The sun lay low on the horizon over Battle Mountain in northwestern Colorado. The big man on the imposing black stallion veered off the trail and onto the shale and gravel scattered along the hillside and dismounted.
He stood for a moment, sniffing the air. Satisfied that there were no enemies nearby, he unfastened his pack, lifted the load from his horse and threw it like a pillow full of feathers off to one side. It was no problem for the most powerful man who ever strode the Rocky Mountains. Or, at least, so legend said.
The man who had come to be called Liver-Eating Johnson, or Dapiek Absaroka by the Indians and “Crow Killer” by the whites, uncinched and removed the saddle from his horse. The setting sun silhouetted his six-foot-three-inch frame and 240 pounds of muscle below the thick red beard that had become his calling card.
Staking his pack animals in a small patch of greenery among the stones, he whispered to them that all was well and they’d be safe that night. Mountain men often talked to their animals when no one else was around. Johnson hadn’t seen another soul for weeks.
Near the belongings he had thrown to the ground lay an oblong pile of stones in the shape of a grave. He removed the two top layers, reached down into a hole, and removed a hinged copper kettle. He loosened its latch and opened it up. Reaching in, he lifted out the skull of a woman followed by a second, smaller one. After that, he removed an eagle’s feather and several mementos, including a necklace and armbands.He checked the items carefully before putting them back in the kettle and returning it to its hiding place. He mortised in the stones and, as darkness settled over the mountainside, he sat back against a boulder and pulled on his pipe while he watched Battle Mountain shimmer against the twilight.
