Antonio flashed him a quick smile and nodded his head gratefully.
“Are you and your family all right?” Christ, what a stupid thing to ask, thought Michael. How could they be all right, leaving their home behind and being driven across New Mexico like sheep. But what else was there to say? “I am sorry”? Em, he was sorry. He was in agony, not knowing who he was or what he could do about anything. He couldn’t have saved his mother; his uncle had died…. He shook his head to clear it. He was here, not there. Oh, but here was so much like there….
Serena had turned to him with such a look of gratitude in her eyes that he was ashamed and ducked his head. Then he saw her hands on the reins: they were wrapped in scraps of blanket but her fingers weren’t covered and were looking almost white. She followed his glance and shrugged. “My husband and I think maybe I am turning bilagaana,” she joked. “Do you think they would let us go if that happened?”
Michael stripped off his gauntlets. “Here, put these on.”
Serena protested. “But your hands will freeze.”
“Take them, please,” he said, his voice breaking. “ ‘Tis little enough I can be doing for you except praying.”
Serena reached up and grasped Michael’s bare hand. “Whatever happens to us, my friend, I am glad to have known you. I think it will be important to remember your kindness to keep our hearts open in the days to come.”
* * * *
On the fourth day of the walk, more people began to drop by the side of the road. Their relatives surrounded them, encouraged them. Some families even carried the fallen ones, taking turns with an old grandmother or grandfather.
The soldiers were prodding them with bayonets, but some were so far gone that even that couldn’t get them on their feet again.
“Put her in the nearest wagon,” ordered Michael when he came up to three troopers pushing at an old woman’s body with their boots. The men were halfway there with their burden when Lieutenant Cooper came riding up.
“What is going on here, Sergeant Burke?”
“We are moving this woman into a wagon, sir.”
“The wagons are overloaded as it is, Sergeant. We’ll be lucky it the mules make it. Take her to the side of the road and shoot her, Corporal.”
Michael started to move forward, his mouth open to protest.
“Is there anything you wanted to say, mick?” Cooper said with deceptive mildness. “Some order you wanted to refuse? You are lucky I am not asking you to do it.” Cooper wheeled his horse and rode back to the beginning of the line.
Michael couldn’t watch. He kept saying to himself, She was old, she wouldn’t have made it anyway. Perhaps this was a merciful end.
* * * *
The next day, it happened again. Only this time it was a young woman who had just given birth. Her husband was beside her, carrying their baby, and she was stumbling along when a woman behind them saw the snow becoming bright red in front of her as she walked. “Your wife…she bleeds!” the woman told the young husband. “Let me take the baby.”
The man lifted his wife into his arms. She was only semiconscious and he could feel her few garments soak with blood and then freeze stiff. “Put me down,” his wife whispered as he stumbled along.
“Never.” But after a few minutes, he realized he was too weak to carry her and he moved off to the side, laying her down gently and brushing her hair back from her face with his blood-soaked hand.
Michael saw them and spurred Frost. “Get going, man,” he said urgently, “or they’ll shoot you.”
“My wife is bleeding,” the man whispered.
“Día,” exclaimed Michael when he saw her. The woman who had taken the baby was standing next to the couple and he motioned her back to the march. Before he could think of what to do, troopers ran by him, their rifles ready.
“No, ye cannot,” said Michael, starting to dismount. He didn’t hear Elwell come u p beside him and almost kicked him in the face as he swung his leg over Frost.
Elwell grabbed him by the collar of his coat and pulled him backward, nearly choking him.
“You dumb mick! Do you think Cooper will let you get away with insubordination a second time? He’ll have you hanged, you fool!”
Michael fought only for a minute and then sagged against his mare. One shot rang out and then the two men moved by. The third was prodding the young woman’s husband, saying, not unkindly, “Come on, man, get back to the march. I don’t want to have to shoot you, too.” Finally, the woman who was carrying the baby pulled the father up and led him along.
“Mount up, Burke, before Cooper sees you over here.”
Michael mounted up and rode on. One more Navajo, an old man, was shot just before they stopped to make camp. And he was sure it would get worse the further they went, for the people had started out weak and hungry and were now dying from exposure as well as hunger.
He was fumbling with the coffeepot, trying to pour his coffee with his frozen fingers when Elwell squatted down beside him.
“What the hell is wrong with your hands, Burke? Are your gloves worn through?”
“I gave them away,” Michael muttered.
“You are a madman, Michael,” said Elwell.
“I am keeping them wrapped in my scarf. They’ll be fine.”
“Better be careful or you’ll have yourself a case of frostbite,” Elwell warned him. “What is it with you and these Indians, Burke? You’ve fought the Sioux. You’ve been Indian fighting for years.”
“Maybe I’ve done too much fighting, Joshua. Maybe I’m just tired of seeing the same thing happen again and again. Maybe I’m wondering what the hell an Irishman is doing to others what was done to him.”
“You’re a damned idealist, Michael, and you’d better keep out of Cooper’s way or you’ll be a dead one.”
“Thanks for grabbing me today, Joshua,” Michael said, smiling ruefully at Elwell.
“Just keep that Irish temper of yours under control for now, man,” said his friend, spitting out the dregs of his coffee onto the ground. “Save it to keep yourself warm!”
Michael made it through the rest of the walk by blocking out as well as he could the sights and sounds around him. He did not forget Antonio, however, and whenever he could speak to him and Serena without drawing attention to himself, he would. The soldiers were on reduced rations themselves by now, but he saved whatever he could and passed it on.
Chapter Thirty-eight
Michael had expected that when they at last reached Fort Sumner there would at least be food and shelter. But with their arrival, the number of Indians doubled and there were almost five thousand Navajo gathered on the edge of the Llano Estacado, the Staked Plain, one of the bleakest regions in the territory. Makeshift hogans and tattered tents provided shelter for some, but most were exposed to the freezing winds blowing out of the Staked Plain. The troops at the fort were on half rations so that the Navajo might receive at least subsistence level.
If he had seen the march as hell, thought Michael, then he had been mistaken. It had only been the approach to hell. Sumner itself was Hades.
By the time they arrived, two of his fingers were frostbitten and he sought permission to find the camp doctor.
“Damn it, Burke, I can’t spare anyone,” yelled Cooper. “Only a dumb mick would let his fingers get frostbitten. Where the hell were your gloves?”
“Em, I lost them, sir.”
“All right, all right. Get over to the infirmary.”
The doctor kept Michael overnight. “Lucky I can save them, soldier,” he said, clucking over him sympathetically and giving him whiskey laced with laudanum. “But they’ll be painful as you regain feeling.”
He was in the infirmary for another day and night, drifting in and out of his laudanum haze. He had a vague memory of Mr. Cooper standing at the foot of his bed, looking down at him in disgust. And of Elwell, sitting next to his bed, saying, “I told you so,” and then, “Goodbye.”
By the third day, however, the p
ain was at a manageable level. When the doctor unwrapped Michael’s hand, he nodded, a smile of satisfaction on his face at his own good work.
“We’ve saved them, Sergeant. You’ll be able to leave the infirmary today.”
“Thank you, Doctor. I am grateful to have me fingers, I can tell you.”
“Yes, well, your friend Elwell told me what you did. It was a stupid gesture, but a good-hearted one and I am glad to send you home so well. I understand you have a wife back at Fort Defiance?”
Michael laid his head back on his pillow, nodded, and closed his eyes. He couldn’t, for the life of him, summon up Elizabeth at all.
“She’ll be happy to have you safe at home then. But you’ll be traveling by yourself.”
Michael remembered Elwell’s good-bye. “The troop has left?”
“Yesterday, I asked for another day for you to recuperate.”
* * * *
The next day, Michael dressed himself, fumbling awkwardly at the buttons on his blouse and grimacing with pain as he pushed them through with his healing fingers.
First he visited Frost at the stables with a couple of dried apples in his good hand. The mare approached him slowly as if to say, “Well, you’ve taken your time, haven’t you?” She took the apples from Michael’s outstretched hand and chewed slowly as though she were considering whether she should forgive her neglectful master. Then, with a low whicker, she pushed her head into Michael’s chest in her usual gesture of greeting.
“So ye forgive me, do you,” he whispered. “It looks like they’ve been taking good care of you. I’m glad, for we have a long ride back and we leave tomorrow.”
He picked up a curry comb and after a few awkward minutes of adjusting his grip, got into a good rhythm of brushing. The familiar activity relaxed him, and by the time he finished, he was feeling better than he had since he arrived at Sumner.
“I’ve got to find your old friend, the bay,” he told the mare. “But I’ll be seeing you tomorrow.”
* * * *
It took two hours and Michael was almost dizzy from the effort of keeping his emotions in check as he walked through the camp looking for Antonio and his small family. Finally he found them huddled together with two other families. When he greeted them and squatted down beside them, they only looked at him with dull eyes as though they had never seen him before. They were the eyes of his dream, and he had a moment of terror when he wanted to jump up and run away. He made himself stay and keep quiet. The terror subsided, leaving a very real fear for their chances of survival. He had never seen faces so expressionless, eyes dead, with no light or spark of determination behind them. If they had given up, then what would happen to them?
At last, Antonio spoke. “We thought you had left with Cooper.”
“Em…no…I had some orders to carry out before I left. You know old Stringy Arse,” he added with a smile.
There was no response from either Antonio or his wife.
“Em, how is the baby?”
“She is alive,” said Serena quietly, as though speaking took a great effort.
They all sat silently for a while and Michael feared he was going to lose them. They would give up here and die away from Dinetah. And why not? What reason was there to live in this godforsaken place. And what use to them was his anger and his grief and his guilt at what his adopted country had done to them.
Finally he pulled out a small pouch. It was why he had come, to give them this. He would do it quietly and leave.
“Antonio, I have a little money that I brought with me. I am thinking that it will be a while before the crops come in here. And there is always someone willing to sell if you’ve got the means to buy.”
Antonio said nothing. Did nothing.
“Antonio”—Michael’s voice was harsh—“ye must take this.”
“Why must I, bilagaana! So that we will live a few extra weeks? Why would we want to live anyway, so far from Dinetah?”
Michael was twelve again. Saying to his da, “Da, I’d rather be here, starving with you, I can’t leave ye, Da.” Meaning he couldn’t leave the green hills and rocky hills and pearl white strands of Ireland. He might die if he stayed, but surely would die if he left. But he hadn’t died. He had taken the chance his da had given him. Some small group of Indians far away had given him. It was all one, it seemed to him: his grief, Antonio’s grief. What was between them but an ocean of salt tears for all those who had died before them, victims of mankind’s greed. He had to close the circle. He had to give back what had been given.
“Antonio, look at me.” The passion in his voice made Antonio look up, although the Diné never looked anyone directly in the eye. It was torturous, but Michael’s eyes held him.
“Antonio, I am here. I survived. Some of my family and some of my neighbors survived. So many of us had to leave our homeland,” said Michael, his voice breaking. “I know what that is like.”
Antonio’s eyes changed. Only a little, but Michael could see some life come back to them.
“ ‘Tis my heart speaking to your heart, Antonio. You will take this money. Sure and ‘tis little enough. But it will get you through this, you and your family. I promise you.”
Antonio nodded and reached out his hand. “Thank you,” he whispered. The Diné rarely said thank you, but this was a time to break that custom, if any was.
“I must go, my friends. I will be praying to the mother of my God for you. I will be keeping you in my heart and I will be hoping we will meet again.” He said something softly in Irish, and then repeated it in English, “Deep peace of the son of Peace to you.” and as he got up to leave, Antonio stood too. The two men were silent for a moment and between them was all the pain and unassuageable grief of parting: their own, which might be final, and the sorrow of losing one’s own place and becoming a stranger in a strange land. It felt to Michael that the world’s heart was breaking between them. And as it broke open, what it revealed at its core was the essential spark of the universe: love. Despite greed, despite cruelty, it was love that had kept him alive. And that love, which was not his to give or to claim as his own but only to experience, had flowed through him today and would give strength to Antonio and his family.
“I will see you again, Antonio,” he said softly. “And if God and his Holy Mother are kind, it will be in Dinetah.” Michael turned and walked away quickly. He could not look back.
Holy Mother of God, who am I to promise anything, he thought. He was suddenly drained of all energy and whatever had filled him for those few minutes had left him empty. Maybe it would have been better, to offer no hope at all.
* * * *
He left early the next morning, having said his goodbye and thanks to the doctor the night before. Frost was fed and rested and eager to get home, but he made the journey slowly.
No one had picked up the bodies of those who had died along the way and as Michael retraced the route, he saw their bones, already picked clean by buzzards. He felt like he was moving in darkness and the only thing that kept him going was that occasionally the dark curtain lifted and he would have a glimpse of Elizabeth’s face.
* * * *
Elizabeth had been frantic when the troop returned without Michael. She had received a short note from Lieutenant Cooper, which only informed her that her husband had been left behind in the Fort Sumner infirmary, which sent her running to the barracks to look for Joshua Elwell.
When she handed him the note, her face was white and her hands shaking. Elwell looked up after reading it. “He is a stupid bastard. Or a meaner one than I thought. There is no need to worry, Mrs. Burke. It was only a touch of frostbite that kept the sergeant behind.”
“You are sure it wasn’t something worse than that?”
“I swear to you, it was only a couple of fingers that were affected.”
“Oh, thank God.”
“He’ll probably be back within a week,” Elwell reassured her.
It was ten days. Ten days of walking Orion near the fo
rt. And around and around the fort. Ten days of scanning the southeast with field glasses. Ten days of worrying if he had become lost, if not in the desert, then in one of his nightmares.
Elizabeth knew she was being foolish, but she couldn’t help it. Her anxiety took her over completely and by the end of the tenth day she had almost stopped eating.
She was sitting in the dark in their parlor when she heard footsteps on the stairs. She was frozen in place. What if it was someone else, come to tell her he had been found dead. The door opened and there he was, his pale face shining through the shadows.
“Elizabeth?” He sounded disappointed as he called into the darkness.
She willed her fingers to be steady as she struck a match and lit the lamp next to her.
Michael was fumbling with the buttons on his coat and looked up like a startled deer.
“You are here.”
Elizabeth walked slowly over to her husband. She looked up at him and her eyes held all the worry and all the love that had tortured her these past few weeks, and with a little sob she put her arms around him and collapsed against him.
“Día, a ghra. ‘Tis all right. I am home.”
He held her to him the way he had at the kinaalda, his hand pressing her head against his chest. They stood there awhile and then Elizabeth released her hold on him and pulled herself out of his arms.
“Let me help you with your coat, Michael.” She finished unbuttoning it for him and then he drew off his gauntlets. It was only then that she realized it hadn’t been only exhaustion that had caused his awkwardness.
“Your hand, Michael?”
“Sure, ‘tis fine now, Elizabeth,” he said lightly.
“Sergeant Elwell told me they’d been frostbitten.” Her voice was strained. “They look barely healed.”
Michael flexed his fingers. “They are feeling very good, as a matter of fact. I’m lucky the doctor was so good,” he said, shaking his head in disbelief.
“Come and sit down, Michael. You look exhausted.”
They sat on the sofa and she curled her feet up under her and held his left hand in her lap, stroking it gently as though that might speed the healing.
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