Folsom looked like he was about to ask Kakìdsha something but then thought better of it. “I will need to make some arrangements,” he said.
“Then go and make them,” Istaqa said. “We must leave soon. I am hungry. Are you hungry?” he asked Kakìdsha.
She nodded and said, “Yes.”
“We are hungry,” Istaqa said. “Go.”
He watched Folsom hurry off, then he reached into his shirt and said, “This is for you.”
Kakìdsha looked down as he placed the eagle feather in her hands. She smoothed it and felt its softness against the tips of her fingers.
“It has come a long way to find you,” Istaqa said. “Take good care of it.”
* * *
* * *
Jesse considered Folsom’s request. “That wagon spends more time taking people back to their homes than it does doing ranch work,” she said.
“If you cannot spare it, I will find some other way.”
“Of course you can have it, Officer Folsom. It’s the least I can do to thank you for saving my life.”
He extended his hand to her. “I will return it to you once I am able.”
“Keep it.” She took his hand and shook it. “We don’t have any need for it now.”
“You will begin again,” Folsom said. “As shall the rest of us.”
PART FIVE
VIVE VALEQUE
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
By summer, the new house had been framed. They were waiting on a lumber delivery to finish building the walls and roof. Still, they had a porch to stand on and a rail to lean against in the evenings.
The barns and sheds and animals had been mostly untouched by the flames that had consumed the house. Once they’d all been put back in their pens and had their water troughs cleaned and their slop shoveled out, life on the ranch, as far as the livestock was concerned, returned to normal.
The crops, of course, were ruined. No matter. The season had been almost over anyway. There was enough seed in the storage sheds to replant.
Jesse sold off half the cattle, half the pigs, all of the goats, none of the chickens, and a few horses. With that money, she’d secured a loan to rebuild the house and hire hands. Now the ranch had five decent, hardworking men who believed in their work and were glad to have found it. None of them were being paid very much, but they all knew that as the ranch grew and began to earn, so would they. Two of the men were married to diligent women who wanted to work to earn their keep. They milked cows and cooked meals and pumped freshwater for everyone.
One of them had a little girl named Violet and the little girl named Violet called her “Mrs. Jesse.”
Jesse had been firm that all the new workers were to call her Mrs. Sinclair, even the ones she was fond of. But Violet had trouble saying Sinclair—it came out Sindare—so Jesse took her aside and said, “I’m going to let you do something nobody else is allowed to do.”
“What’s that?” Violet asked.
“I’m going to let you call me Mrs. Jesse.”
“Mrs. Jesse?”
“That’s right. But I’m going to tell you a secret. The only other person who was allowed to call me that was a real good friend of mine. Real good. But she had to go away, so—I guess what I’m saying is, if you’re going to call me that, me and you have to be friends too. What do you say?”
Violet nodded enthusiastically. “Best friends.”
“Then give me a hug,” Jesse said, putting her arms out wide. “Come on. Get in here. Make it a good one.”
Violet hugged Jesse’s waist and Jesse closed her eyes and squeezed her tight.
* * *
* * *
On the day Connor and Hank Odell finished burying Miss Rena and reinterring Ash Sinclair, Odell rested his arms on his shovel and said, “Don’t be worried that we didn’t find every last solitary single piece of his skull. Ashford wouldn’t mind. He never was big on using his head too much.”
Connor clapped his grandfather on the back. “I’ve got to hand it to you, Henry. We did a fine job.”
Odell eyed Connor sideways. “What’s with all this Henry stuff anyway? Since when do you call me Henry?”
“Haven’t I always?”
“No. You always called me Grandpa Hank.”
Connor shrugged. “I’m not sure. Grandpa Hank sounds like something a little kid would say. Henry’s got a better ring to it. Sounds more natural to my ear.”
“Only one person I ever known in my whole life called me Henry and you ain’t him,” Odell said. “Matter of fact, ever since you woke up outta that fever, you been acting weird.”
“You think so?”
“I think so,” Odell said.
“Well, come on, then. Let’s go see if anyone needs a hand.”
Odell’s eyes narrowed. “You trying to be funny now?”
“About what?”
Odell held up his stump and said, “About this.”
“Your arm?”
“My hand!”
Connor leaned forward to inspect the stump. “I’m sorry to say this, Henry, but I don’t see a hand there. Did you do something with it?”
“You’re not too big for me to bend you over my knee and whoop you,” Odell said. “You know that, don’t you?”
“Oh, I know,” Connor said. He put his arm around Odell and the two of them headed down the hill.
* * *
* * *
On the last day of summer, Jesse stood on the porch and looked out over her new family. They were talking and laughing and being alive. One of the workers had a guitar and he played it half-decent, and once enough drink had gone around, a few of the others joined in and sang. She heard her father say, “Play that again and I’ll teach you the original words to it. Just make sure none of the ladies can hear.”
Jesse could hear, and she was sure everyone else could too, but she smiled as she listened and never wanted it to stop.
* * *
* * *
Mirta brushed her favorite horse and made sure its speckled brown coat was shining. She patted it on the neck and told it how well it had done that day. The horse lowered its head and whinnied and Mirta reached in her pocket and gave it a piece of apple.
“There you are,” Connor called out from behind her. He walked past the other hands and nodded to them as they waved.
Mirta continued to brush the horse. Connor went around her and stroked the horse’s nose and scratched it on its forehead. He was wearing a black hat that she recognized and knew did not belong to him. “That is not yours,” she said.
“It is now,” he said.
“You should have buried it with your grandfather.”
“And throw away something that makes me look so handsome?”
“Who told you that? Your mother?” Mirta asked.
“Well, she has always been this valley’s best judge of handsomeness,” Connor said. Mirta laughed and put the brush away.
“Can we take a walk together?” he asked.
“What for?”
“So we can talk.”
“We are talking now.”
“It’s more of a private conversation.”
She squinted at him. “I am afraid you are about to say something estúpido. All of this time you haven’t said anything that made me want to kill you, but now here it comes. El estúpido.”
“It’s not stupid, I promise,” Connor said.
“I will be the judge of that,” Mirta said.
They walked along the fence line toward where it was strung with thick honeysuckle vines. The air was fragrant and sweet. Connor plucked a flower, pulled out the stem, and tipped it toward his lips to taste its nectar. He offered one to Mirta and she curled her lip at him. Connor cleared his throat and said, “The house is coming along nicely.”
“Sí,” Mirta said. “What other obvious things should we talk about? The sky is blue and the air is hot and the grass is green? This is what you wanted to walk with me to say?”
“I just meant that it will be finished soon,” Connor said. “We’ll be moving out of our tents and have a real roof over our heads—”
“No.”
“No what?”
“No,” Mirta repeated.
“Now, how can you say no and you don’t even know what I’m about to ask you?”
“I already know,” Mirta said. “I am not Miss Rena. I will not work in the house.”
“That’s not what I was going to say.”
She eyed him skeptically. “Oh, really?”
“You’re always so quick to assume the worst in me that I feel like I’ve always got to make up lost ground before I can even get started. I come out here to talk to you wearing my best hat, looking as handsome as any man you’ve ever seen, and you still won’t give me a chance.”
“Please,” Mirta said. “You are dreaming.”
“You’ve seen handsomer than me?”
“Everywhere I go.”
“Well, now I know you’re lying,” Connor said.
“This is what you wanted to talk about? How handsome you wish I thought you were?”
“Actually, what I wanted to say is I’m going to hire four new hands once the house is finished.”
“You mean, your mother is going to hire them,” Mirta said.
“I’m hiring them,” Connor said. “Ma’s going to focus on running the house from now on.”
“I see,” Mirta said. “And you are going to run the ranch?”
“We’re going to run the ranch. I’m putting you in charge of the horses and livestock. We’ll work together to make sure everything gets done right.”
Mirta squinted in thought at the idea, then said, “No.”
“No?” Connor asked. “You don’t want to be in charge?”
“I don’t want to be half in charge. I don’t want to be in charge until the owner does not like what I say and decides to tell everyone not to listen to me. I am either in charge, or I am not in charge.”
Connor smirked. “I think you just want to boss me around. That’s what I think.”
“I already boss you around,” she said.
“Only because I let you.”
She regarded him then. She held out her hand and said, “Give me your hat.”
Connor took off the hat and handed it to her. She swept her long hair back over her ears and put it on. She pressed it down and smoothed out the brim with the tips of her fingers. “I will do it on two conditions.”
“What are they?”
“I keep the hat,” she said. “And from now on, you call me jefe.”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
It’s been a great privilege of mine to spend time with Native Americans and have a small window into their culture. From what I’ve been told, they are not overly concerned with what labels are applied to them, be it Indian, Native American, Indigenous people, etc. They are far more concerned with the acknowledgment of and respect accorded to their culture, history, representation, and equality.
In the writing of this book, usage of the word “Indian” was done in accordance with historical context. The United States Bureau of Indian Affairs was established in 1824 and still operates under that title. Indian agents, Indian Police officers, Indian Lighthorsemen, etc., were official designations, and while it’s important to remain true to that context, it should never be forgotten that these are words assigned to the Indigenous peoples of the American continents, who were here long before a bunch of white European settlers showed up and decided to call them “Indians.”
I hope this book conveyed the deep admiration I have for Native culture and the many who work endlessly to ensure it is not lost. If you want to learn more about it, I encourage you to go to a powwow and support your local Native community.
I’ve done my best to be accurate regarding the names and details and words of various dialects contained herein. If I got anything wrong, I take full responsibility for it. It was not intentional. If I got anything right, it was most likely because of the hard work of many different people and the research materials I was lucky to get my hands on. There is only one still-living person fluent in the Modoc-Klamath language, so I relied heavily on The Klamath Indians of Southwestern Oregon by Albert Samuel Gatschet. It was published in 1890 as part of the Department of the Interior’s series Contributions to North American Ethnology.
This book brings to a conclusion the story that sprang full-blown into my mind when I was first asked did I want to write a western?
No, I said. I want to write three.
Face of a Snake, Snake’s Fury, and Hell Snake would not have reached publication without the hard work and devotion of many different people.
To Berkley Books. Thank you to all of the fine people who helped design, typeset, proofread, create cover art, sell, distribute, and do all the thousands of things required to put this book in front of the very eyes reading it right now.
To Tracy Bernstein. The magnificent editor on all three novels who never said no, even when I started writing about giants and spooky cannibals and cults and an enormous hallucinatory snake. Thank you for trusting me.
To Sharon Pelletier. My Rock of Gibraltar. Thank you for all that you do and for making this book possible.
To my children, Brandon and Julia, who make it all worthwhile.
To Tony Healey, Tanya Eby, the Bernard Schaffer Book Review Crew on Facebook, my whole family, Adam Kraus, and all of the people who have not seen or heard from me in the past six months since this all started, thank you. I promise to take a break now. At least for a little while.
And to the readers like you. Vive valeque, my friends! Live and be well. We’ll see each other soon.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Ralph Compton stood six foot eight without his boots. He worked as a musician, a radio announcer, a songwriter, and a newspaper columnist. His first novel, The Goodnight Trail, was a finalist for the Western Writers of America Medicine Pipe Bearer Award for best debut novel. He was the USA Today bestselling author of the Trail of the Gunfighter series, the Border Empire series, the Sundown Riders series, and the Trail Drive series, among others.
Bernard Schaffer is an author and full-time police detective. A twenty-year law enforcement veteran, he is a decorated criminal investigator, narcotics expert, and child forensic interviewer. He is the author of numerous independently published books and The Thief of All Light from Kensington Publishing.
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