Willmar tribune. [volume] (Willmar, Minn.) 1895-1931, 1900-12-05

pair, except such sas could be accom-
plished ..by the labor Of troops, 2 which
was why, when he wasn't fighting In.
dams, the frop tier soldier of that day
was mainly occupied in doing the odd
jobs Of q day laborer, without the rec
ompense Of one, or his privilege Of quit
ting if he didn't like the job. That he
should know little of drill and less of
parade was, therefore, not to be won
dered a 'sS
vs. But what he didn' t know about guard
duty was hardly worth knowing. He
had prisoners and property Of every
conceivable kind - Indians, horse
thieves, thugs and deserters, maya
zines and medicines, mules and NUM-
tons, of war. Everything had to be
guarded. The fort lay a mile to the
west of and 200 feet higher than the
railway hotel in the heart of the town.
It looked down upon the self-styled
city, and most Of it's womenkind did
the same on, the citizens, who were, it
must be owned, rather mixed lot. The
sudden discovery of gold in the neigh
boring foothills, the fact that it prom
Used to be the site of, the division car
shops and rOundhOuse, that the trails
to the Upper Platte, the Sweetwater,
the park country to the south and the
rich game regions of the Medicine Bow
all conferred there, and that stages left
no less than twice week for some of
those points, and the whole land was
alive with explorers for a hundred
miles around-all had tended to give
Gate City a remarkable boom. Chey-
enne and Laramie, thriving frontier
towns, with coroners' offices in full.
blast from one weeks end to the other,
and a double force on duty Sundays,
contested to and exhibited pardonable
jealousy. Yet there was wisdom in the
warning of an old friend and fellow
frontiersman, who said to Folsom:
"1ou are throwing yourself and your
money away, John. There's nothing
in those gold stories, there's nothing in
that yawp about the machine shops;
all those yarns were started by U. P.
fellows with corner lots to sell. The
bottom will drop out of that place in
side of year and leave you stranded"
All the same had Folsom bought big
blocks and built his home there. It was
the nearest town of promise to Hal
Folsom's wild but beautiful home in
the hills, and, almost as he loved Nell,
his bonny daughter, did the old trader
love his stalwart son. Born a wild
Westerner, reared among the Sioux
with only Indians or army boys for
playmates, and precious little choice
in point of sayagery between them:
Hal had grown up a natural horseman
with love for and knowledge of the
animal that is accorded to few. His
ambition in life was to own a stock
farm. All the education he had had in
the world he owed to the kindness of
loving-hearted army women at Lara
mie, women who befriended him when
well-nigh broken-hearted by his
mothers death. Early he had pitched
his tent on the very spot for ranch
mans homestead, early he had fallen
in love with an army girl, who married
the strapping frontiersman and was
now the proud mistress of the promis-
ing stock farm nesting in the valley of
the Laramie, devoted wife and
mother. The weekly stage to the rail-
way was the event of their placid days
except when some of the officers would
come from either of the neighboring
posts and spend week with her and
Hail. From being a,delicate,: consump-
tive child, Mrs. Hal had developed into
a buxom woman with exuberant
health and spirits. Life to her might
have some little nonotony, but few
cares: many placid joys, but only one
great dread-Indians. John Folsom,
her fond father-in-law, was a man all
the Indians trusted and most of them
loved. Hal Folsom, her husband, had
many trusted and devoted friend
among the Sioux, but he had also enc
mics, and Indian enmity, like Indian
love, dies hard. AS boy he had some
times triumphed in games and sports
over the champions of the villages. AS
youth he had more than once found
favor in the dark eyes that looked
coldly on fercer, fonder claimants,
and one girl of the Ogallallas had
turned from her kith and kin and
spurned more than one. red lover to
seek the young trader when he left the
reservation to, build his own nest in
the Medicine Bow. and they told
story as pathetic as that of the favor
tie daughter Of old Sintogaliska, chief
of the Brule Sioux, who pinned and died
at Laramie when she heard that the
soldier she loved had come back from
the Tar east with a pale-faced bride.
There were red men of the Ogallallas
to whom the name of Hal Folsom was
taunt and an insult to this day, men
whom his father had vainly sought to
appease, and they were Burning Star,
the lover, and two younger braves, the
brothers of the girl they swore that
Hal had lured away.
z, South Of the Platte as it rolled past
Frayne and Laramie, those Indians
were bound by treaty not to go. North
of the Platte Hal Folsom was warned
never again to venture. These were
the stories which were well known to
the parents of the girl he wooed and
won, but which probably were not full.
ly explained to her. Now, even behind
the curtain of that sheltering river.
with it's thanking forts, even behind the
barrier ofsthe mountains Of the Medi-
cine Bow, she often woke at night and
clutched her baby to her breast when
the yelping of the coyotes came rising
on the wind. There was no woman in