Snow Mountain Passage by James D Houston Read Free Book Online Page A

the confidence of a scholar. “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. It is the code of Hammurabi, and it must be our code as well.”
    “You ask me,” says Uncle Billy, “Jim Reed deserves a hanging.”
    William Eddy takes his hat off and slams it against his leg. He was a carriage maker back in Illinois. He has a thick, square body and a face that looks hewn from oak. Disgusted, he challenges the circle with his eyes. “If George Donner was here, you people wouldn’t have the guts to talk about a hanging.”
    “Well, George ain’t here,” says Uncle Billy, “and something’s got to be done.”
    “The main thing that has got to be done,” says Eddy, “is getting through the mountains. We’ll need every hand we have. Let’s wait till we make it to Sutter’s, and we can settle it there.”
    “It ain’t enough,” says Uncle Billy.
    “Why don’t each one of us write down what we saw today,” says Eddy, “and as soon as we get to Sutter’s, we’ll bring it before the magistrate.”
    “It’s the wagon party’s business,” says Patrick Breen, glancing at his wife. “We’re like a fort, or a town, or any other collection of humankind.”
    Breen has an apostolic face. His thick hair is wild and unruly beneath the dusty hat brim. He is a fiddler, and his eyes beside the bow have often flashed with merriment. But that look has not been seen in weeks. His eyes are hard, as if he has been recently betrayed. His wife’s are the same, and he expects her now to agree with him.
    “It needs settling,” says Peggy Breen. “It needs settling today. But we don’t want another killin’.”
    Breen looks at his wife with suspicion, ready to be betrayed again. Then he sees what she is getting at.
    “Yes,” he says, “I’m not at all sure we want Jim Reed’s blood upon our hands.”
    “We’ll take a vote,” says Graves.
    “On what?” says Eddy.
    “On hanging the man who killed Johnny.”
    Eddy tips his head back and laughs a long, mocking laugh. “Where you gonna hang him? There ain’t nothing out here higher than a coyote. Anybody thought about that?”
    “Yes,” says a voice from beyond the circle, “I have thought about that.”
    In front of his wagon, Keseberg has hastily cleared a space and moved his lines around and now lifts the long wooden tongue so that it makes a post twelve feet high. In this world of cinder cones and starving river grass, it is the straightest thing in sight. He hauls out some baggage and a wooden crate to prop up the tongue and hold it steady. As hanging becomes possible, a hush falls over the crowd. They regard him with horrified wonder, and Keseberg swells.
    “This will suit him fine,” he says.
    Graves is pleased. He surveys the gathering. One third of these people are relatives. His clan alone could decide the outcome.
    “We will mark on pieces of paper,” he says. “Everyone eighteen and over has a vote.”
    William Eddy shouts, “Listen to me! You can’t hang a man for defending himself!”
    “He ran Johnny through!” cries Elizabeth Graves.
    “You weren’t there,” says Eddy. “How could you see what happened?”
    “We saw enough!” says Uncle Billy.
    “Those were my animals Johnny was beating on,” Eddy says. “Milt and me had hitched ‘em together so he could pull the hill. Johnny was beating on ‘em so bad Jim tried to put a stop to it. That’s when Johnny turned on him and knocked Margaret down, and Jim had to pull his knife to hold him off …”
    “Ain’t the way I saw it!” Uncle Billy shouts.
    “Well, hell, you were clear up on top!” says Eddy. “All Jim was aiming to do was hold him off. But Johnny, he was like a mad dog, and Jim never stabbed him …”
    “Ain’t the way I saw it, neither,” says Elizabeth Graves.
    “Johnny ran right up against the blade,” Eddy says.
    Now a rise of many voices fills the air.
    Eddy shouts, “I was right behind ‘em in the next wagon!” But he is drowned out as all the grievances