Excerpts of This Cursed Valley by Larry K. Meredith
Set in Colorado's Crystal River Valley and recounts a Ute Curse.

      The thought occurred to him once again that they had killed too many.
     This time he agreed with himself and groaned involuntarily, letting his usual Ute stoicism slip as he struggled to rise from the cross-legged sitting position he had assumed throughout the long night. Too many winters, he muttered to himself as he brushed at the dust on his store-bought Levi’s. He trudged the few steps to a weathered pine tree and scratched his back against the bark, not worrying about snagging the plaid shirt he had worn since he and the others had fled the White River Agency five days ago.
     It saddened him to think of what he had decided he must do as a result of what the whites were calling a “massacre.” The Utes called it necessary. Nevertheless, it was done, and now he was soon to use his powers as a holy man in a manner that had once been unthinkable. 
     Owl Man shrugged as if to say it didn’t matter. In his heart, however, in the deepest secret places of his soul, it did matter. 
     He discussed it with himself some more.
     They had killed only twenty-three, he told himself again, and thirteen of those were soldiers. One of the others, though, had been the agent Meeker. That was it, then. It had been the deaths of the agent and the women that had sent the white soldiers into such a rage they had pursued the small band of Utes down Colorado’s rugged backbone to this deep, isolated valley.
     He laid the thought aside and turned slightly, looking past the brush toward an army of ramrod-straight aspen trees, trying to see the woman. He had heard nothing from her for several hours and it was nearly light, the false dawn of early morning beginning to give shape to the bulk of mountain across the valley. He wanted to join the others this morning and cross the pass that would lead them to safety in the southwestern San Juan Mountains. It would not be a good idea to stay here much longer, he thought. The soldiers would be along much sooner than the Nunt’z, the People, expected them. Most of the Utes respected the soldiers for the power of their guns and because there were so many. Few, however, gave them credit for being fast or smart.
     There was a moan from the aspen grove to his left. Good. Perhaps the half-Ute, half-white child would come soon and they could leave this sacred mountain.
     He walked to the edge of the high outcropping and sat once more on the rock where he had waited throughout the night. His knees creaked as he bent to the boulder and he shook his head sadly at the thought of the rigors of old age. Straight gray hair with hints of the deep black of the past fell to his shoulders and framed a broad face, a flat nose that spread wide beneath still-sharp and deeply set eyes and a narrow line of a mouth. The face was smooth except for the etched lines at the corners of his eyes and in his forehead, made even darker by the consternation he felt as he pondered the events of the past few months.
     Few of the Nunt’z had listened when he told them it was inevitable. The speed at which it happened had been a surprise, though, even to him, a holy man with powers that had once made him rich and honored by his people. But when the whites laughed at him the People slowly began to doubt his power. It was Meeker, though, who turned them finally against him and many of the Nunt’z deserted Inu’sakats and turned to Meeker’s Jesus.
     He waved his hand at a blowfly and then stared at the palm. It was old and scarred. His life was written on that hand, the thick wrist, the short, strong fingers. That scar there between the thumb and forefinger. A Comanche knife blade might have severed the thumb entirely but he had been too quick. Something like a smile cracked his broad, dark face. That hand had killed a man, had held many babies, had caressed many women. His smile broadened slightly. Was it for the killing, the babies or the women? No, it was for his youth. Only yesterday he had been young and strong. One day young, the next old. He did not remember the transition.
     Now he was old and running like a frightened rabbit from vengeful white soldiers who were angry over the deaths of twenty-three of their number, even though it was clearly their fault. It was good to grieve for those killed but they had died in battle and honorably. It had to be the women. The conclusion comforted him slightly. The whites were people, too, and they could rightly be angry and vengeful because of the women. He hoped it was the women and not simply the twenty-three deaths.
     The old Indian sniffed the air and wished for the scent of a campfire and breakfast. Instead, the sharp bite of spruce, familiar to those who lived in the high country, filled his nostrils. It was a comforting smell, one he quickly associated with this place, this valley. The Nunt’z, the People, his band of Utes, had spent many good summers here. Game had been plentiful in those days and the People were happy. Then the miners had come and said there was value in the rocks of the mountains. “Pha!” He spat on the ground, thinking of the gleaming eyes in faces streaked with greed. He thought about it all, then, and fought the despair that threatened to overwhelm the anger. Keep the anger, he said to himself, and never accept the loss of country, of pride, of identity. 
     There was a sharp cry of new life behind him and soon the woman called his name. The child was already at her breast when he turned to her. “It is a man child,” she said. He saw a scraggle of black hair, a nose that was bent to the side. Potentially blue eyes hinted at part of the child’s parentage. Sooner than he had expected, the woman claimed she was ready to leave. He directed her to the ponies at the base of the ledge and lingered behind, waiting until she was out of the range of his voice. Then he stood and stretched his arms to the north and south. The sun cast his shadow far over the broad valley below.
     He called on the powa’a and the ini’pute who had served him well for so many years. When he felt their calming presence, in a voice he hoped was angry but which betrayed the sadness that engulfed him, Owl Man placed a curse on the valley that he knew would lead to lives of pain and sorrow for all white men who walked in the shadow of the Mountain of Sanctuary.

      This book is a work of the imagination. Although the story is fiction, the “cursed” valley of the title is a very real place.
     Much of the story is true and many of those who people its pages are actual figures who had an impact on the valley and its environs. While most of the main characters are fictitious, J. C. Osgood, the coal baron, did develop Redstone and Cleveholm; most of the “silver kings” of Aspen were real people and what is written of them, except for their association with my fictional characters, is based on historic fact.
     The Ute Indians did populate the valley although the majority of those who make up the cast of Native Americans are also figments of my imagination. The use and spelling of the Ute language is taken from one source and may be at variance with other resources.
     The history of the valley as depicted here and that of nearby Carbondale, Aspen and Glenwood Springs is also based on the way it actually happened. Now and then I have taken liberties with dates and travel times to make the story flow more smoothly. 
     Did the Utes place a curse on the valley? The legend says they did and many old-timers agree. What we do know is that trouble and calamity have plagued many of those who have tried to use this beautiful valley to their own benefit. To that end, perhaps the curse is not such a bad thing after all.

Larry K. Meredith
Gunnison, Colorado 
2002