That popping sound echoed from valley

That popping sound echoed from valley to valley and then from mountain to mountain for almost a minute. It was that popping sound made by the snapping of Millers neck that brought the rescuers directly to those desperate and forsaken travelers and everyone was saved. Doris recovered from her wounds tented to by Lorenzo and together they remained lifelong companions. The entire party returned safely back to Kansas but not before Gerald Higgins was given a proper burial even though his head was never recovered. It was a funny thing when they pulled Millers body down still hanging from the frozen grip of Higgins hands, that snowman face that Miller had replaced for the head of Higgins was no longer frowning instead it was beaming with a huge smiling grin? And while dangling from those hands Millers eye’s were fixed and glazed over bulging from their sockets like a dead prairie dog flatted under a heavy wagon wheel. And his thick squatty neck was clearly broken and it stretched like a piece of salt water taffy making an occasional snap, crackle and pop sound as it twisted in the chilling wind.

From out of nowhere a pair of ravens swooped down from the surrounding ponderosa pines and as one of the birds perched in a nearby branch the other landed directly on top of Millers head. The majestic birds glistening plumage flashed like lightning as it caught the last remaining light from a fast approaching sundown. Everyone present stood silent with some captivated by the moment while others did not wish to frighten the regal birds. The raven cocked its head to one side and in an instant plucked out one of the bulging eyes from Millers hideous corpse. It then just as swiftly took flight and jointed by it’s mate together they disappeared into the evening shadows but not before depositing their own calling card over Millers face. Some folks speculated the two ravens where possibility the spirits of Benjamin and Katie O’Neil and perhaps the eye was food for Posse maybe still alive and lost in the snow but this was doubtful. That evening before the party started their return trip home they all gathered around the body of Potts Miller. They quickly tossed his frozen corpse now with the missing eye like a piece of cord wood in to his wagon and pulled it to a deep and forbidding ravine.

There the wagon was set on fire and as the flames reached skyward some twenty feet the wagon was pushed over a bottomless cliff. The wagon skipped and ricocheted off several sheer granite ledges showering sparks and flames into the freezing sky until it rested at the bottom with a crashing thud. No one dared to look inside the wagon before it was set adrift into the endless sea of snow because if they had done so they would have discovered the bodies of the O’Neils as well as their faithful dog Posse. As Granny watched the flames flicker and start to die out she turned and said to the others, “ it’s time to leave this terrible place of death and  horror,  the horror of cannibal canyon”. Well that’s the story of Potts Miller and his appetite for organ meats or just one of many that could have remained a mystery forever. So the next time you drive through the High Sierra’s stop and take a long look into the cliffs and mountains that lay before you. Try to imagine what it was like for those terrified souls living in a time not so long ago. You just may see the wandering spirit of Potts Miller waving his tomahawk at you or perhaps the O’Neils and Posse locked in a time capsule.

But like so many stories and legends of the old west this story never left the memory of a four year old little girl named Sarah Margaret Bently, you see she lived to be one hundred years old or so they say and grew into a fine woman a lot like granny. But before leaving this earth she taught this rime to her children and their grandchildren and their great grandchildren from that time forward.

Evil Potts Miller went insane

Evil Potts Miller would eat your brain

Evil Potts Miller didn’t give a heck

So dead Gerald Higgins broke his wicket neck

Sarah Margaret Bently

Wichita, Kansas

As told in her later years on her One Hundredth Birthday

In the year of our Lord

1944