Читать книгу Vigilante Days and Ways. The pioneers of the Rockies; the makers and making of Montana and Idaho онлайн

20 страница из 135

Tracy & Co., of Lewiston, had a pony express route from that town to Salmon River, a distance of seventy-five miles. Their messenger, whom we only know by the name of Mose, was a man of great intrepidity, and perfectly familiar with all the risks of his business. In single encounter he was understood to be more than a match for any man in the mountains. Some time in the early Fall of 1862 a plan was laid by Plummer and his associates to capture Mose. The place selected for the purpose was the trail crossing of White Bird Creek, at a distance of sixty miles from Lewiston and eighteen from Salmon River. At this point the creek runs between very abrupt banks densely covered with cottonwoods, rendering both descent and ascent tedious and difficult. The robbers, in anticipation of the arrival of Mose, as usual on a keen lope, after darkness had set in had felled a tree across the trail at a sufficient height to admit the passage of the horse, and at the same time strike the rider in the chest, and throw him suddenly from the saddle. They then intended to kill him and rob his cantinas, which it was supposed would contain several thousand dollars in gold dust. At Chapman’s ranche, near the crossing, Mose was told that several suspicious characters had been prowling in the neighborhood during the afternoon, and with that keen sense which had been educated to scent danger from afar, he at once comprehended the whole plot. Carefully descending the bank, he discovered the snare, and turning to the left avoided it, hurried through the creek, and ascending the opposite bank cast a look of derision back upon the foiled highwaymen. This fearless messenger continued in service long after this event, but his future trips were made under the escort of well-armed assistants.