Holt's Gamble

by Barbara Ankrum

  The crowd cheered him as he feinted right when the others went left, rolling nearly beneath their feet to escape.

  "Ee-yii!" came the boy's crow of success as he raced ahead. At the head of the circle, Clay's old friend, Many Horses, kept score, tallying the winning two points for the "buffalo" with a pair of smooth round river rocks. Each hunter, respectively, lost two of his.

  A cheer went up for the boy who'd eluded his captors and won the game. The crowd closed in around him, offering their appreciation. Clay wondered if he knew the boy—if he was an older version of one of the children he'd come to know six years ago. It was hard to tell with all that dirt, he thought with a speculative grin.

  Spotted Frog nudged his pony forward with a nod to Clay, and together the three rode into the clearing. Many Horses was the first to spot him riding between his two braves. One by one, heads turned in Clay's direction. Reaction, he noted, ranged from surprise to downright hostility, but all comments were silenced with a slashing gesture from Many Horses.

  Clay stopped his stallion before the chief, whose solemn expression betrayed nothing of his thoughts. Many Horses was a young chief, one of several in the tribe. His strong body was that of a warrior, though in practice, he counseled his people in peace.

  "Haáhe, hóovehe." Clay spoke in the other man's tongue as he dismounted. "Hello, my friend. It has been a long time since we have looked into each other's eyes."

  "Yours have grown older, vé-ho-e," Many Horses observed, a sad smile softening his strong features. "And wiser, I think."

  Clay tipped his head in agreement. "Time changes a man," he allowed.

  "You are still a brother to the People, Sacred Bear Killer," Many Horses replied, using the name that had been given him years ago. "That has not changed."

  "Your words honor me, Many Horses," Clay answered, relieved and grateful that he'd been welcomed. "It is good to be back among the People again. I have missed being here."

  The chief motioned to Spotted Frog. "Stake his stallion beside my lodge where the grass is thick. Sacred Bear Killer will be my guest."

  Spotted Frog led Clay's horse and mule away. The crowd began drifting off as it became apparent that the vé-ho-e posed no immediate threat, though it was obvious some were disappointed that his appearance hadn't occasioned more excitement.

  Clay scanned the retreating faces. Some were familiar. Many more were not. The dirt-encrusted boys from the Buffalo Pound game watched him from a short distance away. The tall one—the "buffalo"—cast a suspicious glance at Clay through narrowed eyes. Something about the boy bothered Clay, but he couldn't put his finger on it. Clay tipped his chin up at the boy in silent acknowledgment. The boy's eyes widened, revealing, to Clay's utter surprise, eyes the color of new green shoots of grass. Clay's lips parted in astonishment and the boy turned and bolted away, disappearing into the crowd.

  Clay turned to his friend, who had watched the exchange. "He's not Cheyenne?"

  Many Horses shook his head. "Forgive him. He has become one of us now. He has much to prove."

  Clay had known that the Cheyenne sometimes took white children captive and adopted them into the tribe. He'd simply never seen one in this camp before. "Prove? To whom?"

  Many Horses started walking slowly toward his tepee. "To the others. To himself. But his heart is brave and he will make a good Cheyenne."

  "Where did he come from?"

  He gave Clay an inquiring look. "South. A hunting party found him. He was close to death. His people were killed by Crow raiders. It was many suns before he spoke of it."

  The hairs on the back of Clay's neck bristled with cold suspicion. He thought again of the green eyes, so like Kierin's. It couldn't be, he thought, fingering the locket at his neck. Could it? "Did he tell you his name, Many Horses? His vé-ho-e name?"

  Many Horses nodded. "He called himself Mat-hew."

  Chapter 20

  Clay's face went pale. "Oh, my God."

  Many Horse's brows drew together in a frown. "You know this boy?"

  "No... not personally," came Clay's slow response. "He may be the brother of my woman."

  "Is this why you have come?"

  Clay glanced up at his old friend. "No," he answered, but he wondered, ironically, if it was.

  "Come into my lodge. We shall talk of this later."

  With a nod, Clay followed Many Horses back to his tepee, still shaken by his discovery. If it was Matthew, it would change everything and his plans to return to Missouri were about to go all to hell.

  The pair walked through the village, past the isolated camp of the Ma-o-hóohevase, the Red Shields—the elite warriors who lived apart from the rest of the village and lived by their own rules; past dozens more tepees, all set up so their entrances faced east, toward the dawn.

  There were other societies—The Dog-men, the Bowstrings, the Wolf Warriors. All had different rules within the structure of the tribe. Like Spotted Frog and Sees the Sky, Clay remembered many of the braves he passed and they saluted to him with a nod as he walked by.

  Many Horses' lodge was set up in the center of the village along with the other chiefs of the People. Stepping inside, Clay noted it was as spacious and orderly as it always had been. Sleeping robes occupied the sides of the lodge. Beside these, neatly stacked, were Many Horses' weapons and medicine bundle. Corn Woman, Many Horses' only wife, was stirring something in a skin pot suspended above the slow-burning cook fire.

  She was still as beautiful as Clay remembered. In spite of a thin strand of pure white that streaked her hair in front, she was younger by a few years than her husband—his guess was close to thirty. When she straightened, he saw that she was once again heavy with child. She smiled broadly when she saw Clay enter behind her husband.

  "I had a dream that you would return soon, Sacred Bear Killer," she said with some satisfaction. "You are too thin."

  Clay laughed softly at her bluntness. "It is good to see you, too, Corn Woman. The memory of your cooking still sweetens my dreams. Perhaps you can fatten me up while I am here."

  She chuckled, pleased by his compliment. The two had shared a special bond since the time seven years ago when Clay had saved the life of her only son.

  "Where is Lame Beaver?" he asked. "He must be nearly fourteen summers by now."

  "He hunts with the men now," she said proudly. "He has grown handsome and strong like his father." She glanced with obvious love at her husband.

  "Saaaa! Woman," Many Horses grumbled as he pulled his pipe from its intricately beaded sheath. "Your mouth runs like a creek in spring. Leave us now, so we might smoke in peace."

  Corn Woman grinned knowingly and gave him an affectionate touch on the shoulder before waddling out the tepee flap.

  "You are a lucky man, my friend," Clay told him, leaning against the willow backrest. "You must be the envy of many braves to have such a wife."

  Many Horses' expression softened. "It is good to have a woman who admires you. Yours is such a woman?"

  Clay pulled a packet of tobacco from within his shirt and handed it to the other man. "Yes," he said, and his chest squeezed painfully at the thought of her. When she's not fighting me.

  "But you are not with her, my brother. Why is this?"

  "There is much to tell you. Let us smoke first."

  Many Horses lit the pipe and tipped it in all four directions—north, south, west and east—before drawing the blue smoke into his lungs. He handed it to Clay, who repeated the gesture before taking his turn. Smoking the pipe was a gesture of peace and symbolized the longstanding friendship they shared.

  He told Many Horses about Kierin, about their escape from Independence. And he told him about the massacre. Lieutenant Fleming had been right in thinking the Cheyenne would hear of it by the time Clay got there. Word had reached them already and anger ran rife through the hot-blooded braves who were hungry to set the Whites straight. As he had in the past, Many Horses had preached peace, but all feared the worst because of what had happened.
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br />   "Our brothers, the Sioux, will meet something very hard now," Many Horses said with a shake of his head. "But none can blame them for what they did. Conquering Bear, their chief, was killed that day. Many of his warriors are thirsty for the blood of the Yellow Legs. They say there are not many—it would not be hard to wipe them out."

  "They are wrong." Clay searched Many Horses' obsidian eyes. "If the Sioux attack them, the Yellow Legs will send more. And more. They will come until they cover the prairies like blades of buffalo grass. And they will wipe out all the tribes from the Plains."

  Many Horses looked at him skeptically, then drew a long pull on the pipe. "Many are hungry. Many of our people have been wiped out already by their sickness. The vé-ho-e in the rolling things drive the buffalo from our hunting lands or leave their flesh rotting in the sun." He shook his head sadly. "My brothers ask if we should let this thing happen."

  "I cannot tell you what is right, Many Horses. I can tell you there are some honorable white men, even as there are dishonorable ones. The one who started this fight with the Sioux did not understand honor. He knew only his own hunger for power. And there are many like him.

  "You must follow what your heart tells you. But if you choose to fight the Yellow Legs soldiers, I tell you this: Many Cheyenne will die."

  "I will think on this," Many Horses said, putting the glowing tip of a burning twig to the bowl of his pipe. He took a long draw, filling his lungs with the fragrant smoke. He handed the pipe to Clay and leaned back against his willow backrest.

  "The boy..." Clay asked, leaning back, too. "Whose lodge does he sleep in?"

  "The lodge of my wife's sister, Buffalo Wallow Woman. It makes her heart glad to have a child in her tepee again. Her son died of the vé-ho-e sickness two winters ago. Little Fox brings her much happiness."

  Little Fox. A name befitting a survivor like Matthew. "If he is my woman's brother, she will want him back." Clay paused. "And I will have to take him."

  A frown played at the corners of the other man's mouth. "Speak with him first, before you decide. If he is the one you seek, and he wishes to go with you, there will be time to talk to Buffalo Wallow Woman."

  Clay unfolded his legs and stood in the spacious tepee. "Do you know where I will find him?"

  "He has been gentling a gelding pony for himself in the meadow to the north of the creek," Many Horses said. "He is a fast learner. Someday, he will be a great leader. But the lessons come hard for him."

  "Life has been hard for him, I think," Clay replied. With a sigh, he lifted the flap of the tepee and headed out into the waning daylight to find him.

  Dark spires of pine and Douglas fir silhouetted themselves against the vermillion evening sky as Clay left the circle of tepees behind and made his way around the edge of the dammed-up pond. The thick carpet of fragrant pine needles absorbed the sound of his footsteps. Not far from the camp, a clearing opened into a grassy meadow where Clay spotted the herd of horses grazing in the natural enclosure.

  From where he stood, he could see the boy, clad now in deerskin leggings and shirt, nose to nose with a handsomely proportioned pinto gelding. The boy made soothing noises with his tongue and spoke to the horse in soft tones. Behind his back, he gripped a handful of purple clover. Smelling the sweet stuff, the pinto nudged him for it, shoving the boy backward, and again, until the boy relented with a laugh and fed it to him.

  "He's a fine-looking horse, Little Fox," Clay observed, speaking in Cheyenne.

  The boy jumped at the sound of Clay's voice and turned to face him, glaring at the intrusion.

  "Is he yours?" Clay asked, approaching the pair. The boy had washed the grime from his face, leaving behind the fair but tanned skin of his Scottish ancestry. His dark hair was tied back from his face with a leather thong. The resemblance to Kierin, now that Clay had a good look at him, was astonishing.

  The boy nodded silently and turned back to his pony, scratching it absently behind its ears. The pinto snorted a steamy breath and blinked at Clay.

  "It looks like you're friends already," Clay said. "E-pe- va?e. That is good. Have you ridden him yet?"

  The boy nodded and looked at him obliquely. "He's faster than all the others," he boasted.

  The horse seemed a safe subject, Clay thought. "A man needs a fast horse."

  The youth's proud green eyes darted up to Clay's blue ones. Watching. Waiting. Clay reached out and smoothed a hand over the animal's well-muscled hindquarters. The boy didn't succeed in hiding his surprise when the pony didn't skitter away, but stood enjoying Clay's touch.

  "You speak Cheyenne well for being here such a short time, Matthew." This time his words were spoken in English. Clay saw the boy's Adam's apple bob in his throat.

  "H-how do you know my name?" He spoke in his native tongue now, too.

  "I know a lot more about you than you think."

  Matthew moved so the horse stood between them. "Who are you?"

  "A friend."

  "I don't know you."

  "Your sister does."

  Matthew's eyes flew open and a rush of memories clouded them. "M-my sister?"

  Clay smiled. "She's been looking for you for a long time."

  His expression sank again into mistrust. "I don't believe you. Why should I believe you? She's—"

  "Kierin's told me all about you. About how you love the stars, and how you used to sit on your roof poring over astronomy charts..." This peaked the boy's interest. "About how she helped raise you when your mother died. And how it broke her heart when your father took you West without her..."

  Matthew peered intently at the Pinto's soft coat, emotion riding the rims of his eyes. "She doesn't even know—"

  "What happened to you? No, you're right. She doesn't. They told her you were killed in that attack in the South Pass."

  Matthew's doubtful eyes met his again. "Then how did you-?"

  "Blind luck," he answered. "I'm here on other business. Many Horses is an old friend of mine. So is his son, Lame Fox."

  The boy hesitated. "I've heard the story of how a white man saved him from a grizzly. Was that... you?"

  "Knowing the Cheyenne, I'm sure the story's grown some in the telling," he answered with a soft laugh.

  Wide-eyed, Matthew stared at him with new respect. If this was Sacred Bear Killer, perhaps he could trust him after all. Didn't his Cheyenne uncle speak of this man like a brother?

  "Still have your doubts?" Clay undid the locket around his neck and handed it to the boy. "Maybe this will convince you."

  Matthew's mouth dropped open. "How did you get this? M-my father sold it at—"

  "Fort Kearny," Clay finished. "That's where we found it. Kierin gave it to me to carry when I left her a few days ago."

  Questions spun around in Matthew's head like a whirlwind as he pried open the locket. Where was his sister now? How did this man know her? What did he want of him? He held his tongue, knowing that answers to all those things would come in time. That was what Buffalo Wallow Woman had taught him.

  Beside his picture, inside the gold locket, was Kierin's. Tears burned the backs of his eyes, but he blinked them back. He'd worked too hard this year to become a man to let it all fall apart now. "If I believe you," he asked, "what then?"

  "Then," Clay answered with a smile, "we need to talk."

  Matthew shared the cook fire that night with Many Horses, Corn Woman, and Clay. Buffalo Wallow Woman and her husband, Gray Wolf, joined them for a feast of roast rabbit and fragrant soup. Buffalo Wallow Woman made fry bread and brought fresh, tart huckleberries for desert. It was the best food Clay had in days and he ate ravenously.

  Matthew was quiet as was his adoptive mother, Buffalo Wallow. Clay had put his proposition to them both. He wanted to take Matthew back to his sister. It was to be Matthew's decision and he could see it would be a difficult one.

  There was no question, by the look he saw in the boy's eyes when he spoke of Kierin, that he loved and missed her. But, he'd become attached to Buffa
lo Wallow and her husband, and had carved a niche for himself here among the Northern Cheyenne. It was a hard decision, and Clay said he would give him the night to think about it.

  Morning mist still shrouded the camp when Clay stepped out of the warm confines of Many Horses' lodge the next morning, carrying a towel from his saddlebags and a bar of brown soap. He needed a bath after a week on the trail and preferred to do it privately.

  The camp was still silent. Asleep. A few dogs stirred from their nightly repose, sniffing his heels, then wandered away, satisfied he was not a threat.

  When Clay reached the pond, he stripped his clothes off and, with a quick in-drawn breath, waded into the frigid water. He ducked beneath the surface, every nerve alive as the cold water sluiced past his body. He hadn't slept much last night and his body felt the lack. Matthew's decision preyed heavily upon him. If the boy decided to return to Kierin, it meant Clay would have to give up the notion of returning to Independence for now. How ironic, that a boy could hold so much power over his life.

  But did he? Clay wondered as he surfaced. Perhaps that was what Many Horses had meant last night when he'd reminded Clay that Ma?heo?o, the All Father, had his own plans for us while we were busy making our own. Was he talking about Fate? Clay had never been a believer in the word but he was beginning to doubt his own convictions.

  What were the odds against finding Matthew here among his friends? What were the odds that Matthew had survived that attack at all? Astronomical, he supposed.

  He smiled, imagining Kierin's reaction when he returned with her brother. He smiled just thinking about seeing her face again. A fresh pang of loneliness constricted his throat and he dove beneath the water again, pushing the feeling back.

  He surfaced to the sight of Matthew, squatting near the bank of the pond watching him. Silently, the boy proffered the bar of brown soap to him.

  "Pave-vooná?o," Clay said. Good morning.

  "Morning," Matthew answered with a tentative smile.

  It was good to see the grim look of suspicion gone from his eyes, Clay thought, taking the soap from him. "You're up early."