Hugh Glass - Bruce Bradley

by Bruce Bradley

  The magnificence of the scene before Hugh thrilled him. Now that he could see the buffalo, they were all he could see. The herd stretched on and on, seemiugly for miles, to the edges of his vision and beyond. In a way that the sea never had, it made him feel small.

  The indians had split into their respective groups. Three of those groups, under Big Soldier's direction, had moved off to cut away a section of the herd and surround it on three sides. Hugh's group stayed where they were. It didn't take long before the other three groups had cut several hundred head away from the rest of the herd, and were driving them toward the small knoll where Hugh and the others sat waiting. It was a frightening sight--nearly a thousand head of buffalo, each one weighing two or three times as much as the horse Hugh sat upon, all charging down on them. Hugh felt a giddying impulse to turn his horse and run. None of the indians in his group had moved except to change horses. Hugh stood his ground with them.

  "Plenty scary, eh?" Lucky Hawk said. Hugh knew they would be watching him, looking for signs of courage or cowardice. He merely smiled.

  Starting far down on his left, the line of indians began to move, charging down in the direction of the stampeding buffalo. When the man next to him yelled and charged down with them, Hugh did likewise, followed a moment later by Lucky Hawk. Long before he reached them, however, the big animals veered off, moving in a counter-clockwise direction. The men on Hugh's right then charged down on them, keeping the buffalo moving, while Hugh's group fell back to their original position, to wait for the buffalo to come around once more. In this way, they kept the buffalo running in circles for nearly an hour, until the great beasts were exhausted and could run no more. Then, on a signal from Big Soldier, the indians all rushed down on them at once, killing them. Very few of the buffalo got away.

  When the indians had finished, almost one-thousand dead or wounded buffalo lay before them. As the butchering began, Hugh looked around. The rest of the herd had moved a quarter of a mile away and were grazing, unconcerned about the fate of their brethren. The herd, to Hugh, looked every bit as huge as when he had first seen it, and seemed completely undiminished by the buffalo that had been killed.

  Nor were the indians done with them. Before there were finished, the Pawnees would make three more surrounds, and would easily secure and dry enough buffalo meat to last them well into winter, until the winter hunt.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  THE PAWNEES used the buffalo for nearly everything. Nothing was wasted. The skins they used for robes, blankets, and for covering their lodges when they were traveling. The hair of the buffalo was used for rope; the horns for ladles and spoons. The sinew was used for lariats, or for their bows--one piece being used for the bowstring and the other to back the bow, to give it added strength to keep it from breaking. The shoulder blade of a buffalo was used as a hoe. Most of the meat they dried. It would sustain them in the months to come. Hugh was amazed by it all.

  One other thing he learned on the day of the buffalo hunt, that he hadn't known before, was about their arrows. It made sense that, as the various indian tribes were different, so would their implements and weapons be different. A Pawnee arrow would differ from the arrows made by the Otoes or the Sioux, or from any other tribe. What Hugh hadn't realized was just how far these differences went. Any arrow that a man made was uniquely different from the arrows made by any other man. Not only were the arrows from the various tribes different--the arrows a man made were as individualistic as his signature would be in the civilized world. Hugh had imagined that, since the tribe shared what was killed on the whole, that it did not matter who killed what. This wasn't exactly so. By looking at their arrows, everyone knew who had killed which buffalo. And they, of course, were entitled to that kill.

  Not that he would have known himself by looking at the arrows, but the indians told him that he killed three buffaloes on that first day. Not bad for a white man.

  Of the four surrounds that were made, Hugh killed seven buffalo. Two of these he gave to Little Feather, two he kept for himself, and three he gave to the poor of the village. Neither the gift to the poor, nor the one to Little Feather, went unnoticed by the other members of the tribe. In return for the gift, Little Feather sewed moccasins and clothing for him. She helped him to dry the meat and store it, and showed him how to pound the meat in a bowl, adding berries and herbs to make pemmican. The two of them spent a great deal of time together--another fact that did not escape the notice of the Pawnees.

  And although Little Feather was expected to wait a full year for Storm Dancer to come back before finding another mate, the village smiled on them.

  ***

  After the hunt was finished and all the hides had been tanned, and the meat dried for later use, the Pawnees packed up their belongings and headed back to their village. Moving only a little slower because of the extra load, the trip took about three and a half weeks. When they arrived, it was almost time to harvest the beans, squash, and corn they had planted in the Spring.

  As time went on, Hugh continually found himself comparing the similarities and differences between the Pawnees and the pirates at Campeche. Both groups stole, and both were capable of incredible acts of brutality and murder. The Pawnees called it going to war. For them, it was an ancient and accepted practice; appropriate in the world they lived in because all those around them did the same. To not to have practiced "war" upon their enemies would have meant weakness, and weakness would have meant the end of them as a people.

  The pirates chose their way of life, mainly, through laziness and contempt for the rights and lives of others. Selfishness and greed had turned them from values that their society had believed in for centuries. There was a pettiness about them that Hugh hated.

  The Pawnees had killed his only friend, true, but Hugh had never seen any signs of pettiness among them. In fact, on the whole, they were the most generous group of people he had ever known. To judge them fairly you had to judge them in the context of the world they lived in. In that world, they were no more guilty than lions or wolves.

  Coincidentally, in indian sign language, the sign for Pawnee was the same sign that was used for "wolf'.

  Interestingly enough, the only pirate Hugh had ever been able to tolerate was Willie Brandt. Willie had been born a pirate, from parents who were pirates. Like the Pawnees, it was the only way of life he had ever known.

  ***

  The Pawnees were on the move for six to eight months out of the year. Traveling with them, Hugh slowly learned their ways and developed the skills they found necessary for survival. In time, practice yielded results in skills such areas as the lance, knife, and tomahawk, as well as with the bow and arrow. He also learned what plants were good to eat and which ones held medicinal uses.

  The one thing that seemed to elude Hugh, no matter how much he worked at it was tracking. Time and again he watched Big Axe or Lucky Hawk look at an area littered with leaves and pick out the tracks of a bobcat, deer, or a fox, when all Hugh could see was leaf litter.

  "Eyes too hard," Big Axe told him. "Need soft eyes to see tracks in leaves." Patiently, they would follow the tracks with him, pointing them out as they went. Occasionally, Hugh would see indents that were supposed to be the tracks. Mostly, he saw leaves. Eventually, the animal they were following would step out of the leaves and into the soft earth, leaving a track that even Hugh could follow. This frustrated him all the more, knowing that the tracks really had been there all along and he had been unable to see them.

  "Soften your eyes," Big Axe told him. "Eyes too hard. Practice much."

  Eyes too hard. It would be months before Hugh figured out what Big Axe meant by that. In the meantime, he learned to identify the tracks of various animals whenever he came upon those obvious enough for him to see.

  ***

  Hugh had been having nightmares again. They woke him up in the middle of the night. He would lay, shivering afterwards. Sometimes it would be hours before he could get to sleep again. Sometimes the
dreams had Tom Halpern in them, usually with Clint standing somewhere behind him. Hugh figured those dreams were left over feelings of guilt, come back to haunt him for staying alive when the others had all died. It was the other dream, though, that really terrified him. Hugh didn't know what the significance of Sarah and the two boys was, but he was now pretty certain that the beast in the dream that kept tearing at him had to be a bear. He'd seen the necklaces of claws that some of the warriors wore. They were the same as the ones that tore at his flesh in the dream. Hugh had never seen a bear, but he knew those claws.

  ***

  Once more they were back in their "permanent" village. It was nighttime. Unable to sleep, Hugh was standing at the outskirts of the village, out near the horses, letting his stomach settle and not really thinking much about anything.

  He had learned quite a lot from the Pawnees, in the time he'd been with them. Despite having "hard eyes", as Big Axe called them, Hugh had learned to identify the tracks of quite a number of animals, as well as how to tell how old those tracks were. There was much more, however, that he still had yet to learn.

  It amazed him to realize just how at home with these people he had become. They had accepted him as one of their own, even though he was different. He would never truly be one of them, but they made him feel comfortable with them, and they treated him as an equal.

  A sudden noise off to his left startled him. As he looked to see what it was, he felt something fly past his head. Reacting instinctively, Hugh threw himself to the right. Rolling, he came back up onto his feet, pulling his knife from his belt as he did. A dark form rushed him out of the darkness, wielding a tomahawk. The indian struck two quick blows, back and forth across the front of him. The first one missed.

  The second blow cut across the front of Hugh's deerskin shirt. Stepping in close, Hugh drove his knife into the indians' chest. Immediately, the man went limp and fell to the ground.

  From somewhere in front of him, Hugh heard the distinct sound of a rifle being cocked. Again he threw himself sideways, this time sprawling face first in the dirt. Hugh heard the rifle bark loudly and saw the muzzle flash thirty feet away from him, but the shot missed.

  Rolling back to the indian he had just killed, Hugh snapped up the dead man's tomahawk. The tomahawk had a thong on it, which the dead man had wrapped around his wrist. When Hugh tried to take the tomahawk, the thong caught. Hugh lost precious moments getting it free. Finally, pulling the tomahawk from the indians' wrist, Hugh jumped to his feet and ran toward the man with the rifle. The indian was reloading to take a second shot. The man seemed unhurried, as though he had all the time in the world.

  Before he had covered half the distance to the indian, Hugh knew he wouldn't make it. The man was finished reloading. Hugh took two more steps, stopped, and let the tomahawk fly. The indian looked up from his rifle in time for the tomahawk to bury itself in his forehead. He wavered a moment, then fell forward over his rifle. Hugh reached him just as, with a yell, a third indian leapt onto one of the horses and began driving a number of other horses before him, out across the prairie.

  Hesitating for only a second, Hugh reached down and rolled the body of the second indian off the rifle. Then, picking it up, he took aim. In the dim starlight, Hugh could make out only an outline of the man, hunched over the form of the galloping horse. Breathing, Hugh squeezed the trigger. In the darkness, the man seemed to give a little jump. Then he slipped off the horse and into the grass. Almost instantly, the Pawnees were there, ready with their weapons, drawn by the two shots. Some of them had torches. When they saw that the excitement was over, they began checking out the devastation Hugh had wrought. Big Axe inspected the bodies of the two men who were killed near the compound. Grunting with satisfaction, he indicated the man Hugh had killed with the tomahawk.

  "You practiced--you got good!" he said.

  Big Soldier scalped the two dead men who were close by, while, some of the others went after the third, who lay out on the prairie. Still others went after the horses that had gotten away. Big Soldier tried giving the scalps to Hugh.

  "No, my friend," Hugh told him. "You take them. It is my gift for teaching me to throw the tomahawk."

  Hefting the scalps, Big Soldier nodded with satisfaction at what was, to him, no small present. Then, lifting them into the air, he yelled, "Aye-Yi-Yi-Yi-Yi! My brother, He-Shoots-In-Darkness, has shown himself to be a great warrior! He has killed the Kansa's, our ancient enemies, who came to steal our horses! He is truly a worthy Pawnee warrior!"

  The man Hugh had shot was not quite dead. Dragging him back by his hair, The Pawnees scalped and dismembered him. They also dismembered the other two and dragged the entrails of all three out into the prairie. Having become accustomed to their normally gentle, laughing ways, Hugh was shocked by this, and a little sickened. He accepted it though, and in time would learn to understand their reasons for doing some of the things they did. Had it been the other way around, the Kansa's would have done the Pawnees no differently.

  The rifle, Hugh kept. It was different from those that the Pawnees had. Theirs were fusils--flintlocks that, while antiquated, could shoot a ball with considerable force and accuracy. The rifle Hugh took off the Kansa was a much newer design and better made, better even than the weapons he had seen and used while he had been with the pirates.

  It would be some time before Hugh would come to know what he actually had, or how well known the name "HAWKEN" was becoming in circles where men knew firearms.

  ***

  Later that night, after much celebrating and dancing, Hugh finally caught sight of Little Feather. Slipping away from the festivities, he followed her and caught up with her behind one of the earth lodges. Hugh was still strangely "keyedup" from his experience earlier that evening. All of his senses seemed heightened, somehow. His skin tingled. He felt alive and powerful in a way he had not felt for quite some time.

  As if she knew he was following, Little Feather stopped to face him. Hugh stopped only inches away, standing closer to her than he ever had before. The scent of her, drifting up to Hugh, was strangely intoxicating to him.

  "I am glad you were not hurt," she said. Reaching up, she felt the spot where the tomahawk had cut across the front of his shirt. "I will sew this for you-"

  Hugh reached for her and pulled her to him. To his surprise, Little Feather lifted her mouth toward him and kissed his as a white woman would.

  Moments later, the two of them slipped away, disappearing into the tall grass just outside the village.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  ST. LOUIS--MARCH, 1820

  WEST OF THE Missouri, things were beginning to warm up.

  That's what everyone said, anyway. Within the next ten years, settlements would sprout up in areas that were now nothing but wilderness and indian territory. Adventures would be had and fortunes would be made.

  Young Jim Bridger wanted both.

  Ever since the Louis and Clark expedition of 1804--the year Jim had been born--people had talked about the rich, fertile land the expedition had found. Up until now the government, and the indians, had kept any kind of expansion in check. The talk was that would change soon. Nine years earlier, in 1811, Major Andrew Henry had made his own expedition over the Rockies. Most of the expedition had been wiped out by Blackfeet indians, but those who returned in the spring of 1812 brought out tales of an unimaginable wealth in furs, waiting to be taken by whoever got there first and managed to survive. Since then, the cry had been growing louder every year: "Did the United States Government make the Louisiana Purchase just to leave the land to the indians?"

  The talk around Baird's Blacksmith Shop, where Jim worked, was that they hadn't. Any day now, the government would open the land up for those who were hold enough to take it. Jim's greatest fear was that it would happen before he was old enough to join them.

  Old enough legally, anyway. Emotionally and physically, he was as ready as anyone to take on the new world.

  The past few years had bee
n especially hard, both on Jim and on his younger sister. Four years earlier, their family had moved from their home in Richmond, Virginia, to a spot along the Missouri River called the American Bottoms, six miles from St. Louis. Jim's father was a surveyor by trade, and there was no lack of work in the St. Louis area, but the job took him away from home for long periods of time.

  One year after they arrived at the American Bottoms, in the summer of 1816, tragedy struck. Jim's mother died. Then, as winter began to set in, his baby brother followed her. Jim's father was away on both occasions, leaving Jim to handle all of the details and funeral arrangements, and anything else that needed to be taken care of.

  A year after the death of his brother, just before Christmas of 1817, Jim's father died, leaving a thirteen-year-old Jim Bridger to take care of himself and his younger sister.

  Not waiting for starvation or for handouts, Jim immediately began to look for work. He managed to obtain a canoe and, with the help of Pierre Chouteau, at Chouteau's General Store, began to trap for muskrat and mink. In addition to this, he found occasional work as a deck hand aboard Antoine Dangen's ferry, which ran from the American Bottoms to Old Cahokio, or East St. Louis.

  He learned right away to distrust and dislike the average riverman, as well as to keep his wits about him. He had more to think about than just himself. He had his sister to care for.

  On March 17, 1818, while the Irish of St. Louis celebrated St. Patrick's Day, Jim turned fourteen. That same day, he signed a four-year apprenticeship at Baird's Blacksmith Shop. It was a big day for Jim. It meant that he would learn a trade, something he could take with him wherever he went. It also meant an end to the hand-to-mouth existence that he and his younger sister had been living over to past months. On top of this, a blacksmith named Phil Creamer had offered to let Jim and his sister stay with him and his family.