Vengeance Moon

by Charles G. West

  There was nothing approaching romance in P. D.’s mind as she studied her temporary partner. You lying bastard, she thought, sitting there grinning at me. You don’t know where that village is, and you don’t have any idea where to look for Slaughter. I’m giving you one more night. That damn camp better be where you said it was. In the meantime, I’m going to watch you like a hawk. Her thoughts were interrupted when Bo’s excited whoops distracted her. Looking toward the river, she saw her son climbing the bank, holding a fish up for her to see.

  “What’d I tell you,” he blurted proudly. “I caught a big’un, and Arlo ain’t caught shit!” He brought the fish up for her to examine. “What kinda fish is that, Ma?”

  “Hell, I don’t know, son. Fish is fish. We’ll cook him up for supper.”

  The fish was fairly large, but not enough to feed five people, so P. D. cut it in chunks and mixed it in with the bacon. After they had eaten, they sat around the fire for a while. “There’s liable to be Injuns here-abouts,” P. D. said. “It’s best we keep a lookout while we’re sleepin’.” This especially caught Bill Cotton’s attention. Noticing, P. D. continued. Talking directly to Cotton then, she said, “We’ll let these young boys take turns watching. They don’t need their sleep like us older folks, like you and me, Bill.”

  “Hell, I’ll take my turn,” Cotton quickly volunteered. This looked like the opportunity he was hoping for. “Nobody has to stand in for Bill Cotton.”

  “No, no need,” P. D. retorted just as quickly. “We’ll let the boys do it.” Then, ending all discussion on the matter, she turned to the three disappointed young men. “Wiley can take the first turn. Arlo, you and Bo can decide who goes when after that.”

  Later, when Cotton walked up into the trees to empty his bladder, P. D. called Arlo over. “I ain’t worried ’bout no Injuns. I want you and your brothers to keep an eye on ol’ Bill, there—make sure he don’t get to wanderin’ around during the night.”

  Arlo grinned. “Yessum,” he replied. “We’ll watch him.”

  The night passed peacefully enough, with nothing untoward to distract from the serenity of the river valley. P. D. snored in contented slumber, oblivious to the night sounds. Cotton, on the other hand, slept fitfully, not at all comfortable with being watched all night long, and frustrated to know that the opportunity he had hoped for was lost to him. Several times during the long night, he awakened and looked around to see if the “sentry” was alert. Each time, he discovered one of P. D.’s boys up and on the job. It was blatantly obvious to him that they were stationed in a position to watch him rather than to look for anyone approaching the camp. Along toward morning, he gave up and went to sleep.

  He was awakened by the toe of P. D.’s boot, prodding him in the back. “Come on, Bill, you’ve done sawed enough logs,” she cajoled. “We’ve got some ridin’ to do if we’re gonna reach that Crow camp before noon.”

  Cotton bolted upright, startled that he had over-slept. In the process of scrambling out of his bed, he became tangled in his blanket, causing him to trip and land on the ground again—much to the amusement of his audience. “It’s a good thing we ain’t Injuns,” Wiley said, delighted by the confused man’s efforts to disengage himself from his blanket. “We’da done had us a scalp.”

  Bill Cotton was not possessed of a sense of humor. Bitterly mortified for being the butt of the joke, his face reflected the anger he felt inside. “Maybe, maybe not,” he uttered as he finally threw off the blanket to reveal the .44 revolver in his hand.

  There followed a protracted moment of dead silence as the Wildmoon family stood staring eye to eye with their new partner. P. D., her hand casually resting on the butt of her pistol, finally broke the silence. “Was you expectin’ trouble, Bill?”

  “I’m always expectin’ trouble,” he answered gruffly. Looking around him then at the faces watching him with eager looks of anticipation, he holstered the weapon, ending the confrontation. Realizing the odds were definitely not in his favor, he said, “No harm done. I expect we’d best get movin’.”

  * * *

  Cotton wasn’t comfortable with P. D. and her sons behind his back, but he had little choice but to ride out in front, since his value to the hunting party was as a guide to take them to the Crow village. He glanced up at the sun, now almost directly overhead, as he followed the trail through another narrow gorge. It was beginning to look like he had made a poor guess when he assured P. D. that the camp was a half day’s ride from the trading post. He began to doubt whether the village was even on this river. The farther they rode, the more mountainous canyons they encountered with no suitable places to set up a large Indian camp.

  He resigned himself to the fact that the showdown with P. D. and the boys was going to be a lot more difficult than he had hoped. At some point, he was going to have to separate Arlo and Bo from their mother. Wiley was of no major concern. Of the four, P. D. was his primary concern, and by far the most dangerous. The element of surprise was going to be the key. If the timing was right, he could gun down the woman and her youngest before Arlo and Bo knew what was going on. He was running out of time, because it was already noon, and P. D. would be asking questions before much longer. “Wouldn’t be a bad idea to stop and rest these horses a little,” he called out behind him. “I could use a little coffee, myself.”

  P. D. pulled up beside him on a path so narrow that their stirrups were rubbing together. “We oughta been comin’ to that village by now, if what you said was right,” she said. “I ain’t seen a spot big enough for a camp in these damn canyons. I believe you mighta been tellin’ me a story when you said you knew where that village was.”

  “It ain’t much farther,” Cotton assured her. “We’ll find us a place to rest the horses before long. After that, it won’t be far.”

  He was beginning to believe that there was no end to the steep river canyon, but eventually they came to a pass where the river made a turn, creating a small grassy meadow inside the crook of the bend. Relieved, Cotton called back, “See, I told you there was a place up here to rest a spell.” He rode on ahead, and dismounted in the meadow close to a sizable boulder sitting by the water’s edge. While he waited for the others to file in behind him, he made his mental preparations for the task he was getting set to perform. The ol’ bitch will send a couple of the hoys to water her horse, he thought. While they’re watching the horses, it’ll be easy to shoot her and Wiley before they know what hit them. Then I can use this rock for cover while I pick off the rest of them. It was as good a plan as any. He was satisfied that he could take down the four of them, maybe before any of them had time to get off a shot. Hearing her horse walking slowly up behind him, he turned to greet P. D. with a smug smile of anticipation on his face, only to have it freeze when he looked into the barrel of her pistol. There was not even an instant of time to realize what was happening before the revolver discharged in his face, ending Bill Cotton’s worries in this life.

  “Whup!” Bo whooped, as startled by the gunshot as Cotton. “Godamighty,” he exclaimed excitedly.

  “He ain’t got no more idea where that Crow village is than Wiley has,” P. D. casually announced, as Cotton’s body fell back against the boulder and slid slowly to a sitting position on the ground. “He was just after my money.”

  “Ma, I ain’t got no idea where that Crow camp is,” Wiley said, confused by his mother’s remark.

  P. D. smiled patiently. “I know you ain’t, son.”

  “Dumber’n a stump,” Bo mocked, and reached over and knocked Wiley’s hat off his head.

  “Leave him be, Bo,” P. D. scolded her middle son, then turned to Arlo, who was standing over Bill Cotton’s body to see if he was dead. “Get his gun belt and that pistol he was aimin’ to shoot us with, and anything else you can find on him. Bo, you can lead his horse. That saddle looks to be in good shape. Leave it on. We might as well take it with us.”

  “Yessum,” Bo replied, leaving young Wiley standing there staring at the corpse.<
br />
  “How we gonna find that Crow camp now, Mama?”

  With patience she had only for her dull-witted son, P. D. explained. “The same way that son of a bitch was hopin’ to find it. I’m guessin’ he just figured it was up this river somewhere. Go get back on your horse. We’ll find it, and when we do, there’ll be somebody there that knows where Slaughter’s holed up.”

  She sat there on her horse for a while longer, watching Wiley go back for his. Every once in a while she wondered why she had a soft spot in her heart for her simpleminded son. In a litter of puppies, Wiley would have been the flawed one that got knocked in the head. Knowing her compassion for him was because of his father, Buck Wildmoon, she almost sighed when she thought of Buck. Damn, he was hell between the sheets, she thought. Trouble was, he wasn’t particular whose sheets he was working between. It always brought a smile of satisfaction to her face when she recalled the night she walked into that hotel room in Omaha and put a bullet square in the middle of Buck’s naked backside. Dismissing the thought, she aimed a final glance at the corpse slumped against the boulder. You were good for a ride, too, but not as wild as one with Buck Wildmoon.

  Chapter 8

  “You’re gettin’ pretty good at that,” Matt said as he walked up behind her, then apologized when she started. “Sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

  Recovering her composure, Molly favored him with a mock frown of anger. To compensate for her inability to speak, nature had endowed her with a keen sense of hearing. Still, her husband moved with the soft-footed tread of a cat, and if she was not listening for him, he was always startling her. She had let him know before that he should not suddenly appear behind her after being gone from the cabin to hunt, but he often forgot.

  He knelt beside her and felt the softness of the doe hide she was working on. “Who taught you to soften a hide like that?” he asked. She poked him on the shoulder to remind him to look at her while she signed Singing Woman’s name. He smiled. “You’re turnin’ into a full-blooded Crow Injun,” he remarked as he looked from the deer hide to the strips of meat drying in the sun.

  She placed the adze-shaped dressing tool, made from an antler, on the ground beside the deer hide and put her arms around his chest, nestling her head on his shoulder. Contented, like a puppy needing to be petted, she held him tightly, pressing her slender body so close that he could feel her heartbeat. He kissed her gently on her forehead and reached down to pat her swollen belly. It would be in the coldest part of the winter when the baby came.

  Matt was now spending most of his time hunting for food to store for the time when the mountain passes would be filled with snow. There was still need for more firewood before fall arrived, also. Thanks to Singing Woman’s teaching, Molly was quite prepared for the coming winter. She had learned to dry meat to store for the times when fresh meat was not available. Singing Woman had taught Molly to make pemmican by pounding the sun-dried meat to a fine consistency, then mixing it with melted fat, marrow, and a paste made by crushing wild cherries, including the pits. It had become one of Matt’s favorites. Life was good. They were content in the mountains, away from the stench of civilization. Matt knew that he could not avoid contact with the outside world from time to time. There were things that they had to have that could only be obtained in the white man’s world. Rifle cartridges would eventually run out, although he had a generous supply, courtesy of the Frenchman’s. There were other things: coffee, flour, salt, sugar, things that made life a little more pleasant. But for now there was no need to journey up the Yellowstone to old Fort Manuel and the trading post there. The thought brought to mind the last time he had gone to a trading post and the hell that had resulted from the trip.

  “I expect I oughta ride down to see how Zeb’s doin’,” Matt said, his thoughts turning to his partner and the way he looked the last time he had seen him. The old scout was definitely standing in death’s door when he left him in Singing Woman’s care. The Crow woman had insisted that she would make him strong again, but, in Matt’s opinion, Zeb just might be too old to recover fully from the wounds he had suffered. “If he stays in that Crow camp much longer, he might turn Injun sure enough,” he remarked to Molly and laughed. It had been a week since he had brought Zeb to Broken Hand’s village, and he felt a little guilty for not having been back to check on the old man’s condition. There had been much to do to prepare for the coming winter, and he and Molly had both been busy. “I saw sign of elk on the far side of the ridge.” He hesitated as he thought about adding one of the huge beasts to their food supply. “I reckon we’ll go get Zeb first, though. I expect he’s champin’ at the bit to get home.” Molly pulled her head away from his chest and smiled up at him. She was always happy to visit Singing Woman.

  * * *

  Zeb was seated on a bearskin robe outside Singing Woman’s tipi, taking advantage of the warm sunshine, when Matt and Molly arrived at the Crow camp. Beside him, a pair of crudely carved crutches lay, fashioned from a couple of stout limbs. Already, there was a bit of a chill in the afternoon air, the mountains’ promise that cold weather would not be long in coming. Singing Woman, like the other women of the village, was busy drying meat for the cold months ahead. She paused in her work to greet Zeb’s visitors.

  “I reckon you’re about ready to get rid of that old man,” Matt teased.

  “I think he wants to go home,” Singing Woman replied, laughing. “I told him he should stay here till he gets strong again, but he says no.”

  Matt turned his attention to his old partner. “How ’bout it, Zeb? You ready to go? Think you can stay on a horse?” His tone was light and cheerful, but he was thinking that Zeb still looked fragile and unsteady. He had lost considerable weight during his recovery, leaving his face thin and haggard and looking a little long in the tooth. It was difficult to remember the ruddy, robust scout he had been so recently. Matt dropped his reins and walked over to sit down beside his friend while Molly went off to visit with Singing Woman.

  Zeb gave a little shake of his head and sighed. Answering Matt’s questions, he said, “I don’t know, partner, but I’m gonna damn-sure try. I’m ’bout to go crazy settin’ around this camp.”

  Matt nodded. “I reckon,” he allowed. After a few moments’ silence, he said, “I thought you might decide to take up with Singing Woman and sit around with a wife to wait on you.”

  Zeb grinned at the thought. “You know, she would, but I’m damned if I wanna end up my life as a loafer Injun.”

  “All right, then, if you’re ready, we’ll head back up in the mountains. I’ve got plenty of meat packed away, but I’m set on killin’ a good-sized elk before I’m done. It would be good if you were there to keep Molly company while I’m gone.”

  “That’s about all I’m good for, right now,” Zeb complained, “but maybe, before long, I’ll be able to help you hunt.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Matt replied. “Like I said, I’ve already got meat enough. I just like to be sure.”

  The two friends were joined by Broken Hand, and the three of them talked about the coming winter. Matt was already thinking about heading back to his camp, but Broken Hand insisted they should wait until morning. Not wishing to reject the old chief’s invitation, Matt accepted. It would give Zeb one more night of rest before the hard ride up into the mountains. It would also please Molly to have a longer visit with her friend, Singing Woman.

  * * *

  Morning brought a cloudy sky over the valley. The cool night air caused a mist to rise from the river to mingle with the smoke from the cook fires already rekindled. The result was a thin gray canopy over the Crow village. Matt rolled out of the bearskin robe he used as a bedroll, being careful not to awaken Molly, who had left Singing Woman’s tipi sometime during the night to snuggle in beside him by the river. He tucked the robe back around the sleeping girl and paused to gaze at her for a moment before seeking the privacy of the willows to answer nature’s call.

  It feels like
snow, he thought as he walked back to his bed. Peering up at the cloud layer above him, he decided that they looked like snow clouds. Zeb had always maintained that he could smell snow in the air. Matt smiled at the thought. Zeb made a lot of claims that some might challenge. Matt could not be convinced that snow had any detectable odor. He was not even sure that certain clouds looked like snow clouds; it was just a feeling. At any rate, he felt an urgency to return to his cabin. His camp was much higher up in a mountain valley, and he had already seen scattered flurries of snow near the peaks. There was a good possibility that he would see snow at his cabin when they returned.

  Molly was sitting up with the robe wrapped around her slender shoulders when he walked back up from the river. “Morning,” he said. She answered with a sleepy smile and made the sign for cold. He smiled and replied, “It is a little chilly. Let’s go get some breakfast. Then we’ll start back home.” She nodded, then got up to seek the privacy of the willows herself. He rolled up his bed and went to saddle the horses.

  * * *

  Though he never complained, it was obvious to Matt and Molly that the ride up into the mountains was extremely painful for Zeb. To reach their little valley, which was little more than a crotch between two of the higher peaks, they followed a game trail that wound up through the spruce and pine. There were many steep places where they almost lay flat on their horses’ necks while the animals toiled to make the climb. During some of these stretches, Matt wondered if it might not have been wise to let Zeb remain with Singing Woman a while longer.

  When they finally reached the little meadow and the cabin, Matt helped Zeb dismount. As he did, he noticed a spreading spot of fresh blood on his partner’s shirt. “Damn, Zeb,” he remarked. “You’re bleedin’ again. I was afraid the ride up might be too rough for you.” He couldn’t help but think of the worried look in Singing Woman’s eyes as she had stood watching them depart.