Free Silver City Massacre by Charles G. West

riding well-rested horses. The clothes just recently purchased in Denver City were stowed away on their packhorses, hardly broken in. Seth Burns was content with his acquisition of two new Sharps carbines and two boxes of cartridges.
    The trading took a total of four days out of their already tight travel time, but they considered it worth the delay. They used the time to saddle-break the two Indian horses to the cavalry saddles. Both horses seemed faster than their regular horses and they accepted the strange new saddles without much of a fuss. Joel decided to ride the gray and lead his chestnut. Feeling a slight guilt for choosing the unshod horse over his longtime partner, he justified it in his mind by telling himself that Will deserved the rest. For his part, the gelding showed no sign of complaint, and probably appreciated the rest, for Joel was a sizable man.
    A trip that Riley had estimated to be about six days turned out to take a full week. But they finally reached South Pass, a thirty-five-mile-wide saddle of sagebrush and open prairie between the Wind River Mountains and the Oregon Buttes. They made camp beside the Sweetwater, a river that many wagon trains had followed across the country’s midsection on their way to Oregon. They had had no contact with anyone, nor seen sign of any Indian activity during the whole trip from Seth Burns’s trading post. But Indians were unpredictable. They might be friendly one day and set on destruction the next, so Joel was happy not to have encountered any hunting parties.
    Upon reaching the Sweetwater, they saw the obvious ruts from countless wagons to confirm Riley’s claim that he could find the Oregon Trail. They figured their trip to Silver City to be at least halfway accomplished, even though Riley warned that there was some rugged country ahead of them after they reached the Snake River. As if to emphasize his warning, a light dusting of snow roused them from their bedrolls the next morning.
    â€œNot enough to worry about,” Riley said. “It’s just the Rockies lettin’ us know we ain’t that far from winter.”
    Leaving South Pass, they pushed on away from the mountains with Riley pointing the way. Joel couldn’t help noticing the air of excitement in his elder partner, as Riley relived the first time he followed that trail. Although quite a few years ago, there were wagon ruts still evident along the way. The next five days found them following a path through a series of shallow valleys with mountain ranges in the distance that seemed to be lined up one behind the other. But the threatening snow never came and the horses were all in good shape, so they made good time while the weather cooperated. Actually, Joel worried very little about the possibility of bad weather. Like Riley on his first journey across the Great Divide, he was too awed by the majesty of the rugged mountain peaks to worry about winter closing in. He enjoyed the confidence of knowing that whatever befell them, he would deal with it.
    With the mountains behind them now, they ascended to a wide, almost flat plain, and Riley said that the traveling would be easier for a good spell, at least until they reached the Snake River Plain.
    â€œWe’ll be comin’ on Soda Springs,” he said. “We stopped to rest up here. There’s hot springs all over the place, bubblin’ up like you ain’t never seen.”
    Joel agreed that the prospect of a hot soak wouldn’t be bad at all. Within a short time, however, his thoughts were directed toward another confrontation with hostiles, for he suddenly heard gunshots in the distance. He reined the gray back and he and Riley stopped to listen.
    â€œThey’re a fur piece off,” Riley said, and Joel nodded his agreement. “Could be a huntin’ party—huntin’ buffalo, maybe.”
    It was difficult to tell exactly which direction the shots came from, because they were partially