Boys Become Men: Book Three ~ Mountain Ranch

Tommie hired two more of the High School Cadets, Gordon Lee and Lion Wild Bear. Both boys had been orphaned and had grown up with John and Nora's help. Tommie had purchased a small wagon and a horse for the two new boys and he set them up as traders. They were to go out to the small outlaying farms and communities, trading food stuffs and dry goods for whatever the ranchers and villagers were willing to trade. The two new boys proved to be a good choice, they drove a hard bargain, but they proved to be honest and diligent in their trades, they developed a reputation for honest and fair dealing with their customers and Tommie's Stores grew by leaps and bounds.

Gordon and Lion made a regular circuit as they traded throughout the new state. They would go as far as the Military District Headquarters in St. George and circle around the wild lands to the east. They could not cross the high mountains to the west for fear of the radiation caused by the bombs of the "Collapse Wars", but they did discover small groups of people living in the canyons of the eastern slopes of those dividing mountains.

They carried news and mail, along with their trade goods and were made welcome wherever they stopped. Usually, a squad of Cadets would tail along with them for training purposes, but only once did they need protection.

They had just pulled into the small settlement of Littlefield, along the Virgin River southwest of St. George, when they noticed something was wrong. Usually, small children would come running out to them as they always had a bag of sweets under the seat to hand out to them. (When Tommy discovered they were paying for those treats out of their own pocket, there was always a good sized bag of candies and treats sitting on the wagon seat just before they departed on a sales trip!) There was nobody around on the single street of the village and the place was as quiet as a tomb.

Lion motioned for Cadet Corporal Dennis Fast Horse to take his squad and tour the village and to report back as soon as possible. They then drove the wagon over to the trading post and tied up before they went into the store.

There was a new person running the store and "something" just didn't seem right! They plunked the small bag of mail and messages on the counter and asked the man if he had any outgoing mail. The man snarled at them and shouted, "NO!"

They shrugged their shoulders and turned to leave when a shot rang out and they saw Dennis Fast Horse standing in the doorway, his rifle still smoking! The man behind the counter was on the floor, screaming in pain and they heard shots elsewhere in the village.

Dennis said, "Sirs, theys be bad stuffs in this here town, my boys is takin' care of it right now!" His "boys" included four young men and two teen girls, all of whom were terrific shots and from the sounds coming from the small town, they were busy taking care of "it".

A short time later, they watched as a group of men were herded towards the Trading Post, some of them had obviously been shot and their wounds left untreated!

A Senior Private came up to the Corporal and reported, "Corp, We's gottem' all. We's collectin' ropes ta' hang the bunch of'em, the Medic is treatin' the kids n' they's parents. It ain't good, Corp, theys be hurted purty bad!"

Gordon Black Stone grabbed his bag of medicines and tools he always carried, Doc Black Stone had given him serious medical training before they had begun their trading venture.

Gordon went running to the house that the private was pointing to, while Lion looked the captured crud over. They were dirty and surly men and they cursed Lion whenever he even looked at them.

Lion had been sworn in as a Magistrate and he dreaded what he knew was coming next. The Cadets performed their own sworn duty and there were six additional ornaments swinging from the struggling oak tree near the Trading Post. There was also a dozen new long-term residents of the district jail who would curse Lion for the rest of their lives. Those lives, it turned out, would be quite short as they could not stay out of trouble after they had served their terms.

They freed the villagers and treated their wounds, the children had been imprisoned away from their parents and they all went running to their families as soon as they were released, all, except for one boy about ten years old.

Dennis went to the child and asked, "Where are your parents?" The child answered, "Me not know, me not from here, bad mens tooked me with thems from another town. Me not know the name, we's just gotted there when the bad mens shotted me Papa. Me no got a Mama."

Corporal Dennis Fast Horse knew exactly what he wanted to do about the little boy.

Magistrate Lion had no problem signing the hastily hand written document that Corporal Dennis Fast Horse presented to him, Little Carl became Carl Fast Horse that same morning! Dennis traded two small silver coins for a small pony and saddle for his new son and two weeks later, as they left the village of Littlefield, a very proud ten year old boy rode beside his new Papa!

Another boy had just become a man! The Great Celestial Clock in Heaven was going to need a new, bigger dial.

Cadet Corporal Dennis Fast Horse would become Lieutenant Colonel Dennis Fast Horse, Army of Arizona and would retire as Military Governor of that state. His son would follow in his footsteps and do the same.

Every time Traders Gordon and Lion made the rounds of their trading customers, they brought home refugees who had come straggling in from the west. They told horrifying tales of cannibalism, bloodshed, strange religious rites and murder.

They told of a terrible town they called Fisso, where the people worshiped a weed that they grew in places they called parcs. They used that bush-like weed in their cooking, they chewed on it and they inhaled its smoke when they burned it.

Other refugees told of tribal wars in a place called Sacto and a whole town of people who worshiped a water god in a village the inhabitants called Fesselo. The strangest stories of all, were about a tribe living in a place they called Saddle and they worshiped a giant fish! The folk at Red Mountain shuddered and hoped they never had to deal with these strange folk.

Red Mountain was becoming a major town. There were deposits of a low-grade coal in the area and they had converted the boiler at the lumber mill, east of town, to burn the coal, it was getting too much of a hassle to keep the steam pressure up burning wood alone. They had scavenged abandoned mines and ore processing plants in the area to enlarge the generating plant and had disassembled a boiler and generator system in Elkland and dragged it across the desert to Red Mountain and reassembled it. The boilers were old, but they could burn both coal and wood.

The new plant would satisfy their need for a long time to come. Red Mountain and St. George were the only two communities in the entire state to have electric lights and, of the two towns, Red Mountain's was by far the largest power system! It also had the largest number of residents and was where new businesses were being formed.
The influx of refugees intended for Flagstaff, usually ended up at Red Mountain. There was little at Flagstaff to support a population, the few people who did try to make a go of it there, lived a bare existence, there was little water and most of those who tried living there either moved very soon, or lived on as trappers and hunters. They would hunt the dark, cool canyons that radiated from the mountains to the valley below. They had to be careful, there were still pockets of dangerous radioactivity down in the valley, but as time marched on, the hunters mapped out all the dangerous places and life went on.

With the addition of the Lyman property, they had enough good ground to support a larger population. Old Paul Lyman still lived in his original house and he was frequently seen walking with the children as they helped tend the gardens and fields with their parents.

Mr. Paul always seemed to have a sweet in his sweater pocket for the younger children and he loved to sit in the shade of a tree and tell tales about earlier times, back when he was a boy growing up. Granma Emma made up the sweets for him and every time he stepped out of his door, he had a pocket full of sweet goodies for the children. Many times he needed to return to his house for a refill, the children had some secret means of telling when he was going for a walk and they always would be waiting for him just outside Granma Emma's kitchen door.

There were lots of Indians around and cowboys were working on every ranch, so the children wanted to hear about cars whizzing by on the roads, picture shows on a thing called television, and moving picture shows that talked!

The children's favorite thing was for Old Mr. Paul to get out his fiddle and make music for the children to dance. It was not uncommon to see twenty or thirty children, of all ages, dancing in front of the old man, as he scraped away at his fiddle. That it was badly out of tune made no difference to the children, they would pick up the beat and hop and jump in time with the fiddle strokes.

The newly arrived Refugees were shocked to see electric lights turned on at night and fresh water pumped to their individual homes. Jim and Carl had set up a small stamp mill and were coining their own silver money that was good anywhere and had been declared legal tender by the fledgling Central Government. They had an ancient Navajo Silver Ring Maker carve the steel dies and the coins had the old American Eagle on one side and the other said, IN THE GREAT SPIRIT WE TRUST!

Gordon and Lion's trading post did a lively business, a child could purchase a huge bag of honey sweets, or ginger cookies for a small silver coin and, if a child did not have a coin, they usually gave out the sweets or cookies anyway. The two traders were hardly more than teen boys themselves and they felt the need to have other children around them. When they made their trading rounds, their wagon always came back home, loaded with new folks and strange new goods they had traded for.

They, also, were rapidly becoming men.

One summer, the weather was exceptionally good and they traveled further north of their usual haunts to a place the Indian folk called Ben. There, they traded for some smoked dried fish that was pink and tasted so good, they bought or traded for all the fish the local Indians would part with.

When they made ready to return to their own lands, the old village chieftain came to them and made them understand that he wanted to send his two grandsons, Bil Rolling Rock and Ti Big Log with them. Both young men promised to assist the traders and they brought along their own ponies and added to the traders' stock of goods in the wagon.

The two traders welcomed the company and they headed back to their homelands before the winter snows hit. They stuck to the old roads left from before the collapse and made good time on their return trip despite the heavily loaded wagon.

The two traders found it difficult to keep from nibbling on the fish they had traded for, it was salty and smoky at the same time. It took them a month to make the return trip, as they rolled into Red Mountain, the two visiting Indian youths were amazed at the bustling town. They jumped in fright when the lights came on as darkness fell and both Lion and Gordon assured them that the lights were normal.

They all rested in the back room of the Trading Post and the next morning, local folks were lined up at their door to see what "goodies" they had brought back from their latest trading trip.

The pink fish was an instant success, except for the small portion they had kept for themselves, it was sold out in a single day! Bil and Ti were busy explaining to the local people the fish was called sam-mon and it was plentiful where they lived.

Both the visiting boys were taken over by the local Indian youths and more than one mother looked at them with speculation in her eyes. It would not take them long to discover that the two boys had eyes only for each other. The Mothers would be sad, but the fact that two boys loved each other was not a problem among them and they were included in all the activities of the local tribe.

The following spring, the two traders set Bil and Ti up with a wagon and a sack of silver coins, along with trade goods to be traded in Ben and they were to bring back as much sam-mon as they could stuff in their wagon! It was to be a life-long relationship and all four of the men would become wealthy in goods and, more importantly, friends!

Several years ticked by and Red Mountain was the most important town in the state, it was larger than the capitol and had become the major business center of the entire region. Besides lumber, several meat packing plants had been established and local silver mines supplied the state with its own currency as well as domestic needs, like fancy buttons and hair combs. Wool and hides were turned into clothing and there was a vigorous import trade with the Indian tribes of Ben and the coastal areas even further west that had escaped the terrible bombs.

Red Mountain College had been started and the first bank in the state was headquartered there. The area held important grain growing areas and the local lava held large quantities of hematite that was being experimented with as a source of iron to be smelted.

Local copper mines were producing moderate quantities of that metal and Red Mountain itself was approaching twenty-thousand people. There had been a couple of scares when bandits attempted to raid the town, but the local Militia kept them out of town and there was a special section in the local graveyard for those persons marked as "Unknown".

BILTI Trading Company had a dozen traders working the immediate area and twenty wagons traveled all over the state trading and collecting goods for GORLI Stores. Tommy had semi-retired and spent his time reading stories to the children who had not yet learned to read. Ten wagons made the annual trek to Ben to bring dried sam-mon to Red Mountain and Bil and Ti made sure there were goods returned to their hometown of Ben in payment for the sam-mon.

They had taken over the trading business from Gordon and Lion on a shares basis and they continued Gordon and Lion's promise to retrieve any child in need. They had adopted several of their own, and their oldest daughter, Cissi Mourning Dove, was attracting teen boys like bees to honey. They had no worry, however, Cissi's brothers guarded her like tigers and most boys of Red Mountain were slightly afraid of those brothers, some even more than just slightly afraid! They had "stepped over the line" and tried to snag a kiss and the brothers had performed surgery on his face until he promised that he would actually MARRY Cissy Mourning Dove! Fortunately, when the scabs dropped off, there was no sign of her brothers' handiwork.

The first sign of the troubles to come was when a BILTI Trading wagon came roaring into town, hell bent for election! Both horses were lathered and nearly blown, and the wagon guard had used all his shells protecting the wagon!

The racing wagon drew a crowd and a Militia Corporal began ringing the emergency bell, calling out all Militia members to Muster! The Militia Duty Section turned out, armed and ready to guard the south road, where the wagon had come roaring into town.

Armed horsemen came skidding to a stop as they met armed Militia, their rifles pointed directly in their faces. They whirled around and galloped off before any of the boy soldiers could shoot them.

Not believing they were done with the intruders, the Militia Officers posted squads at all entrances to the town and at the important businesses that had located there.

They sent a message up to the Ranch to warn Mr. Jim and Mr. Carl. They both had heard the bell ringing and had called out all their cowboys to protect the ranch. George Yellowbush had sent his Warriors out to guard the Indian Village and the Teen Boys from the local tribe were already out in the hills watching as scouts.

There were several probes during the night, but Johnny Snapping Turtle, the leader of the Teen Scouts, had sent a message to George that the main force of the intruders were down in Flagstaff around a huge bonfire.

Johnny reported that there were more than two hundred of them and they were comprised of both men and women. Their shouts and screams seemed to be all in Spanish.

The local Militia Commander, Major George Winks, sent a telegram off to St. George, requesting troops and cannon. He had eight five inch Howitzers in his armory and plenty of ammunition, but that was not sufficient to protect all the entrances to the town.

The first attack came at dawn of the next day and the attackers left twenty of their number dead in the road leading from Flagstaff. The townspeople left the bodies where they lay, all the more to discourage the attackers.

For the next several days, the attackers probed various ways to get into the town, including coming over the top of the mountain through Red Mountain Ranch. Carl's and Jim's Cowboys wiped them out and left the bodies to feed the coyotes and the few remaining wolves in the area.

The State Troopers arrived from St. George, Captain Jeff Bullard and two companies of regulars arrived with six field guns and twenty wagons of ammunition!

The draft horses had run nearly the full distance and were panting, trying to regain their breath. The local men unhitched the wagons and led the steaming horses off to be cared for.

The Indian Girls joined their Teen Brothers and formed sniper teams, keeping the invaders from resting or relaxing. They had drum relays that kept their fathers informed of what the invaders were up to and more importantly, where!

The invaders had no food and little water, they had planned on foraging the town, after they had conquered it. They were getting hungry and thirsty, it was a case of invade or die!

The morning after the State Troopers arrived, the invaders massed on the road from Flagstaff and marched on Red Mountain. Marched was not quite the way they arrived, undisciplined rabble was a far better description!

Between nearly a thousand trained and disciplined Warriors defending the town and two hundred teen snipers hiding in the hills, the invaders had no chance and the last invader died more than a mile from Red mountain, sprawled out on the old highway pavement in a pool of his own blood.

Because their bodies were blocking the road, the Militia and State troopers scooped up the bodies and dumped them down a distant ravine. Unfortunately, that ravine was not far enough away from the town, the citizens of Red Mountain were kept awake for two nights as the desert coyotes fought over the bodies!

Nobody ever discovered where the invaders had come from, that they were Mexican was never in doubt, but their home was never determined. That would be the last serious attack to take place in the state.

Peace finally returned to Red Mountain and the area grew rapidly, becoming the most important town in the western part of the Restored United States. Two years later, the railroad returned and freight service reconnected Red Mountain with the rest of the country. Universal telephone service was a little slower in returning, but the telegraph had beaten the rail service by fifteen months.

Jim and Carl were growing old, both had white hair and both were greatly loved by all who knew them. What they had begun as High School Students had become a major part of a restored nation. There was no counting the number of lives they had saved, let alone those they had affected.

School children from all over the country would come on the train to see those two historic men and they gave courage to any number of boys or girls as they sat on their porch, holding each other's hand.

They both had become men at an early age and helped all those around them come of age at a time when it was a wonder just to survive.

Red Mountain Ranch became a National Shrine and an annual youth camp was held there each year, where teen boys and girls could learn about themselves and others in the hope that they would learn to live with each other in peace and to support each other in times of hardship.

The awful day came when Carl and Jim Redmond Bates died within hours of each other. Flags all over the country were lowered to half-mast and black armbands of mourning were seen on the youth of the entire nation.

The local Indian Tribes went into a year of mourning and continued to serve as sentries over their graves permanently, FOREVER! Many teens had their birthdates legally changed to read the same as Jim's or Carl's and many boy children born that year carried their names. More than just a few girls, carried variations of their names, many were strange adaptations of Jim or Carl, but they carried them proudly!

Each year, on the date of their passing, it became a tradition that boys or girls who had no family, were invited into homes for supper and from those invitations came many offers of adoption and more than a few offers of marriage!

It was a proud child who would say that he or she was adopted on Jim and Carl Day! Most of them accounted that day as their birthing date. It made for some confusion, to see an obvious near teen tell people he had been born just two years prior, but soon, nobody cared.

Their lives marked out the path for boys to follow on the road to Manhood and they had assisted uncounted boys on that road, even after their death. They left Red Mountain Ranch as a shrine and National Preserve in perpetuity as a place of refuge for any child in need of assistance.

There was a judge assigned around the clock who had the power to grant parenthood to any adult willing to raise a boy or girl not their own. Their definition of an adult was loosely held, just so long as the adult could and would care for the child properly.

Every year, on Jim and Carl Day, graduates of Red Mountain Ranch gathered in memory of those two great men and their descendants would sit on the porch and show the visitors pictures and describe the deeds of both Jim and Carl Redmond Bates. They had shown the world how to grow up and become Men and Women.

While this story has ended, there are more stories of boys becoming men to be told. Boys are the primary subject of these stories, but, at the same time, there are girls becoming women too and they should not be forgotten either. As Jim and Carl often said, "It takes two to tango"! (They had no idea what a tango was, but they repeated the word faithfully for many years.)