Ghost Warrior

by Lucia St. Clair Robson

  Kit Carson had a lot on his mind, so he added two glasses of whiskey to the menu. Maybe he had a lot on his conscience, too. Kit Carson was a conundrum. He was honest, fair, and good-natured. He admired and sympathized with Indians, but he fought them anyway, and he did it more effectively than anyone else. A conscience was an inconvenience for any soldier, but it was a lethal liability for an Indian fighter.

  Rafe felt a nipping at the heels of his own conscience when he thought of the paltry amount of corn and beef that he and the other freighters had hauled in. That wasn’t his fault, but he still felt guilt by association with a government that would starve the people it had promised to feed. He knew there would not be nearly enough to provide for the eight thousand Navajos that Kit Carson had recently brought to join the five hundred Mescalero Apaches here.

  The sound of voices grew outside. Mescaleros and Navajos were gathering at the building where the rations and blankets were distributed, and where Dr. Michael Steck had set up a temporary office. The general hum was punctuated by shouts in the Apache and Navajo dialects, and in Spanish and English as soldiers tried to restore order.

  “A reg’lar pandemonium of breech-rags and red bellies, hain’t it?” Kit sighed and drained the last of the whiskey.

  Caesar headed for the wagon yard. Rafe and Kit waded into the resentment and anger. Outnumbered, the Mescaleros stood on a slope a hundred yards away while the Navajos crowded around the door of Dr. Steck’s office. The two groups traded insults and accusations of thievery, murder, abduction, slander, depravity, and, worst of all in their view, mendacity.

  Under General Carleton’s orders, Carson had waged war on the Navajos through the summer and fall of 1864, but he had disobeyed the general’s directive to kill every Indian he found. The general held with the common aphorism that nits made lice, but Carson hadn’t fallen into the habit of murdering women and children. Instead, he burned the Navajos’ orchards and fields and slaughtered their sheep and cattle. By winter, destitute, frozen, and starving, they had surrendered. Scores of Navajos had died on that terrible march through the bitter winter. Regret kindled in Kit’s eyes whenever the subject came up.

  For all that, they had learned that Carson kept his word, which was something no other white man except Dr. Steck would do. They believed he would try to help them as best he could. They were right, but their current affliction was beyond his ability to remedy.

  When the Confederate troops fled the territory, they left behind three soldiers with smallpox. All three died, but not before they spread the disease to the Union-army. The army spread it to the Navajos.

  Now many of them carried their sick kin on makeshift litters. They called out “Ka’-san, Ka’-san,” and pleaded with him to help them. With sorrow in his gray eyes, Kit pushed through the crowd. He was finding that the burden of peace could be as heavy as war.

  The hideous sores that covered the sick Navajos’ faces repulsed and frightened Rafe, and he followed close on Carson’s heels when he went inside. They stood in the cheerful heat of the cast-iron sibley stove while Dr. Steck and General Carleton carried on their argument as though they were alone.

  “There was no need for you to come here,” Carleton thundered.

  “I wanted to see the inhuman conditions for myself.”

  “I am seeing to their welfare. I have sent to Santa Fe for a teacher to school them.”

  “The Navajos need medicine, not someone to teach them the ABC’s.”

  “The Navajos have contracted. smallpox from the soldiers because their women fornicate with them.”

  “No matter what the cause, hundreds are dying, and many of them are innocent children.”

  “I’ve taken care of the problem.”

  Dr. Steck looked hopeful. Maybe Carleton had included the cowpox vaccine in this current shipment. “How?”

  “I sent orders for them to throw the corpses into the river.”

  “But the Apaches are camped downstream from them.”

  “The Apaches should have thought of that when they were stealing everything on four hooves.”

  “The Mescaleros have been the least troublesome of the Apache tribe. They were poised at the brink of starvation. They ate whatever stock they stole.” Steck was heating to a cherry-red state of eloquence on the subject. “If all the Indians were Spartans, they could not bear up against the relentless tide of gold seekers. The white man has disrupted their ancient means of subsistence.”

  “You know very well that their ancient means of subsistence has always been thievery. ‘For the thief should make full restitution; if he have nothing, then he shall be sold for his theft.’ Exodus, chapter twenty-two, verse three.”

  Kit raised one eyebrow and glanced at Rafe. They both knew about the shady deals Carelton had been hatching with men like Joseph Reddeford Walker and his crowd. If they weren’t outright thievery, they were close enough. Rafe reckoned Carleton could never be sold as punishment for any thefts though. Not even those who agreed with his policies would give two cents for the man himself.

  Carleton turned to Rafe and Kit. “Unload the provisions quickly.” He started for the door. “Dr. Steck is going back to Santa Fe with you.”

  THE RAIDING PARTY DIDN’T HAVE TO FIND A WIDE CLEFT IN which to bury Skinny’s remains. A narrow one accomodated him. Fights Without Arrows, Flies In His Stew, Ears So Big, Chato, and the others wrapped him in his blanket. They lowered his slender frame, his weapons, and all his belongings into the crack in the basalt.

  The rancher and his vaqueros had put up more of a fight for his horses than the warriors expected. A bullet had made a neat hole above the ridge of Skinny’s nose. The bullet’s exit from the back of his skull had not been so neat.

  Fights Without Arrows delivered the news to Skinny’s wives. The smoke from his burning lodge and possessions lingered like a pall over the village. The wailing went on for days.

  Victorio had depended on Skinny’s advice. Now he couldn’t even talk with Red Sleeves about the troubles besetting their people. Red Sleeves and his men had gone to Pinos Altos more than two years ago, and they had not come back. His son, Mangas, was leading his band in the absence of a better candidate.

  Mangas was good-natured and strong, but he lacked the boldness and cunning of Red Sleeves. Mangas visited often at Victorio’s fire, brooding about the disappearance of his father. Many of his people had sought shelter with relatives in Victorio’s and Loco’s villages. They were hungry, cold, and disheartened.

  The world had always harbored dangers for The People, but it had become more perilous than even the oldest ones could remember. A gang of Pale Eyes had attacked Loco’s village while its inhabitants slept, and had killed mostly women and children. They had taken scalps. They had knocked out their victims’ teeth and sliced off body parts. Mexican traders from Alamosa said the Pale Eyes didn’t even collect a bounty for the hair. They took it as souvenirs.

  The Warm Springs people depended on Lozen’s powers to warn them of approaching enemies, but they still lived like hunted creatures. No longer could they enjoy a big blaze and storytelling in the open air. Now twenty or so of them huddled close to the small fire built in a cave. Lozen sat between Grandmother and Daughter, and she held three-year-old Wah-sin-ton on her lap. She rested her chin on his head, closed her eyes, and listened.

  He Makes Them Laugh had invited them here. He knew that second to food, laughter was the best remedy for hunger. Tonight he wore his favorite headdress, a skunk’s pelt with the tail hanging down the back of his neck and the stuffed head perched over his forehead. Stands Alone had sewn on two black seeds as eyes. Sometimes when speaking, He Makes Them Laugh would barely move his lips. He had convinced the younger children that the skunk could talk.

  “Coyote was going along …” He began with the familiar phrase and the children came to attention. Stories about Trickster Coyote always made them laugh. “He came to a tall, dead pine tree, reaching up into the sky. A fat lizard sat on the trunk. Coyote looked
up at him and said, ‘I only eat fat. Come down here so I can gobble you up.’

  “Lizard said, ‘Old Man, the sky is about to fall on us. I have to hold up this tree because it’s supporting the sky.’

  “‘I don’t believe you.’ Coyote put his two front paws as high on the tree trunk as he could, but he couldn’t reach Lizard. ‘Look up,’ said Lizard. ‘You’ll see what I mean.’

  “Coyote leaned his head back on his shoulders. He stared up at the top of that tree, and it seemed to sway and rotate in the wind. The clouds moving past the top of that tree made Coyote dizzy. They convinced him that the sky really was about to fall on them.

  “‘I’m getting tired and can’t hold the tree up much longer,’ said Lizard. ‘Catch on and hold it while I fetch my children to help us.’ Coyote grabbed that tree trunk, and he held on with all his strength. Lizard scampered down and ran away.

  “Coyote held that tree all night while sleet fell on him and icicles formed on his nose. In the morning his muscles ached so badly he couldn’t hold on anymore. He let go of the tree and ran to a hollow place in the rocks. He waited for the sky to fall, but it stayed where it had always been. Coyote realized that Lizard had tricked him.

  “‘Worthless Coyote!’ he grumbled. ‘Son of a Coyote! You never will have any sense.’ Angry and hungry, cold and wet, he headed off to wherever he was going.” He Makes Them Laugh paused before he added, “I’m talking about flowers and fruit and other good things.”

  He Makes Them Laugh started another Coyote story, progressing through them in the usual order, and Lozen sank into an anxious revery. She felt like Coyote, holding up the sky, straining until her muscles ached. How much more weighted down must Victorio feel as every day people arrived asking him for shelter, food, and advice.

  The world had gone so far awry that the sky falling no longer seemed far-fetched. For instance, how could someone as big as Red Sleeves vanish? Where were those who had gone with him to hold council at the diggers’ village two years ago? Had the Pale Eyes killed them? Had they decided to visit Long Neck in Mexico and been detained there for some reason? Had they set out on a horse-stealing expedition south to the wide water because the stock in northern Mexico had been depleted by warriors desperate to feed their familes?

  If Red Sleeves and his men were dead, then their names must never be spoken again. Their wives must marry other men who could bring meat for the family kettle. If the missing ones lived, then they could be discussed. For a few men to fail to return from a raid was common enough, but not all of them. Never all of them.

  Parties of warriors had gone out looking for them. Once Victorio had approached Bluecoats under a white flag, to talk peace and ask about Red Sleeves, but the soldiers had opened fire on him.

  The mystery tormented everyone. Whispers of witchcraft circulated through the villages. Suspicion roosted like crows among the arbors and lodges. It circled like vultures over the dance grounds and the hoop-and-pole fields. People became wary of their own friends and relatives. They watched each other, looking for signs of evil magic. Many came to Lozen, asking her for protection against witches and spells.

  He Makes Them Laugh started the last tale as the sun was about to rise. He had just finished when Chato and Fights Without Arrows appeared. People moved closer to hear whatever message they brought.

  “Many Mescalero relatives and friends of Broken Foot’s second wife have come,” Chato said. “They bring news of Red Sleeves.”

  “‘The Bluecoats lured him to their camp with promises of peace and gifts for his people,” Fights Without Arrows said. “Then they killed him. They ambushed those who waited for him and killed all of them.”

  A murmur rippled through the crowd.

  “There is more.” He waited for the talking to stop. “The Bluecoats cut off the Old Man’s head. They boiled the flesh from it.”

  A woman screamed. People drew their blankets over their heads and moaned with horror and grief. Lozen sat stunned.

  Death was inevitable, and Red Sleeves had lived a long life. But to be condemned to spend eternity headless, that was worse than death. That was worse than the Pimas, who dropped heavy rocks onto the faces of their slain enemies so their loved ones would not be able to recognize them in the afterlife.

  Fights Without Arrows crouched next to Lozen. He opened a saddlebag so she could see the calico, tobacco pouch, and Broken Foot’s best saddle blanket inside.

  “Grandmother,” Fights Without Arrows murmured. “Broken Foot knows these are insignificant gifts, but he asks that you bring your curing herbs, your wand, and your healing stones to his second wife’s camp.”

  “Is someone ill?” Lozen wondered why Broken Foot, her teacher, would be asking her to hold a sing when he was more qualified.

  “He doesn’t know.”

  “He doesn’t know?”

  “You must see for yourself.” Fights Without Arrows stood up. “He asks that you hurry. Chato and I are going to Red Sleeves’ village to tell them what happened.”

  Quietly, so as not to disturb Grandmother, Lozen collected her medicine and hurried through the gray light of dawn to Wide’s camp.

  Wide’s relatives had walked for two days and three nights from the reservation at Bosque Redondo. Exhausted, they wrapped themselves in blankets, hides, and rags, and slept. Some had stacked their few belongings in an attempt to block the cold wind.

  Broken Foot limped to meet her. He clutched his curing wand so tightly that pale half-moons formed at his knuckles.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “I don’t know. I think the Bluecoats put a spell on my second wife’s cousin’s small son. They are powerful witches, those Bluecoats. They cursed the Navajos. They gave them a sickness that covers them with running sores. The Navajos threw corpses full of maggots in the river near the Mescaleros’ camp. Many of my wife’s people got sick, but I don’t think that caused this boy’s condition.”

  Broken Foot looked wearily around at the sleeping relatives for whom he would now be responsible. “I’ve seen patients suffering from bear sickness, coyote sickness, the effects of lightning, thunder, witchcraft, and snakes, but I’ve never seen anything like this.”

  A PALE STREAM OF MORNING SUNLIGHT ENTERED THE LODGE door. When it flowed over the child, he cried out in agony. His arms jerked and his fingers became rigid claws. His legs contracted with such force that his knees struck his chin, snapping his teeth closed on his tongue. Blood dribbled from the corners of his mouth, but his jaws had clamped so tightly together that Broken Foot could not pry them open. The sound of the child’s gurgling filled the shelter as the blood backed into his throat and trickled from his nose.

  With trembling hands Lozen fumbled at the cords of her medicine bag. She spilled some of the pollen, and she was so shaken she couldn’t remember the first song of the healing cycle. But the songs would not have helped anyway. A convulsion shook the boy. His eyes rolled up in their sockets, and he went limp.

  His mother began to wail. The aunts and uncles and cousins took up the cry. The keening spread through the camp. It made Lozen’s head ache and jumbled her thoughts. She went outside with Broken Foot.

  “What’s happening to us, Uncle?”

  “We have strayed from the path. We must ask Life Giver to send us a sign so we can find the correct way again.”

  The boy’s father stood off to one side, staring at nothing. Lozen put a gentle hand on his shoulder.

  “My brother, did your child eat anything unusual on the way here?”

  “He found three sacks of pinole by the trail, but his mother told him not to eat any of it.”

  “Where are his belongings?”

  The father pointed his chin at a feed sack lying by the door. Lozen crouched beside it and searched through the contents. Underneath his rolled up shirt and a small pair of moccasins, she found the pinole. One of the pouches was half empty. She poured some of the parched corn into her hand and sniffed it. She held it up for Broken Foot to sme
ll.

  “Something’s wrong with it,” he said.

  Lozen emptied it onto a woven tray and carried it to her shelter.

  Grandmother was waiting for her. “What happened?”

  “Wide’s cousin’s child died.”

  Grandmother glanced at the tray of parched corn. “Where did the pinole come from?”

  “Someone left it by the trail, Pale Eyes probably. It might be poisoned. Maybe it killed the boy.”

  That night Lozen left the tray out when everyone went to sleep. She wasn’t surprised to find three dead rats in it the next morning.

  Chapter 37

  SEEING RED

  Just because horse-stealing was necessary didn’t mean it couldn’t be fun. Lozen felt the usual mix of excitement, glee, serenity, and power, and a hint of fear. She lay on her stomach and watched the Bluecoats through the far-seeing tube. This was the new fort the Bluecoats had built at Doubtful Pass. Lozen looked for the guns on wheels that had killed so many warriors, but she didn’t see any.

  The helter-skelter of wooden lodges amused her. Any Mexican peasant knew he should build a wall around his village to fend off attacks, but the Bluecoats were either too stupid or too lazy to bother. They had merely picketed the horses.

  The sliver of a moon was well on its way along before Lozen heard Victorio’s quail call. She ripped up a bundle of grass and stuffed it down her shirt. She added branches of the pungent bush the Mexicans called hediondilla, “little stinker.” She stuck more of the bush into her headband, into the tops of her moccasins, and under her belt. That should throw the dogs off her scent.

  She eased slowly downslope. She lay behind a yucca plant downwind of the pasture and watched the twin glows of the sentries’ cigarillos approach. Talking in low voices, they strolled past, their muskets dangling in the crooks of their arms. When they were out of sight, Lozen slipped in among the horses. Some of them moved away nervously, but none whinnied or tried to rear. That was why Victorio had sent her in first.