For ten years, at guard posts all over the Texas frontier, he had listened to Augustus talk about Clara Forsythe. It wasn't even that the subject was boresome, particularly--it was just that it was pointless. Clara had set her mind against marrying Gus, and that was that.
"Buffalo Hump's down there," he remarked, hoping Gus would accept a change of subject.
Under the circumstances it would be a prudent change. Buffalo Hump might be older now, but he was still the most feared war chief on the southern plains. If he woke up in the mood to do battle, Gus would have more to worry about than Clara's refusal.
"I miss Clara," Augustus said, ignoring his friend's feint. "It helps to talk about her, Woodrow. Don't be so stingy with me." Of course, Augustus knew that Woodrow Call hated talking about romance, or marriage, or anything having to do with women. He wouldn't even discuss poking, one of Augustus's favorite topics of discussion, as well as being a highly favored activity. Many a night he had sat with Woodrow Call on guard duty and engaged in the same tussle, when it came to conversation. Call always wanted to talk about guns, or saddles, or military matters, and Gus himself would try to steer the conversation onto love or marriage or women or whores--something more interesting than the same old boots-and-saddles stuff.
"I expect you're a lucky man, Woodrow," he said. "You'll probably be married long before I am." "That wouldn't be hard," Call admitted, "You'll never be married, unless you give up on Clara. She don't mean to marry you and that's that." "Hush that talk," Gus said. "If you knew anything about women you'd know that women change their minds every day. The only reason you don't want to hear no talk of marriage is because you know you ought to marry Maggie, but you don't want to. You'd have made a good Indian, Woodrow. You've got no use for the settled life." Call didn't argue; what Augustus said was true, in the main. Maggie Tilton was a kind woman who would undoubtedly make some man a good wife--but he would not be that man. The truth was he'd rather be right where he was, sitting on a canyon's rim, looking down on the campfires of the last wild, dangerous Indians in Texas, eating horsemeat stew and breasting weather that would freeze you one night and burn your skin off the next day, than to live in a town, be married, and buy vittles out of a store. Maggie was pretty and sweet; she might yet find a man who would protect her. He himself had no time to protect anybody, except himself and his comrades. That was the way it was, and that was the way it would stay, at least until the Indians camped below them had been whipped and scattered, so that they could no longer raid, burn farms, take white children captive, and scare back settlement on the southern edge of the plains.
Augustus was bored, and when he was bored he liked to devil his friend as much as possible. It annoyed Call that he wouldn't just shut up. It was a fine, still night. Now and then he could hear the Comanches' horses nickering, from the floor of the canyon.
"I know one thing," he said. "If I was a Comanche I would have had your scalp long before this.
You're so dern careless it's lucky you've even survived." "Now that's brash talk," Augustus said.
"You could spend a lifetime trying to take my scalp, and not disturb a hair." "That's bragging," Call replied. "You've always had a troop of rangers with you--t's why you have your hair." "If I'm going to take risks I prefer to take them with women," Gus said. "Any fool can wander off and get scalped." "Go back to camp--it ain't your turn to stand guard anyway," Call told him. "I'd rather listen to owl hoots than to listen to you yap." Augustus was mildly insulted, but he made no move to leave.
"I wonder what Jimmy Watson and the Captain had to say to one another about wives," he said. "I would have liked to listen in on a few of those conversations." "Why, it would be none of your business," Call told him.
"That wife of the Captain's is fancy," Augustus said. "A woman who can spend twenty-five dollars every day of the week is too dern expensive for me." "He's rich and so is she--I don't suppose it matters," Call said.
Augustus gave up on getting his friend to talk about women--he scooted a little closer to the edge of the deep canyon.
"Look down there, Woodrow," he said.
"That's probably all that's left of the fighting Comanche." "No it ain't," Call said. "There's several bands off to the west--they call them the Antelopes. However many there are, it's enough to scare most of the white people out of the country north of the Brazos. They just picked off one of us, this very day." "Woodrow, you're the most arguesome person I've ever met," Augustus said. "Here I've been trying to talk sense to you all night and you ain't agreed with a single thing I've said. Why am I even talking to you?" "I don't know, but if you'll stop we can stand guard in peace," Call said.
Augustus made no answer. He scooted a little closer to where Call sat and pulled his long coat up around his ears, as protection from the deep cold of the night.
Buffalo Hump had taught Blue Duck that the safest time to attack a white man, and a Texas Ranger particularly, was while the man was squatting to do his morning business. The whites were foolish in their choice of clothes; they wore tight trousers that slowed their movements when they squatted to shit. Blue Duck, like most braves, only wore leggins--even those he discarded unless it was bitter cold. The leggins didn't interfere with his movements, if he had to rise quickly. But a squatting white man was like a hobbled horse: you could put an arrow in him or even jump on him and cut his throat before he could get his pants up and run.
Blue Duck knew they had killed a ranger the morning before. He had seen the other men hacking out a shallow grave with their bowie knives. They even spent a long time gathering rocks and piling them on the grave, to protect the corpse; a foolish labor. Then they sang a death song of some kind over the rocks, and rode off.
As soon as the rangers were out of sight Blue Duck quickly scattered the rocks and pulled out the corpse--of course it was stiff as wood. He tied the corpse on his pony and followed the whites all day. He was alone. The other braves had spotted three antelope and had gone off to run them down. He doubted that they would catch up with the antelope, but he didn't try to stop them from leaving. There was more bravery in following the Texans alone. Perhaps he would be able to kill Gun In The Water, or even Big Horse Scull. After all, even Big Horse would have to shit sometime. Perhaps he could get him with an arrow, while he squatted.
That night, when the rangers camped, Blue Duck made a big circle around them, carrying the corpse. He wanted to put the dead ranger where the others would find him in the morning. First, though, he untied the corpse and began to hack it up. He scraped the icy scalp away from the skull. Then he cut off the man's privates and sliced open his body cavity. He pulled out the frozen organs and smashed the man's ribs with a big rock. He had with him a little axe that he had found in a burned-out farmhouse near the Brazos.
With the little axe he cut the man's feet off and threw them into the canyon, to assure that the ranger would be a cripple in the spirit world. Finally, with a single blow of the axe, he split open the man's skull. Then he shot three arrows into the man's legs--his arrows. He wanted the whites to know that he was Blue Duck, a warrior equal to his father, Buffalo Hump.
In the darkness he brought the hacked-up corpse as close to the ranger camp as he dared come. He didn't want them to ride away and miss it, so he put it near the horses. It was only an hour before dawn. Soon the rangers would be stumbling off to do their shitting. He would wait, a little distance away. Perhaps Big Horse would walk out, hoping to shit in private. If he came Blue Duck meant to wait until his pants were tight against his legs, before trying to kill him.
While it was still dark he walked over toward the canyon, to make sure his horse was still there.
Once while sneaking up on some Kiowa he had failed to secure his horse, a skittish pony.
The horse ran off, causing him to miss the battle. He had to walk all the way back to the Comanche camp, a humiliation he had not forgotten.
It was while returning to his horse that he saw Gun In The Water. The other one, Silver Hai
r McCrae, was walking back toward the camp, his shoulders hunched. It was cold and misty; the clouds of McCrae's breath were whiter than the mist. Blue Duck thought McCrae would surely see him, but McCrae was taken by a fit of coughing as he stumbled on toward the camp.
He was almost to his horse when he saw Gun In The Water walking along, a pretty rifle in his hands. Blue Duck immediately decided to kill him. Gun In The Water went into a little shallow gully near the edge of the camp and began to take down his pants.
It was then that Blue Duck made his mistake. He had a gun and a bow as well--he preferred the gun and was out of practice with the bow; it was a failing his father had often chided him about. His father still practiced every day, shooting arrows at prickly pear, or jackrabbits, or anything he thought might sharpen his aim.
Blue Duck knew that he could easily kill Gun In The Water with his gun; but he had not yet checked on his horse. If he fired a gun and his horse was not still there, the rangers could run him down and kill him. He thought he had better attempt to kill Gun In The Water with an arrow, which meant creeping a little closer. He crept a little closer and was just raising up to draw the bow when Gun In The Water, still squatting, brought up his rifle and shot him. Blue Duck shot his arrow just as the bullet struck him; the arrow missed completely, sailing over Gun In The Water's head.
The bullet had gone into his side, spilling blood down his leg, but Blue Duck could not pause to think about how badly he might be hurt.
He had to run for his life. Gun In The Water fired again and hit him again, this time only in the arm.
Blue Duck ran as fast as he could. He could hear the rangers yelling. Soon the great Buffalo Horse would be thundering after him. His horse was still there, and in a moment he was on him, clutching his rifle and his bow. He flailed at the horse and the horse ran well, but before he had gone many yards there was a shot and his horse fell.
Blue Duck was up at once--he saw that it was McCrae who had shot his horse. McCrae, mounted, was already in pursuit, and, just behind him, Blue Duck saw Scull, on his great steed.
Big Horse Scull was waving a big sword --x was known that he liked to kill with the sword, when circumstances allowed it.
Blue Duck ran for his life, embarrassed by his own carelessness. He knew that the whites would tell that his arrow had flown over Gun In The Water's head; Buffalo Hump would be dark in his displeasure. He raced along the edge of the canyon, looking for a place that he could go down but that a horse could not. The Buffalo Horse had already outrun McCrae, whose mount had come up lame. It was Big Horse Scull and the Buffalo Horse who were pounding down upon him.
Then, desperate, Blue Duck jumped--he had come to a place where the drop was not sheer. He jumped fifteen feet and rolled and rolled--the slope was slick with frost. He could not stop rolling but he held on to his weapons.
Bullets were hitting all around him, zinging off the frozen ground. But the depths of the canyon were still in darkness--the farther he rolled, the more the night protected him. A hard little rock gouged his ribs and then he slammed into a large boulder, stopping his roll. The shots had stopped. The rangers could no longer see him and had decided not to waste any more bullets. Blue Duck crawled behind the boulder, panting. He knew that Big Horse Scull had almost caught him.
He wasn't scared--he knew that even the Buffalo Horse could not follow him down the steep sides of the canyon--but he was out of breath and confused. When he could breathe a little better he stood up and satisfied himself that his wounds would not kill him. He heard the beat of wings and looked up to see a red hawk, flapping just above him, climbing into the air, higher and higher, toward the rim of the canyon. He wished he could become a hawk--then he could glide down into the canyon on hawk wings and drop right into the camp.
But he was not a hawk. The slope was icy and the drop steep but Blue Duck limped along.
He knew it was not wise to wait. Gun In The Water and McCrae might be bold enough to climb down into the canyon after him. As he made his way down, slipping now and then on patches of ice, he took care to keep his weapons tight in his hands. His father might approve of his bold attack on the rangers, but only if he came back with his weapons in good order. Buffalo Hump was always scornful of warriors who lost weapons in battle. A bow to him was a special thing--it should always be in the hands of the warrior it belonged to, not in the hands of his enemy. If the enemy had his bow, a witch doctor might be able to witch it in such a way that it would never shoot arrows accurately again. Rifles, to Buffalo Hump, were of lesser importance; they came from the whites and were not made with skills the Comanche had learned. The gun Buffalo Hump allowed Blue Duck to have was old and not very reliable, but it was a gun, and it would be foolish to let any gun fall into the hands of an enemy.
When Blue Duck stopped a minute he listened for the sound of horses. Surely the shooting had been heard in camp. Some warriors ought to be on their way to investigate. Now, to the east, the canyon rim was orange with light. If the rangers were following him they would soon be able to shoot at him from a long distance. He hurried as much as he could, trying to get well down into the canyon before light came, but he had to be careful. He did not want to lose his footing on a patch of ice and start rolling again.
Perhaps his father would come, Blue Duck hoped.
Sometimes Buffalo Hump rode out just before dawn, on a short hunt. He was better than anyone in camp at surprising young deer at their morning feeding. Often he would arrive back in camp with a doe or a big yearling fawn slung over his horse. Buffalo Hump's young wife, Lark, was good at working deerskins. She had made a soft cloak that Buffalo Hump could throw over his great hump. Lark was comely and plump--Blue Duck thought that Lark was one of the reasons his father had little interest in fighting. He preferred to stay with Lark, letting her feed him, and enjoying the warmth of her young body. Lark had come from the band led by old Slow Tree, who was so afraid of Buffalo Hump that he had let him take the girl for only a few horses, a thing that made Kicking Wolf angry. He himself had bought two wives from old Slow Tree and had even tried to buy Lark before Buffalo Hump saw her. But Slow Tree had never given Kicking Wolf any bargains, when it came to purchasing wives; the contrary old chief had refused absolutely to let Kicking Wolf buy Lark only a month before he let her become the wife of Buffalo Hump.
Blue Duck limped on down and finally reached the floor of the canyon. When he looked up he saw to his astonishment that the Buffalo Horse was still at the canyon rim, high above him. Big Horse Scull was not on him--the horse was just standing there. It was a worrisome thing: the Buffalo Horse might be some kind of witch animal that would cause his death if he were not careful.
Blue Duck hurried as fast as he could, worried about the witch horse high above him.
Probably it was the witch horse that had alerted Gun In The Water, enabling him to put a bullet into Blue Duck without even aiming his gun. The more Blue Duck thought about it, the angrier it made him--the next time he had an opportunity to kill Gun In The Water he meant to come on him while he slept and cut his throat--he vowed never again to embarrass himself by sending an arrow over an enemy's head. There was no question of missing when you drew a knife across a man's throat.
Blue Duck knew he had better get home and explain that a witch had been involved, before his father heard the story from someone else.
Buffalo Hump had a way of knowing what had happened to one of his people before anyone else in the tribe. Old women told him things that they had heard from crows or hawks--things that had happened far from camp, so far that no warrior would have time to return and report. Some old woman might already have heard about the wild arrow from a bird, and told his father, which would not be a good thing, particularly not on a day when he had lost a horse--it was a loss his father would be sure to resent. The whites had a lot of horsemeat already; perhaps they would not even bother to butcher his horse, in which case he could go back later and get the meat and bring it to Lark, who was the only one who could c
ook for his father now. His other two wives were angry because of Lark and rarely lifted a hand to cook for Buffalo Hump now. Since he liked the plump young woman so much his older wives saw to it that she did all the work. One of the wives, old Heavy Leg, even made Lark go around the outside of the camp and collect the turds that people dropped in their shitting. Heavy Leg told Lark that they might need the turds for fuel, but that was absurd. The Comanches did not burn human turds for fuel, not in a wooded canyon where there were many buffalo chips to be gathered. When Lark protested, the two old wives, Heavy Leg and Hair On The Lip, beat her with an axe handle they had found in a white man's wagon.
Hair On The Lip got her name because she had a mustache, like a white man. Even so, Hair On The Lip had been Buffalo Hump's favorite wife for many years. Even now he sometimes made Lark leave the lodge so he could joke around with Hair On The Lip.
Blue Duck walked halfway across the canyon--he was angry that no one had responded to the shooting and come to see if he was in trouble. Then he saw Slipping Weasel and Last Horse riding toward him. They were just trotting their horses, not in any hurry; even after they came close enough to see that he was limping they only put their horses into an easy lope. Buffalo Hump was not with them, nor were any of the other warriors. Though he was now in sight of the camp, no one was paying much attention. The sun had touched the bottom of the canyon now--p were just standing around looking at it, enjoying the warmth after so many cold days.
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