Star, while holding Mary Todd’s reins. Shell climbed up on her horse, and Sarah took her familiar position next to “Grandpa.”

“Get comfortable, Little Dove, we have a long way to go.” Buffalo Head smiled at the young girl next to him.

“Yes sir, Grandpa, we sure do, all the way to Denver City.”

“Further than that, Sarah,” Meeker spoke as he worked tobacco into his jaw. “We’re heading to Golden, the mining camp.”

“Oh, we gonna mine?”

“Nope, I’m going to run the marshal’s office there, Shell will work with me, Henry will be the jailer, and you will get schooling.” At that point, US Marshal Holloway walked up to the group. His right arm rested in a sling. In his left hand, he held something shiny. He tossed it up to Michelle.

“Pin it on the left...” he paused, shook his head ever so slightly, glanced at young Sarah, and decided to change his wording, “um, the left side, girl. You took the oath last night, but you need the badge of the office. It only weighs an ounce; it’s just tin with words stamped on it.” Uriah paused a moment while he cleared his throat. Michelle pinned the badge on her new buckskins.

“The one I make my men, and now woman, wear is a crescent with a star. It is called a Crescent Star.” Pausing, he looked in the young lady’s eyes with an unblinking stare. He wished to impart his feelings to her so there was no mistake. “The words on it are “Deputy U.S. Marshall”; many a man and a couple of women have worn it before you. More than a few of them have died doing their duty. It is not just a badge of office. It is a badge of courage and honor. Without men and women like us, there is no law out here. If there is no law, then all you have left is chaos. You will not bring shame to it or I will be sorely angry with you.” He talked about the honor of the job for a few more minutes and then changed the subject.

“There are two young girls, younger than Sarah there, running around western Kansas and eastern Colorado Territory.” Michelle felt a burn in her stomach. “They have held up some saloons, general stores, a mercantile or two, and one bank. They are little blonde-haired twins between eleven and thirteen years of age.” Realization dawned on Meeker as a cold tingle ran up his spine. “Deadly shots, but they haven’t hurt anyone, at least not yet. They haven’t stolen more than a pittance. Mostly food, a few guns, and they got themselves one hundred dollars at the bank. There is a fifty-dollar government reward offered. There ain’t no civilian compensation, and they ain’t wanted dead or alive. If you come across them, bring ‘um to Denver City to face justice. Miss Tanner, I must point out federal officers cannot collect government rewards.”

Somehow, even before he said their names, the group knew who they were. “Their names are Helen and Hannah Packer. No one has heard anything from them for over a week. Just maybe they gave up their evil ways. Last place they robbed was a saloon in Copper City, down Southwest corner of Colorado Territory.” It was for certain that it was the girls they saw kill the judge back in Larned. Shell now understood what Meeker meant about unintended consequences.

Once more, they set out westward toward the boomtown called Denver City. The wagon creaked and groaned as the group made their way west and the late August sun beat down on them with a relentless determination. Michelle looked at Nate and envied his tanned skin. Her skin was always blistered. Sometimes her face was as red as her hair. By noon, they felt like they were cooking.

“Hotter than a frog in a frying pan today,” Meeker spoke as he tried to think of a cooler day. His mind meandered to the past and a memory rose; Meeker chuckled, then laughed.

“What’s so funny, ‘Sleeps with Bears’?”

“Oh, I just tried to think of a cooler day and had one specific day pass through my mind. A day way back in ‘45 when I met a homicidal deer who laid two Sioux bucks low. By God, it might just be the damnedest thing I have ever seen. He again chuckled, then added, “But no one wants to hear that story.”

“I sure would like to hear it,” Sarah said. Pulling her feet up on the old wooden seat, she wrapped her arms around her legs. This was her habit anytime Meeker told a tall tale. The wagon jolted over a rock in the road.

“Well, if everyone is in agreement.” He looked from one to the other, each nodding. “I was in the second year of a three-year engagement with the Company and looking for new trapping grounds. While winter was not quite here, fall turned to a memory and the weather was cooler.”

The wagon rolled over the plains. The two riders accompanied the vehicle while two other horses brought up the rear tethered to the back of the wagon. Meeker spun his tale as the assemblage headed west. His story meandered with many wanderings from the main crux of his tale. He ambled around about the trapping, the scenery, and what he ate for breakfast. “I came to a valley in the Black Hills and saw these two Lakota Sioux bucks shoot a deer. He dropped straightaway. That brave hit him in the head. Well, as fortune would have it, he fell to the ground right under a big ole knotty pine.

“The second warrior scampered up that tree, rope in hand. He tossed one side over a big thick limb and dropped back to earth with the t’other side of the line. He tied one end of the rope to the buck’s right hind leg and then the two of them dragged that big ole ten pointer upward. Once the deer was high enough for them to work on him, the first one got out his knife. The brave sort of spun the bugger around to get at his belly for gutting. The second man tied the rope off and turned to watch. As it turned out, he was too close for comfort.

“I approached them and called out to them. The first one knew me—he was the dog soldier that gave me the moniker, ‘Sleeps with Bears.’ He hollered for me to come and give him a hand. Our communication was a mix of Lakota and sign. Even so, with just a mite of effort we could make our intentions clear one to the other. My friend promised me a meal if I lent him a hand. Quite a generous offer, so I headed toward them.

“Now if the truth was known to them, which it wasn’t, the ball of his rifle hit the antler and ricocheted down, striking the deer in the head just behind his big mule ear. You see, it only knocked him unconscious. This was about to be a predicament for the two Indians.

“As I got closer, I saw the deer’s eye flutter open. That deer took to trying to get free. He flung his legs this way and that and spun his head side to side. An antler caught the first man in the belly, and when the buck pulled his head up, he split my pal wide open. Shaking his head and body, the beasty turned on the rope and caught the second warrior in the neck ... the fool had moved closer, thinking he could help. That deer did significant damage to the two men in the batting of an eye. Both men lurched and jerked around on the ground in agony for a minute or two. Driven by their fear, their hearts pumped hard, so the blood spurted out of them fast. They writhed on the ground, and that deer went through contortions on that rope. The Indian hunters expired before I could close the distance between them and me.

“Pulling up on my horse, I reached down and took my Hawken in my hand. With care, I shouldered the big .50, then took careful aim, pulled the set trigger, and then squeezed off the shot with the second trigger. The deer seemed to die right off. Even so, I wanted to be mighty sure he was dead. So, I hesitated a moment. After all, that murderous deer just kilt two men, ayah. So, out of caution, I waited a minute or two more because the redskins were beyond helping. Getting off my horse, I pulled the men clear. I cleaned, skinned, and quartered the animal and put the meat on my packhorse. After that, I dug two graves and used the hide of the deer as shrouds. Often, the Lakota wait a day to bury their dead, in hopes that their spirit might return to them. I didn’t see any possibility of that. I put the braves in their beds for their long slumber. I was careful to make sure they had their bows, arrows, and rifles, along with their medicine bags. Don’t want to send a warrior to the other side without his medicine bag.” Buffalo Head nodded his agreement.

“Taking the meat and their horses to their Lakota camp, I gave everything to Chief Swift Elk. Conveying to him what happened to the men and where their remains were located. The chief sent out a couple of dog soldiers and a medicine man to move them to more holy ground. The chief thanked me for my kindness and asked if I would stay a day or two. In order to not offend him, I agreed. Knowing an Indian as my friend beat the hell out of having a Lakota as an enemy. While I was there, I met me the Chief’s daughter, Graceful Sunset; prettiest squaw that ever adorned the mountains. In Lakota, it is pronounced, Magaskawee Weayaya, nice ring to it, but usually I just called her Sunset, sometimes Grace. I feel a great debt of gratitude to the two Indians and that damn homicidal deer. I have to say that the ole boys being kilt by that deer was the damnedest thing I think I ever did see.”