Wilderness Double Edition 13

by David Robbins

  Nate doubted it. A wolf just wasn’t able to bound from boulder to boulder as the lion had done. Rising in the stirrups, he glimpsed a streak of gray high along the trail, making for the gap in the cliff. “There he is. He must be on the sorrel’s scent.”

  Evelyn smiled. Finally! All the trouble she had gone to would not be wasted. Blaze and her brother would be together again. Maybe Zach would be grateful enough to speak to their folks on her behalf, to suggest that she not have to do his chores. Who was she fooling? Zach would never pass up a chance to loaf around doing nothing. She was stuck.

  See if she ever did him a favor again!

  “I can’t see them anymore. How long before they get here?”

  “Not long.”

  Louisa May Clark was running flat out. Minutes earlier the warriors had filed into heavy pines, and now there was no telling where they were. Legs pumping, she was hard pressed to keep up with Stalking Coyote, and wondered if he was holding back for her sake.

  Zach willed himself to stay calm. He did not mention that he had seen one of the warriors point toward the stream just before the Indians disappeared in the forest. He came to the clearing, and the sight of the elk meat filled him with resentment. Why should those who had intruded on his happiness fill their bellies at his expense?

  “How do you reckon they found us?” she asked. “Did they spot our smoke?”

  “No.” Zach had taken particular pains to insure they did not give themselves away. “Just dumb luck, I guess.”

  Louisa crooked her head to see the woods. She tripped over her own feet, and would have fallen if not for Stalking Coyote, who caught her around the waist. “Thanks.” She did not mind his nearness. Truth was, she welcomed it.

  “Gather everything except the meat while I saddle the horses,” Zach directed. There was not a moment to lose. If the warriors had spotted them, men would be sent to both ends of the valley to prevent them from escaping, while the rest spread out and swept the valley floor from side to side.

  Louisa did not mind being told what to do. He could throw on a saddle faster than she could. She bundled up the blankets and his parfleche, then untethered the pack-horses and looped the lead rope around the neck of the one she would not be riding. She was ready to go when he gestured for her to climb on.

  Out of sheer spite Zach tipped over the drying racks. He would have burned the meat if there were time, just so the warriors could not get their hands on it. Forking leather, he brought the sorrel to a trot.

  “I want to thank you for all you’ve done for me,” Louisa said as they started out. It might be the only opportunity she had, and she did not want to die without showing her gratitude.

  Zach absently nodded. He had weightier issues to deal with. What tribe were the warriors from? Were they friendly or hostile? Was it a hunting party or a war party? He hoped they were Crows. While not as partial to white men as the Shoshones, neither were they as bitterly disposed as the Blackfeet. They were wily tricksters who could steal anything right out from under a person’s nose. Unless provoked, they rarely slew whites.

  Zach stayed to cover as much as was possible. At the ridge, he climbed to within a stone’s throw of the crest. The band had done just as he’d figured. Three warriors were to the east, right out in the open. Several others were off to the west, secreted among pines, but one of their mounts moved and gave them away. That left another six who were moving slowly into the valley, strung out at fifty-yard intervals.

  Louisa was thankful for the spruce trees that sheltered them. “What will we do?” She whispered, even though the Indians were much too far off to hear her.

  “We sit tight,” Zach said. Judging by how the warriors were poking into every stand and thicket, it was safe to assume they did not know where he and Louisa had gotten to. For the moment they were safe. But only for the moment.

  Zach looked at Louisa. If she was scared, she was putting on a brave front. She did not show it. Here was the kind of girl who would make a fine mate for any man. Brave, dependable, attractive. The very traits his father had said he should look for.

  “Something wrong?” Louisa did not understand why he was staring at her so strangely. Not when she was striving so mightily to please him. If she had done anything she should not have, she must learn what it was and never do it again.

  “You are pretty,” he said.

  Louisa could have been floored by a feather. Of all the times for him to choose to compliment her! “I am not, but it’s awful kind of you to fib.”

  “I am part Shoshone, and Shoshones always speak with a straight tongue.” Zach had more to say, such as how he took great pride in being known as someone who always told the truth. But one of the warriors was moving toward the ridge. “Take a gander,” he warned,

  Louisa did, and her heart hammered as if fit to explode. The warrior was one of those who had attacked her pa and her! It was the same war party! Were they after her? Or had they stumbled on the valley by chance, as Stalking Coyote believed? “What tribe do they belong to?”

  Zach was ashamed to say he didn’t know.

  “I thought you knew all about Indians,” Louisa teased.

  No one knew all there was to know. Not even Zach’s Uncle Shakespeare, one of the most widely traveled mountain men alive, could make such a claim. Shakespeare had once told him there were scores of tribes that had had little or no contact at all with the outside world. Tribes that were more likely than not to view all whites as potential enemies.

  “You have no idea at all?” Louisa would like to know who her father’s slayers were.

  “They dress like Piegans, but their hair is different, more like the Sioux. Yet look at that red circle on the horse’s chest. That’s the kind of symbol Flatheads use.”

  “They must have come here expressly to find us.” Zach was skeptical. The Indians would not have shown themselves if that were the case. In any event, it was unimportant. Whether they were from a known or unknown tribe was of no consequence either. Surviving was all that counted. And to do that, Zach must somehow slip past them. It was unfortunate the day was so young. Under cover of darkness, sneaking away would be child’s play.

  Two of the warriors were near the stream, near the pool. One kneed his warhorse into the water and waded to the gravel bar. He bent low, hanging by one arm. Then, rising, he yipped like a coyote, bringing the others at a trot.

  “He found where I hopped off the bank,” Zach guessed. Soon the warriors would find the clearing amid the saplings. Tracks would lead them to the ridge, and he would have a fight on his hands.

  “Should we make a run for it?” she asked.

  The idea had merit. Only three warriors blocked the east end of the valley. Better to battle them, Zach reflected, than to go up against six or more. “Stay close. I’ll take care of the packhorse.”

  “No. You’ll need your hands free to fight. Leave the packhorse to me.”

  Their gazes met, and lingered. She was right, of course, so Zach nodded, feeling oddly proud of her. As the Texicans might say, she would do to ride the river with. Grit and wit, grace and charm, all combined in one. That, and she could cook.

  “Don’t shoot unless I do,” he said. “If they spot us, I’ll hold them off while you get away.”

  Louisa dismissed the thought of deserting him with a wave of her hand. “I’m not leaving you.”

  “It would be best.”

  “I could never live with myself.” Impulsively, Louisa bent and clasped his fingers. They were warm, strong. “I know we hardly know each other, but I care for you. I’m sticking by your side, come what may.”

  A heavy feeling formed in Zach’s chest, like the feeling he had when he suffered from a cold. Only this was stronger, and made him tingle from head to toe as if he were giddy from sipping his uncle’s whiskey. “I care for you, too,” he heard himself admitting.

  Louisa listened to what at first she thought was wind rushing through the trees. But the noise was in her head. She straightened
, and was briefly dizzy. What could have caused it?

  The six warriors had left the stream and were moving slowly toward the saplings.

  Zach wheeled his mount. Enough cover existed to hide them both until they were almost out of the valley. Where it narrowed, the undergrowth thinned. That was when they would be most exposed.

  Tugging on the rope, Louisa dogged the sorrel. She sorely missed Fancy. The packhorse did not have as smooth a gait. Worse, it fought the bridle and was uncomfortable with the bit. In a scrape it might act up and put her life in jeopardy.

  Zach remembered to favor the shadows, to never silhouette himself against the sky. As a sprout he had spent hours at his father’s knee learning woodcraft. Foremost among the many lessons were those on how to keep his scalp when he was in danger of losing it.

  “When you’re badly outnumbered, run,” Nate had instructed him. “Never throw your life away. Never think you have something to prove. There’s a fine line between being brave and being stupid.”

  “But what if I have no choice, Pa?”

  “In that case, fight like a wildcat. Or better yet, remember those Vikings we read about in that history book the missionaries swapped me?”

  “The Vikings who went mad in battle? The Berserkers?”

  His father had nodded. “If you’re trapped, go berserk. Do whatever it takes to live. Nothing else counts.”

  “Shucks. Don’t worry about me, Pa. I aim to live longer than Uncle Shakespeare.”

  Aiming to and doing so were two different things. Zach bent low over the sorrel as the tall trees gave way to shoulder-high brush. He held the Hawken down next to his right knee so the metal was less apt to reflect sunlight.

  Louisa imitated everything Stalking Coyote did. When he stopped, she stopped. When he continued on, so did she. At any moment she dreaded hearing a war whoop and seeing the entire war party converge.

  Presently, Zach reined up. They had about run out of vegetation. Across forty yards of grass were the three men who had corked the bottle, as it were. One had dismounted and was fiddling with his mount’s hoof. Another, a stocky man whose face was severely scarred, honed the tip of a lance. The last, the tallest, was fully alert – and armed with a rifle.

  Recognition quickened Louisa’s pulse. The tall warrior was the one who had let her leave with her pa. She recognized the stocky man, too, as the one who had made such a fuss over it.

  Zach twisted. “Keep under cover. If I go down, head east until you see Long’s Peak. North of it is a valley about twice as big as this one. In it is a lake, and near the west shore is a cabin. That’s where you’ll find my folks. Tell them I asked for them to help you.”

  “What are you planning to do?”

  “My ma always said to be polite when I meet strangers,” Zach quipped, and without further ado he rode into the open, the Hawken slanted across his saddle.

  The warrior examining his horse vaulted astride it. The stocky one leveled his lance and started forward, but stopped at a word from the tall man, who did not move.

  Zach did not know which surprised him more, that he was risking his all to save the life of a female he had met less than twenty-four hours before, or that he felt no fear. He had been in bloody scrapes before, and in each, he was ashamed to recall, he had experienced some fright. Why not now?

  The tall warrior advanced on a fine dun. Both the scarred man and the third warrior did likewise, both looking as if they would rather fight than palaver.

  Thirty feet out, Zach drew rein. He nodded at the tall warrior, who returned the favor. “Savvy English?” When the warrior did not answer, he resorted to Shoshone. “I come in peace. I am your brother, not your enemy.” None of them responded.

  That left Zach a last recourse. Sign language. His father had begun teaching him “finger talk,” as one old trapper had called it, as soon as he was old enough to do the basic gestures. His mother had added to his store of knowledge. So had his Shoshone kin and friends. Shakespeare McNair had rounded out his education by showing him signs McNair had learned during wide-flung travels that stretched from Canada in the north to Mexico in the south, from the muddy Mississippi River to the mighty Pacific Ocean.

  Sign language was widely relied on. Tribes that lived on the prairie favored it most, but it was also used by mountain dwellers like the Nez Perce and Utes. Some signs were used by all. Some were more common in the north than the south, or the other way around.

  White men who learned it fared better than white men who were too lazy or indifferent to bother. Zach’s father claimed it had saved his bacon on many an occasion. Now Zach hoped it would do the same for him. Holding his right hand in front of his neck with the palm out, he extended his index and second fingers straight up. Then he raised his hand until the tips of his fingers were as high as his head. It was the sign for “friend.”

  The three warriors understood. The stocky man made the sign for, “You lie, boy.”

  “I fond peace,” Zach signed.

  “Give me rifle,” was the stocky warrior’s reply.

  The tall man gestured, signing at the stocky man, “I chief. I talk.” He did not say “chief” exactly; the sign equivalent meant “elevated,” or “one who rises above others.” Turning back to Zach, he signed, “I called Tall Bear. Question. You called.”

  “Stalking Coyote,” Zach responded. The leader seemed reasonable enough. Maybe, just maybe, bloodshed could be avoided. Inwardly, he laughed at himself. A few days before he had wanted to count coup more than anything else in the world. Now here he was – trying to avoid counting coup!

  The stocky man with the scars snorted. He placed his right hand at the center of his chest, fingers up. Then he moved his hand about a foot to the left, slid it back again, then moved it a foot to the right. It was the sign for “half-breed.” The sharpness of his movements reeked of contempt.

  Tall Elk glanced at the tall man. He and the stocky man exchanged harsh words in their own tongue, and when they were done, the scarred warrior was quivering with rage. Tall Elk had another question for Zach. “Where you sit.”

  It was the same as asking where Zach came from. “I sit across mountain,” he signed, with a vague motion eastward. Under no circumstances would he reveal more. His parents and sister might pay with their lives. “Question. What white man do?”

  “I hunt elk.”

  “Question. You alone?”

  There was no way around it. Zach answered, “No. My woman with me.” Louisa was not truly his, not in the sense that they shared a lodge. But he needed the warriors to realize she meant a great deal to him, to appreciate that he would not part with her without a fight.

  Tall Elk’s brow creased and he scanned the brush. “Question. Where?”

  Zach shifted in the saddle. “Come on out, Louisa,” he hollered. “But do it real slow, and don’t come too far.” He smiled encouragement as she complied.

  Louisa was as nervous as a mouse in a barn full of cats. She saw the tall warrior’s sudden alarm, saw hatred darken the scarred warrior’s face. Suddenly it hit her that she had neglected to tell Stalking Coyote she had met these Indians before, that they were the same ones who had killed her father. She prayed she had not made a mistake.

  The next moment the stocky warrior hefted his lance, whooped like a banshee, and charged.

  Eleven

  On the south shore of the lake was a large log Nate and Zach had rolled out of the forest the summer before. It was there because Winona had commented how she liked to sit and admire the water and the wildlife, and how it was a shame she did not have anything to sit on.

  Now, on this bright sunny afternoon, Winona and Evelyn were seated on the log. At opposite ends. Winona glanced at her daughter several times, noting Blue Flower’s slumped shoulders and exaggerated pout. “Do you see those baby ducks? They are cute, are they not?” Evelyn did not look up. She merely said, “Cute.” And went on pouting.

  “They are out on the lake, not at your feet.”

 
Against her will, Evelyn lifted her chin a fraction. The baby ducks were cavorting like kids, chasing one another and quacking noisily. Ordinarily, it would be enough to make her smile, but not today. Nothing could make her smile after the way she had been treated.

  Winona folded her hands in her lap and pondered. She knew how much her pride and joy loved it here, and she had hoped it would snap her daughter out of her funk. But it was not working. “Want to go for a walk all the way around the lake?” Another favorite pastime.

  “No, Ma.”

  “Want to go search for flowers?”

  “No.”

  Winona felt profoundly sad. Her daughter adored flowers more than anything else. “All right. Let us talk about what is bothering you.”

  “Nothing is bothering me.”

  Hurt, Winona said softly, “Has it come to this? You would lie to your own mother?”

  Evelyn finally looked up. To lie was to go against everything her parents had taught her. Her father said liars were snakes in the grass, the lowest of the low. Her mother had impressed on her that among the Shoshones, lying to someone was the same as striking them a hard blow. “It wasn’t an out-and-out lie,” she hedged. “What else would you call it?”

  “I’m upset, is all.”

  “I never would have guessed.”

  “Please, Ma. I’d rather not talk about it.” Evelyn regretted letting her mother persuade her to go for a stroll. She would rather have stayed in the cabin and sulked.

  “You would rather go on being miserable and make everyone else miserable besides? That is selfish of you, Blue Flower. I am disappointed.”

  Evelyn refused to let her mother get to her. “Why should you be miserable? I’m the one who has to do Zach’s stupid chores for two whole months.”

  “Ah. And that has you mad?”

  “Dam right it does!” Evelyn had done something she had never done before; she had raised her voice to her own mother. But she could not help herself. It was unfair, what they had done! “It was bad enough Pa told me I had to do them for a month! Then you went and added another month! All because I tried to do what I thought was right. I tried to do Stalking Coyote a favor. Now I have to suffer.”