Blood of the Devil

by W. Michael Farmer

  I motioned for him to join me on a blanket spread in the shade of tall pine nearby. “Come let us smoke to the four directions, and I’ll answer all you ask.”

  Captain Branigan sat at his agency table smoking his pipe when I came to his door. He glanced up through the cloud of smoke floating around his head, saw me, smiled, and, curling his fingers, motioned me toward the chair in front of his desk.

  “Mr. Yellow Boy. You return to us. I’m happy to see you, and the eyes of Major Llewellyn will be glad. You resolved your business in Mexico? You come ready to continue your work as a tribal policeman?”

  I nodded. “Yes. We finished what Ussen gave us to do in the far Blue Mountains. Now I must help my family. It’s a big one, and I’m the only warrior in it. The stories between the camps say something big happens soon, but none know the truth. If you need more policemen, the two warriors I traveled with and the apprentice, who became a true warrior at the end of the trip, will help you.”

  He nodded and groaned, putting his boots up to rest on the edge of his desk, while he stared at the high ceiling, thinking and stroking his pipe. At last he said, “You ever had any dealin’s with the Jicarilla?”

  I told him, all the while wondering why he asked me such a thing, “The Little Basket people who live in the mountains to the north? Yes, I know them some. When my father lived with Cha’s band in the Guadalupe Mountains, a Jicarilla buffalo hunting party rested with Cha’s band for a few suns before they moved on. Usually they hunted on the llano east of their camps in the mountains, but that year, the buffalo had disappeared from their usual path, and a Jicarilla band had drifted far to the south looking for them. They had little meat to show for their hunt. Cha told them to go for their families, come back to his camp, and help him raid the Indah and Nakai-yes. Their leader thanked him but said their great warrior spirit from the long ago time, Monster Slayer, demanded they live in their northern mountains or they would be no more. I remember a young man with them. It was his first hunt. Ussen had touched his cheek with the shape of a red pony running. He rode his pony better than any of the others, and he showed me a few riding tricks I still use.”

  Branigan made a half smile on the right side of his face, blew a puff of smoke toward the ceiling, and, looking me in the eye, said, “I suppose you’re wonderin’ why I asked if you’d dealt with the Jicarilla. The government has decided to combine the Mescalero and Jicarilla agencies, and after some haggling back and forth, the Jicarilla are movin’ down here rather than the Mescaleros movin’ north. Major Llewellyn will be their agent, too. I’m not gonna mix Jicarilla in with my Mescalero tribal policemen, so you boys is gonna hafta handle enforcing the reservation law for both tribes. There’re gonna be twice the Jicarilla as Mescalero, but the Jicarilla will be spread out across the reservation in three camps: one on the Río Tularosa, one on Carrizo Creek, and one at Three Rivers over the mountains. They’re startin’ on their way here just about today, over seven hundred of ’em. They should be here in a couple of moons. Think you can handle the law for both tribes? I know it won’t be easy, and I’m gonna need some more policemen. Tell your friends to come in and talk to me. I might use ’em. What do you say?”

  I didn’t like what he had just told me. The reservation land belonged to the Mescalero. There would be many confrontations between the tribes over where and how often to hunt, fights and killings over gambling wagers, and competition for women.

  “I treat Mescalero and Jicarilla same. Why Jicarilla come here? Mescaleros no want. Jicarilla no want. Why big chief in east do this?”

  He made wrinkles on his face and shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know his thinking. I just do what I’m told and ask you boys to help me.”

  “Hmmph. I went far with Crook in land of the Nakai-yes, and my brothers and I finished reason for ride we take there. I ready now to be tribal policeman again. I send my brothers to talk to you.”

  “Good. Chawn-clizzay looks for old women making new tiswin. We watch for smoke in the deep canyons where they hide and work. You come tomorrow. Ride to help find ’em. When the Jicarilla come, we’ll all help to get them settled. I’m glad you’re back from Mexico.”

  “Next sun, I go with Chawn-clizzay.”

  “Good.”

  I left Branigan at the agency building and walked to the trading post to see my friend Blazer. I thought maybe he could tell me why Jicarilla were coming, but he couldn’t. He thought the big chief in the east had lost his mind.

  Tata Crooked Nose moved seven hundred twenty-one Jicarilla over a distance Branigan said was five hundred miles to our reservation. It was in the Season of Large Fruit, and the heat on the llano made the walk hard on the old ones and little children. I learned later from a Jicarilla that, on the way, six died from the fever and skin sores the Indah call small pox. Tata Crooked Nose never told the Mescalero this. He feared we might fight to keep the sick Jicarilla off our land. The big chief in the east never asked either tribe what it wanted to do, and neither was happy the Jicarilla had come to Mescalero.

  Kah, Beela-chezzi, and Yibá talked to Branigan. Branigan liked Yibá and thought him a good warrior, but he didn’t think him old enough to handle older warriors without a lot of trouble. He hired Kah and Beela-chezzi and asked me to show them the way tribal policemen did their job.

  A moon after Beela-chezzi and Kah began working for the tribal police, we sat smoking by a fire and tried to think what life would be like sharing our reservation with Jicarillas. Kah said, “Mescaleros have much anger over the Jicarilla coming to stay on the reservation.”

  I looked at Beela-chezzi. He shrugged, indifferent, but said, “Kah is right, but if the big chief in the east says they come, there’s nothing we can do. There’s nothing the Jicarilla can do.”

  “Kah, why do you say this? I only remember seeing Jicarilla the time they stopped at Cha’s camp when we were boys. I saw nothing then to make me dislike them. I remember my father didn’t like them, but I never understood why. Do you know?”

  Kah nodded. “Based on that one time they camped with Cha, I, too, would say nothing against them. But, remember, I rode with Victorio and listened to stories the Mimbreño told of the Jicarilla. They said the Jicarilla believe their god, Monster Slayer, told them long ago in the time of the grandfathers that they must live in the northern mountains or be lost. There they live and hunt. They never think, like the Mescalero, about driving the game away or wiping them out by taking too many. They never learned the lesson of the Indah fur trappers in the high north mountains who wiped out Beaver’s tribe, or how the Indah made the buffalo vanish.

  “I also remember my father telling me that, in the days before Bosque Redondo, the Jicarilla rode with the Navajo and Utes on raids against the Indah and other Apaches. When the Blue Coats made us go to the Bosque after Cadete surrendered to Keet-Kah-sohn (Kit Carson), the Navajo came often to raid our animals and shed much blood. It didn’t help when Keet-Kah-sohn sent all those Navajos to the llano around Bosque Redondo to make life worse for us day by day. My father remembered the Jicarilla raiding with the Navajo and did not like them at all. I think your father thought the same way.”

  Beela-chezzi said, “I’m older than you two, and I remember the Navajo raids on Bosque Redondo the first year or two there. We killed many. I wish we’d killed more. A tribe that rode with the Navajo at any time should not be on our land. I don’t like them. They don’t like us. They should go. But I give my word to Captain Branigan to do as he says. I’ll do it.”

  Within a moon after the Jicarilla came to the reservation, we rode with a group of tribal police, Tata Crooked Nose, and Branigan to the camps of sullen Jicarilla, healing from long, hard days on the trail. At the camps, Captain Branigan explained to the Jicarilla what the tribal police did and the power we had if they made trouble.

  At the Río Tularosa camp, a tall, proud Jicarilla warrior stood, a red mark under his right eye there from his birth and looking like a running pony. He threw his blanket off in the cold
evening air, crossed his arms, and said with some heat, “Why put Mescalero over us? Tribal police for the Jicarilla must come from Jicarilla warriors.” Many heads nodded in agreement, but Branigan shook his head no. “The Jicarilla have great warriors, but the Mescalero tribal police know my rules and ways of doing things and have worked together a long time. For now, only Mescalero are tribal police.”

  Silence fell like the quiet before a big storm as the Jicarilla looked at each other and frowned and then looked back to Branigan. We sat together behind him and stared back at the crowd as hard as they stared at us. Before hot words flew, Tata Crooked Nose motioned for Branigan to sit down, and, stepping to the speaking place, began telling the Jicarilla how they would be given supplies and how often. He also said they would get cattle to start their own herd. When the tribal police heard that news, we looked at each other and frowned. The Mescaleros had no cattle to start a herd. Were the Jicarilla being favored over the Mescaleros? If so, that would surely start trouble.

  I could tell trouble of a different kind was already starting to brew. There were rumors all over the reservation that a witch, one with shape-shifting powers, had come and walked unnoticed among both Jicarilla and Mescalero. This was the kind of belief that might hurt a lot of innocent people. Branigan was smart enough about Apache nature that he told us to keep a close eye out for any indication that might point to someone about to be charged as a shape-shifter by di-yens back in the camps scattered over the reservation.

  After the Jicarilla talks, not many days passed before Tata Crooked Nose and the Mescalero chiefs had a long council. After they finished their talks, they smoked to the four directions, and Tata Crooked Nose announced he would buy five hundred head of cattle, half to go to the Jicarilla, half to the Mescalero. He even registered the tribes as part of the Lincoln County Cattle Growers Association. We Apaches thought of ponies as something valuable to care for, but we saw cows as food. Those herds will grow small quickly, I thought.

  CHAPTER 38

  RED PONY

  On a cold gray day before the snows of the Ghost Face Season, I stood by the stove in Dr. Blazer’s store. The warrior who challenged Captain Branigan for not using Jicarilla for tribal policemen came in with a woman carrying a baby still on its tsach. Less than three moons had passed since the tribe made their camps in the places Tata Crooked Nose showed them. I knew this warrior camped on the Río Tularosa. The pile of skins and furs he brought to trade showed him busy hunting and trapping, much more so than a Mescalero for that time of year.

  The pile of skins and furs reminded me of the talk I’d had with Beela-chezzi and Kah about the Jicarilla coming to the reservation and how they would pay no attention to overhunting game. I said to the Jicarilla warrior, “I’m called Yellow Boy. When I was young, my father rode with Cha, who camped in the mountains the Nakai-yes call Guadalupe. I remember a band of Jicarilla returning from a hunt off the llano that rested with us on their way back to their northern mountains. A young warrior with them had the same kind of mark under his eye that you have. Are you that same warrior?”

  He stared at me, looking me straight in the eye, nearly insulting me, before he looked away and said, “Yes, I stayed at the camp of Cha with that hunting party. I remember you. You didn’t have the name Yellow Boy then. I showed you some horse tricks we used to hunt the buffalo.”

  “My name was Ish-kay-neh then. How are you called?”

  Again, he stared in my eyes and then put a finger to the mark under his eye. “I’m called Red Pony. I remember when you came to our camp with Branigan. Your coat says you’re a tribal policeman. I tell you this in a good way. The Jicarilla won’t obey Mescalero tribal policemen. If Branigan sends you or your brothers to arrest one of us, you will fail, and blood may flow. We didn’t ask to come to mountains we don’t own. One day, we’ll go back to the mountains Monster Slayer gave us and leave you to the land the Indah gave you. Leave us in peace.”

  I wanted to challenge Red Pony then, but I decided it wouldn’t be worth the trouble it might cause. Instead, I stared at his eyes and said, “I hear you, Red Pony. Now hear me. If Branigan sends a tribal policeman to arrest a Jicarilla, the Jicarilla will be taken, blood or no blood. The Mescalero don’t want you here, but we do as the big chief in the east says we must. Live in peace, and there’ll be no trouble. Break our laws, and there’ll be blood if you resist us. That is all I have to say.”

  He opened his mouth to speak, changed his mind, and turned away.

  The Ghost Face Season that year had much snow. Trees popped, cracked, and split from the cold. We stayed by our fires, hunted when we could, and went to the trading post only when we had to. Kicking Wren grew fast before my eyes, learning to speak words and to joke and play with me as the winds blew and the deep snows surrounded us.

  Juanita was ready to carry our next child, and we lay together under the blankets by the orange and golden flames of our tipi fires many times during that Ghost Face Season, but no child appeared to make her belly swell with life.

  In the Season of Little Eagles, the rivers ran higher than usual, making them hard to cross. This kept the men from hunting. Instead, they spent much time playing Monte, and other card games, around the camps. It was only a matter of time before Jicarilla played cards with the skilled Mescalero and lost much with their bets. This led to disputes ending in fights and even death.

  Captain Branigan motioned me into his office one morning. He sighed and slid a reservation pass across his shiny, brown desk.

  “A game of Monte went bad last night. A Jicarilla named Red Pony claimed the one who ran the game, a Mescalero, old He Who Catches Horses, refused to give him the pony he had won in a big bet. He Who Catches Horses claimed Red Pony never made the bet. Red Pony didn’t say much, disappeared for a while, and then came back with two other Jicarilla who kept their rifles on the other players. Red Pony beat and then cut the old man up pretty good. He took the pony he claimed he had won and claimed an extra one for his trouble.

  “The Mescaleros in nearby camps gambling with the Jicarilla want to wipe out Red Pony’s camp and any others that get in the way. I told ’em I’d take care of it properly, and they’d damn well better leave the Jicarilla alone. I checked this morning. Red Pony ain’t in his camp on the Tularosa, but his woman and children still have their tipi there. Naturally, nobody, including his woman, knows where he went or if he’s plannin’ to leave the reservation.

  “Old Charlie, who works the mules unloading logs over at Blazer’s sawmill, said he saw a warrior on a big buckskin leading another pony headed across the mountains on the Three Rivers trail. I’m guessing he’ll cross the Tularosa Valley at Three Rivers, ride around the southern end of the Valley of Fires, take the pass across the San Andres to the Río Grande bosque, and follow it north. He’s likely plannin’ to hide out in the mountains he knows and dare us to come after him. I can’t let what he did stand. We have to get him back here in the calaboose, or there’s gonna be more fightin’ and blood than we can handle. If that happens, the big chief back east will send in the army. That’s not what I want. Is that what you want?”

  I shook my head. “No! No more Blue Coats back on reservation. Bad time. Very bad time.”

  “Yes, sir. I think you’re right about that, and I don’t want some fool sheriff and his posse chasin’ him, gettin’ their tails shot off and gettin’ us in more trouble. You’re the best shot I got. Catch Red Pony and bring him back here. If you have to kill him, do it. I’d prefer to have him back alive. I want the Jicarilla to learn they ain’t gettin’ away with breakin’ rules and nearly killin’ folks—even if they deserve it.”

  I took Branigan’s paper with the tracks he drew on it and folded it to fit in my pocket.

  “I go. By and by, I come back with Red Pony.”

  Branigan smiled, saluted like the Blue Coats do, and waved me out of his office.

  I found Beela-chezzi, told him what Branigan said, and asked that he tell Juanita I’d be gone a few days.
He said he’d tell her, but that he wanted to come with me. I thanked him but said Branigan’s pass was just for me and not to worry, that I’d be careful chasing Red Pony. I took an extra pony from our corral, got some extra cartridges and supplies, and headed for the trail over the mountains to Three Rivers.

  CHAPTER 39

  CATCHING RED PONY

  The trail to Three Rivers from the agency at Mescalero, well used since the Jicarilla began their camps, branched off from the main wagon road to Tularosa. It ran due north up a ridge and through a canyon to another ridge that went all the way to the ridgeline above the Rinconada. From there, a long canyon led into the Rinconada. The trail crossed canyons and ridges and then followed a steep, winding trail up a canyon to the top of the mountains where the Tularosa Valley, the San Andres Mountains on its far side, and, in between, the black, burned rock of the Valley of Fires suddenly spread out west before me. In the middle of the sun’s fall from the time of shortest shadows, the canyons below me had already started to show shadows on their northern walls.

  I paused to rest my ponies and pulled out the Shináá Cho to study the land. Up high where I sat, the air felt cool, smelled of pines, and I could see green pines and piñons descending into the canyons, stretching far below and vanishing into the tan-colored desert. Due west, the San Andres Mountains, a day’s ride away, rose tall and rough in the gray haze.

  The pass I thought Red Pony rode toward lay just beyond the Valley of Fires. Easy to see even from the ridge where I stood, the pass to the eastern side of the Jornada del Muerto stood out clear and inviting, a clean getaway from the order of the big chief in the east and revenge for the attack on He Who Catches Horses. Stretched out just before the San Andres, the Valley of Fires lay like a great, black lake except it was not water but a mighty ash heap. Its black rock, black as crows and covered with knife-sharp edges, ashes of fiery liquid the old ones said came burning like wood from a hole in the ground long ago, lay waiting to cut the unsuspecting hand or foot touching it. Only the desperate dared to run across it, much less ride a horse. I knew Red Pony must have spoken to his brothers in the Three Rivers camp who, no doubt, had quietly explored the range below me and told him not to cross it, but to go around it, if he ever used the pass to the great river.