Wilderness Giant Edition 4

by David Robbins

“You know that for a fact?” Nate said, looking at her.

  “I saw him talking to those men a short while before they came up to us,” Blue Water Woman detailed. “They laughed and slapped one another on the back.”

  “Hmmm,” was all Nate said.

  “There was something else strange,” Winona commented. “When they walked over, they acted like they had been drinking. Their legs were unsteady, and when they spoke they sounded as if their mouths were full of flour.”

  “Why was that so strange? You’ve seen drunk men before.”

  “Because, one I love, they did not smell of whiskey. Not a little. And when you arrived they were able to talk and act just fine.”

  Nate mulled the information, puzzled over its significance. It sounded as if the men had staged the whole thing, yet their motive eluded him. And another thing. There had been plenty of Nez Percé women at the fort. Why hadn’t those three picked on any of them?

  The clerk, Porter and Clark were hastening anxiously toward the fort but stopped to await the returning party.

  “We came as soon as we heard,” Porter said. “Were there really men giving your wives a hard time?”

  “We almost spilled blood,” Nate said, his gaze on Hughes. “No thanks to your friends.”

  “My—?” Hughes said, and laughed, a brittle tinkle as of glass breaking. “Where did you ever get such a notion? I never set eyes on those men until today.”

  Nate handed over the reins, saying, “You were seen talking to them, so don’t try to deny it.”

  “No need to,” Hughes said good-naturedly. “They stopped me to ask questions about our expedition, and then had the gall to ask me to lend them money so they could go on with their debauchery.”

  The excuse was plausible. Lacking grounds to press the issue, Nate let it drop and faced Porter. “A word to the wise, as they say. Tell everyone to tread lightly in the fort and to shy away from the HBC crowd. They like to throw their weight around every chance they get.”

  “I’ll give orders to that effect.” Porter looked toward the woodland to the west. “How unfortunate Mr. McNair is off hunting with Chavez. We could use his expert advice at a time like this.”

  What’s wrong with mine, damn you? Nate nearly said, but didn’t. His family and Blue Water Woman tagging along, he walked to where they had piled their belongings and reclaimed the rifle he had negligently left behind in his rush to protect Winona.

  Zachary hunkered down and said, “I wanted to teach those vermin a lesson, Pa. I sorely did. But Ma wouldn’t let me tangle with them. She said she didn’t want to make a fuss with Evelyn on her back.”

  “Your mother and you both did fine.”

  The boy accepted the praise but was still upset. He’d seldom seen anyone be so rude to his mother, and his anger had about choked him. “I suppose. Yet I can’t help thinking that I should have put a ball into the gut of that fat one. You should have seen him running his fingers through Ma’s hair, treating her like she was a horse he was looking to buy.”

  “I’m glad I didn’t see that,” Nate said severely.

  “You are?”

  “I would have shot him dead and been thrown into the coop.”

  “Then I would have sprung you.”

  Nate saw that his son was serious. Smiling, he clapped Zach on the arm. “I know I can count on you when things are tough. Always remember this, though. It’s not enough to be willing to defend yourself or those you care for. You also have to know when to act and when to let things sort of drift along. There’s a time for shooting and a time for using your head, and it’s a smart man who can tell the difference.”

  “I didn’t see you letting things drift,” Zach said.

  Nate grinned. “I couldn’t, I wanted to put a ball into them so bad I could taste it.”

  Father and son laughed, sharing a special moment. Winona took a seat, Evelyn in her arms, and nonchalantly opened the top of her dress so the child could breast-feed.

  “What is your secret?” she asked her son.

  “Ma?”

  “Knowing how your father is, I thought he would be upset for days, growling at everyone like a bear that has just come out of hibernation. How did you cheer him so fast?”

  The boy glanced at his father, then did that which showed he stood on the brink of young manhood; he winked and answered, “We had us a man-to-man talk, Ma. Men stuff. Only a man would understand.”

  “Most interesting,” Winona said in her precise English, a fluency stemming from years of hard study and practice. She took great pride in her ability, as did Blue Water Woman, and it was generally conceded among the trapping fraternity that of all their Indian wives, Winona and Blue Water Woman knew English the best, even better than many of the trappers.

  The banter ended when Brett Hughes appeared and told Nate, “Tm glad none of you were hurt. I guess I should have said something on Winona’s behalf, but I figured you’d rather take care of it.”

  “I’m in your debt,” Nate said, uncomfortable about confessing an obligation to someone he hardly knew.

  “No, you’re not,” Hughes said. “I told you the other night that I’m honored to have McNair and you as my friends, and there’s never a debt between friends.” Waving, he cheerfully left.

  “Is he your friend, Pa?” Zach asked.

  “He figures he is.”

  Winona reverted to her Shoshone tongue. “My people have a saying: Beware a man who shows you his teeth but not his heart.”

  “Your people, as always, are wise,” Nate said in the same language. His inflection and pronunciation were not always right, but he could speak Shoshone better than any other white man. “I wish we had some of them with us. Touch The Clouds, Drags The Rope, and your uncle, to name just a few. Then I would not worry so much about you.”

  “What is meant to be, will be. The men of my tribe do not worry half as much as you, my husband. You must learn to worry less. It cannot be healthy for you.”

  Nate smiled. “They don’t fret because their womenfolk are always telling them not to.”

  From out of the forest rode Shakespeare and Chavez, each with several grouse dangling from his saddle. They separated. McNair studied his wife and friends closely and said as he dismounted, “Something happened while I was gone. What?”

  Nate let the wives tell the story. He became curious about a man standing on the west wall of the fort, staring in their direction. Was the man spying on their camp? he wondered. Or simply keeping his eyes peeled for hostiles?

  Shakespeare squatted and folded his arms across his knees. “It could be coincidence that those HBC men pestered you.” he said to the women. “But I’m not a big believer in coincidence. And from what you tell me, they acted darned peculiar.”

  “The farther we go, the more peculiar this whole thing becomes,” Nate said.

  “Bad medicine,” Blue Water Woman said.

  “Or just bad men,” her husband responded.

  Young Zach, who rarely got to take part in their discussions and wanted to prove he fit right in, ventured, “There’s something I’ve been wondering about and maybe one of you can set me straight.”

  “What is it, son?” Nate replied.

  “Mr. Porter. He says he’s all upset about his daughter who went missing, and he keeps saying how much money he’s spending to track her down, and how cost is no object.”

  “What’s your point?”

  “I’ve never seen him look very sad. Mostly mad.”

  Nate glanced at Shakespeare, who glanced at Blue Water Woman, who in turn glanced at Winona. “Go on,” she urged.

  “Haven’t you noticed?” Zach said. “Mr. Clark and him are supposed to be all upset that Hetty is nowhere to be found. But not once have I seen either of them look as miserable as I know that you, Pa, and you, Ma, would look if I went missing. Mostly, they act angry.” The boy paused, his face mature beyond its years. “I might be all wrong, but sometimes I think that maybe Mr. Porter doesn’t love his daughter a
s much as he claims, or he’d be a darned sight more upset more often. Wouldn’t he?”

  Nate slowly nodded.

  “Out of the mouths of babes,” Shakespeare said.

  “I’m not no baby,” Zach scolded. “If my notions are dumb, say so. Don’t call me names.”

  “Your notions aren’t dumb,” Nate said.

  “Really?” Zach swelled with pride.

  “Not in the least,” Shakespeare said. “And that’s what has me asking myself if maybe we made a mistake, if maybe there’s more to this so-called expedition than meets the eye.”

  “And if maybe we’re going to live to see it through to the end,” Nate said. No one argued, not even his wife.

  Eleven

  The Nez Percé had long been friendly to whites. When Lewis and Clark made their historic odyssey, they noted in their journals that the Nez Percé were as helpful as could be.

  Which was all the more remarkable, given that the Nez Percé were a powerful tribe who controlled a vast area of the Plateau region and could have resisted the white tide as fiercely as the Blackfeet, had they wanted to. Eventually they did, but by then it was far too late.

  Two Humps of the Nez Percé was an honored warrior, a respected chief, and one of those who had long pushed for friendly relations. Not out of any noteworthy kinship of spirit. Rather, Two Humps, and many like him, saw the whites as a limitless source of the material goods the Nez Percé so highly valued.

  It had not always been so. Once, the tribe had been like every other in the region, living simple lives in small scattered villages, subsisting as plain fisherfolk who dwelled in unadorned mat-roofed dwellings.

  Then came the white invasion. The whites had guns and steel knives, steel traps and fire steels and tinder boxes and axes of superior make and so much more it dazzled the minds of the simple Nez Percé. They couldn’t get enough trade goods to suit them, and soon they found themselves unwittingly depending on the whites for many of the things they had once gone without or had made themselves.

  To be fair, not all the blame could be placed on the whites. For another factor in the great change that had come over the Nez Percé was their decision to live as did the warlike Plains tribes. They started counting coup. They wore shirts and leggings of buckskin, decorated with beadwork. They forsook their plain lodges for tall buffalo-hide tepees.

  In so doing, the Nez Percé were no longer the Nez Percé of old. They were just like the Blackfeet, the Crows, the Shoshones. They were powerful, yes, but they had paid a price for their power: the loss of their simpler life.

  Of late there had been grumbling among some that the tribe had erred in cutting ties with the old ways and taking up the new. These tiny voices of protest were smothered by the greater greed. But they did not go unnoticed, and one of those who did notice, much to his own surprise, was Two Humps.

  For several moons the old chief had been deeply troubled. He knew the old ways well, and when he parted the fabric of time to peer at the life once led by his people, it seemed that they had, indeed, been unwise. They were so caught up in owning horses and things that they had lost sight of some of the greater values that had once bonded them as a people.

  Two Humps wanted to share his troubled heart with another. But not with his wife, who was perfectly happy with the way they now lived, with all her utensils and parfleches and brightly colored European-made blankets. Certainly not with any of the other prominent warriors who, like him, had been largely responsible for the changes and would laugh at the suggestion that they had done wrong. Nor could he talk to those who were complaining, since they would take his interest as evidence he accepted their argument and use his good name to further widen the rift between those who yearned for the old days and those who did not.

  Two Humps was left with no one to talk to until the morning that a commotion in the village drew him outside to see a square-shouldered white man with hair and beard like driven snow and a younger one with the bearing and aspect of a big mountain cat.

  Hurrying forward, Two Humps made the sign for friendly greeting and called out, “Wolverine! My friend! My heart sings to see you again!”

  Shakespeare McNair gripped the chief by the shoulders and said sincerely in the Nez Percé tongue, “Your heart sings no louder than mine, old friend!” Turning, he indicated Nate and said, “This is another one whom I cherish. They call him Grizzly Killer.”

  Two Humps regarded the younger trapper. “He has an honest face. And he kills silver-tips. If he is not married, I have a pretty granddaughter who might interest him. She cooks and weaves well, but I hear she snores.”

  “Grizzly Killer has a wife,” Shakespeare said.

  “He could have two. Some do.”

  “Not him.”

  “It is just as well. I have always been happy with one, myself. Men who want more must be able to close their ears at will.”

  Nate was scanning the busy village, which reminded him in every respect of those of his adopted people. Laughing children played various games. Women at one spot had deer hides stretched taut on stakes and were scraping off hair and tissue. Elsewhere other women were gossiping gaily while mending a torn buffalo hide. Men worked at making arrows or sharpening knives or other crafts of war.

  Horses, of course, were everywhere, as well they should be, since the Nez Percé were noted as the finest horse breeders west of the Mississippi. They had developed a special stock, which some called the Palouse because the animals were bred in the Palouse River region, and others had recently taken to calling the Appaloosa.

  Nate had once owned a fine Palouse, a gift from another Nez Percé chief, given after Nate saved the chief’s camp from an enemy war party. It had been the finest animal Nate ever owned, and one day he intended to trade for another.

  Now, gazing on the idyllic scene, on the abundance of horses and decorated lodges and fine clothes of the inhabitants, Nate remarked, “Your people are some of the happiest I’ve ever seen, Two Humps. It looks like you have prospered over the years.” He spoke English because McNair had informed him the chief spoke a little.

  Neither Nate nor Shakespeare understood why a fleeting sadness lined the old warrior’s features. “Yes, Grizzly Killer,” he said haltingly, “we rich people now.” The sadness deepened. “Much rich.” He motioned at his lodge and addressed them in his own language. “You would do me honor by smoking a pipe.”

  “We will be glad to,” Shakespeare said. Since he knew the warrior well, he knew Two Humps was greatly aggrieved and was curious to learn why.

  The subject had to wait until after they were formally escorted inside and had passed the pipe around. Two Hump’s wife, Blanket Woman, brought them pemmican in a bowl. They sat munching for awhile, waiting for their host to speak as etiquette dictated.

  When Two Humps did turn to them, he used sign language as a concession to Nate. “It is a sign that you have come when you have, Wolverine. An omen. My spirit has been troubled of late. I have looked for answers and not found them. Now the answer walks into my lodge.”

  “How can I be an answer when I do not know the question?” Shakespeare signed.

  “The question is you. The answer is you,” Two Humps responded.

  “My friend tries to confuse me,” Shakespeare said.

  “I speak with a straight tongue.” Two Humps lowered his hands a moment. “For many moons now my people have lived by the new ways. Some say this is not right. Some say the old ways are better. I was of two minds. At times I would think the new is best. At other times I would think the old was better.”

  Shakespeare thought he understood. He spoke in Nez Percé, “People change as they grow, my friend. A young man is ruled by his feelings. A man in his middle years by his thoughts. An old man is ruled by his regrets, unless he has learned to use his thoughts to control his feelings.” He paused. “A warrior like you should have no regrets. You have lived a full, long life. Most Nez Percé would give anything to have done as well.”

  “These thin
gs I know,” Two Humps said. “The question that has bothered me does not concern the stages of my own life but the course of all my people.”

  “As Grizzly Killer said, the Nez Percé have prospered. I remember the first time I set eyes on them, when they lived along the river in small, dirty lodges. They have come far.”

  “At what cost?”

  Shakespeare saw into the depths of his friend’s tortured soul, and made no answer.

  “I have asked myself why many times,” Two Humps continued. “Why did we do as we did? Was it only for finer lodges, finer clothes, finer belongings?” He mustered a wan grin. “There was another reason. It was you, and friendly whites like you. We wanted to be as our friends were. That is why you are the answer to my question. That is why I thank you for coming when you have.”

  Nate had listened in a fruitless effort to get the drift of their talk. He saw his mentor and the chief clasp hands, and was surprised to see a glistening sheen in the old warrior’s eyes. Since it was improper for a younger man to speak unless invited to do so by an older warrior, he contented himself with chewing more pemmican.

  “I am glad I could help you,” Shakespeare said, “although I still do not know quite how I have done it.”

  “What matters is that you have.” Two Humps patted the mountain man’s knee. “Now tell me. What has brought you to our country? It must be important. Too many winters have gone by since last you visited.”

  In barest detail Shakespeare related the journey to date, ending with, “Last night we ate with the chief of the whites at the fort. He told us that at one time there was a small group of settlers on the Bear, but that they went westward four months ago.”

  “This is so,” Two Humps said. “I visited them twice when we were in the vicinity of the Bear. Most of them were nice and offered me food or drink.”

  “Do you remember one named—” and here Shakespeare had to resort to English—“Oliver Davin?”

  “Sony, Wolverine. None of them told me their white names. The one I remember best was a beautiful young woman with hair like the sun and eyes like Black Bear Lake. She always had a smile for me.”