The Ferguson Rifle by Louis L’Amour Page A

and pointless. I had come west on impulse, and what lay behind it I did not know. Was it a secret desire to die? Had I come west for that?
    Or to lose myself in a land far from all I knew, from old memories and old associations?
    Rising, I walked back to the fire. Talley was squatted beside the coals roasting a chunk of beef, and the smell was good. Kemble was cleaning his weapon, giving it all the care a mother would give a child.
    Ebitt came up to the fire, carrying some knots and large fragments broken from a stump. “Are you from Boston, Scholar?”
    â€œFrom Virginia, and then Carolina. When the war ended, we moved near Boston. We lived in the country not too far out.”
    We talked campfire talk while the coffee came to a boil and the meat roasted. Meanwhile we ate wild onions dug from the prairie soil.
    â€œMy family worked with iron,” Ebitt said. “I had no taste for it then, but one day I’ll go back.” He looked up at me. “We did ornamental ironwork. Pa considered himself an artist.”
    â€œSome of them were,” I said. “I have seen the screen in the cathedral at Nancy, done by Jean Lamour, and the staircase in the town hall … beautiful work. And there was always Malagoli of Modena.”
    Ebitt lowered his chunk of meat, looking up at me. “Were your people in iron, too? I’ve heard my father talk of such men. They were the masters!”
    â€œYou’re a smith, then?” I asked him.
    He lifted his hands to me. They were square, powerful hands. “Iron is in the blood. Once a man has worked with it, it never leaves him. Yes, I was a smith, but I grew restless thinking of the western lands. At nights I would lie in my bed and think of all that vast, open land … unridden and untouched. One day I shouldered a pack and started out.”
    â€œThere’s no telling about wandering men,” Talley commented. “They come from everywhere. I knew James Mackay. He was west in 1784, and again in ’86, ’87, and ’88.”
    Kemble agreed. “Truteau was an educated man. Jean Baptiste Truteau. He came from Montreal, taught school for a while in Saint Louis, I hear … that was about ’74, but some years later he was in the Mandan villages, trading. He lived with the Arikara, too.”
    We made our plans. Of the lands toward which we were moving we knew nothing but hearsay. There were furs … we did know that, and once in the mountains we had no doubt of our ability to find them.
    For three days then we moved steadily toward the setting sun. We rode the flanks or point along with Buffalo Dog, and we saw no enemies. Several times we killed buffalo, and once an antelope. The Cheyennes were well supplied with meat, and the wounded brave grew better. Soon he could walk a little, and on the day we reached the hollow near the North Platte, he was able to ride. His name was Walks-By-Night, and he had counted many coups.
    He rode beside me. “Why do you give us meat?” he demanded.
    â€œYou need meat,” I said.
    He was not satisfied, but after a while he asked, “Where do you go?”
    â€œTo trap fur in the western mountains,” I said. “First, I must have horses. This,” I said, “is a splendid animal, but he needs time to learn to feed upon your grasses. He will learn, but in the meantime he should not be ridden as hard as I must ride. I shall need a western horse.”
    â€œI will give you a horse,” Walks-By-Night replied. “When we come to our people, I have many horses.”
    â€œIt would be a great gift. I have nothing to give Walks-By-Night.”
    â€œYou have given meat to my people. You have ridden beside us when the Utes might have come, or the Pawnees.”
    To that I made no reply. Our presence might have contributed to their safety, and it was well that he believed so, for we wanted their friendship.
    â€œYou do not count coup? You take no