by Win
“Go to Crow country with Fitzpatrick. Get a pipe. Do a hunt. Find Pegleg in Taos next winter.”
“Pegleg, he probably goes to Taos in the winter,” mumbled Joaquin.
“So maybe I will find me sisters by meself.”
“You’re too young for that,” Sam said fast.
“¿Das verdad? I am eighteen. How old were you when you came to the mountains?” Tomás rushed on. “Eighteen. How old were you when you walked seven hundred miles alone”—his words underlined the oft-spoken words with sarcasm—“to get to Fort Atkinson?” Now he stood up and leaned directly into Sam’s face. “How old were you when you killed a white man for the first time? Twenty-one, and he was a ‘giant.’” Tomás’s voice grew soft and sing-song. “Excuse me again, how old am I?”
Peanut Head’s eyes burned at this talk, and Sam wondered why.
He deliberately turned his back on Tomás. “You have no idea what you’re getting into.”
“Like you did no,” said Tomás.
Sam turned back to his son. “What if Comanches own these women?”
“A man does not add up the risks,” said Tomás, “when it is slavery.”
Sam looked into his son’s eyes thinking, You expect the world to be a fairer place than it is.
“Yes,” said Joaquin, “we are men.” He thumped his chest. “Corragio.”
Sam stared at him. Between the empty-head and the hothead…
“So what exactly is your plan?” said Tomás.
“Right now,” said Sam, “I’m going to take Paladin to water.” He stood and strode off.
“I’ll walk with you,” said Peanut Head.
Coy trailed along, three-legged.
“Damn,” said Sam loud and hard, paying no attention to Peanut Head.
Peanut Head said, “I think his leg is coming along all right.”
Sam counted his angers. Gideon Poorboy lost his leg. Blue Medicine lost his life. So did Third Wing. Meadowlark died. Paloma died. I seldom see Esperanza.
He let Paladin walk into the creek. Vexation worked at him like a toothpick. He met Peanut Head’s eyes, saw the flame again, and wondered what it meant.
“Sam, Tomás said you killed a giant white man. How did that happen?”
“I’ve killed more men than I wanted to.”
“Tell me about that one.”
Irritation chinked at Sam. “His name was Micajah. He wasn’t a bad man, I don’t think.”
“You killed a good man?”
“It was righteous.”
“How could that be?”
Sam looked into Peanut Head’s eyes but saw nothing.
“Way righteous.”
Paladin came out of the water and stood beside Sam.
“I hear you keep hidden weapons.”
Sam turned to the newcomer. He was careful not to lift a hand to his hair, or to his belt buckle. “Maybe more than one.”
“Where?”
Sam eyed him. “I’m not inclined to say.”
Peanut Head shrugged and smiled. “Any tips you can give me, I’d be glad to have.”
Sam studied Peanut Head’s face. He seemed a modest youth, far more brawn than brains. “That’s all yesterday’s troubles now.” He stood. “I have plenty of today’s.”
Fitzpatrick was waiting for Sam at the lodge. “I need ye to lead a brigade for me.”
Sam glanced at Tomás, who sat head down. “Can’t help you. I’m going to Crow country like you, but to get a pipe.”
Tomás’s eyes flashed fire at Sam.
Fitz said, ”You know us and American Fur Company have divided the country for the coming year?”
“No.” This was big news. Could the two cooperate?
“They’re mostly west of the mountains, we’re mostly east. They’ll trap the Salt Lake country, the Teton country, the Flathead country, and all that around the Snake River and the Salmon. We’ll trap the Siskadee here, the Big Horn, the Yellowstone, and the Three Forks as well.”
“Good idea.” Sam looked at Tomás edgily. The Crows Sam needed to see would be on the Big Horn.
“How about you?” Fitz said to Tomás. “I’ll give you fifty dollars a month.”
Tomás shook his head. “Me sisters are missing.”
Fitz turned back to Sam. “I need one thing from you sure and true. Next summer you sell me your fur.”
“That’s a bargain.” He thought. “You think you and American Fur Company can share the mountains?”
Fitz shook his head. “The bastards are gonna trample us into the ground with their money.” He grinned wryly. “You think I can really afford to pay partisans $1500 for a year’s work?”
Sam saw it. One good decade, and now the beaver-trapping world was slip-sliding away.
Suddenly, Fitz called out, “Hey, Bill, come sit.”
Old Bill Williams walked rickety their way. The man was all bones sticking out, knees, elbows, and nose. He looked disreputable, his buckskins black with grease, his hat with a hole big enough that his red hair stuck out. You could even see that it was turning gray. But he was whipcord strong, and his bright blue eyes spoke of a lively intelligence.
Old Bill kept his own counsel and had a reputation. It was said that it wasn’t smart to ride in front of Bill Williams in starvin’ times.
“Hydee, Sam,” said Bill, “I don’t recollect ever’body’s name.”
“Tomás,” said Tomás curtly. Sam suspected that Bill always forgot the name as a way of teasing. “This is me friend Peanut Head.”
Bill reached for the kettle with the whiskey, swigged, and scratched Coy’s ears. Sam wouldn’t let Coy be around Old Bill in starvin’ times either.
“I need you,” Fitz told Bill. He made the same offer he’d made to Sam and ran through the reasons.
Bill sat, thought, and chewed his wad. “Don’t allow as I could.” Bill always seemed to trap alone, or slip away from any companions he had. Now he spat out a brown glob. “I’m glad to have this little set-down with ’ee, though. Got something to communicate.”
He reached for the kettle and swigged again. “This here, you might say I done had a vision.”
Sam smiled and deliberately didn’t look at Tomás. Bill had come West as a preacher to the Osage. The Indians, though, had been the ones who did the converting. Bill carried a pipe now and made medicine with it. He prayed to the four winds. And it seemed like he’d gone even further and made up his own way of seeing the world from lots of things he’d heard, a sort of patchwork quilt of wisdoms.
“I seen how I’m gonna come back,” said Bill. “Yessirree, I did. I’m comin’ as a elk, bull elk.
“Now, ever since I’ve knowed that, it has worried me some. One of you boys—my friends—is liable to make meat of me.”
He stared at them wild-eyed.
“So I’ve figgered out a way around that. Listen here. If’n I see you, I’ll give you a signal that it’s me.”
He fixed Tomás with his eyes. “You mindin’ what I say, boy?”
Tomás gave him a flat look.
After a moment Bill gave up on the indignation. “See here, it’s a simple signal. You know how elk look at things off to one side, not ahead?”
He gave Tomás another look, suspicious about the youth.
“Well, whatever side you’re on, I’ll wave that antler in a little circle.” He fixed each of them with his eyes. “Like this.” He wobbled his head round and round.
“You payin’ attention? You hear what I’m saying? Like this.” He wobbled his head again.
“Got it, Bill,” said Sam. Bill stood up, in a hurry to spread the word.
“Don’t you be burnin’ powder in my direction, you hear? Just recollect what I told you.”
“Not for anything would I blow a hole in your elkdom, Bill.”
31
“Stupid old fart,” said Tomás. He wobbled his imaginary antlers.
Flat Dog walked up with a bundle of sticks, sat beside them around the fire pit, and started stra
ightening arrow shafts.
Sam locked eyes with his son. “I’m going to Crow country.”
“Pegleg is south,” Tomás said with an edge. “Me sisters are south.”
Sam pursed his mouth. “The pipe comes first.”
Tomás threw off an exasperated sigh. He turned to Peanut Head. “First he throws away Christianity for this primitive religion.” To Tomás Christianity and Catholicism were the same. “In Santa Fe we have a most beautiful place of worship, the Church of the Virgin of Guadalupe. When Paloma and I go to mass, to hear the great words, my father sits outside and puffs on his pipe.”
He smirked at Sam. “What is it, you see the future in the smoke?” He made a wavy, rising motion with one hand.
“You’re stepping into the shit,” said Sam.
“He takes a secret religious name, Joins with Buffalo.”
Now Sam was truly offended.
Tomás plunged on. “He goes from man to beast. What you think of that?”
Peanut Head kept his face rigid.
“He makes medicine.” Tomás gave a mocking laugh. “He does a dance where you go without food and water until you see, how do you say, hallucinations.”
“Tomás,” said Sam, “you’re offending your uncle.”
“Flat Dog is not me uncle,” said Tomás. “He is not your brother.” He jumped up. “And the way you act, you are not me father.”
Sam stood up, put his face straight in Tomás’s, and grabbed the boy’s shoulders. “You sit down and act right,” he said, growling.
Tomás swung. The fist caught Sam right on the bridge of his nose. Blood flooded out.
The two men glared at each other, stupefied.
Tomás uttered a strangled cry and ran off.
“God damn it!” yelled Sam, and used his sleeve to stanch the blood.
32
Julia handed Sam a wet, cold cloth for his nose.
He put it on and said nasally, “What got into him?”
Nobody answered for a while. Then Flat Dog said, “Everything, I expect.”
Sam would have snorted, but he didn’t want to blow blood on himself.
“Maybe now is the time for the beads,” said Julia. Her kind eyes flicked to Esperanza.
Sam thought and nodded. One-handed, he drew a rolled piece of hide from his shooting pouch and squatted down by his daughter. Her eyes were on the bloody compress on his nose. Sam unrolled the hide—it was a beaded featherburst in gay colors.
“Papá!” she squealed. She loved pretty beadwork and quillwork.
“What do you say?” asked Flat Dog in English.
“Gracias,” she said.
Flat Dog gave her a look.
“Thank you,” she said the second time.
“You’re welcome,” said Sam, sounding like he had a bad cold. “Here’s what you do with these.” The beadwork was on a disc of sheepskin tanned white. “You sew it to your dress, right in the middle, like this.”
“I’ll do it for you tonight,” said Julia. She took one wet cloth away from Sam’s nose and gave him another one. The nose was swollen into a pear shape.
“I want beads,” said Azul.
“And I brought you some,” said Sam. He handed the boy two strips of beadwork, blue and white pony beads to ornament his shoulders. Flat Dog and Julia would know that Azul’s ornamentation, with beads the size of the boy’s finger joints, was quickly done, while the tiny beads in Esperanza’s featherburst took dozens of hours.
“Keep it going,” Julia said softly to Sam.
“I have something else for both of you, too.”
He brought out the multi-colored yarn. He had gotten it in Santa Fe, several feet of it. He and Paloma had played with it until they figured out what the best lengths were, and he cut it and tied several pieces into circles the right size.
“One piece for you”—he handed it to Esperanza—“and one piece for Azul.” He handed the rest of the ball to Julia, who looked dubiously at the pear in the middle of his face.
“Papá!” Esperanza squealed. Last year he’d given her some emerald ribbon to tie up her rust-colored hair and flatter her hazel eyes, and she loved it. Every day she made a bow in her hair, partly to show she knew how to tie the knot.
Azul looked at the string like it was a mess a dog made.
“These are for playing a game,” Sam said. “It’s called cat’s cradle. I used to play it with my mom and my sisters.”
He wondered if his mother was still alive. He’d had no contact with his family since he knocked his older brother Owen cold nine years ago.
“So. Your mom knows this game, and she and I will show you how to play.”
Julia was ready. She and Sam squatted opposite each other, and she began with the yarn around her hands, thumbs outside. Then a loop around each hand. “Now watch,” she said. She used the middle finger of each hand to reach across, catch the loop from the other hand, and make a pretty series of diamond shapes and triangles, all in different colors. “This,” she said, “is what we call a cat’s cradle.”
“Let me, let me!” cried Esperanza.
Azul bunched up his string and squinched it between his nose and upper lip, like a mustache.
“Wait,” said Julia. “Now this is where it gets good. Tricky but good.”
Sam put down the compress—at least his nose wasn’t leaking red any longer. He reached out and pinched some of the Xs made by the taut yarn. Then he pulled his hands far apart, stretching the yarn, made a scooping motion, and—lo and behold—the entire cat’s cradle was on his hands.
“Estupendo!,” cried Esperanza. “Let me, let me!”
“Just a minute,” said Sam.
Azul watched in puzzlement.
Sam held his hands out to Julia, she pinched some strings and made some motions, and—a brand-new shape was in her hands. “This pattern is called candles,” she said, and held out her hands to Sam.
Quickly, they went through the manger pattern, the diamonds, and a couple of more.
Esperanza fell silent. She was awestruck.
“All right, now,” Sam told her, “you try it with me.”
They worked on it together. Julia and Azul did too, but Azul didn’t put his mind much on it.
Quickly, Sam had a cat’s cradle small enough for Esperanza’s hands. It took three tries for her to switch it from his fingers to hers. “Hot damn,” she said in English.
All the grown-ups laughed.
Esperanza ran around the fire, holding her cat’s cradle to the sky.
Sam looked at Flat Dog. His eyes were direct, warm, and open to Sam. They didn’t spend as much time together as they wanted, but Sam felt their bond now.
The sun was well down behind the western mountains, and the sky was the color of mother of pearl. Sam breathed the mountain air in and out through his mouth. He watched his daughter run in mad circles. Finally, she stopped and faced him.
“All right,” he said, “do you want to try doing the manger pattern now?”
“Yes!” said the little girl.
Much later, when the children were tucked in, Flat Dog said, “How’s your nose?”
Sam said, “It hurts to be a dad.”
Sam held the kaleidoscope against the reddening dawn and turned it. He loved looking at the designs, and could do it for hours. For fun Sam start-stopped several turns fast. Then he rotated the instrument slowly and steadily, hands like a machine. He savored the shifting patterns. Since they reminded him of stained glass windows in a church, they brought Paloma to his mind.
He reached over and rubbed Coy’s ears. He wondered where she was now. If things went according to plan, she and Hannibal got to Chihuahua City in early June and stayed there a while. Another month to Durango, plus stops there and in Zacatecas to trade at the mines. Maybe they would be leaving about now for Mexico City, another month and a half away. He pictured her kneeling in front of the Virgin of Guadalupe.
He wondered how ill she might be. He wondered whether she thou
ght of him.
He hung his head for a long moment. Then he chided himself, lifted the kaleidoscope and kited off again into its world.
Flat Dog came out of the tipi. “No sign of Tomás?”
“Nothing.” Sam slipped forward onto his knees, poured Flat Dog a cup of coffee, and put more wood on the fire.
Two days and they hadn’t seen or heard from him.
“He’s run away from home,” said Sam.
“Like father, like son.”
Sam gave a rueful smile. He’d run away from home on Christmas day, 1822, right after his girl announced her engagement to his older brother Owen. “Probably he signed on with someone.”
“We’ll find out who he went with.”
“Yeah.”
“Maybe he’ll get that big money we’re missing out on,” said Flat Dog with a grin.
“Yeah.”
Sam looked around at the camps, where men were stirring. Today most trappers would pack up and move out. Robert Campbell would take the Rocky Mountain Fur pack train across South Pass to the Big Horn River, down it to the Yellowstone in bull boats, on down the Yellowstone to Fort Union, and then on the Missouri River to St. Louis by steamboat. The brigade leaders of both big companies would point their outfits toward their designated hunting grounds. The many Indians were heading back to their villages.
Sam’s friends Fitzpatrick, Bridger, and the other partners would spend a year paying ruinous wages to beaver men. American Fur would do the same. They would make big hunts and maybe no profit. Sam couldn’t guess what it would all come to.
This was one year Sam might have gone back to work for Rocky Mountain Fur. But he couldn’t. Fitz’s offer was stunning, and Paloma wasn’t waiting for him in Santa Fe. I have to get a pipe.
Esperanza and Azul tumbled out of the tipi. Julia would be nursing the baby inside. “Hola, Papá.”
Sam picked her up and gave her a hug. “I’ve got something to show you.” He put the kaleidoscope to her eye.
“Oooh, pretty.”
He rotated it.
Esperanza squealed.
He turned it again.
Another squeal. She grabbed it and made the turns. Choruses of excitement. Coy yipped and jumped up and down, excited in his coyote way.
