The Adventures of Bass Reeves Deputy US Marshal

by Charles Ray

  The two posse men looked at each other. Floyd shrugged, but, O’Malley still looked as if he’d jump out of his boots at the first strange sound. Bass kept his face impassive. He wasn’t sure whether he believed in curses or not. His wife, on the other hand, was one for believing in dreams and conjuring and the like, and on more than one occasion her interpretation of a dream had been awful close to what actually ended up happening. He couldn’t let that stop him, though. When Judge Parker swore him in as a deputy, he reminded him that how he performed his duty would reflect on how everyone in the territory thought about black people. The judge had cautioned him and the other black deputies that they would have to show that a black man could be just as good an officer of the law as a white man. Since the day he pinned on the badge, Bass had kept those words in mind, and so far, he hadn’t come up short. He wasn’t about to let this be the time he would, either.

  Because of the two wagons, it took them nearly an hour to make the journey to the area where he’d been told the old Indian was hiding, and another thirty minutes to find the cave, a concavity in a pine-covered hill that the old man had covered with tree limbs and pine straw so that until you were almost upon it, it looked like a natural part of the hillside.

  He hadn’t been completely convinced that the old Indian woman who’d told him where Yah-ko-te was hiding had been completely honest. Having lived among the tribes of the territory for most of the war, he knew they had a flexible morality when it came to dealing with outside authority, especially that representing the white man. Too many times, the tribes had signed treaties with the white man, only to have them violated before the ink was dry, so many of them thought in only fair to give like for like. If the white man could lie to them, they could lie to the white man. Bass, though, was a strange element in the equation. He wasn’t Indian, even though he spoke six of their languages, could track as well as the best of them, and had lived among them for a long time. At the same time, he wasn’t white either, although some of them, including his friend, Joseph Lone Tree, a Cherokee he met when he first ran away from his white master and made his way to Indian Territory during the war between the Union and the Confederacy, had early on called him a black white man, because, even though the Cherokee tribe had held black slaves for years before the war, Joseph himself hadn’t had much contact with blacks. Even some of those who had owned slaves used the term to describe those blacks who had no Cherokee blood. At any rate, the old woman, like many Indians in the territory, knew Bass by reputation, and from the wisp of white smoke seeping through the pine mats covering the cave opening, had told him the truth.

  He signaled for the wagons to stop. “Keep the other prisoners back here,” he said. “I don’t want to spook him into runnin’.”

  “So, how you gonna do this?” Floyd asked.

  “I’m gon’ go up and ask him politely to come out and give himself up.”

  “And, if he don’t?”

  “Then, I’ll go in and git ‘im.”

  “You need me and Bill to go with you?”

  “Naw, you two stay here and guard the prisoners. I can do this.”

  Bass dismounted and began walking slowly toward the cave, some hundred yards away. Except for the distant call of birds, and the snorting of the horses behind him, it was as quiet as a graveyard at midnight.

  When he reached the cave, he stepped to the side, just in case the information he had about the old man not being armed was wrong.

  “Yah-ko-te,” he said. “I’m Deputy U.S. Marshal Bass Reeves. I got me a warrant for your arrest for horse stealin’. Now, I want you to come on out and surrender.”

  There was no reply to his demand, and still no sound from inside the cave.

  He reached for one of the pine needle mats, and slowly pulled it aside. The cave was small, about the size of the sitting room of his farmhouse. A couple of muslin bags were stacked against the back wall, near a deer hide sleeping mat. Several iron pots sat near a smoldering fire in the center, from which the smoke drifted. But, otherwise, the cave was empty. He had no doubt that this was Yah-ko-te’s hideout but had no idea where the old man had gotten off to. He put the mat back, careful to place it exactly as he’d found it, and walked back to the horses and wagons.

  “What happened?” O’Malley asked.

  “He ain’t home,” Bass said.

  O’Malley looked relieved. “So, we goin’ back to Fort Smith without him?”

  “Naw, they’s a settlement just up the road apiece. We gon’ go there for the night, and then tomorrow, I’se comin’ back and if he ain’t here, I’ll wait for him to come back.”

  O’Malley’s expression went from hopeful and relieved to that of a man with a bad case of constipation. Floyd chuckled and patted his carbine.

  Chapter 3

  At the edge of the settlement, a collection of huts fabricated from local timber, sheets of tin, some canvas tents, and a couple of buffalo-hide teepees, they saw an old Indian man dressed in tattered buckskin pants and a faded Union army jacket shambling along the side of the trail.

  When Bass rode up beside him, the old man looked up and smiled, showing a mouth with only two or three teeth left in it.

  “Hello, old one,” Bass said. “What’s the name of this town?”

  The old man, still smiling, squinted as if he couldn’t see Bass clearly.

  “Got no name,” he said.

  “Do it have a place where we can put up our horses?”

  The old man pointed.

  “Livery stable, other end of town.”

  “Is there a sheriff in this town?”

  The old man laughed, and even high up on his horse, Bass could smell his fetid breath. “Sheriff, what is that?”

  “A lawman. Somebody to keep order and enforce the law.”

  The old man laughed again. “I know what a sheriff is, mister. I was just having some fun with you. No, we have no sheriff. People here like to be left alone.”

  “You live here long?”

  “Ever since they built the first shack, about five years ago.”

  “So, you know everybody in town?”

  “All except strangers or newcomers, but I usually get to know them pretty quick. Sort of like I’m doing with you.”

  Bass nodded. “Well, do you happen to know a Creek medicine man, name of Yah-ko-te?”

  The smile quickly disappeared from the old man’s face. “Yah-ko-te? Why you want to know about him?”

  “He stole some cattle,” Bass said. “I got me a warrant for his arrest.”

  The old man peered up at Bass again, his head cocked to the side. “I thought you looked familiar, stranger. You that deputy what used to live in the Cherokee Nation. I hear you always get your man, is that right?”

  “I ain’t one to brag, but I have got every man, or woman, I went after.”

  “Well, your luck just run out.” The old man shook his head. “That Yah-ko-te, he ain’t gonna be took, not by you, not by no lawman.”

  “I heard he don’t even have a gun.”

  “He don’t need no gun. That one, he got his medicine bag. Nobody dare cross him, ‘cause if they do, he use the spirits in that there bag of his to put a real bad hex on ‘em, you betcha.”

  Bass looked down at the old man, looking for some sign that he was joking, but the watery eyes looked serious, and the snaggle-tooth smile was gone.

  “Well, if he can hex me while he’s wearin’ handcuffs, he’s welcome to try. You wouldn’t happen to know where he is, would you?”

  “Just happen, I do,” the old man said. “Ever day, he go up north of here to some place in the hills, where he gets new roots and stuff for his conjure bag. He be back at his cave ‘fore sundown.”

  Bass was pretty sure the old man’s information was correct. He looked like someone who had nothing else to do but keep track of everyone else’s business. It was unlikely that anything happened in the settlement that escaped his notice.

  “Thank you, old one,” he said. He turned his
horse and walked back to the others. “Looks like we ain’t gon’ be stayin’ here after all. That old man say the medicine man be back at his cave by sundown. I aims to be waitin’ for him. So, let’s turn these animals around and go back to that cave.”

  O’Malley looked like he wanted to cry, and Floyd, who was taking his turn driving the wagon, was enjoying his discomfort, but, both complied without a word.

  Chapter 4

  They weren’t a hundred yards from the edge of the settlement, when a hitch was thrown into Bass’s plan to get to the cave before Yah-ko-te.

  Up ahead of them, a young man, dressed in black, complete with a black bowler hat atop his lank, yellow hair, had a long-barreled revolver in the face of an older man dressed in a dark brown suit, with a fedora sitting on the back of his head.

  “Give up that money purse, mister,” Bass clearly heard the young man say. “Or, I’m gonna put a hole in your gut.”

  Before the older man could respond, and without hesitation, Bass drew the revolver from his left holster, and kicked his horse. The big black stallion jumped forward, covering the twenty feet in a few seconds.

  “Drop that shootin’ iron, boy,” Bass said. “Or, it’s you who’s gon’ git a hole in you.”

  The boy turned. He started to shift his weapon toward Bass, but when he saw the business end of Bass’s revolver aimed at his chest, in a moment of clarity, he made the right decision. He let his revolver drop from limp fingers and raised his hands.

  “Who the blazes are you, fella?” he asked.

  “My name’s Bass Reeves, and I’m a deputy U.S. Marshal out of Fort Smith, Arkansas. I’m here in the territory serving warrants on wanted fugitives.”

  “Well, that ain’t got nothin’ to do with me, deputy. I ain’t wanted for nothin’ . . . yet.”

  “Don’t matter, boy. As a deputy marshal, I’se also required to take action if I see somebody breakin’ the law. Now, I clearly heard you demand this gentleman’s money, and threaten to kill him if he didn’t give it up. That there’s two laws you done broke, so I’m arrestin’ you for attempted robbery, and threatenin’ to kill somebody. Now, you get yourself over to that wagon, and one of my posse men’s gon’ put the chains on you and put you in the wagon for the ride to Fort Smith.”

  As the boy, with a dejected look on his face, walked toward the wagon, Bass heard him mutter, “Dang, first day I decide to be an outlaw, and the law come ridin’ up. Ma was right, I was born under a bad sign.”

  “You should consider yourself lucky, boy,” Bass said. “You keep on the trail you followin’, and sooner or later somebody gon’ put a bullet in you, or you gon’ wind up at the end of a rope. Now, while you sittin’ in that there prisoner wagon on the ride to jail in Fort Smith, you be puttin’ your time to good use if you think on the wages of sin.”

  “What kinda sin. I was just takin’ the man’s money. I know that’s a crime, but where’s the sin?”

  “Boy, don’t you know your Bible? It’s right there in the Ten Commandments; they shalt not steal. Now, the law ain’t gon’ forgive you. It’s gon’ out you behind bars. But, the good Lord, now, He just might if you pray hard enough, and you mean it.”

  “I ain’t never been good at praying, mister.”

  “Well, you gon’ have a good long time in jail to practice. If I’se you, I’d get started right now.”

  “Better listen to ‘im, boy,” Jacob Carson said. “And, promise that you’ll do it, else he’s just gonna keep preachin’ at you the whole trip. I, for one, would rather not hear no more preachin,’ if you get my meanin’.”

  The boy looked at the snarl on Carson’s face, and back to Bass. “Okay, deputy, I’ll sure ‘nuff think on that prayin’ thing.”

  Bass nodded and smiled at him, glared at Carson, and turned to O’Malley. “Get ‘im up in the wagon with the rest.”

  Chapter 5

  The delay caused by having to arrest young Billy Barton, in the process of committing his first robbery, caused them to arrive back at Yah-ko-te’s cave just as the sun was touching the western horizon. There was more smoke seeping through the straw mats, and as he got closer, Bass could hear the sound of movement from behind them.

  He moved up to one side of the opening to the cave. He could now hear the sound of humming or chanting from inside.

  “Yah-ko-te, you in there,” he called.

  The humming stopped. There was a long moment of silence. “Who calls my name?” a cracked voice asked.

  “My name’s Bass Reeves. I’m a deputy marshal, and I have a warrant for your arrest for cattle stealin’.”

  “You sound familiar. You don’t sound like a white man, but you don’t sound Indian either. Do I know you?”

  “I never met you before, Yah-ko-te, but, maybe you heard of me. I used to live in the territory, back durin’ the war.”

  “Ah, the black man who can speak the language of the people. I heard you were now working for the white man. But, you should not be here, your white law does not apply to me. Only the tribal police can arrest me.”

  “I’m ‘fraid you’re wrong there, old man,” Bass said. “You done gone and stole a cow from one of the white settlers, and that brings you under Judge Parker’s court over to Arkansas.”

  The noise from behind the mat stopped. There was silence for such a long time, Bass began to wonder if maybe the cave had another entrance. Just when he was about to rip the mat off, the old man spoke. “I am sorry, Bass Reeves, but you cannot take me to the white man’s court.”

  “I got no choice, Yah-ko-te. You stole the cow, or leastwise, the man say you stole it. You’ll get your chance to explain things in the court. But, I got to bring you in. That’s the law.”

  “I do not care much for the law of the white man, or the law of the tribal police, for that matter. I answer to a power greater than both.”

  “Now, listen here, old man. You can use whatever excuse you want, but you got to do it to the judge, not to me. I got to take you in, so come on out of that cave.”

  “No, Bass Reeves. You will not take me to the white man’s place.”

  Chapter 6

  “Oh, horse feathers,” Bass said. “I ain’t got time to stand here all day a jawing with you, old man.” He blew air threw his broad nose, ripped the mat down, and rushed into the cave, which was lit only by the flames of the fire burning in the center of the dirt floor.

  The old man, dressed in deerskin leggings and jacket, his graying hair parted in the center of his scalp, and hanging loose over his shoulders, kept out of his eyes by a decorative head band. He was sitting on the ground, next to the fire, his eyes closed, and his legs crossed and his hands, palms down, on his knees.

  “You cannot touch me,” he said without opening his eyes.

  “Get up, old man. I can’t be standing here all day.”

  Yah-ko-te mumbled incoherently in a sing-song voice, still refusing to open his eyes. Bass moved forward. Without opening his eyes, Yah-ko-te held a wizened hand up, stopping Bass in his tracks.

  “If you touch me, you will suffer,” he said.

  “What in blazes you talkin’ ‘bout, old man?”

  Yah-ko-te opened his eyes. He turned his head and looked up at Bass. His eyes each looked in a different direction, which momentarily unnerved Bass. The old man just sat there and stared for the longest time. Just at the point when Bass felt that he couldn’t take the piercing stare from those watery, bloodshot eyes any longer, the man’s parched and cracked lips moved. “I am protected by the spirit of the raven. The raven is the bringer of death. Anyone who harms me will suffer the anger of the raven.”

  “Is that your way of sayin’ you’ll put a curse on me if I arrest you?”

  “That is right. If you try to take me to the white man’s court, you will die before we get there.”

  Bass felt a stab of cold fear in his gut but shook it off. He laughed, although, his laugh didn’t have its usual merriment. He drew his handcuffs from his coat pocket. “Okay, old m
an, stand up, so I can put these cuffs on you.”

  “No,” Yah-ko-te said.

  “Aw, come on, don’t make this no harder than it need be.”

  “No.”

  With a growl, Bass reached down and grabbed the collar of the old man’s deerskin jacket and jerked him to his feet. Six inches shorter and nearly a hundred pounds lighter than Bass, lifting him was about like lifting a sack of grain. Yah-ko-te hung limply in Bass’s large hand, glaring at him. Holding him against his chest, Bass cuffed his hands in front, then, sat him down. The old man went limp again, so Bass, still holding his collar, dragged him out of the cave.

  “What’d you have to do, Bass,” Floyd asked. “Knock him out?”

  “Naw, he refused to walk, so I drug him.” He dumped the old man next to the wagon. “Toss him in there with the rest, and let’s get out of here. This place gives me the woolies.”

  Floyd dismounted, picked Yah-ko-te up and hefted him into the wagon with the other prisoners, each of whom shrank back from the old shaman as if he was a rattlesnake.

  “Hey,” Jacob Carson said. “I done heard of this old medicine man. Why you have to put him in here with us?”

  “He’s a horse thief,” Floyd said. “He’s goin’ to jail just like you. Now, sit back and shut up.”

  Yah-ko-te stirred after he was put in the wagon. He glared over the sideboard at Bass. “The raven is coming for you, Bass Reeves. Before we get to the land of the white man, you will be dead.”

  O’Malley, a not-so-devout Roman Catholic, crossed himself. “Holy Blessed Mother Mary, Bass,” he said. “That heathen’s done put a curse on you.”

  “Just words,” Bass said. “Ain’t nothin’ but words.” But, as he walked to his horse, he felt weak in the knees, and wondered if they were just words.

  Chapter 7

  The journey from the settlement to Fort Smith would take about two or three days, Bass reckoned, so he drove the horses and men until it was almost too dark to build a camp; it was, in fact, too dark to build a proper camp. But, he was anxious to turn this particular batch of fugitives over to the federal jailer at Fort Smith.