by Win
Flat Dog trundled along with the second kettle. He wondered why Sam hadn’t reached into the tipi for it. Ahead he saw something very odd. Peanut Head raised his rifle. Soundlessly, over the swoosh of the river, he cocked it. What was the youth aiming at? A fat goose on the water?
Then horror flushed through Flat Dog. He dropped the kettle and flung his rifle up. Fear swung the barrel beyond Peanut Head, and Flat Dog needed a second try to steady the front sight on…
He saw the white smoke burst from Peanut Head’s gun and heard the explosion. Sam fell into the river, and Flat Dog saw blood fly from his head.
Flat Dog centered on the murdering bastard’s back and pulled.
Peanut Head flew into a sapling and crumpled to the ground.
As Flat Dog ran by him, he saw Peanut Head was hit in his lower spine. Flat Dog kept sprinting.
Coy marked the spot on the bank, barking furiously.
Sam lolled on his back in the river, a long plume of red seeping downstream from the floating ends of his white hair.
Flat Dog dropped his rifle, jumped in, hefted Sam up, and set him on the bank.
Crow men came running with bows, clubs, and some firearms.
Flat Dog inspected the wound frantically. Sam’s head was a mass of blood on the right side, and his ear was mostly gone.
Flat Dog lifted Sam high and clambered onto the bank on his knees. He stood up with a humph and ran toward the camp. As he passed Peanut Head, two warriors were bending over the body.
“What?” snapped Flat Dog.
“Bad,” said one of the warriors.
“Good,” said Flat Dog. He called back over his shoulder, “Bring the son of a bitch to my lodge.”
Coy loosed a tirade of barking at Peanut Head.
Flat Dog ran. Coy trotted behind, his head turned back and barking fury.
Flat Dog didn’t know who the healer was in Plays with His Face’s camp, but Julia had acquired some skills. “Bring a robe,” he yelled.
The moment she spread it, Flat laid Sam down on his back.
Esperanza came out of the lodge and stared at both her fathers, gape-mouthed.
Julia washed the wound and probed it with her fingers.
Sam didn’t care—he was unconscious.
Flat Dog knelt opposite Julia by Sam’s head.
“I think maybe it gouged the bone but didn’t touch the brain,” she said. She probed some more. “Maybe…”
“Will Papa be all right?” squeaked Esperanza.
Julia looked at her daughter, then at Flat Dog. “You can never tell with head injuries.”
Esperanza went to Flat Dog and put a hand on his shoulder. “Papá,” she said, “help Papa.”
41
“I can’t feel my legs,” said Peanut Head. He was on a blanket a few steps from Sam.
Flat Dog slapped him with words. “Your spine is severed, and you’re gutshot. By me.”
He glared down at the son of a bitch. A dozen Crows looked on, men, women, and children.
“Dying,” said Peanut Head, “shinin’ times.”
Flat Dog made a laugh that sounded like an axe cracking into wood. “That ain’t all you’re going to do.”
Coy lay next to Sam, head on his paws, mewling.
“Why?” Flat Dog’s word was sharp.
Soft and simple: “The bastard killed my father and my uncle.”
Flat Dog slapped Peanut Head hard in the face.
“What are you talking about?”
“Elijah was my uncle.”
Flat Dog said again, “What the hell are you talking about?”
“Micajah was my father.”
“Oh.”
These next words Peanut Head barely squeezed out. “The murderer Morgan bragged to me about how he did it. Righteous, he called it.”
Flat Dog sniffed but said nothing about Peanut Head calling Sam a murderer. Instead he remembered: Micajah the drunk. Micajah the giant. Flat Dog saw the resemblance now. That’s what had always nagged at him about Peanut Head—he was Micajah in miniature.
Bell Rock came up at a trot, his eyes pleading.
Flat Dog turned away from Peanut Head slowly and knelt by Sam’s head. He barely heard Julia telling Bell Rock about the head wound.
“There’s a man good at stopping a fever,” Bell Rock said. “I’ll go get him.”
She carefully put a poultice on the angry rip on the side of Sam’s head. “It’s going to be a long time before we know anything,” she told her husband.
Flat Dog nodded. They both looked at Esperanza, sitting on a log and staring into space.
“He might not wake up for hours, or days. He might never wake up.”
Flat Dog pursed his mouth. “Right now there’s things to take care of.”
Three young men helped Flat Dog carry Peanut Head on a blanket. They were gentle as they could be. Flat Dog didn’t give a damn how much pain they caused Peanut Head, or how much damage they did. He just didn’t want the man to pass out.
On the far side of the river, on the far side of a dry hillock, they set Peanut Head down.
“Listen,” said Flat Dog.
The wounded man’s eyes more or less focused in Flat Dog’s direction.
“I’m leaving you this tin cup of water. Not to ease your pain. To make you last longer and suffer longer. Drink it when you want to.”
He looked up at the sky and around at the hills, paying no attention at all to the three young men watching.
“What’s going to happen to you is like this. The ants will come first. You’ll feel them crawling, crawling, nibbling, nibbling. Then the ravens. They’ll peck at you, picky here, picky there. They like blood, they like innards, and they’ll go good for your gut wound. People say they like the eyes sometimes too.” He paused, looked straight into Peanut Head’s eyes, and smiled. “I hope so.
“After that the coyotes. Even if you can still move your arms, they won’t give a damn. They like cripples. They’ll eat your guts out good.
“The bears? No telling. If they find you soon enough, they’ll chase the coyotes off. Ain’t nothing they don’t eat, if it’s meat. Legs, arms, everything.
“And here’s the good news. When the bears are done. The ravens will come back. They like to peck the last flesh off the bones, and they leave the carcass pretty clean.
“Last, the ants will come back and finish off every little scrap.” He paused, savoring it. “All that will take a month, maybe. Then the wind will sing a little song through your ribs, moan through your eye holes, whoo through your mouth cavity, through your brain chambers, your whole skull. After a while it will dry your bones, parch them all the way. That’s when you start turning to dust.”
He stood up.
“Savor every moment,” he said.
Peanut Head moaned.
Flat Dog waved for the young men to follow him. As they approached the river again, one of them said, “You are a good comrade and a bad enemy.”
”Thank you,” said Flat Dog.
42
“There were signs,” said Flat Dog. “He shot near Sam when we were hunting antelope. He knocked him off Paladin during the buffalo hunt. Signs we might have seen.”
Julia poured them both cups of coffee and sat next to her husband in front of the fire.
“You want to hear the story?” asked Flat Dog.
“Please,” said Julia.
The children were asleep. Esperanza, who seemed stuporous, had taken a long time to drift off but was gone at last. Man and wife were sharing black coffee at the center fire of their lodge, their sugar being gone. To the side of the fire lay Sam Morgan, still unconscious, his head wrapped with blue cloth intended for a shirt for Flat Dog, now drenched in blood.
Flat Dog looked at her questioningly.
“He’s starting to get feverish. We’re doing our best against it.”
Flat Dog looked at his brother-friend in the shadows, and through his prone form into the past.
“The first yea
r I went beaver hunting with Sam, there was a fellow trapper named Micajah. He was a river man, burly like Peanut Head but half a foot taller and fifty pounds stouter, the kind they call half horse, half alligator. For a reason I didn’t understand, whenever he saw Sam, he’d tell him, ‘I’m your friend—I really am.’ And he wanted Sam to perform this ritual with him. It came from back in the States, among the river men. Two men would swear eternal friendship by shooting whiskey cups off each other’s heads.
“But Sam would never do it, just wouldn’t, not with anyone. Gideon stood in for him, which was allowed by the river man code.”
Julia knew Gideon well, from the time Jedediah Smith’s men crossed to California. That was when she met Flat Dog.
“So Gideon did the ceremony a couple of times in Sam’s place. Big deal to Micajah.
“Sam finally told me why. Back in the States, when he was boating to St. Louis on a big river, Micajah and his brother tried to rob Sam and Abby.”
Abby, Sam’s friend the madam, was also in California now. Julia had heard endless stories about her beauty, cleverness, and spirited disregard of morality.
“Sam and Abby fought back, and she killed the brother. Elijah, his name was.
“When Sam ran across Micajah out here later, he was worried, thought Micajah might sneak-attack him.
“But Micajah said he didn’t hold Elijah’s death against Sam, said he and Elijah were drunk or it wouldn’t have happened. ‘Friends forever,’ said Micajah.
“That seemed to work out fine as long as Micajah was sober. He was crazy when he was drunk. Which meant rendezvous.
“Anyway, after that, when we came across each other out here, Micajah was always going on about that one thing—what happened was forgotten, and now he and Sam were friends. Always he wanted to prove it in that one particular way.
“1826 rendezvous, Micajah wouldn’t stand for anything but to do it again. ‘Friends forever,’ he said, drunk as a skunk, ‘us three against the world.’
“Gideon stood in for Sam like before. But Sam could see something was wrong—Micajah was riled up about something and hiding it. That’s what Sam saw in his face.
“Well, Gideon’s shot was clean—the cup flew off—Micajah’s turn. Sam was bad scared. Just as Micajah pulled the trigger, Sam jumped forward and knocked the barrel of his rifle up.”
Flat Dog pursed his lips and looked at the past.
“Mightily insulted. Outraged—that’s what Micajah said. He ranted, ‘My honor cries out to be satisfied.’ Nothing would do but for him and Sam to fight.
“Seemed no one had seen that mean face but Sam, or else they didn’t think much of reading a man’s mind in his eyes in the twilight.”
“So Jim Bridger says they must fight until one couldn’t go on. No weapons, no eye-gouging, definitely no killing.” Flat Dog sighed. “Bad for Sam—Micajah was big as one and a half of him. Anyhow, as they fought, the big bastard went to his boot and pulled a knife. Slashed Sam’s ribs with it. Then the giant rolled on top of Sam and started strangling him. The man was monstrous strong—Sam didn’t have a chance. I was about to interfere.”
Flat Dog hesitated, remembering. “Sam slipped out that little knife he keeps hidden in his hair and cut the bastard’s throat.”
He looked at his friend, so silent on the blanket that even his breath was inaudible.
“And now these seven years later it comes back to kill him. Sneak-kill him.”
On the fourth day Sam Morgan rolled over. “Thirsty,” he said.
Julia gave Esperanza the cup of water to take to him.
After a couple of hours of sleep he sat up, and Julia got him to sip some broth.
The next day Esperanza brought him her yarn. She made a cat’s cradle and slipped it onto his hands. He made a diamond pattern and passed it back.
The day after that he walked to the fire in front of the lodge and sat all day. In the twilight Sam walked around the camp of Plays with His Face. Though he had to sit down several times, he managed the full circle.
Over a breakfast of broiled strips of buffalo a few days later, Flat Dog raised the issue. “Most of the camps will ride out tomorrow,” he said. “Rides Twice day after tomorrow.”
The friends looked at each other, the dilemma in their eyes. Sam glanced sideways at Esperanza, who was shaking a buffalo hoof rattle vigorously. Another winter and spring without my daughter. Then he reminded himself. This time I got extra months with her.
Julia poured all three of them coffee and put the pot back on the center fire. The tipi was cozy against the morning chill.
Sam felt the side of his head. “What’s here?”
“The scalp wound will heal,” said Julia.
“And there’s a little bit of an ear left,” said Flat Dog. “Looks like a piece of gnarly root.”
Sam decided to take a nap.
That evening Flat Dog said, “Plays with His Face has offered you sanctuary.”
Sam pursed his lips.
“There are good women in this village. You are a man of many honors.”
Sam nodded. “I need to catch up with Tomás.”
“You don’t even know where he is,” said Julia.
“I need to find him.” Simple as that.
“You figure he’ll go in to Taos for the winter?”
Sam grinned. “There’s a waitress he fancies.”
“So you’re on your own?” Flat Dog said. His expression said he didn’t like it.
“I’ll go to Taos,” said Sam.
Two days later, when they left this camp on the Little Big Horn, no one crossed the river to see the remains of Peanut Head. They knew what was left.
The villages of Rides Twice and Plays with His Face were headed across the Pryor Mountains. Rides Twice would ride up the Big Horn to where it became the Wind River, and up that to the winter camp the people had used for generations. Plays with His Face would ford the Big Horn River, which was easy at the low-water season, and go up the Stinking Water to the river’s hot springs. Sam knew the place. Nearly thirty years go, John Colter, the first of all the Rocky Mountain beaver hunters, came to the village there, a lone white man wandering the country of Crows. The people still remembered him, and how he invited them to come in to the fort at the mouth of the Big Horn to trade.
Sam saddled up Paladin and put his mule on a lead. Coy pranced around eagerly. Sam would ride along the eastern edge of the Rockies, where the plains rose to meet the peaks, all the way past the North Platte and South Platte to Boiling Fountain Creek, where he would rest and drink the healing waters. Then on across the Arkansas and over the Sangre de Cristo range to Taos. He would arrive before Christmas. Tomás would attend the vigil at the church on Christmas eve, just as Paloma had always done.
“Damned dangerous,” said Flat Dog. He was already mounted and ready to take his position as a Kit Fox alongside the train of pony drags. “You’re not strong yet.”
Sam guided Paladin over to Esperanza. She jumped up. He grabbed her, gave her a hug, and set her down. He lifted a hand to Flat Dog, Julia, and their sons.
With a touch to Paladin’s flanks he was off.
Coy looked back, whined, and trotted after Sam.
43
Tomás’s triumph had come nearly three months earlier, the day rendezvous broke up. It was a nice, hot glow. Sam Morgan, the man who was not his father, had asked every brigade leader if Tomás was with his outfit. All of them answered no. So Mr. Morgan was now riding out with Mr. Fitzpatrick and his brigade, plus Flat Dog and the Crows, bound north.
Tomás was going the other way. His ruse was simple and it had worked. He was not working for any of the brigades. He had chosen to become a free trapper. With Old Bill Williams and a gaggle of other men who preferred freedom to high wages, plus Walkara’s Utes, he was headed south. That’s where his sisters would eventually show up, maybe in Walkara’s camp, maybe in Taos or Santa Fe. He would find them. It was a much better mission than going after a pipe glorified by supe
rstition.
He threw hitches on the load his pack horse would carry and helped the other men get ready. They would be off within the hour. And he was glad, damn glad, that Baptiste had decided to go with him. The Frenchy smiled in his slow way and said, “I have a yen for Taos.”
The only fly in their ointment was Joaquin. The drunk said, “I go you, fin’ wife, fin’ son, I go you.”
“We’ll toast our toes in Taos,” said Tomás. “They’ll freeze their asses in a lodge with snow piled head deep on the side to the wind.”
“You’re hoping to toast your thing in Xeveria,” said Baptiste.
Tomás grinned. “I’m counting on it.”
His grin wobbled a little. He was worried that half the men in the outfit, even Joaquin and Baptiste, might be looking forward to Xeveria. This Taos waitress liked dancing, drinking, and presents, and had special ways of rewarding any man who showed her a good time.
“Let’s not fortheget that we need to take some fur to have pesos to spend in Taos,” said Baptiste.
“Don’t tease me,” said Tomás. “Let’s not fortheget that my sisters come first.”
They rode south toward the Uinta Mountains, a country they knew had plenty of beaver. Old Bill, by seniority, led the free trappers as much as they were willing to be led. Walkara rode beside him, Tomás, Baptiste, and Joaquin several horse lengths behind them. Further back came a throng of free trappers and their families, and on the flanks of the outfit the young Ute warriors.
It was on a scorching hot noon about a week later when the horses pulled up a rise, the Siskadee slugging along to their left, well below. Old Bill suddenly raised his left hand—halt. When the dozens of people stopped, they drooped.
Baptiste and Tomás eased their mounts up beside Old Bill and Walkara to see ahead. Joaquin piddled up behind.
A band of Indians. A whole village, riding straight upriver toward them. All at once they all stopped and waited, stretched across the long flat.
“Blackfeet,” said Old Bill. Tomás wondered how he could tell at such a distance. The partisan motioned the outfit forward.
In a couple of minutes, when most of his men were visible, he halted them again. He watched and then spoke to Baptiste directly. “Let’s go, the four of us.” He gave Tomás an eye. “Keep your mouth shut,” he said, “and your hands off your weapons.”
