Shakespeare raised his hands in sign language. “We greet you in peace, red brothers.”
An imposing warrior wearing a greatcoat that must have belonged to the ship’s captain, grunted and answered, “White men far from home. White men in our country.”
Shakespeare knew that for a lie. The Kelawatsets lived well to the north. He deduced they were on their way to the Chinook village to trade and signed as much.
“Maybe we trade with them,” the warrior signed in return. The sign language he used employed slightly different gestures than that of the Plains tribes but was close enough for Shakespeare to understand. “Maybe we trade with you.”
“We do not want to trade,” Shakespeare said. He was alarmed by the furtive manner in which the warriors were fanning out, some moving toward the horses, others toward the expedition members, most of whom were clustered on the river side of the stock.
The tall warrior frowned. “You are whites. Whites always have many goods. You make us glad. You trade with us.”
Shakespeare glanced at Nate and said out of the corner of his mouth. “We’re in for it. I’ll take this son of a bitch. You protect the women.”
As Nate melted away, Shakespeare shifted the Hawken from the crook of his left elbow to his right, then signed, “You do not have anything we want. Let us smoke a pipe in peace and we will be on our way.”
“We smoke after we trade,” the warrior insisted. One of the Kelawatsets was nervously fingering the trigger of his rifle. Shakespeare made a mental note to shoot that one second and turned so the leader and the eager brave were both in front of him. He paid particular attention to the man doing all the signing, since he was the one who would give the signal to attack. A glance showed the majority of the warriors had mingled with the rivermen and the rest, some pretending to admire clothing or guns, others standing aloof. This was bad, he reflected. Very, very bad.
It suddenly got worse.
Cyrus Porter, with his shadow Adam Clark dogging his heels like a whipped cur, walked up and stood between Shakespeare and the pair of warriors. “What the hell is the delay, McNair? What do these heathens want?”
“Move out of the way,” Shakespeare said as calmly as he could.
“What? Why?” Porter said angrily. “We don’t have time to waste coddling every miserable group of Indians that comes along. Tell this band to get in their canoes and shove off.”
Shakespeare saw the leader of the Kelawatsets glance at the warrior with the itchy finger. “For God’s sake, Porter, get out of my way before they shoot.”
“Shoot?” Porter responded, puzzled. “Why would they do that? We’ve done them no harm.” Unbidden to Shakespeare’s mind came gory memories of all the trapping parties and travelers wiped out by Indians over the years. It had always amazed him that so many of the whites had been massacred because they foolishly let down their guard at the wrong moment. Now he saw how easily it could happen. All it took was one idiot like Porter, and dozens of people would pay the price with their lives. “Damn it, move!” he commanded.
Porter’s nose tilted into the air and his jaw muscles quivered with indignation. “Who do you think you are, using that tone on me? Must I remind you which one of us is in charge and which one is the hired help?”
Shakespeare gripped his Hawken with both hands. The two Kelawatsets had moved closer to one another. To Shakespeare’s right, Chavez was slowly edging around Porter to get a clear shot at the pair. Before the tracker could, all hell broke loose.
The leader of the war party suddenly threw back his head and howled like a wolf. At the first note the Kelawatsets exploded into furious action, foremost among them the warrior who had been fingering the trigger of his rifle. He raised the barrel and shot Adam Clark in the back.
War whoops, shrieks, and the blasts of guns filled the air as Shakespeare darted to the left so he could kill the leader, who was taking aim on a stunned Cyrus Porter. Before Shakespeare could squeeze off a shot, though, two pistols cracked and the leader and the warrior who had downed Clark both pitched to the ground with holes in their foreheads.
Shakespeare pivoted, saw smoke curling from Chavez’s dueling pistols. Behind the tracker a warrior was lifting a war club to bash him on the head. Quickly Shakespeare sighted and fired. The ball bored the Kelawatset’s chest and toppled the man backward.
Pandemonium reined. The expedition members were fighting for their lives, some locked in mortal combat, others firing, others reloading. Clouds of gunsmoke shrouded the battleground.
Nate had reached the women just as the wolf howl rang out. A stocky Kelawatset charged Winona. Nate whipped his Hawken to his shoulder but she fired first, shooting from the hip, hitting the Kelawatset high in the chest. The warrior twisted, clutched himself, and fell.
Zach and Blue Water Woman cut loose at the same instant. Unwittingly they had both aimed at the same warrior, and the man went down with two balls in his head.
Nate moved closer to cover them while they reloaded. Without warning steely arms encircled him from behind, and he was wrenched off his feet and flung to the earth. He tried to land on his knees so he could turn and shoot, but his shoulder smacked the ground instead and he lost his grip on the Hawken. As he put both palms flat to push up, his assailant leaped onto his back. A knee gouged his flesh, lancing pain seared his spine. A hand seized his hair and his head was snapped back. He saw a knife blade materialize in front of his face, then swoop toward his throat.
In desperation Nate lifted his right hand, catching hold of the warrior’s wrist. In doing so, he fell forward, accidentally flipping the Kelawatset over his shoulders. He rolled to the right to gain room to maneuver and felt a stinging sensation in his left shoulder. Leaping to his feet, he discovered he had been cut, but not deeply.
The warrior with the knife was also erect. Slashing savagely, he closed, trying to rip Nate open.
Retreating, Nate palmed his tomahawk but held it close to his leg so the Kelawatset wouldn’t notice. Then, as the warrior lunged at his chest and missed, he arced the tomahawk up and around and buried the sharp edge in the Kelawatset’s skull. Skin and bone were cleaved like so much butter. Screeching, spouting blood, the warrior collapsed.
Elsewhere the fight raged on. By now the clash was being waged largely hand to hand. Bodies littered the ground. The women and Zach were untouched, huddled back to back, Evelyn perched in her cradleboard on Winona.
Nate wedged the bloody tomahawk under his belt and drew both of his pistols. A muscular Kelawatset was astride one of the rivermen, about to sink a war axe into the man. Nate shot the warrior in the side. He jumped like a stricken jackrabbit, then sagged.
A scream pierced the din. Nate whirled, spotted LeBeau in trouble. The young riverman fought two warriors, all three using knives, all three dotted with crimson splotches. A seeping wound on LeBeau’s right thigh slowed his reactions, making him easy prey for the confident Kelawatsets.
Nate ran up close and shot one in the back of the head at point-blank range. The warrior’s forehead blew out, spraying LeBeau, and the other Kelawatset turned toward Nate. In a flash, LeBeau rammed his knife into the warrior’s throat.
Nate heard hooves drum heavily. Two Kelawatsets, on horseback, were leading nine pack animals eastward along the river bank just as rapidly as they could flee. In the river the three canoes were streaking eastward as well, each manned by a single warrior.
Of a sudden Nate realized the battle was over. He straightened, his eyes stinging from the thick gunsmoke, his wound throbbing. The wives and his son were fine. Nearby, Hestia Davin hugged LeBeau in relief at his deliverance. To the left, Brett Hughes was on one knee next to a dead warrior. Of the other rivermen, only three were alive, one of them Gaston. Over by the water’s edge stood Cyrus Porter, mouth agape, miraculously unscathed. Two Humps was scalping a slain foe.
Shakespeare came over, his buckskins peppered with scarlet dots. “I’m not one to hold a grudge, but for two cents I’d rub out the whole damn tri
be.”
“It was so sudden,” Nate said. He’d thought that he was used to the random violence of frontier life, but the stark butchery had affected him as deeply as it always did.
“Death usually is,” Shakespeare noted, and moved to help the wounded. He stepped over a riverman he assumed was dead, but the man groaned and opened his eyes.
“Help me, s’il vous plait!”
It was hopeless. The man had a nasty bullet wound above the heart. In addition, his stomach had been torn open from side to side and his intestines were visible. “There’s nothing I can do, son,” Shakespeare said gently. “Unless you’d like a blanket or a drink.”
“Kill me.”
The fervent appeal in the riverman’s eyes touched Shakespeare’s soul. “Are you sure?” he asked in a whisper.
“Please,” the man repeated, coughing up blood. “The pain ….”
Without further comment Shakespeare pulled one of his pistols, touched the muzzle to the man’s forehead, and fired. The riverman arched his back, eyelids quivering, then sighed as his body went as limp as melted wax. Shakespeare closed the man’s eyes and slowly stood. “I wish I could have done more.”
“Shakespeare! Behind you!”
Nate’s shout came a hair too late. Shakespeare was struck between the shoulder blades and knocked to his knees. He looked around, thinking a Kelawatset had been playing possum, but it was Cyrus Porter who had attacked him, hitting him with a rifle stock. “What—?” he said in a daze, his limbs refusing to move him out of harm’s way.
“Are you insane? He was one of ours! You didn’t have to kill him!” Porter elevated the rifle for another blow. “This is all your fault! I should have done this long ago.”
A buckskin clad avenger hurtled out of the air, barreling into Porter and plowing him over. The New Englander attempted to scramble to his feet, but Nate grasped him by the front of his coat and bodily threw him down again.
“Enough, Horatio!” Shakespeare shouted when Nate made a grab for a pistol. “You can’t!”
Nate paused, the pistol half drawn. “Watch me,” he said.
Porter cringed, not even trying to hide his fear. “Wait!” he exclaimed. “I wasn’t really going to hurt him. I just never expected him to kill one of our own.”
Shakespeare managed to stand. “I had to,” he said. “The man didn’t have a prayer.” He was ready to spring, to stop Nate from killing in cold blood and having to bear the stain on his conscience for the rest of his life, but there was no need. Nate shoved the pistol down, glared in disgust a few moments, then walked back to his family.
Shakespeare was of half a mind to punch Porter in the mouth, just for the hell of it. He might have, too, had Porter not done the one thing that would save him; the man who had brought so much misery on others buried his face in his hands and cried like a baby.
To the men and women looking on, it was the final straw. Whatever lingering vestige of sympathy for Porter any of them had felt, died. These were mature men and women who had learned to wrestle life on its own terms, not pampered aristocrats who had life’s riches doled to them on silver platters. They knew how to stand on their own two feet and take the good life had to offer with the bad. They saw Porter’s tears for what they were, the selfish act of a man too timid to face reality.
LeBeau and Hetty looked on in disgust, their hands entwined. Winona and Blue Water Woman turned away, as was Indian custom when a person behaved badly. Brett Hughes scowled. And the surviving rivermen wore black expressions of bitter resentment. This was the man who had hired them, who had bossed them around for so long, who had lorded it over them as if they were his personal servants. They felt more than disgust. The rivermen felt revulsion.
Then the moment passed, broken by another cry for help, this time from near the river.
Nate reached Clark before any of the others. The young man lay on his back, his knees slightly bent, blood oozing from both corners of his mouth and his nostrils. His eyes were wide in fright, his breaths short and fast. The ball had ripped clean through him, shattering the sternum as it exited.
“Help me,” Clark begged again, tears rolling down his cheeks. “Please, King. I don’t want to die. Not like this. Not here.”
“There’s nothing we can do,” Nate said.
“There must be something,” Clark said weakly. “Get your squaw to mix a poultice.”
The corners of Nate’s mouth crinkled as he held his temper in check.
“It was her herbs that brought Hetty around,” Clark continued. “I’m sure of it.” Feebly, he put a hand on Nate’s arm. “Call her. Have her mend me.
“She can’t do the impossible,” Nate said. “You must accept what has happened. It will be easier for you if you do.”
“Accept dying?” Clark’s fear rivaled Porter’s. “No one can do that. I’m afraid, King. Afraid of what lies on the other side. Afraid because I’ve wasted my life and have nothing to show for it. Please—” He had a coughing fit, his whole body convulsing. When it was over he could barely speak. “Oh, God! Save me! I’m rich, King. I’ll give you half my fortune if you’ll only save me!”
“I don’t want your money,” Nate said.
“What kind of man are you? Everyone wants money. Lots and lots of money. With it a man can do as he pleases. Fine women, a mansion, the best food and clothes.” Clark’s features had a dreamy quality. “Money has meant everything to me, King. It made me the man I am, made me a respectable citizen. It gave me all any man could want.”
“Did it give you the woman you love?”
Adam Clark blinked. “No,” he croaked, choking on more than blood. His eyes slowly widened until they seemed as big as saucers. “Oh God!” he whispered. Then, once more, at the top of his lungs, “Oh God!” And with that, he died.
Nate stared at Clark’s face until a warm hand brushed his brow. It was Winona.
“Are you all right, my husband?”
“Never better,” Nate said, standing. He slipped an arm around her. “Never, ever better.”
Twenty-One
It was a disheartened company of weary travelers who set out shortly after dawn the next day. They left behind them a long line of shallow graves topped by makeshift crosses, a concession to Hestia Davin. Zachary King looked back before the trees closed around them and saw the crosses silhouetted against the glare of the rising sun, an image that burned itself into his brain and would not let go. It served as a reminder that no one could let down their guard in the wilderness, not for a minute, not if they cared to go on breathing.
Shakespeare, Nate, and their wives rode at the head of the shortened column. Next came LeBeau and Hetty. Then Hughes. A dozen yards behind them the three rivermen led the pack animals. Gaston wore a mask of pure hatred, which everyone assumed was meant for the man who brought up the rear.
No one wanted anything to do with Cyrus Porter. He plodded along, hardly aware he was in a saddle, his eyes as vacant as the air, his features pale as if he were sick when in fact he was as healthy as the horse he rode.
Nate glanced at the expedition’s leader just once, and remarked to no one in particular, “He brought it on himself. The fool should never have left Hartford.”
“True enough,” Shakespeare said. “You never see a duck pretending it’s a cougar.”
Nate wondered what that had to do with Porter, but he held his tongue. Once McNair got started on a subject, he might talk for hours. And Nate relished the cool quiet of the new day. It let him see how grateful he should be for his family’s deliverance. Any one of them could have been slain. It had been a stroke of warped luck that the Kelawatsets were mainly interested in plunder and not rubbing the expedition out to the last man, woman and child.
Up ahead hiked Chavez and Two Humps. Nate glimpsed them every so often through the vegetation. Shakespeare had advised them to keep their eyes skinned for more Kelawatsets. For that matter, once word of the fight spread, any tribe in the region might decide to teach the white interlo
pers a lesson and attack them when they were least prepared.
Nate was almost sorry he had agreed to come, that he’d brought his family along. Almost, but not quite. Though there had been a few harrowing experiences along the way, there had been more pleasant ones, plus plenty of marvelous sights they would remember for the rest of their lives. And the journey was only half over. Who knew what wonders lay in store for them?
There was, however, a cloud hanging over their future. They had to figure out how to go about returning to their neck of the Rockies. Making the trip with the few men they had left invited disaster. They wouldn’t be able to defend themselves against the smallest of war parties.
The night before, during a heated talk around the camp fire, Gaston had pushed to bend their steps immediately for the Mississippi. He had been seconded in his opinion by the other two rivermen and, surprisingly, Brett Hughes. None of them had been very happy when Shakespeare bluntly refused, citing the safety of them all. It was his opinion that their sole hope lay in reaching Fort Astoria. Or, in case they found themselves cut off from the trapping post there, they should cross the Columbia and try to reach Fort Vancouver, an HBC post run by a Scotsman named McLoughlin.
At one point, Nate had felt sure Gaston was going to wade into Shakespeare with fists flying. He had even put a hand on a pistol to stop the riverman if need be, but Gaston had reluctantly backed down.
Beset as they were with so many problems, Nate was more than mildly bewildered when he happened to glance at his wife and saw her smiling broadly. “Care to let me in on your secret?” he asked.
“My secret?”
“How you can be so happy at a time like this?”
Winona partially turned and nodded toward the young lovers strolling behind them. “They remind me of us, my dearest, when we were their age. They bring back memories long forgotten.”
Nate recalled the first time he had stood under a buffalo robe with Winona, recalled the exquisitely sweet sensation as their lips touched for the first time, and smiled himself. “Those were fine days,” he sighed.
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