After a respectful silence, Yellow Bear rose. “This is a hard thing,” he said. “I do not like the taste of pale-eyes beef, but, with the buffalo all gone, it is better than the pig meat. Pigs are not clean. I would rather eat grasshopper. I do not understand the ways of the Pale Eyes. But they want to pay us money for grass. Grass that grows free. In the old days, which were not that long ago, we would not pay for grass. If there was grass, and it belonged to our enemy, we would take it.” He pounded a fist into his open palm. “I do not need pale-eyes money. I have two wives, thirty-nine horses, but four are mares and will foal in two, three moons. I have many grandchildren. Quanah is a good husband to one of my daughters. He was a great warrior, a leader of the Kwahadi. My eyes are no good. His are strong. He sees far. He sees what we must do to work with, and live with, those who once were our enemies. I do not like the Pale Eyes. Except their ice cream. I like Quanah. He does what is best for The People. We should listen to him.”
He sat. Daniel nodded in agreement, saw Isa-tai’s black eyes boring into him, could feel the puhakat’s anger, then realized that Isa-tai was not looking at him, but at his son Charles Flint.
In the tradition of The People, the men remained silent, considering the words Yellow Bear had spoken. Nagwee looked at Daniel, who realized it was his turn to speak. He shook his head. Charles Flint also declined to speak.
It was Quanah’s turn. He stood.
“Yellow Bear is a wise man,” he said. “I have always listened to him, respected his opinion, even when we disagree. I am glad we do not disagree now. This paying for grass for pale-eyes beef is a subject as foreign to us as the god the Black Robes pray to, as trying to understand the ways of the Mexicans. I am Nermernuh. We are all Nermernuh. But we live with taibos. We must understand taibos. The Pale Eyes, these Tejanos with their many heads of cattle, they believe in money. Money is what buys our shirts. It buys our hats. Yes, these are clothes of the Pale Eyes, the Tejanos, but it also buys us coffee and sugar and blankets for when the north wind blows angrily. These ranchers have offered us six and a half cents an acre for three hundred thousand acres. I must ask the son of Isa-tai to tell us how much money that would mean.”
Charles Flint cleared his throat. Avoiding the stare of his father, he withdrew a pencil and note pad from his coat pocket. “I have …” He smiled shyly. “I can’t do that ciphering in my head.” He worked, scratched the eraser in his hair, pressed the lead point, then nodded and said, “Nineteen thousand five hundred dollars.”
A snort sounded, and Isa-tai turned his head to spit. His head shook, and he mumbled something that Daniel could not catch. Rude. Daniel could not believe a puhakat like Isa-tai would be so disrespectful. One did not interrupt any speaker during a council. Ever.
After thanking Charles Flint, Quanah continued. “Nineteen thousand five hundred. That is much.” He removed his hat and held it toward the others. “This I bought at the store where Tetecae works for the taibos.” He used Flint’s Nermernuh name. “It cost me one dollar and fifty cents, and it is a fine hat. Imagine how much nineteen thousand five hundred dollars could buy for all of The People. It could fill the bellies of our children, our grandchildren. It could keep our wives warm. That is how much the cattlemen I have spoken to will pay. I have not heard from Isa-tai how much his friend will give The People.”
There was no time to consider Quanah’s words. Isa-tai shot to his feet the moment Quanah sat and crossed his legs.
Chapter Seven
“What I have done, what I will do, what I do now, I do to protect The People,” Isa-tai said. “My people. This Pale Eyes, Car-mo-dy, he will not pay as much as those friends of Quanah Par-ker.”
Charles Flint’s father stressed the name Quanah had adopted, the taibo surname name that had been his mother’s, a white girl taken captive during The People’s raid in the pale-eyes year of 1836. Daniel looked into the faces of the older men, wondering how they would react, but trying to read any emotion in the face of a puhakat, or any Comanche, for that matter, always proved fruitless.
“That is true,” Isa-tai continued. “I, however, do not believe that we should let any taibo feed any of his poor cows on grass that belongs to The People. It is not right. That is why I let Car-mo-dy bring his cows. To stop Quanah Par-ker.”
Daniel’s head already hurt, and he decided against trying to figure out Isa-tai’s logic. Instead, he just watched and listened as the puhakat paced around the circle as he spoke, waving his arms, his voice rising, his face animated. When he stopped in front of his son, Isa-tai extended his right arm and pointed directly at Quanah.
“See this man. He has become a taibo. Look at him. Look at his fancy clothes, his pale-eyes hat. He has even taken the name of a Pale Eyes. No longer do we know him as Fragrance. He has become Quanah Par-ker. He lives in a pale-eyes house built for him by Pale Eyes. He has learned to speak some of the tongue of the Pale Eyes. On this very afternoon, he goes into that big house and buys those pale-eyes clothes. That cloak, and what they call that dol-man. Bah!”
Now his left arm pointed at Charles Flint, then swept toward Daniel.
“They give my son and this son of a brave warrior the names of Pale Eyes, and this was done with the blessing of Quanah Par-ker. I do not call them by those names. My son is Tetecae, and this one will always be His Arrows Fly Straight Into The Hearts Of His Enemies. Good Nermernuh names.” He touched the front of his buckskin shirt, and let his fingers stream through the blue-dyed fringe. “I do not wear the clothes of the Pale Eyes. I am Nermernuh. I will always be Nermernuh.”
Walking again, flailing his arms, his voice reverberating across the practically empty dining room.
“This Car-mo-dy will pay me two hundred and fifty dollars to let his cattle eat The People’s grass. I do not know how much money that is. I do not care. I care not for pale-eyes paper. I judge my wealth by the number of my horses, by the scalps I have taken in battle, by the coup I have counted. This Car-mo-dy, he will also pay Nermernuh boys to help guard his cattle. This will put ten dollars a moon into the hands of those who wish to work for this Car-mo-dy.”
Now he stopped. “But this is not the way of The People. Once, we stole horses from the Mexicans, and Tejanos, and the foolish travelers to the north of us. We stole horses from all of our enemies. This was the way of The People. It was a good way. We will steal this man Car-mo-dy’s cattle for ourselves. They are not fit to eat grass that belongs to The People. I am like Yellow Bear. I do not care for the taste of pimoró. Cuhtz is what a warrior, a puhakat, should eat, but the Pale Eyes do not let us hunt the buffalo any more. They treat us like women. Like children. I will show these Pale Eyes that we are men. We are men who will not be tamed, that we will not become Pale Eyes.”
He sat down, folded his arms, glared across the room at Quanah, who bowed his head, considering the words Isa-tai had spoken, but waiting for someone else to speak.
The words came from Nagwee. “If you steal or kill the taibo cattle, the Long Knives will arrest you.”
“They will try,” Isa-tai said, still looking at Quanah.
“I,” Yellow Bear said, “would like to hear words from that one.”
Daniel swallowed. The father-in-law of Quanah was pointing at him.
“I …” Daniel could not summon any words.
“Rise and speak, His Arrows Fly Straight Into The Hearts Of His Enemies,” Nagwee said. “Yellow Bear is right. We are old men. We do not understand the ways of the Pale Eyes. You have lived among them. You speak their tongue. Yet you also protect The People. You are a good Metal Shirt. This I know. You once arrested my son after he had drunk too much of the bad whiskey the Creeks bring to our land. That was a good thing. My son could have hurt someone, could have hurt himself. Rise. Speak. We will not bite you, at least, not too hard. As for me, I cannot bite you at all.” He pulled back his lips to reveal his missing teeth.
Laughter made its rounds across the circle. Only Isa-tai found no mirth in Nagwee’s joke. Neither was
Daniel exactly amused.
That his legs supported him came as a surprise. Daniel did not attempt to walk around the circle. He cleared his throat, wet his lips, and tried to think.
“We are The People, yet we act like Pale Eyes.”
Those words surprised him; indeed, they surprised everyone in the circle.
“Go on,” Nagwee said.
Daniel took a deep breath, slowly exhaled, and found his courage.
“We argue over land. Land, that as we know, none of us owns. How does one own grass? It belongs to all. We fight over money. This is not something we would have done ten summers ago. I was sent, as was Tetecae, to follow the white man’s road, and this was something I did not wish to do. But it is done. I am back. I try to find the right path. Sometimes I see that The People’s path is the best. Yet there are times when I believe that we can learn from the road the Pale Eyes take. In this day, we must learn the white man’s road, for the road of The People is becoming shorter, arduous, more difficult to travel.”
He nodded respectfully at Isa-tai. “I have heard the words of Isa-tai, and know he believes in his heart”—Daniel tapped the center of his chest—“what he does is best for The People.” Facing Quanah, he said softly, “Quanah has led The People in war and now in peace. His way would bring in more money for The People, not for himself. What Isa-tai proposes would lead to much trouble. I respect Isa-tai, but I do not think his plan is something The People should consider. He invites this rancher named Carmody to graze his cattle in The Big Pasture, yet at the same time he plans to steal those cattle? A lie? This is something I would expect from a taibo.”
Shit, he thought, and even silently mouthed the pale-eyes curse he had picked up working in the coal mines in Pittsburgh. It was, he had always thought, a good word. Yet he knew comparing Isa-tai to a taibo was wrong. There’s no worse insult to a man like Isa-tai.
He couldn’t look at Isa-tai, nor could he apologize. So he stood there, trying to think of something else to say, but his tongue had swollen, and his brain refused to give him any words. Feeling the stares, he slowly sat down and crossed his knees.
“Good.” Yellow Bear’s head bobbed. “He speaks well.”
“And we did not have to bite him,” Nagwee added, then looked at Charles Flint. “Would you like to speak?”
With a shrug, the young bookkeeper said, “I have nothing to say.”
Grunting, Isa-tai stood, pointing at Daniel. “He Whose Arrows Fly Straight Into The Hearts Of His Enemies has become a taibo, too. He is no different than Quanah Par-ker. I no longer call him by the name his father gave him. I call him by the name he is known among the taibo. Kill-straight.” He spit, and sat down, but wasn’t finished talking. “He disgraces The People with his words, and with his actions. Metal Shirt. Bah!”
Anger flushed Daniel’s face. When he glanced at his hands, he realized his fists were clenched so tightly they shook. After sucking in air, he slowly exhaled, did it again, and again, waiting for the temper, that strong Comanche temper, to subside. Looking up, he saw Yellow Bear pushing himself to his feet.
“You speak of disgrace, Isa-tai,” the old man said. “You say Quanah and this young one have disgraced us. You say they have betrayed The People.” His voice was steady, but Daniel could feel the temper, the tension. “Should I bring up your disgrace, Isa-tai?”
The puhakat did not wait for Yellow Bear to finish. Shooting lithely to his feet, Isa-tai roared in defiance, “I have heard those insults since that day. I do not have to defend myself, old man. It was that fool warrior of the Paganavo.” Meaning the Cheyenne, who The People knew as Striped Arrows. “When that idiot killed a skunk, he destroyed my puha for the entire raid. If that Cheyenne had listened, had followed my instructions, we would not have been defeated by those Tejanos with the far-killing rifles.”
Yellow Bear simply stared, his black eyes like buckshot. “That is not the disgrace I refer to,” he said bluntly, and sat down again.
“Puha?” Nagwee, still sitting, suddenly sniggered. “What puha?”
“You are old men,” Isa-tai said. “I do not stand here to be insulted by old men, one whose belly is full not of buffalo, but a pale-eyes sweet thing that is so cold it hurts one’s teeth.” Now, he sat down, and the floor was open.
It stayed that way, too, for five minutes, maybe longer, until Quanah rose one more time.
“We should not quarrel amongst ourselves. Not when the Pale Eyes can see us, hear us. On this matter, we will speak no more while in the land of the Tejanos. When we return to our country, then we will hold a council. Yet I have heard enough. Carmody will remove his cattle from The Big Pasture, and even if The People say that I am wrong, that Carmody’s cattle should stay, we will not steal those cows.” He glared at Isa-tai. “Not if you have invited him, Isa-tai. We do not lie. Not to ourselves. Not to Tejanos. We have not become that much like Pale Eyes.”
No one else spoke, and, of that, Daniel was glad.
They gathered their belongings, and left the dining room, letting the waiters and cooks and the tall one with the thin mustache who Captain Hall had called a maître d’ stare at their backs as they went through the door and stepped into the hotel’s immaculate lobby.
More stares found them there, and all of the Comanches stopped except for Isa-tai, who strode through the doors and stepped outside onto the boardwalk in front of Rusk Street.
Charles Flint started after his father, but Yellow Bear stopped him.
“Let him go.”
Flint turned. “He is my father,” he said, “and cannot find the Pickwick, I mean, the apartments near that hotel.”
“Go, Tetecae,” Quanah said. “Go with your father.”
Charles Flint walked out the door.
“Well, Quanah?” The question came from Captain Hall, backed by the ranchers Waggoner and Burnett, and some other Tejano wearing a dusty, high-brimmed hat, wiry mustache, and goatee.
“We sign no papers,” Quanah said in English. “We talk more on reservation. But I think your beef will eat our grass.”
None of the cattlemen cared much for that answer.
“We can’t wait long, Quanah,” Burnett said.
Quanah’s head bobbed, but he said nothing.
“Red,” Burk Burnett said, suddenly grinning, “I’m a man of faith, and I believe in Quanah Parker. Everything’ll work out. We’ll put Carmody in his place, our beefs’ll get fat on Comanche grass, and the Comanches will have a lot of our coin to spend.”
“I hope you’re right, Burk,” Waggoner said.
“I’m always right, Dan.”
The smiles looked as forced as the silence, but when Yellow Bear said “Ice cream,” the laughter that followed was real.
“All right, Chief,” Captain Hall said, putting his right arm around Yellow Bear’s shoulder. “Let’s get you over to the Queen City. I don’t think Missus Connor would have closed up yet, not as hot as tonight is.”
So Captain Hall and Burk Burnett led the procession to the Queen City Ice Cream Parlor, where they were soon joined by Charles Flint, who said his father had retired to the room for the night at the Taylor & Barr building. Daniel, Flint, Yellow Bear, and the cowboy—who Dan Waggoner introduced as his segundo, George Briggs—were the only ones to partake in Mrs. Connor’s butter pecan ice cream. The ranchers, Nagwee, and Quanah smoked cigars, with Burnett and Hall sipping coffee.
Yellow Bear lifted his bowl to his mouth, tilted it, and slurped, producing more grins on the faces of the Tejanos. Even Quanah, lowering his cigar, shook his head and laughed.
“Is it that good?” he asked in Comanche.
Yellow Bear nodded, and the bowl rattled on the table.
A loud ticking drew Daniel’s attention, and he saw that Captain Hall had drawn a gold watch on a heavy chain from his vest pocket. “It’s getting late. Been a long day.”
Quanah nodded. “We go,” he said in English.
Which suited Daniel, but not Yellow Bear.
“I wan
t to see more of this taibo city,” he said. “I am an old man. I want to see what else these Pale Eyes offer.”
After Daniel translated, the cowhand, George Briggs, slapped his thigh. “Hell’s bells, I’d be right proud to tree this town with a man like you.” He glanced at his boss. “Be able to tell my grandkids that I once treed Cowtown with a renegade Comanch’.”
More laughter, and Quanah rose. “I go my way. To bed. You go yours. Don’t wake me up.”
“I’m going with you,” Daniel said, and stood beside Quanah.
“We’ll meet you tomorrow in the lobby of the Pickwick Hotel and go eat some breakfast,” Captain Hall said. “Say, seven o’clock?”
Quanah grunted.
“My stomach hurts,” Nagwee said. “I will go with you. Sleep. Feel better.”
Daniel looked at Flint.
“I’ve got to get the post books in order. I promised Mister McEveety I’d get that done while I was here. So I guess …”
Yellow Bear grunted. “My Nermernuh friends are women.”
Daniel tried to fight down his smile, and Charles Flint shook his head. “All right, Tsu Kuh Puah,” he said. “I will go with you. But just for a little while.”
Chapter Eight
Church bells, chiming in the distance, woke him. Daniel swung out of bed, and rubbed his stiff, aching neck. He remembered waking up in the parlor chair, stumbling back to bed, still sweating. Even now, he felt damp and hot.
“This time of year, Fort Worth,” he remembered overhearing someone say last night, “would make a good hell.”
Again, he moved to the open window, sticking his head out, hoping to catch a cool breeze, only to feel no wind at all, just rank dampness and morning heat. With a sigh, he went back to the dresser, poured the last of the water from the pitcher into a bowl, and washed his face, his neck, under his armpits, and across his chest.
Already 7:00 a.m., the Progressor told him. He had overslept, if he could call how he had spent the night “sleeping.” After drying his body, he opened the valise.
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