by Lou Bradshaw
Scooping out a handful of meat, I held it out to the dog and quickly got his attention. He got up and followed me a few steps. I held the bloody handful out again, and again he became excited. Then I threw the whole hand full deep into the darkness. The mongrel lunged into the night after it. Within the two blinks of an eye, other dogs had joined him and a squabble was going on.
I pulled my hatchet, and prepared myself to fight my way out of the village. I could hear shouts and saw guards running toward the noise. I moved quickly toward the slope, and had almost reached the safety of the trees, when a door flap was flung aside and a brave stepped out in my path. He looked to the right and as he turned his head to the left, I hit him with the flat of my hatchet. I felt bone crunch, but I kept on going. He flopped back into the doorway yelling in pain.
The whole camp was alive with noise. Men were running toward the dogs thinking the dogs had captured the man wolf… they had not, but it was good that they thought so. I pulled the wolf head back trying not to stand out from the rest in the gloom.
Almost to the trees a man ran past me and said, “Which way?”
“The dogs have him.” I called back and kept on running. I heard him stop and yell, but I was in the trees and gone. Instead of going up the slope, I went over the ridge and gained the slope from the far side and farther back into the next canyon. It was much steeper and a harder climb, but worth the effort if I had left any tracks.
I wanted to stay and watch when Scar Face’s woman showed the drawing to the chief, who was also her father. If I had understood the brave who had shared a jackrabbit in my camp was correct. But I was weary and wet. I needed sleep and I needed to tend to my pony. I had an idea that I would soon need him.
After taking him to the little valley, I found a dry place among the trees and rolled up in my blanket and slept until the sun was at his midway point in his chase across the sky. After thinking about the sun’s chase, I came to think that he may never catch the moon.
By mid afternoon, I was back at my perch on the upper end of the slope just below the burnt out canyon. I had no intention of coming back after dark. I had done all I could do to stir up and worry the camp. From there I could see and recognize faces. I could hear shouts but not words. The village was quiet for the most part.
The only one doing much of anything was the chief, and he was only pacing back and forth in front of his lodge. From time to time he would stop and say something to those sitting there in the sunshine. Two women and a child sat and listened to his tirade. The child was the daughter of Scar Face, which told me that the women were her mother and grandmother
Eventually, the little one fell asleep in her grandmother’s arms, but the women did not move. They only sat and listened when he had something to say. I didn’t have to hear him to know that he was cursing the man wolf, his incompetent braves, and Scar Face for bringing this trouble on his village.
By late afternoon the headman had cursed himself out and had sat down in front on his lodge. The women and the child had gone inside. The older one came out and started preparing a cook fire. She set a three legged cook rack over it and hung a blackened pot made from some kind of animal skin. Then she poured water in the stiff leather pot and started adding vegetables and chunks of meat to it. The leather wouldn’t burn as long as the flames were kept below the waterline. It was the same method the Diné women used, except our women mostly used earthen pots they had traded blankets for.
The first war party came in from the northwest, and they were empty handed. The leader of the party talked at length with the headman with much arm waving and gesturing. The headman didn’t seem any happier.
The following morning, I was sitting in my camp eating some broiled meat, when far below, I saw one of the other war parties coming back. I put my pony on some fresh grass, but did not take him to the valley. I wanted him handy if I needed him. I went back to my perch.
From there I could tell that the chief was no happier than he had been the day before. He was just sitting in front of his lodge looking into the distance. I wondered if he slept as well as I had. I had slept well, but I imagined the chief and others had awakened with every noise wondering if it could be the man wolf.
He seemed to come alive when the war party I had seen came into the village. They must have also been fruitless because the braves went to their lodges and only one stayed to face the disapproval of the chief. It went pretty much the same as the other war party leader had faced.
The sun was in the late stages of its chase when I saw dust out on the plain to the southwest. A bit later another war party came in, but this time they all rode into the common area laughing and yipping…. They had prisoners.
From the direction of their travel, I would assume the prisoners to be Southern Tonto. They had probably been caught in the open away from their village. Aside from the three prisoners, one man and two women, I saw at least two bloody scalps hanging from lances. I also saw one warrior draped over his pony’s back. He would be avenged tonight.
The crowd gathered quickly. Four men pulled the male prisoner from his horse and dragged him to a bare tree near the creak. They tied his feet, his hands were already tied. Then they threw a woven rawhide rope over a limb and hoisted him up by his ankles until his head was about length of a man’s forearm above the ground.
The women weren’t fairing much better. They would be kept as slaves under the supervision of the Mescalero squaws. They were pulled from the pony they were sharing and thrown to the ground. Then they were beat with sticks, kicked, and stoned. Squaws are often much harder on female prisoners than the men. They would be beaten close to death then bound and kept under guard until they were completely broken.
This was entertainment. The women they could slapped around anytime they wanted until they died of overwork or found a way to take their own life. The man would die tonight or tomorrow at the latest. That would depend on how strong a man he was and how long he could last. But in the end, he would die a terrible death.
The warrior would be turned over to the small boys with their small bows and tiny arrows. The boys would take target practice with sharpened sticks for arrows. The boys were not likely to do much damage, unless they were to put out an eye. The small boys were more an annoyance than real pain, but they got the blood started and created soreness.
Next came the squaws with their switches. They would leave him alive but a bloody wreck. He would spend the rest of the afternoon hanging upside down with some sort of torment being inflicted on his body at the whim of anyone who passed by.
When darkness came, the men would take their turn at him. He would have his skin slit and peeled off in strips; he would have wooden stakes driven into and through the muscles of his thighs. The stronger the man, the better they liked it. If he cried out, he would only get more pain. If he took the pain without crying out, he would only get more pain. He could not escape the pain. The only thing he could do was die well.
Eventually, they would build a small fire under his head, and he would die with his brains boiling. The last part could take a long time.
As the sun went down I moved down the slope to get closer. The drums started, and the entire camp was excited. They were hoping this was a strong man and would live along time. They had for the time, forgotten about the man wolf.
I was a jealous warrior. I wanted to be the center of attention at all times. I resented this man… this Tonto warrior stealing my place of honor. I would not let them drag out the torture of this man for pleasure when they should be in their lodges cowering and biting at their nervous lips.
The men had started working on the prisoner with their knives. Great welts had risen were the women had lashed him with their switches. But the men were getting ready to skin him alive. They were turning him around to start peeling his back.
I was in the pines beyond the small stream, not more than thirty strides away. I looked at the man’s face, and he was determined to die strong. So I put an arrow i
nto his chest. The impact of the arrow made him jolt. The man working on his back thought he had hurt him and celebrated with a yell. The torturer spun the prisoner around to look at his face and savor the moment. But what he saw was an arrow buried deep in the man’s chest.
No one had seen where the arrow had come from, but it was an Apache arrow. Those looking on were silent. They didn’t know what to think. No member of the tribe would do such a thing.
While they stood there pondering over what had happened, I was going up the slope as fast as I could move without making a sound. Reaching the desired place, I lay on the grass with my head and shoulders extended over the edge and gave them a blood curdling wolf call…. I was once again the center of attention.
Chapter 17
Going back to my camp, I prepared to move on short notice. Scar Face would be coming in soon with his war party. I was sure that the headman would send him out immediately to search for the man wolf. After a good meal and a night’s sleep, I went back to the village.
I sat at my perch near the tail end of the narrow canyon and waited through the morning for Scar Face’s party to return. When they did, it was without fanfare, I could only assume that they did not find me.
The members of the party were all young men except for Scar Face and the one who had been with him the year before. I called him Back Looking because he was always looking over his shoulder. The younger braves moved away to their own homes and families, while Scar Face and his man stayed to face the chief. The chief was not happy with the report and berated Scar Face, who stood and took it.
He took it until the chief made a gesture which I took to be telling him to leave. Scar Face flared up and went face to face with the chief, and then he pointed in the direction of his lodge and back to himself. I didn’t know what that meant, but the chief was thrown into a rage, and gave orders to Back Looking, who ran off to obey.
A short time later, other men started to arrive and went into the headman’s lodge. They were all older, so I placed them as the village elders. A chief cannot tell his braves what to do as far as going into battle. He can plan a battle, but each brave has the right to decline. Of course, if he declines, he is dishonored and his life will be miserable. Most will do as they are asked. Most warriors will follow a chief, who has proven himself a leader, without question.
The chief does, however, have the power to banish a brave from the village. I could only guess, but that seemed to be what was happening. The chief wanted Scar Face to leave the village and lure the man wolf away. My further guess was that Scar Face wanted to take his family with him, and the chief did not want that. It would be decided by the elders.
I watched the sun move across the sky and waited for the council to be finished. The chief came out and took the cook pot and carried it back inside. The elders were getting hungry. And still the sun moved across the sky.
At long last, the elders filed out of the lodge. Neither the chief nor Scar Face seemed to be happy with the decision. Scar Face’s wife and child were there along with the grandmother. The younger woman went to Scar Face and listened to what he had to say, and then she went to her father and wept. Her father broke away and turned her back to her husband.
The next morning I was waiting as the sun came up to see which direction Scar Face would take and how many braves would follow him. I didn’t have to wait too long. Scar Face, Back Looking, and five braves were mounted and ready to ride away from their home… maybe never to return. What I didn’t expect was to see Scar Face’s woman and child, mounted on a pony and ready to follow.
Scar Face ignored his in-laws, as they said their farewell to their daughter and granddaughter. Scar Face sat looking straight ahead until he was ready to go, and then he nudged his pony and the whole group moved out. He did not look back. The chief’s woman ran after her daughter for a few steps, but she couldn’t keep up.
The young braves looked proud and happy to be riding off with Red Hand. I didn’t know if they were being sent as an escort, or if they were following their new chief into exile. I felt bad for the women… the mothers of those five young men. An Apache woman bears a son with the knowledge that she will probably lose him either to another woman or to an enemy’s arrow.
I watched them ride out through the mouth of the canyon and turn to the southwest. There were eight ponies carrying riders, with two extras and one carrying packs.
There was no need to rush, but I went quickly up the mountain to my camp. My goods were bundled and ready to go. I would be living off the land, as I normally did. So I was always ready to go almost as fast as a thought.
Given the scenes I had witnessed last night and this morning, I reckoned that the chief had ordered Scar Face to leave the village. But Scar Face had refused to go without his family. That surely didn’t set well with the chief, but the elders decided it was the correct thing to do.
Mounting my roan, we moved down the south side of the mountain. I could see them as they crossed far below me. They were holding a straight line of travel toward the far mountains. I would follow from the cover of the timber as long as I could then I would follow at a distance. The tracks of that many ponies would not be hard to follow.
Scar Face was in the lead with Back Looking and the woman riding side by side. The five younger men were spread out behind them, leading the other ponies. They didn’t seem to be in a hurry, which told me that they expected to be traveling for a long time.
I wondered if Scar Face was planning on claiming his own territory and start a new village. If that was the case he would probably turn north into the mountains, and go steal some women. Or he could be going into Chiricahua land. He may be hoping to find them willing to accept his band into their tribe.
It was hard to imagine what Scar Face was thinking, or even know if he was thinking. He was quick to take action without much thought given. If he had not been so stubborn with the chief, he would have gone out looking for me… I would have killed him and gone away with no more trouble. But the way it had turned out, his wife and her family were all crying, as well as the mothers of those young braves in his band.
But that was not the way things worked out. I would still have to kill him, and I will probably have to kill Back Looking and a few of those young braves. I would hope to leave a few to see to it that his widow and orphan returned to their village safely. If there were no young braves left…I would have to decide their fate. Scar Face’s temper had caused many problems already, and I could count on more.
I trailed them at a distance; I could see the dust from their ponies. It was unlikely that they would ever be out of my sight with that many animals crossing the plains. I would get closer when the sun went into the western desert.
~~~~~ 0 ~~~~~
When the sun finally buried itself into the desert sands to the west, I moved closer. The group had made camp at the base of a rugged hump of ground. It was not big enough to be called a mesa; it was more like a tightly packed pile of rocks and dirt. It was just a high spot on the plain.
When the camp grew quiet, I slipped closer on foot, leaving my pony staked on some grass. There was brush he could eat or he could eat the dry stiff grass. I had no plan to take scalps or even let anyone know I was there. I was seeking information, hoping to find out where they were heading. It was my plan to get close enough to hear talk.
The talk would not be fruitful until Scar Face and Back Looking were both sleeping. That was when the younger ones would talk among themselves. They were young and the young are often intimidated by men with status. They feared that they would be found lacking by the foolish things young men say when they are at their leisure.
There were piles of boulders scattered all around the camp area. It looked as if the great hump of rock and dirt was coming apart at one end. I moved as close to the fire as I could without sitting down and warming my hands with it.
When the fire grew low and guards were set, I waited for the two young braves to relax by the fire. They both mov
ed out away from the fire and made an honest effort to protect the camp. I would give them credit for being diligent to a point, but like men of few summers they soon grew restless and sought something to fight the boredom.
One went to the fire and picked at the meat on the spit. He was soon joined by the other guard. They stood and talked in low tones hoping they wouldn’t wake the others. They knew they were slacking their duty, but they were a strong party and no one would try them.
I was close enough to the two young men to take both their lives and be gone without notice. The relief guards would be able to sleep through the night, but that was not my plan. I wanted to get information… I wanted to know where they were going. It was still too close to the village to put them on alert.
The two young braves cut meat and nibbled at it as they talked. After a while, one opened the discussion by asking, “Do you have any idea where we are going… there is a maiden in the Eagle clan waiting for me, and I want to get back before she stops waiting. Sun Walker is also looking her way, and he has many ponies.”
“I was over there in those boulders,” the other one told him in a hushed tone, “relieving myself, when I heard Red Hand and the Coyote talking. The Coyote asked if we were going to the Chiricahuas. Red Hand told him, ‘No, we are going to the north and east to find either the Kiowa or the Comanche people. The Chiricahuas are like the Mescaleros, they have become old women. And they have become too friendly with the Mescaleros, and I am through with them forever.”
“But that will take many moons to go there and get back to our home… the maiden will be old and ugly before I see her again.”
“We have been charged with a duty, and we have given our word to get Moon Woman and the little one to their new home… If we turn back, we can never return to the village.”