Warpath of the Mountain Man

by William W. Johnstone

  When Quinntanna opened his eyes, Shining Warrior was gone. There was no sign of his having been there at all, for the snow was still undisturbed. And now, amazingly, even his own footprints were gone. There had not been a fresh snowfall, yet the surface of the snow was brilliantly white, fresh, clean, and absolutely unblemished.

  * * *

  The Indians were still cleaning up the mess of what had been their village when Quinntanna returned from his sojourn into the mountains. He was met by Teykano and others.

  “You have returned,” Teykano said.

  “Yes.”

  “And did you have a vision?”

  “Yes. Teykano, Shining Warrior came to me,” Quinntanna said.

  “Shining Warrior?” Teykano repeated in awe. “Ayiee, your medicine is very strong. I have known many who wished to see him, but I have known none who have. What did he look like?”

  “Like a warrior of old,” Quinntanna said. “He looks like the warrior who visited Comanche in the story Stone Eagle told.”

  “What did he say to you?”

  “He did not speak.”

  “He came to you, but he did not speak?” Teykano replied in a surprised voice.

  “He did not speak to me with words, but he made me see here, and here,” Quinntanna said, touching his forehead and his heart.

  By now the other young men had gathered to hear what Quinntanna was saying.

  “When we ride on the path of war . . .”

  Hearing Quinntanna proclaim that they would be riding on the path of war, the others suddenly shouted and howled in excitement, elated over the prospect of getting revenge for what was visited upon their village.

  “When we ride on the path of war,” Quinntanna said again, “our horses will leave no sign. Not even the most skilled of trackers will be able to find us.”

  “All creatures leave tracks,” Teykano said. “Even an ant leaves a track.”

  “A bird leaves no track because it does not touch the ground,” Quinntanna said. “We will be like the bird. The hooves of our horses will not touch the ground.”

  “How can this be? How can our horses travel without touching the ground?”

  “I do not know,” Quinntanna admitted. “But Shining Warrior showed me that it could be done.” Quinntanna described the amazing sight of seeing Shining Warrior’s horse galloping back and forth, yet leaving no mark upon the snow. Then he told how his own tracks had disappeared, even though there was no snowfall to cover them. “Perhaps it will appear to us as if our horses are touching the ground, but the sign will be invisible to everyone else.”

  “Yes,” one of the other young men said. “If Shining Warrior has said it will be so, then I believe it will be so.”

  Quinntanna looked over to where the survivors were busy rebuilding as much of their village as they could.

  “What are they doing?” Quinntanna asked.

  Teykano took in the village with a motion of his hand. “Look. The village still lives. The lodges that weren’t burned by fire have been put up again, and soon new lodges will take the place of those that were destroyed.”

  “No, our people must not rebuild here,” Quinntanna said. “We must move the village.”

  “Why?”

  “In my vision, I saw more soldiers come to this place. Many more of our people were killed.”

  “If you have seen it in your vision, then it is to be so and there is nothing we can do about it.”

  Quinntanna shook his head. “I do not believe this. I believe that I was shown the vision so that it could be changed. If the village is moved, then the soldiers cannot find it.”

  “Come,” Teykano said to the others. “We will move our people.”

  “What about guns?” one of the others asked. “While we hunted with bows and arrows, our guns were left behind and the soldiers who killed our families stole our guns.”

  “Yes. Did Shining Warrior show you how we would get guns?” Teykano asked.

  “No,” Quinntanna said. “But I believe a way to get the guns will be shown to us.”

  Even as Quinntanna made that statement, they saw two riders approaching. Two of the hunters, still angry and grief-stricken, raised their bows and drew the string to shoot the visitors, but Quinntanna held out his hand to stop them.

  “Wait. These are not soldiers. We will see what they want.” As the two riders came closer, the villagers saw that they were Indian.

  As they approached, the riders held up their right hands, palms out, in a sign of peace. Quinntanna returned the sign as a signal that they could enter without fear.

  “I am Perry Blue Horses,” one of the riders said. He pointed to the other. “This is Russell Swift Bear.”

  “You have white and Indian names,” Quinntanna said.

  “We have white and Indian blood,” Blue Horses replied. He looked around at the destroyed village. “This was done by the white man?”

  “Yes.”

  “I am shamed by my white blood,” Blue Horses said.

  “All the men were away,” Quinntanna said. “When we returned, we learned that soldiers had attacked our village and killed our women and children and our old men.”

  “Are you at war with the whites?” Blue Horses asked.

  Quinntanna nodded. “I think we are at war now,” he replied. “For many years our people and the whites have been at peace. We lease our land to white ranchers so they may graze their cattle. We keep the money they pay us in the white man’s bank. But some people attacked and killed a white rancher and his family. The whites think we did it.”

  “What?” Teykano replied. “A ranch was attacked? When did this happen? I know nothing of this.”

  “I think it happened a short time ago,” Quinntanna said.

  “Then we must go to the whites and tell them that we did not do such a thing. Perhaps then there will be no war,” one of the older Indians said.

  “I think they will not listen,” Quinntanna said.

  “Will you make war against the white men who did this?” Swift Bear asked.

  “When we went away to hunt, we hunted in the old way, with the bow and arrow, as did our ancestors. Our rifles and bullets stayed behind. Now all our guns are gone, taken by the white soldiers when they attacked.”

  “We can get weapons for you,” Blue Horses said, taking in Swift Bear with a wave of his hand.

  “How?”

  “Because of our blood, we can do business with the white man.”

  Quinntanna smiled broadly and looked at the others. “Did I not say that Shining Warrior would show the way?”

  “Get guns for us,” Teykano said. “Rifles and bullets. We will need these things.”

  “Fifty rifles with bullets will cost two thousand five hundred dollars in white man’s money,” Swift Bear said.

  “How can we pay this? Our money is in the white man’s bank.”

  “It is your money. Go to the bank and take it out,” Swift Bear said.

  “All right. I will get the money. When will we get the guns?”

  “I will talk to the one who has them,” Blue Horses said. “We will come with the guns when you have the money.”

  As Blue Horses and Swift Bear rode away, the others gathered around Quinntanna.

  “Quinntanna, you will get the money?” one of them asked.

  “Yes,” Quinntanna said. “I will get the money.”

  “If you lead, we will follow,” Teykano said.

  17

  The citizens of the small town of Stonewall weren’t particularly surprised to see an Indian riding into town. The Indians frequently did business in the town, and though they had heard that renegades attacked a ranch over near Big Rock, they certainly didn’t expect any trouble from their Indians. After all, the Indians did do a great deal of their business in Stonewall: everything from keeping their money on deposit in the Stonewall bank to buying goods from the local merchants. And because the Indians spent freely, the merchants often went out of their way to make cer
tain that the Indians understood that their money was welcome in the town’s stores.

  The Indians had money because their great chief Quanah Parker had negotiated the grazing rights for all Comanches and Kiowa within a 240,000-square-mile area. With millions of acres to work with, Quanah Parker had arranged to lease pasturage to wealthy stockmen so they could run their cattle on Indian land. That brought in hundreds of thousands of dollars per year, and though the village of Quinntanna was much smaller, and had less land to lease, their percentage was enough to provide an income for every Comanche in the village.

  Quinntanna was extremely cautious as he rode into town. Although he had made a deal to buy rifles for 2,500 dollars, he had discussed the issue with Teykano, and they’d decided that he had better take five thousand dollars from the bank. They’d come to that decision because they didn’t know when, or even if, they would get another chance to make a withdrawal. They had even discussed taking all their money from the bank, but decided that if they did that, there might be some sort of negative response to their action. And until all was ready, they wanted to minimize any chance of trouble with the whites.

  If all whites believed that the Comanche were responsible for the attack on the ranch, then even the citizens of Stonewall, who were normally very receptive, might be antagonistic, and an attempt to close the account could set them off. Quinntanna also realized that the citizens of Stonewall might already consider themselves at war, so he was observant of everyone and everything. He kept his eyes on the roofs and second floors of the buildings, looking for any would-be shooters. To his surprise, no one seemed particularly interested in him.

  He stopped in front of the bank, looped the reins around the hitching post, then went inside. There was still no reaction. But how could this be? Surely they have heard of the raid against his people by the soldiers. And yet, they gave no indication that anything was other than normal.

  Quinntanna stepped up to the teller’s window.

  “Yes, sir, and what can the Bank of Stonewall do for our Indian customers today?” the teller asked, a wide, professional smile on his face.

  “I want to sign paper to get five thousand dollars,” Quinntanna said.

  “Five thousand dollars? Oh, my, that is a great deal of money,” the teller said. Checking a ledger, he looked up and smiled. “However, your village does have enough money in the account to cover it,” he said. “In fact, you have much more than that. But in order to withdraw from the account, you will have to have the signature of either Mr. Running Deer or Mr. Stone Eagle. I’m afraid they are the only two names on the signature card.”

  “Dead,” Quinntanna said.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Running Deer and Stone Eagle are dead.”

  “Both of them?”

  “Yes.”

  “Oh, my,” the teller said, clicking his tongue. “Oh, my. Well, this does complicate things.”

  “I am Quinntanna. I will sign paper for money.”

  The teller shook his head. “No, Mr. Quinntanna, I’m afraid that won’t do. You can’t get the money.”

  “It is money of the Indian people of my village, is it not?” Quinntanna asked.

  “Yes, indeed it is,” the teller said. “But surely you understand that, in order to keep just any Indian from coming in here and getting the money, only certain people are authorized to make a withdrawal. It is for your own protection. And the only ones who can take money from the account are Mr. Running Deer and Mr. Stone Eagle.”

  “Dead,” Quinntanna said again.

  “Yes, yes, so you told me. Wait here for a moment while I go to talk to Mr. Freeman. I’m sure he will know what to do.”

  The teller left the window and walked to the back of the bank to speak to an older man who was sitting behind a desk. As he spoke, he pointed back toward Quinntanna, and the man at the desk looked up toward Quinntanna.

  Quinntanna saw the man, whom the teller had identified as Mr. Freeman, shake his head, then go back to work. The teller returned to the window.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Quinntanna, but Mr. Freeman says we can’t give the money to you. Now if you will have Mr. Running Deer or Mr. Stone Eagle come into the bank, we will be glad to give them as much money as there is in the account.”

  “They are dead,” Quinntanna said again, as if explaining something to a child.

  “Yes, but they are the only ones who can withdraw money, you see.”

  Quinntanna nodded, then, without further comment, turned and walked away.

  “The nerve of that Indian,” the teller said after Quinntanna left the bank. “I suppose he thought he could just come in here and take money out as if this were his own private bank.”

  The others in the bank laughed.

  Outside the bank, Quinntanna had started to mount his horse when he saw the stock of a rifle protruding from the saddle holster of another horse that was tied to the same hitching rail. Without a second thought, Quinntanna pulled the rifle from its scabbard, jacked a round into the chamber, then went back inside. As soon as he stepped through the door, he fired at the table in the middle of the room, hitting the ink bottle. The bottle shattered, sending a spray of black ink spewing up into the air, then splashing back down on everyone. Women screamed and men shouted in alarm. Quinntanna jacked another shell into the rifle, then stepped up to the same window he had been at before.

  “Give me money,” he said, handing a buckskin pouch to the teller.

  “Y-yes sir,” the teller replied. With shaking hands, he began taking money from his cash drawer and stuffing it into the pouch.

  Quinntanna stuck his hand out to stop the teller. “I don’t want all money. I only want five thousand dollars of Indian money.”

  “Five thousand dollars. Yes, sir,” the teller said.

  “Write on paper that I, Quinntanna, took five thousand dollars of Indian money.”

  “Yes, sir.” Quickly, and with nervous hands, the banker did as he was instructed.

  Quinntanna signed the paper, then taking the money pouch, he backed out of the bank, pointing the rifle at everyone inside. Once outside, he jumped onto his horse, then with several whoops and shouts, rode out of town.

  “The bank!” Freeman yelled, running out into the street a moment later. “The bank has been robbed!”

  Freeman began firing his pistol down the street toward the fleeing Quinntanna. His bullets were going wild, ricocheting off the walls and whizzing by innocent citizens.

  “Freeman, you dumb shit! Stop shooting!” a deputy shouted, running toward him. “You’re going to kill someone.”

  “That Indian just robbed the bank!” Freeman shouted.

  * * *

  With Quinntanna in the lead, the village left the reservation. As they traveled, they took special pains to cover their tracks—sometimes moving across rock where no tracks could be left, other times using routes that were so well traveled that their tracks could not be discerned from those already on the ground.

  A few of the young men wanted to let the villagers travel on their own. Now that they had money for guns, they wanted to meet with Blue Horses and Swift Bear, buy the guns, and go on the warpath; however, Quinntanna insisted that their first obligation was to the safety of the old people, women, and children who had managed to survive the attack.

  * * *

  Joe Mayberry, editor of the Big Rock Sentinel, removed the paper from the press, then took it over to the composition table to look at it. Big Rock was the fourth town in which Joe had started a newspaper. Joe had a history of coming into a town, starting a newspaper, then when the paper was going well, getting restless, selling it, and moving on. An indication of how solid a newspaperman Joe was was the fact that all of the previous newspapers were still going, being run by the people who had bought Joe out.

  Joe wasn’t afraid to take an unpopular stand, and often upset his readers with his pointed editorials. He had the notion that this editorial would be one of those.

  WAS TH
E RAID ON THE INDIAN VILLAGE NECESSARY?

  All of Big Rock, if not the entire state, knows about the tragic attack against the ranch of Tom Burke. And while most suspect that Indians were responsible for the attack, nearly everyone concedes that the attack had to be carried out, not by the law-abiding Indians we have come to know over the last several years, but by renegade Indians.

  Last week Sam Covington, in his recently appointed guise as a colonel in the state militia, led a company of volunteer cavalry in a raid against Purgatory, the Comanche village that is nearest Big Rock. The number of Indians killed was quite substantial, whereas not one of Colonel Covington’s men received so much as a scratch. Colonel Covington is hailing it as a very big victory.

  But how big a victory is it? It is now known that most, if not all, of the Indians killed were women, children, and the elderly. There were no young men present at the time of the attack; therefore, the attack was virtually unopposed. What that means is, the “Battle” of Purgatory wasn’t a battle at all. It was a slaughter, a slaughter of helpless and innocent Indians.

  Yes, I said innocent, for even if those scoundrels who raided the Burke ranch were Indians, they were acting on their own. And a peaceful Indian village shouldn’t be any more responsible for their outlaws than we are for ours. If justice is to be done here, let it be done against those who are truly responsible for the evil deeds done. For to do otherwise is to shift the evil from the Indians to ourselves.

  When Covington finished reading the article, he let out a roar of displeasure and wadding the newspaper up, threw it into his trash can. The campaign against the Indians had not generated the kind of publicity Covington had hoped it would. It was barely mentioned in the newspapers in the state, and when it was mentioned, the articles were often as unflattering as this editorial was.

  He wasn’t sure that any out-of-state paper had carried any news about the campaign. Why this was, he had no idea. It wasn’t too long ago that every Indian campaign, regardless of how small it might be, would receive national coverage. In fact, people were still talking about Custer’s debacle, and that was over ten years ago. As a matter of fact, from the intensity of the interest in Custer still ongoing, Covington was willing to bet they would be talking about the Battle of Little Big Horn one hundred years from now.