Free Sacred Is the Wind by Kerry Newcomb Page A

impossible to stem. Apprenticed to a freighter for one year and working at full pay for another, Jubal Bragg had put aside enough for traps and supplies and at sixteen had headed west to the mountains. But trapping did not appeal to him, nor the lonely reaches where a man stands alone beneath the sky. Almost a year to the day he left, Jubal returned to St. Louis and the freighting company. He worked his way up from mulewhacker to manager. An older, wiser young man, Jubal saved his money, shrewdly chose his acquaintances and culled the favor of the city’s wealthy merchants.
    He saw to his own education while learning his trade and establishing a reputation for honesty and competence. At last Jubal garnered enough support that by the close of 1859 he had formed his own freighting company and moved to Denver City. Jubal held the belief that this burgeoning settlement by the banks of Cherry Creek and the South Platte River was destined to become the “Queen City of the West.” Denver grew, though not without a struggle. And so did Jubal’s fortune. Success was inevitable to a man determined not to fail. At war’s outbreak in 1861, twenty-two-year-old Jubal Bragg received a contract to supply the Union garrisons operating in the Colorado and New Mexico territories. War ensured a tidy profit with every shipment of food, tack, lumber, clothing.… Then came the Indian attacks, depredations against settlers and soldiers alike. In response, Jubal organized a militia, commissioned himself colonel and organized the locals throughout the territory to defend themselves against attack. With the Civil War come to an end at a courthouse in Appomattox, the territorial governor had requested that Bragg’s militia continue to defend the outlying areas until government troops could be dispatched in adequate numbers to Colorado. Wealthy merchant, local hero, at twenty-six Jubal Bragg had everything—money, prestige, power … and nightmares.
    â€œColonel?” Marley cut through the reverie, the solid resonance of his voice dispelling the shadows of memory.
    â€œYes, Sergeant Marley, I am up to beaver. Why, I’m as sane as any madman.”
    â€œYou ain’t mad, Colonel. You just got bad dreams from time to time.”
    â€œWell-said, Sergeant Marley. Well-said. I’ll drink to that.” Jubal climbed out of bed and wrapped himself in a brushed-velvet robe. Marley lit another lamp to further dispel the gloom as Jubal reached for a decanter of brandy and two glasses, leaving the revolver on the table by the spirits.
    â€œI suppose the manager will be around. We had better have an explanation ready.”
    â€œEveryone knows you hereabouts, Colonel. I reckon you can just do what you please.”
    Jubal filled a glass for himself, one for Marley. He walked over to the window fronting Main. The hotel was the point from which two intersecting streets, Main and Commerce, radiated outward in a V. Houses sprawled beyond the center of town like a stain of civilization cluttering what had once been a sea of buffalo grass. The window faced west and in the moonlight Jubal could make out the outline of Castle Rock, those great battlements of granite rimmed with silver and jutting upward from the plain like some medieval buttress. The playthings of nature rupturing the proud earth in some forgotten cataclysm. Jubal sipped his brandy, watched Marley’s reflection in the mirror as Marley drained his glass at a single gulp, then busied himself with reloading the Navy Colt. He swabbed the empty chambers, added powder and tapped in wadding and a lead slug, and sealed the chamber with a dab of bear grease, lastly replacing the firing caps and easing the hammer down.
    â€œIt’s cognac, dear fellow, for heaven’s sake don’t bolt it down like that. The masters of Charente are turning in their graves.” Jubal took another sip. The brandy leached the cold that had plagued his bones since