Robson, Lucia St. Clair

by Ride the Wind

“You boys keep the noise down. Or you can ride with another patrol.” Hays said it lightly. He rarely gave orders. He rarely had to.

  “Wallace got a nickname down in Mexico,” said Walker. “There wasn’t a pair of shoes in the whole benighted country to fit him. So everyone started calling him Big Foot. Bill says he doesn’t mind. He’d rather be called that than Lying Wallace or Thieving Wallace.”

  “Big Foot. I like that,” said Rufe Perry. “Remember when Johnny there was as verdant as a meadow in spring and fell under the influence of Wallace? Bill had him plumb convinced that the proper way to cook a buffalo steak was to put it under his saddle and ride on it all day. Told him it not only cooked the meat, but tenderized it and cured a sore-backed horse all at the same time.”

  Ford stood, dusted himself off and helped Smithwick up.

  “Best steak I ever had. You ought to try it.”

  “Naw. The best steak is cooked over a buffalo-chip fire,” said Smithwick. “Spices it just right. You never need pepper when you cook with buffalo shit. Remember when Wallace took John on his first Indian hunt? Damn. I wish Big Foot were here instead of rotting in that Mexican jail.”

  Walker and Wallace had been two of the men who had joined the illfated expedition to invade Mexico in December of 1842. They’d all been captured in the small border town of Mier and marched southward by the triumphant Mexicans. Sam and two others had managed to escape, but the rest were still prisoners. It was a situation that galled the Texans a great deal.

  Hays and Walker strolled over to check the horses’ tethers. In the two and a half years Sam Walker had been in Texas he had become one of Hays’ most trusted men. The two of them were very much alike. Small, quiet, modest and deadly.

  The steep hills around the Pedernales River were covered with stunted, dark green cedars and oaks, but in the sheltered canyons laced with seeps and springs, the elms and oaks and basswood trees grew tall and thick. The Rangers were camped near one of the clear, cold springs that bubbled up, then joined the river in its wild, boulder-strewn gorge. The Pedernales cascaded down the tilted granite slabs of the river and into a crystal pool not very far from the ravine where the men were camped.

  “Listen, Jack, I didn’t mean to mutiny back there. It has its faults, but that little pistol saved the day, didn’t it!”

  “I don’t know about the day, but it saved our hides and hairdos. But it’s frustrating that it should be so close to what we need, yet still not quite right. Why don’t you write Mr. Colt a letter and make some suggestions?”

  “I’m not much on letter-writing, but I just might. A few changes would do it. A pistol in each hand, and each one of them firing five shots without reloading. It’ll solve our Indian problems.”

  “Until they get their hands on them.” Hays had been fighting Comanche for seven years. He had patterned his form of guerrilla warfare after theirs. He knew better than to consider the Comanche whipped because one band of them had fled in panic. “I’ve been trying to get Houston to buy the five-shooters in quantity since that stand-off at Enchanted Rock, three years ago.”

  “They saved your scalp that day too, didn’t they?”

  “They and the rock. I’ve never known any Indian who would climb Enchanted Rock for any reason.”

  “Did you notice any haunts while you were up there?”

  “Well, Sam, I don’t believe in spirits, but it even looks strange, you know. There it sits, four hundred feet high and all humped up out of nowhere. Looks like the back of some sleeping animal.” Hays stared off to the west, as though he could see the huge rock hulking there. “And it makes a creaky noise at night. The top of it glitters in an eerie kind of way in the moonlight. I figure there’s a reasonable explanation, but fortunately for me, Indians don’t hold with reasonable explanations.”

  “Three years, and we’re just now getting the weapons that can mean the difference between defensive and offensive fighting.” Sam shook his head as he absentmindedly stripped the papery bark from a cedar. “Houston seems to think the Indian troubles are over. That he can shake hands with them and buy them off.”

  “In all fairness, Sam, there’s no money in the Republic’s treasury to pay for guns.” Hays spent more of his time in Austin these days, dealing with government officials. He was trying vainly to obtain pay for his men and feed for their horses.

  “Lamar left the treasury busted, didn’t he. A big spender.”

  “A high roller, all right. Houston was ready to take the French up on their offer of a three-million-dollar loan. Did you know that? We’d be jingling sous in our pockets.”

  “I’m glad it fell through. It would have given the Frenchies a foot in the door. A few more years and we’d be fighting them as well as the Mexicans and the Indians.”

  Hays laughed in his shy way. “I hear it was quite a meeting, Sam Houston and the French count, with his chest paved with medals and his shoulders dripping with chicken shit. Did you hear about it?”

  “No.”

  “Old Sam had his boots up on the desk as usual when the Frenchy came rattling in. All those medals sounded like a wagon full of spare machinery parts. Our illustrious president threw back that dirty old Indian blanket he always wears and pointed to his scars. He beat on his naked, hairy chest and roared—let’s see if I can remember it straight. He said, ‘An humble Republican soldier who wears his decorations here, salutes you.’ “

  “Sam may be a lot of things, but humble isn’t one of them.”

  Still talking quietly, the two of them turned back toward camp. They sat down with the rest of the men again. The talk was about the fight of the day before.

  “I’ll tell you, boys,” said Smithwick, “I’ve fought a lot of Comanches, but never did I see the like of yesterday. I’ve seen them retreat in disorder, but never have they left their dead and wounded lying around like that. They usually sweep a battlefield cleaner’n my dear old sainted mother’s kitchen floor.”

  “The trick,” says Hays, “is to keep them guessing. Indians always play their hand the same way. If you change the rules on them in the middle of the game and up the stakes while you’re about it, they get confused. They cash in their chips, push away from the table, and run off to find another game.” Hays took out his pistol and turned it over in his delicate hands. “Boys, Mr. Colt’s invention has definitely changed the rules and upped the stakes.”

  Naduah heard the slow hoofbeats, and she stepped to the door to look out. It was dark outside, but from the light of the lodges around her she could see Wanderer tethering Night. He left a pile of freshly cut grass for him.

  “Is there any water you can give him?” It was the only thing he said as he brushed past her and went inside. She brought out a stomach paunch and rolled the rim back to the level of the water so he could drink. When he finished, she took some of the grass and rubbed his lathered body. She did it as much to give Wanderer more time alone as to soothe Night.

  “Poor Night,” she murmured. “You’re getting too old for these raids.” He shook his head slowly up and down, as though in agreement.

  He stood with his head drooping with fatigue and his tail hanging limply. It had been shaved in mourning, and it looked naked and ugly. The raid had not gone well. Naduah dreaded going back inside. She entered the lodge silently and sat opposite Wanderer, studying him through the flames of the fire.

  “Are you hungry?”

  “Yes.”

  She sliced a piece of meat from the pronghorn she and Star Name had killed that day and hung it from a stick. Wanderer stared fixedly at it as its juices bubbled and hissed on the hot coals. The silence seemed to stretch out forever, but Naduah waited patiently. No matter what had happened, she was happy to see him back alive and unhurt. She inspected him with her eyes, going over every part of him, looking for wounds. Finally he spoke.

  “We left them.” And he was silent again, gathering himself to admit his shame. “We left the wounded and the dead. For a hundred miles we ran, the wounded falling on
to the trail behind us and no one stopping to help them. I picked up Tuhuget Naquahip, Sore-Backed Horse and brought him with me. But he was the only one I could save. There were too many of them. Almost half the war party is gone.

  “We had left our spare horses tied at a distance and we were preparing to split up and raid when we found the tracks of a party of ranging soldiers. There were fourteen of them and seventy of us, so we laid an ambush. It would be a simple thing to kill them, take their scalps and guns and horses.” Wanderer sat as motionless as a statue polished by the fire’s light. Only his mouth moved.

  “We attacked them, and they dismounted as they usually do. They fired their rifles at us while we circled them, but we kept out of range. When their rifles were empty, we charged, thinking they were helpless. But they remounted and raced to meet us, riding right through our arrows.

  “Knee to knee they rode with us. They fired into our faces with their little pistols. Our bows were useless at that range, and our guns had to be reloaded. But theirs didn’t. Again and again they shot, so close they burned us with their powder.” He turned his head slightly so she could see the long black line that raked across his right cheek. “And their leader, never have I seen one like him. He was everywhere, screaming and shooting. He cannot be human.”

  “What did he look like?”

  “A slender man, with black hair. He looks young, but it’s hard to tell with white eyes. They all look alike.”

  “Was there hair on his face?”

  “No. He was beardless.”

  “El Diablo,” said Naduah. “Pahayuca told us about him. They say he’s a devil and not human. He strikes from nowhere, then vanishes.”

  “I can believe what they say.” Wanderer pulled the stake from the ground and cut off a piece of the half-cooked meat with his knife. “Whatever he is, his medicine is more powerful than any I’ve ever seen. My men panicked. They fled, howling. There was nothing I could do to stop them. The Texans chased us, their new guns still spitting death. They chased us for miles. We couldn’t even stop for our wounded.”

  “You’re the first to return.”

  “I pushed Night hard. He deserves a rest. But old as he is, he’s still faster than any of them. I wanted to be the first to tell Iron Shirt. I’m going to see him now.”

  “Won’t you rest first and finish eating?”

  “No. I don’t want anyone else to tell him of his son’s shame. It’s for me to do.” He gave her his old sardonic grin, and she was relieved to see it. “At least I have the small satisfaction of knowing I was right. These guns are better than arrows. We have to get them.” And he walked out into the darkness.

  The council members sat silently in Iron Shirt’s lodge. Outside, the wails of the mourning women added to the tension. Buffalo Piss and other men who had been with the war party had made their reports to the council. Wanderer was just finishing his.

  “Many men believed the Texans were demons, that they had supernatural powers. They became too frightened to fight. Those of us who faced the Texans can understand how men could think that way. But I believe the Texans only have a new kind of gun. A small gun that can shoot as many bullets as I have fingers on my hand. We know they change the designs of their guns often. This is the latest. We must find out where they are made, or who has them for trade. Or we must steal them. But we must get them. No longer can we fire arrows while the white eyes are reloading. This new gun gives them the advantage over us.”

  Iron Shirt stood next and intoned a eulogy for the souls of those who died. Then he turned his wrath on his son.

  “Our band lost thirty warriors, thirty of its finest young men. We have heard that the Texans have magic guns that don’t need reloading. We have heard that they chased the warriors, still shooting at them with guns this big—” he held up his hands to show the size of the small Colt Paterson “—and didn’t allow them time to help the wounded.

  “This is hard to believe. Never in my fifty seasons has such shame fallen on my band. To die in battle, to run from the enemy when it is foolish to stay and fight, these things happen to us. But to leave comrades on the battlefield, to abandon them, that has never happened. I ask myself if this story of guns that fire without reloading is only a tale men tell to cover their own cowardice. I wonder if perhaps they only thought they saw such guns.”

  The council sat stunned. To accuse a man of lying and of cowardice was unheard of. Buffalo Piss started to leap to his feet, but Wanderer beat him to it. His robe was pulled over his head and his face was withdrawn to show his anger.

  “Father Behind The Sun.” He raised his face upward, toward the bit of sky showing through the smoke hole. “You have heard this of which I am accused. Of cowardice. Of lying to hide my guilt. If this accusation be true, let the next bolt of lightning and the next roar of thunder take my life.” He paused, as though to give his god a chance to prove Iron Shirt right. Then, without looking at his father, he turned and stalked from the lodge.

  Silence followed his going. The men sat, letting the words fade before they moved. Rarely did anyone call down the curse of tabbe bekat, sun-killing. Without speaking, Iron Shirt shifted his robe. He draped it togalike around his chest and threw the edge of it over his left shoulder. It was the People’s way of showing a change of attitude. It was Iron Shirt’s way of asking his son’s forgiveness. But Wanderer didn’t see it. And his father was too proud to go after him.

  Wanderer lay staring up at the top of the lodge for hours that night. Naduah lay awake beside him.

  “Stop it,” she finally said.

  “Stop what?”

  “Brooding.”

  “Golden one, how can you understand the shame.”

  “I can understand very well. I’m a hated Texan, remember? I understand shame.”

  “You’re one of the People.”

  “And so are you. And a great chief and a brave leader. What happened was not your fault, and you could have done nothing to prevent it. You couldn’t know about the new guns. But now you do, and the mistake won’t happen again. Stop wounding yourself over and over.”

  “My father called me a liar and a coward in front of the entire council.”

  “If he called you that he was calling Buffalo Piss and Sore-Backed Horse and some warriors of his own band the same thing. All of you agree about what you saw. No one really thinks ill of you. Iron Shirt speaks before he thinks sometimes. You know that.”

  “Yes, I know that very well.” Wanderer even laughed a little. “But I won’t stay here. We’ll leave soon. Head out on our own.”

  “Alone?”

  “Alone, or with anyone who wants to come with us. I think Deep Water will come, and Lance and Spaniard, and Sore-Backed Horse. Perhaps even Buffalo Piss will come. You should have seen his face in council this afternoon. Tomorrow I’ll smoke with those who might want to join us.”

  “Where will we go?”

  “South, to the southern edge of the Staked Plains. There’s room there.”

  “Wanderer.”

  “Yes.”

  “I have something to tell you.”

  “Then tell me, golden one. But I would prefer it be good news if possible.”

  “When spring comes, Night will be a father.”

  “And Wind will be the mother?”

  “Yes. And when spring comes, you’ll be a father too.”

  It took a moment for the words to penetrate Wanderer’s gloom. When he realized what she was saying, he rolled over and put an arm protectively around her.

  “A son?”

  “I can’t promise that. But one or the other.”

  He drew her close to him, and she felt his breath stirring her hair. She slept cradled in his arms that night.

  CHAPTER 40

  A winding procession of ponies and mules and travois stretched behind Wanderer and Naduah, Star Name and Deep Water. Ten families and several single men had fallen in line behind Wanderer when he left his father’s camp. Iron Shirt stayed stubbornly in hi
s lodge, smoking with his friends and pretending he knew nothing of his son’s departure. Naduah could hear him inside, talking loudly, when she rode by at the head of the caravan. She carried Wanderer’s shield and lance, as befitted the first wife of a leader. And her lion skin, edged now with red cloth, hung draped across Wind’s flanks.

  Buffalo Piss had come with them, although he probably wouldn’t stay. As much as he complained about the Penateka, he kept returning to them. Spaniard was part of the group, as well as Lance and Sore-Backed Horse, his shoulder still bandaged from the wound the Rangers had given him. Wanderer had saved his life. Sore-Backed Horse wouldn’t forget it.

  Many of the men from that raid had left with Wanderer. Naduah had been right. Iron Shirt’s son wasn’t the only one offended by his rash words. The band had barely cleared the camp when a small group came pounding after them. The boy in the lead stood on his horse and waved his arms.

  “Wait for us!” It was Upstream, Star Name’s brother, sixteen years old now. He and Cruelest One, Skinny and Ugly, and Hunting A Wife had passed through the village on a run when they heard Wanderer was leaving.

  “We came to visit and hunt with you this fall,” panted Upstream as he pulled alongside them. Cruelest One rode up, looking dour, and Upstream beamed at him. Cruelest One was coming anyway and asked me to join him.”

  “I only wanted you to help with the horses. I figured I could leave you with your sister once we got here.”

  “Herd the horses!” Upstream looked aggrieved. “I’ve gone on my vision quest. I’m a brave now.”

  “So I’ve heard. You’ve talked of nothing else the entire trip.”

  “My new name is Esa Habbe, Wolf Road.”

  “That’s a good name. Brother,” said Star Name.

  “Esa Habbe, Wolf Road. Asa Habbe, Star Road.” Naduah played with the words, sounding them out. The People called the Milky Way by both names.

  “Takes Down and Mother and Something Good made me my own lodge. You women can set it up for me.”

  “And what will you do for us, Brother?” asked Star Name, cocking one brow at him.