April 18, 1851
Drouillard heard the horses before he saw the young men that were driving them. And at that moment, cold tendrils of despair crept over his heart.
Tuilla sat behind him as he stared out into the desert. On her small cushion, outside of their wiki, Tuilla was weaving grasses they had gathered into the baskets that she shared with the tribe. At seventy, it was all that her frail and gnarled fingers could still do. He could hear her humming as she worked, but he did not turn around. The dust cloud from the herd of horses was rising in the distance, and now he could even hear the whoops and the hollering from the young men who rode them.
The fools, he thought to himself.
Leaning hard upon his staff, Drouillard felt all of his eight decades of life bearing down upon him. He turned to his wife.
"Put down your basket. We must make ready and leave this camp."
Tuilla calmly looked up and followed his gaze into the desert to the north. Their camp was just beyond the second mountain range that separated the endless deserts from the valley of the Great Salt Lake, where the white men called the Mormons had now settled. She placed her half-finished basket in the sand and climbed to her feet. She was proud that she still rose and sat much quicker than her husband.
"What do you see?" she asked.
He pointed to the dust cloud on the horizon and knew he didn't need to say more. They had both been afraid that this moment was coming, ever since the elders' meeting where the young men had pounded their chests and talked boldly about stealing the white men's horses.
"I told them it would bring disaster on us," Drouillard said, leaning heavily on his staff. "And it is disaster that I see riding in from the north."
Without another word, his wife went to gather the other members of the tribe.
Luckily, this wasn't the home camp of the Goshute people. The chief was not here, and they numbered just over thirty in total, including the small children and the elderly. This small encampment had been hunting and gathering in the foothills for some weeks, while the main camp was much further south. If what was coming was as dire as Drouillard expected, he was grateful that most of their people were not there.
By the time the herd of a dozen animals thundered into camp, everyone had gathered, and they stared at the three young men and their stolen horses. If they had expected a thunderous welcome, they must have been disappointed.
"You fools!" Drouillard yelled at the first, who pulled up next to him on his unsaddled horse. "Were you seen? Don't you know they will kill us if they catch us stealing their horses?"
"Bah! They are only horses!" the tallest of the young men laughed. "They have many. And we can make use of them."
"You ridiculous child," Drouillard snapped. "Horses have no value to the Goshute! The horses and the cattle of the white man do nothing but destroy the young shoots of the plants that we gather. You did not steal these horses because they would be of value to our people. You stole them out of pride! Out of defiance!"
"Yes!" the young man hissed, leaning down from his mount to point a dirty finger at the old man. "You, Wanderer, have long told us that the white man is a plague. You have warned us that they are rolling towards us like a deadly wave. If anyone has reason to hate them, it is you, who was driven from the north like a whipped dog. This will keep them back. This will tell them that the Goshute are not so easily frightened!"
"No, it will only lead them to us with their guns. It will only give them a reason to slaughter..."
"There!" one elder cried, pointing back along the route the horses had come. At first, Drouillard thought that what he was seeing was just dust from the stolen herd that was slow to settle. But it quickly became clear that this dust was new. And was being kicked up by another group, who was riding furiously.
"Look! They are following you! Did you think you could ride a dozen horses over the desert and leave no trace? You have led them to us!"
In that moment, panic spread through the camp like bitter smoke. It was only through the sheer strength of their respect that Drouillard calmed them.
"What do we do?" asked a young girl with a baby still at her breast. The girl was Drouillard's own granddaughter. The baby, his great-grandson.
He knew he had little time to think, and that the horses would be upon their camp before the sun was fully at its height. As much as it pained him, he could think of only one way that they could escape.
To everyone's surprise, he ordered all the young men to mount the horses. There were twelve of them, and a total of sixteen young men, so some horses had to carry two riders. But to their credit, the young men followed his instructions without question. The sight of their pursuers had placed a fear in them that made them suddenly compliant to the elder's wishes.
Once they were mounted, only the very young, the women, and the very old were still standing on the ground. A group of thirteen were left, plus two babes in their mother's arms. A sad handful of their tribe's past, and it's hope for their future. His great-grandson whimpered, and his mother rocked him until he went silent.
"Take these horses and ride west into the desert, as fast as you can," Drouillard ordered the men on horseback. "Do not look back and ride hard. When you have gone a mile, you all need to head in different directions. I don't believe the band that is pursuing you is large. With any luck, you will evade them, and they will return to the far side of the mountains. If you are not lucky, hopefully only a handful of you will be killed."
"But what about you?" asked the young brave who had led the horses back. "What will you do?"
"We will flee to the East. Hopefully, when the men arrive here, they will not see us, and will instead follow the tracks of their stolen horses. We will make our way back to the home of the Goshute as quickly as we are able."
"But what if they see us?" a trembling woman asked.
"If that is to happen, then perhaps they will spare a group of old men, women, and children. Perhaps they will believe we had nothing to do with this foolish act. They are human. Even the white man may spare the weakest among us."
"What you have told us about the Mormons does not make me believe this." said one of the young men on horseback.
"It is our only hope! Now ride!" He slapped the flank of the horse closest to him, and it lurched forward. The Goshute were not skilled horseman, and several of the braves had never mounted a horse in their lives. It took some time for the band to rally together, but soon they were racing off to the west, as Drouillard had instructed.
"Now we must go," Tuilla said, as she began herding the band of old men and women to the east. "Leave everything in the camp. And walk lightly. Leave no tracks for the white men to follow. If the Great Spirit is willing, we will return someday for what we have left behind."
As he led his old and crippled band out of their camp, supported by his walking stick, Drouillard looked again to the north. The plume of dust was huge now, and he thought he could hear the low rumble of hooves, beating upon the desert sands. Behind him, their small collection of tee pees and wikis looked forlorn in the dust. Tuilla's last basket, half completed, was already gathering blown sand inside of it.
There is no way we will be out of sight before they arrive, he thought. Perhaps the young brave was right. Leaving our people to the mercy of the white man is foolish. It may be the most foolish thing I have ever done.
For the last four years the Mormons had been building in the foothills of the Wasatch mountains. By 1851 the city was already huge, and more settlers were arriving every day.
If it was any consolation to the Goshute, the Mormon settlers had not had an easy time of it in their new land. In the first year their crops were beset by locusts and they all nearly starved. But it had amazed Drouillard how determined and hearty these people were. In their own way, they were very similar to those locusts they had defeated.
Drouillard had known white men throughout his entire life, and he knew they could be relentless. But there was something about these Mormons in particular that frightened him. The tribe had encountered them only rarely in the past four years, but every time they had, their faces always made Drouillard think of wounded mountain lions. They were not just relentless; they were dangerous, and unpredictable.
As the riders approached the camp, Drouillard had his small group kneel down and try to blend into the sage and grasses of the desert. Unfortunately, they had not managed to get more than a mile away, and he knew that if he could see and count the men on horseback so easily then, if they thought to look his way, they could see his band just as easily. He held his breath and waited. One baby in the group behind him began to cry, and his mother stifled it quickly against her breast.
Whether it was the baby's cry, or just bad luck, Drouillard would never know. But his heart sank when he saw the horses turn and begin running. And not toward the west, to follow the horses, but toward the east—toward his small band.
A woman in the group saw this as well, and she jumped up with a squeak of terror, and ran. Drouillard was surprised to see that she quickly dropped over a small rise to the east that had been invisible to them, with the sun directly over their heads. The rest of the tribe was now flowing after the woman, and when Drouillard hobbled to the top of the rise, he saw they had found a tiny dry wash. It was just a few feet deep, and perhaps thirty feet across, but it was big enough to hold the entire group, if just barely. He could see the remnants of a flash flood that had flowed through during some earlier spring, exposing a strange single red boulder that was as high as his knees. But the dry wash provided them no shelter, and with nowhere else to run, all they could do was wait for the riders to arrive.
When the Mormons crested the top of the embankment, Drouillard was relieved at first to see that they only numbered six men. But all six were on mounts that looked fierce and strong, and all the men carried not only Colt Dragoon handguns, but also long guns in holsters strapped to the sides of their mounts. They were dressed in rough trousers with suspenders, linen shirts with kerchiefs knotted around their necks, and broad hats that tied under their chins. Four of the six had long beards, which reminded Drouillard of the mountain men that he remembered from his years as a trapper in Montana.
Instantly, their horses fanned out around the wash, until they formed a circle around the cowering Goshute. Drouillard's heart sank as he realized that if they were to open fire now, shooting down into the wash, his people wouldn't have a chance. And because of the angle, the men could fire with impunity, at no risk to their fellows. Retreating here had been yet another foolish choice.
The leader of the group was tall, with flowing dark hair and an unkempt black beard. He sat high in his saddle, as if he was ready to spring from it at any moment, and he pointed his gun down at the old men, women, and children that instinctively moved together into the center of the wash, clustered around the strange red boulder.
The man who spoke first was one of the two who lacked a beard, but he had a thick mustache that was waxed at the tips. He was a shorter, stockier man, who did not look as at home on a horse as his companions. But despite this, Drouillard sensed violence in him, perhaps even closer to the surface than the group's leader. As the man turned his face toward them, Drouillard saw a scar that went from his nose to just below his ear. And one eye looked cloudy, as if it had long ago ceased to function.
"Damn it, Brother Rockwell!" the man spat. "I told you this didn't look like a group of braves. We should have gone after the horses!"
Rockwell! Drouillard had heard the name whispered before. The tall man with the long hair would be Porter Rockwell, also known as Brigham's "Destroying Angel," and leader of the dreaded Danites. He knew they could expect no mercy from this man.
"The horses are all going different directions by now," Rockwell said, his voice calm and steady. "That's why they left all these old men, women and children. All the braves took a horse, and now they're probably scattered to the winds. Gentlemen, we will not get them back. At least, not today."
"The dirty savages!" yelled the hatchet-faced man, and spat into the dust of the wash.
"Calm yourself, Lorenzo," said Rockwell.
"I'm not gonna calm myself, Porter! Those are Custer Ranch horses those bastards took. My horses! That's my livelihood riding off in all directions. Is Brother Brigham going to compensate me for their loss? I don't think so."
"Well, there ain't much we can do about it now, I'm afraid."
"Nothing but shoot these savages, that is," Custer said, cocking the hammer of his revolver.
"I told you to stay calm, Lorenzo," Rockwell said, his voice quiet but commanding. "So... stay calm."
The man uncocked the gun and lowered it. But the violence in his face made Drouillard's insides tremble. As he looked back and forth between the two leaders of the posse, he instantly knew that the real danger in this group was not the man named Lorenzo. The beast Rockwell was in charge, and the whole posse was on a hair trigger. It wouldn't take much to set them off.
Should I speak to them? Drouillard wondered. Would knowing someone here speaks their language be likely to quell their hatred, or just inflame it? For the moment he decided to stay quiet, hoping he could learn more if they didn't think any of the tribe understood what they were saying.
Communicating mostly in signs, one man tried to ask about the horses. Drouillard was never good at the language of the signs, but Tuilla was, and so he watched silently as she stepped forward, and tried to show the men that no, they did not know where the horses were. And no, they were not responsible for them being stolen. Drouillard caught the sign for "young men" and "fools" as her hands moved, but he was unsure how much of what she was saying was getting through to the man. Until finally he turned back to Rockwell.
"The old squaw says that they don't know anything about the horses. That some foolish young men stole them, but I can't really understand anything else she says. I tried to ask if they sent all their braves with the horses, but either she doesn't understand, or pretends not to."
"She's a damn liar," Custer hissed. "The tracks of the herd ran right through that encampment back there. Why would they run off if they didn't help them get away? And why are there only old people and children here? You can tell that old woman she can burn in hell, as far as I'm concerned."
The posse all turned back toward Rockwell. Clearly, it was his decision that would guide their fate, and he was scratching his thick beard with his long, bony fingers, and looking at the people in the ravine as if they were complex knot he had to untie. Drouillard noticed that the long gun in his holster wasn't a single-shot rifle. It would be the shotgun that Rockwell was famous for. It was said he never missed.
Finally, Rockwell said, "maybe we should march them back to Salt Lake."
"And what would Brigham do with them?" a young man with a blond beard and a red scarf asked. "I don't think the Prophet would appreciate us dropping this problem in his lap."
"I say let's shoot 'em." said another man.
"They're all thieves," said Custer. "If we let them go, they'll just keep stealing our horses and cattle. Let's kill them all and leave their bodies in this wash for the coyotes."
"It would serve them right," said the blond-bearded man. "They took something of ours. Let's take something of theirs. It's only fair. And it will show them we're not going to put up with their nonsense."
To Drouillard's horror, it was at that moment that his daughter-in-law panicked. She started to climb the embankment, her infant clutched to her breast. The man nearest her point of escape had already swung his pistol in her direction.
"Please, no!" Drouillard screamed.
The man on horseback didn't shoot, but he spurred his horse to cut her off. Without saying a word, he kicked her in the face, and her head snapped violently back. The baby flew from her arms, and fell on the top of the wash, wailing, while his mother tumbled down the short embankment. She lay groaning in the dirt at Drouillard's feet.
Then, to his horror, he watched the man get off his horse and kick the baby over the edge. It rolled down, screaming in its swaddling the entire way. When it finally came to rest next to its mother, the wailing it made reminded Drouillard of the sound a trapped beaver would make before he would club it over the head for its pelt.
Tuilla rushed to pick up the infant. The mother did not seem to be hurt badly, and soon took the crying baby and tried to calm it—without success. The child's wailing continued to echo back and forth in the wash.
Drouillard looked up, the fury in his face boiling over. He leaned on his staff, but his knees were shaking so badly that he knew he could not attack these men the way his heart begged him to do. If he were to take a step, they would likely shoot him. And his legs would give out long before he even reached the embankment.
He stared into the face of Porter Rockwell, who, like all the men, now had their guns cocked and pointed down into the wash. But Rockwell was looking directly at Drouillard now, and he had drawn his shotgun. As he spoke, the tip of his gun bobbed in time with his slow words.
"You... spoke... English..." he said.
Clearly, Custer had not heard Drouillard's shouted words. "Come on, Porter. Let's kill these bastards and go after the horses. Maybe we can get a few of them back."
"No..." Rockwell said slowly, his gaze still on the old man. "This one. He understands. I can see it now, when I look in his eyes."
"Yes. I speak English," Drouillard said, slowly. The language sounded strange on his tongue, and the words had a bitter taste. But although he had not spoken the white man's tongue in many years, it came back to him quickly.
"There is something about you, old man," Rockwell said. "Something tells me you are not a Goshute."
Drouillard rose to his full height and stared hard at the bearded man. He thrust out his chest, as if daring the man to shoot. "I am Goshute. I will always be Goshute. These are my people."
"But you weren't born a Goshute."
"No. My name is George Drouillard. I was born of a French Canadian father and a Shawnee mother." He was aware that the entire tribe, including the baby, had now gone silent. They were all staring at him, as none of them had ever heard him speak the white man's tongue before. There was hope in their eyes, but also disgust at hearing the words come from his mouth.
"Did you say 'Drouillard?'" Rockwell asked. "I've heard that name before. But where?"
"Lewis and Clarke," Custer said. "George Drouillard was with Lewis and Clarke. But he left and became a trapper. He was killed years ago, by the Blackfoot, up in Montana. This ain't George Drouillard."
Still pointing his gun, Rockwell dismounted, and walked bow-legged down into the wash. He came to within six feet of Drouillard and looked hard into the man's face.
"I once met Drouillard," he said "It was back when I was a boy. But Lorenzo's right. He died, a lot of years ago."
"That ain't him," Custer said, but Rockwell clearly wasn't paying any attention to him now. He was staring hard at the old man's face, as if trying to read some hidden sign there.
"You may be a half-breed," Rockwell finally said. "I can see that now in your eyes. But no, you ain't George Drouillard." He tapped the man's chest with the cold barrel of his shotgun. "Maybe you're the one that killed him."
"It doesn't matter who I am," Drouillard said. "But what matters is that these people are not your enemies. The Goshute have been hunting and gathering in the desert since long before the white men ever arrived in this land. It is our land. I ask you to leave us be. Go back to your city across the low mountains. I will find your horses, and I will have them returned to you. In exchange for peace. In exchange for our lives."
To his surprise, all the men except Rockwell himself laughed at his speech. Their laughter was harsh and in it Drouillard heard his doom, and the doom of his people. In it, he heard the doom of all the native peoples of this land, and he felt the icy hand of despair on his brow.
But hints of something much more powerful were boiling just under that despair. Something so strong that Drouillard felt it might light this ravine like a thousand suns.
Rage.
Although Rockwell didn't laugh, he too was clearly amused by Drouillard's words. He gave the man a smile, and it was the kind of evil smile that the old man had seen before. It was the dark joy that the white man always took in the destruction of his people. He had seen it from the other side. And he knew that once he saw it, there was no hope remaining.
Rockwell finally dropped the barrel of the shotgun from Drouillard's chest and climbed the embankment back to his horse. Standing next to it, he spoke to his men.
"I don't know who this bastard is, but let's take him at his word. He's a Goshute, and the Goshute have shown themselves to be thieves." He opened his arms to indicate the six men surrounding them. "This, 'Mr. Drouillard,' is Mormon Justice," he continued. "The hand of the Lord is swift and righteous, and there is no defying his will." He kept his eyes on Drouillard, but his voice carried to all his men.
"Kill them all. But leave this one for last. Leave this one for me."
The sound of the simultaneous fire raining down on the Goshute was like the sky itself had been rent asunder, and Drouillard felt as if the entire world was collapsing into a flaming pit of fire. He could not bring himself to look at the men and women and children falling all around him, so he just stared at Rockwell, who also never broke his gaze. He just stared down the barrel of his shotgun at the old man.
As the bullets cut down his friends and family, they also shredded whatever had been holding Drouillard's rage at bay. He felt it roar through him like holy fire. He did not move, and he did not rail at the men. He did not try to protect his loved ones, even as their screams tore through the air, and he felt their blood splattering his face and hands from all sides. He just leaned on his staff, shaking so hard that he hoped his staff would crack open the very earth on which they stood and swallow them.
Great Spirit, take us all! Drouillard begged.
Tuilla was clinging to his side now, screaming in terror. He felt the blood spray on them both as his daughter-in-law was shot, falling directly at his feet. He even heard the baby's screaming as it once again fell to the ground. And through it all, neither Drouillard nor the demon Mormon flinched. The lead rained down on the old, the women, and the children of the Goshute tribe, but Drouillard held Rockwell's gaze, so that neither man could witness the massacre.
Slowly, the firing ceased. And only then did Drouillard look around him.
They were all dead. There were only three of them still alive. Tuilla was clinging to him, and they had clearly spared her only because Rockwell had wanted the old man for himself. She held in her arms the baby, and the sound of his crying was now the only sound in the universe that remained for George Drouillard. That crying, and the red eyes of the demon, who was now descending into the wash. Drouillard watched as he stepped over the bodies of the old men. As he kicked aside the corpses of the women and children. As the hand of a dying woman reached toward his ankles, unseeing.
In that moment, nothing was left of George Drouillard. The only thing that remained of his humanity was the rage that had come from the earth itself. All his love for his family had been converted into fury. All of his memories, all of his dreams. He even thought that the very flesh of his body was now composed only of congealed hatred and the need for vengeance. It was as if his entire body was on the verge of igniting and burning this world to a cinder.
Drouillard was aware that he had begun speaking. They were words of Goshute, words of English, and words he didn't even know. Words of the ancestors, perhaps, or words of the Great Spirit. His voice was the cry of injustice and a call for revenge for all people who had been destroyed by colonizers, from the beginning of the world. And he spit those words in fury as the long-haired Mormon advanced up on him.
"That damn injun's speaking in tongues, Brother Rockwell! Put a bullet in him!" someone yelled.
"He's a demon! If you don't shoot 'im, I will!" another screamed. And there was dry terror in their voices.
Tuilla screamed and rushed Rockwell, the baby still in her arms. She barely got a foot in front of Drouillard before someone on the embankment cut her down. The bullet went through her, and the baby fell again to the dirt. A second shot rang out, and the baby was knocked back against Drouillard's feet, now nothing but a bundle of bloody rags.
Everything was suddenly silent. And Drouillard felt his rage break through the skin of the earth.
I will now destroy them all, he thought. I will now destroy the world.
With a roar, Drouillard dropped his staff. He knew he would no longer need it. He would never need it again. And with strength born from all the murdered native peoples of this land, he bent and wrapped his arms around the red stone beside him. It was a boulder far too heavy for any man to ever lift. But lift it the old man did. And as he pressed it over his head, his mouth opened in a roar. And in that moment, they would all swear that a golden light poured out of the old man's mouth, and then his eyes and ears. As if there was a small sun in his body, eating it from the inside.
When I drop this stone, let the world end, George Drouillard prayed.
Porter Rockwell stumbled back from the spectacle before him, but that didn't stop him from leveling his shotgun at the old man's chest. Rockwell's terror made his face into a twisted mask, like he was gazing into the face of the devil himself. His voice erupted as if God had prepared him for this moment his entire life.
"Get thee back to hell, Satan!" Rockwell screamed, and fired the shotgun.
The blast crashed into Drouillard's chest, but for a fraction of an instant, nothing changed. Then, as if in a wave, all the old man's strength drained out of him. All the yellow hatred and the rage erupted upward, into the stone he held above his head. And for an instant, George Drouillard looked like Atlas, holding all the world itself over his head. But with the draining of his rage, the old man's body was just a frail thing once more.
The weight of the rock crushed him as it fell, breaking first his brittle neck, and then shattering his shoulder and spine, knocking him mercifully to the side. As the stone hit the ground, only the old man's right arm was still under it—shattered now from the elbow to the tips of his fingers, the blood oozing around the stone's edges, and into the dry desert sand.
In his last moment, George Drouillard saw, or imagined he saw, the souls of his departed tribe, rushing past him, and into the sea. They were joining a dark river that would carry them all to the ocean of the Great Spirit. A river that now flowed through this desert wash, and around a stone that had been dropped in its midst. The black waters rolled and boiled, and Drouillard felt himself sinking beneath them.
Great Spirit, take me, the old man pleaded. But the souls were all rushing past him now. He was pinned under the rock in the stream and could not join them. Fastened onto the floor of this desert valley forever by his own rage and need for revenge.
Porter Rockwell knelt down, put his shotgun against Drouillard's forehead, and fired one last blast, directly between his eyes. The old man's head exploded, and blood and brain tissue splattered against the rock. It clung there in gray and red clumps.
The members of the posse would later recount that at the moment that the old man died, there was a great crack and a roar. The ground shook, and a sound rolled across the desert that sounded like thunder from the heart of the earth. They would swear that they saw the ground rippling away from the rock, like waves in a still pool.
Now, only the old woman was still alive.
Tuilla crawled to Drouillard's now lifeless body. She tried to pull him to her chest, but failed because his arm was trapped under the rock.
Lorenzo Custer was now off his horse, and had joined Rockwell in the dry wash. Tuilla looked first at Rockwell, then at Custer. The silence now was profound, and only the sound of the wind across the desert came to her ears.
"You have cursed this valley, and your people," she said, in a language they could not understand. "George has thrown this stone into the great river of life and death. The souls of the Mormon people will be snagged upon it for generations. I pity them. And I pity you."
The party left the Goshute to rot in the desert sun. Rockwell looked down into the wash as they rode away, and saw the rock and the lifeless bodies. He imagined the coyotes scattering the bones. All except, of course, the hand and arm of the man who called himself Drouillard. That would likely stay where it was. The old man's body lay crumpled against the rock, under a thick splash of blood, painted upon the stone. The blood had run down the red rock in a thick stream, which made the stain resemble the old cottonwood trees that dotted the Salt Lake valley.
He looked again at the bloody stone. It is oddly beautiful, he thought. Like a finely crocheted table piece.
As they departed, the buzzards and the coyotes were already drawing closer.
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