We stayed in this camp several days while the women made food ready for the return to San Carlos. The women jerked meat from slaughtered cattle and a few ponies and served the best inside parts to their families. Much mescal was roasted and packed for mules to carry.
The Chiricahua men thought of themselves as great card players, but the scouts were far better. The scouts took much Indah or Nakai-yi money in gold, silver, and paper from the Chiricahuas playing Monte, cunquián, tzi-chis, and mushka with cards they cut from thin, stiff horsehide, painted with the card pictures. I liked the cards and traded one of the pistols I found for a set, and I watched how the good players won most of the games to understand how to use them to take some of the In-dah or Nakai-yi money from the Chiricahua who didn’t yet understand its value.
Small groups of Chiricahua continued coming down the trails to the río where we camped. I looked up from watching a card game and saw an old chief, wearing an Indah scout hat, lead seventeen of his people down a ridge trail and into camp. I knew Nana the instant I saw him. On the trail, he sat his horse easily, but when he dismounted, his ancient legs, joints nearly frozen from age, made him slow and tottering.
A Blue Coat officer and several scouts went to meet him. I started to go greet him, but something whispered in my mind, Wait, and I did. The officer gave Nana’s people a place for their fires, and the women and children went to work. Nana’s face was a mask of indifference, but I saw that his eyes pulled in every detail about the camp. He smoked with the Blue Coat officers. After speaking with the Blue Coats, he sat with the other chiefs until the sun took the daylight over the far mountains.
That night, as the fires burned low and the social dancing finished, it was my turn to help keep watch on the camp. I climbed to a ledge that poked out of the trees and made a good place to sit partway up the ridge. I could see up and down the river, trails leading in from the east, and virtually all the fires in the camp. It was cold, but I kept warm by keeping a blanket over my shoulders and back and one wrapped around my waist.
Somewhere to the north, a wolf howled, and the ponies and mules seemed restless in the grass where they grazed. I kept a close eye on them, expecting they would hear trouble a long time before I did. The sky glowed with white light behind the eastern mountains as the moon readied to show its face.
A voice near my ear said, “Nish’ii’ (I see you), Grandson.” It took all my discipline not to jerk around in surprise, but I had to smile. Nana had again surprised me in the dark here in the Blue Mountains as he had when he first appeared at the reservation three years earlier.
“Idiits’ag (I hear you), Grandfather. My eyes filled with memories of Mescalero when I saw you ride in with your People. Come. Join me. Let’s speak together while I watch the camp.”
His blanket fell beside mine, and he groaned as his stiff joints lowered him to sit beside me. He pulled his blanket over his shoulders, stared out over the camp, and sighed.
“You wear the red headband of Sieber’s scouts. I was surprised to see this when I rode in with my People today. How long have you fought against us? I know it is after the Nakai-yes wiped out Victorio. Juh told me of your battle with the witch, Sangre del Diablo. Tell me of your days.”
I noticed something below was making the horses nervous as they pranced and snorted in their rope corral. My eyes strained to see, but all I saw were scouts approaching to calm them. I picked up a small stone and flipped it off the ledges into the trees below us and that made some night birds fly out squawking at being disturbed.
“I’m a scout only since the time Nantan Lupan begins looking for you in the Blue Mountains. When Nantan Lupan brings you back to San Carlos, I’ll return to my Juanita and our baby girl child, Kicking Wren. I still chase the witch. We found him in Casas Grandes after my friends and I went looking for him in the camp of Elias in the Blue Mountains to the north. I chased him to the great river where he put a bullet in me, and I put one in him, but he crossed the great river and hid in the land of the Indah. I wait to send him blind to the Happy Land when he comes again.
“Juh left his camp and went to San Carlos, but we stayed through a Ghost Face Season there and then returned to Mescalero. A new agent had come, one the Mescaleros call ‘Tata Crooked Nose.’ He spoke true and made things right after the Blue Coats left. His chief of tribal police is Captain Branigan. He too speaks true. I became a tribal policeman.”
The horses in the rope corral, approached by scouts, seemed to relax and returned to grazing.
“Sieber asked that I come with the scouts to the Blue Mountains to bring the Chiricahuas back to San Carlos. Before Nantan Lupan came, he spoke with the chiefs and sent the crooked agents away and found work for the People to do besides raiding. It’s a good thing he does. You need to leave the Blue Mountains and see your people grow strong again at San Carlos. That is all I have to say.”
Nana laughed deep from his belly, shaking his head. “Nantan Lupan’s heart is in the right place, but the Indah are too greedy to keep even Nantan Lupan’s word, and too many Apaches, like Geronimo, still seek revenge for peace to last. But for Nantan Lupan and his scouts, we’ll return to San Carlos, live in the dirt, and beg for bread and blankets until we can stand it no more.
“Sieber has many scouts. They led Nantan Lupan straight to our camps. Why does Sieber ask you to come when he has many others?”
I saw his eyes even in the moonlight shadows, narrow and questioning, watching to see if I spoke true.
“I have given my word I will not say.”
He nodded. “Grandson keeps his word. Enjuh. I know your Power with the rifle. Sieber knows your Power. I’m a chief because I know, if an arrow fits the bow, it will shoot true and straight a long way.
“Now, hear me. Beware of Soldado Fiero. He does not keep his word. Beware of Geronimo. He thinks the White Mountain scouts betrayed us, and he’s willing to die to send them to the Happy Land. He sets a trap for tomorrow night at the dancing. Jelikine, his father-in-law, told him not to do what he plans. He will do it anyway. There will be blood. Watch your back. That is all I have to say.”
I waved my palm horizontal to the ground in gratitude. “I owe you much, Grandfather. Enjuh.”
He grunted as he slid back on his blanket, put his hand on my shoulder, and pushed up to stand. I heard the leaves and twigs fall from his blanket as he shook it before throwing it over his shoulders, and then Nana vanished into the night, leaving me to think over his warnings.
When the moon began to fall in the west, Haskehagola took my place on the shelf. I made my way down to the camp in the cold night air and lay down wrapped in my blanket with my feet toward our fire pit to warm them by its coals.
Shadows pointing west were long, the sun sending spears of light to the dark places, and mists still floated on the cold air. The camp was beginning to stir when Sieber sent word for me to come to his fire. He poured me coffee in a metal Blue Coat cup, and we sat down on a log.
“In three days, we’ll leave here to return to San Carlos. Nantan Lupan will return on the east side of the mountains rather than go the way we came. He doesn’t want to risk the Nakai-yes attacking the Chiricahua and will use the mountains to hide them as long as he can. Tzoe says there are springs with enough water for one-day camps along the trails on the east side.
“I have reason not to trust Soldado Fiero. I want you to watch him close, especially around Tzoe. Do you understand the meaning of my words?”
I nodded. “I understand. Now hear me. I do not trust Geronimo. Don’t let the White Mountains dance with the Chiricahuas tonight.”
Sieber looked at me from under his brows, frowning, and then nodded. “A scout, Ja’ndezi (Long Ears), died this morning from a snake bite. There’ll be no dancing tonight.”
“Enjuh.”
Early the next day, Geronimo and the Chiricahua chiefs told Nantan Lupan their people wouldn’t answer their signals to come in because they thought the scouts tried to fool them. They asked for permission
to go and gather their people and for the young men to gather all the livestock they could find and bring it in from canyons where they had hidden it. Nantan Lupan let them go, but told them he marched for San Carlos in three days. Geronimo told him he would not leave the land of the Nakai-yes until he had all his people gathered together. Nantan Lupan said for them to meet him at the mouth of Guadalupe Canyon.
CHAPTER 27
SOLDADO FIERO
After Geronimo and the Chiricahua chiefs left the camp to look for their People, cattle, and horses, I sat with Tzoe, Dastine, and Much Water at John Rope’s fire. Tzoe told us about the trail north along the east side of the Blue Mountains. He said it was long but not as steep as the one we used to come in from the south and west. I sat against a log as we smoked, talked, and listened, and I watched Soldado Fiero at a nearby fire with other scouts. I noticed he glanced at us often, while Tzoe drew in the dust to show us the way he remembered the trail across the mountains toward Carretas.
Tzoe said, “We sit in this canyon here near the beginnings of Río Bavispe. Up the ridge on the other side of the rio here, there’s a trail that runs north along the west side of the ridges through junipers and a few tall pines and then turns east through a high pass and back around to the east side of the ridges, which begin bending toward the east away from this rio. The trail stays close to the ridge tops, crosses, winds around some deep canyons, and comes out on the eastern llano at springs near the village of Carretas. From there, we can follow the Río Janos around to the Nakai-yi border and then west into Guadalupe Canyon and come out at San Bernardino Springs.
“I think I remember how the trail goes, but I have not seen it for many seasons. Nantan Lupan told Geronimo and the chiefs he moves slowly with the People. There are many women and children. They’ll need water for themselves and the ponies and mules. All the supplies they make now will not be enough because they are slow. We’ll need to hunt every day and find water for the camps along the way. Al Sieber says he thinks there’ll be nearly four hundred Apaches returning to San Carlos. They’re our brothers. We must take good care of them.”
Chiricahua women worked hard packing mescal, dried meat, dried berries, roots, potatoes, and fruit, and nuts. Warriors, who had not gone out with Geronimo and the chiefs, gathered scattered ponies, mules, and cattle nearby into manageable groups, determined which ones they thought could make the long walk across the rough country back to San Carlos, and slaughtered the rest. Blue Coats cleaned their weapons, studied maps, and worked with packers sorting out what to leave and what to take back. Scouts stayed by their fires and, in the shade, cleaned their guns, sharpened their knives, arranged with the mule packers to have the booty they had taken from the Chiricahua loaded on the mule pack trains, and helped the Chiricahuas when they asked. I saw Soldado Fiero, like Tzoe, had taken little from the Chiricahuas but was always close by when anyone needed help with heavy baskets and parfleches filled with food for the trail or family goods.
I watched and helped Tzoe for the next two days. He was everywhere, spending time with the Chiricahuas and doing his work as a scout sergeant. It seemed that where Tzoe was, there was Soldado Fiero, always within sight. Given what Nana and Sieber told me, like Coyote, I watched and waited.
On the third morning after the chiefs and many of their warriors left, the canyon camp lay covered with mists off the river. The coming sun was fast driving it away when I returned to the fire of John Rope from my morning bath and swim. Much Water and Dastine were taking their turn cooking for us. They had pieces of meat speared on the end of sticks stuck in the ground and tilted over the fire; the smell of the meat’s grease dripping in the fire made my belly growl like Wolf, and soon we were cutting the meat off the sticks and feeling its good, savory juices run down our throats.
It was a good morning to be alive. I expected Tzoe to come to our fire and tell us what the Blue Coat officers wanted from us that day. I looked toward the place where the Blue Coat officers and scout sergeants usually met and saw one or two men lounging there, but not Tzoe.
I said, “Tzoe doesn’t come to tell us what the Blue Coat chiefs want from us today?”
Much Water said, “Ummph. He comes a short time while you swim. Says be ready. Nantan Lupan may go today if enough Chiricahuas are ready. Tzoe says he goes to hunt. Maybe finds big black tail deer the Chiricahuas will eat, maybe makes wives happy again so he can sleep inside wickiup instead of by scout fires. Maybe Tzoe needs mo’ betta wives than those two.”
I glanced toward the fire where Soldado Fiero slept. His blanket lay rolled up, ready to go. His friends ate their morning meal, but Soldado Fiero wasn’t there. The meat I had just eaten turned sour in my belly. I had to find Tzoe quick.
“Does Tzoe say where he hunts? I saw big deer back up the canyon at our last camp.”
“Ummph. Tzoe follows the río to high places. He says big deer go there.”
“I want to see the río in high places. I’ll find him and help him with his meat.”
“Ummph. Don’t look like a deer. You might not come back.”
I followed the river upstream. There was only a little water that flowed between deep pools, long stretches of sand, and places of rushing water where stones of all sizes had collected during big runoffs in the hard rains that came with the Season of Large Leaves. A little upstream from the main camp where the women bathed, I found tracks winding round the pools and in the long reaches of sand along the edge. The distance between individual footprints said the track maker was casually walking, occasionally pausing to look back or to survey the canyon sides. The tracks didn’t go far before the stream forked, one stream up into the high mountains to the northwest and the other to the southeast. The tracks turned toward the high mountains.
A second set of tracks came from the junipers, where the river split, and followed the ones I followed, stopping behind boulders when the first set stopped before continuing. The river wound through a canyon in dark, morning shadows being chased away by arrows of light shot from the rising sun. They struck rough, black canyon cliffs streaked in reds and grays, making splashes of gold on the canyon sides. It was cool and calm down by the burbling water, its big, still pool surfaces black, perfect mirrors as the light grew.
I walked in the shadows and listened for calls or flights from startled birds, but there were none. Looking upstream across a stretch of sand between two pools, I saw only one set of tracks. The second set of tracks stopped behind a tumbled pile of boulders and then disappeared. I studied the brush and exposed ground even with the boulders on both sides of the stream until I saw weeds on the west side of the stream, which had been pushed down earlier, slowly bending back straight.
Three or four hundred yards further upstream, the riverbed made two sharp left turns around a ridge before winding north again. Soldado Fiero must have run over the ridge to get in front of Tzoe where he could ambush him when Tzoe followed the river around the ridge. I could run forward and hope to catch Tzoe in time to warn him about Soldado Fiero’s ambush, or I could run over the ridge, find Soldado Fiero, and stop his ambush. Time was against me. I had to take the fastest way to stop Tzoe’s murder. I chose to find Soldado Fiero and began the hard run up the ridge.
Juniper sparsely covered the western side of the ridge, but high shelves of rock I had to run around made the climb to the ridge top slower than I had thought, and the high mountain air made it hard to breathe as I fought against weary weights settling in my bones and muscles. I made the top of the ridge and sank to one knee to let my wind come back. I looked around but saw no sign of any recent passersby. I tried to look down in the bend of the river between the two turns where I hoped Tzoe was, but the ridge end blocked my view of the streambed.
I stayed low and worked my way over the top of the ridge until I could see the river pools far below me. The river coming off the second left turn around the ridge ran straight until it made a right turn up into a high-walled canyon reaching for the top of the mountains. At the place where
the river curved into a new canyon stood a thick stand of junipers. For someone looking downstream, it was a good place to hide, watch, and wait for an ambush victim. I didn’t see any signs of Soldado Fiero, but I knew he must be there. I didn’t see Tzoe coming up the river. My heart pounded from the hard climbing and knowing I had to move fast or Tzoe would die.
I crept along, just below the ridgeline, until I crossed the disturbed grass and earth Soldado Fiero had made going down to the juniper stand at the river’s edge. Far downstream from the junipers, I saw the tiny figure of Tzoe. I guessed he would be over two hundred yards in range from Soldado Fiero’s rifle when he came into view. Since Soldado Fiero planned an ambush, I knew he would wait until he had a shot he couldn’t miss, a range less than a hundred, or maybe even fifty, yards.
I scrambled along the side of the ridge through the thick junipers as Tzoe leisurely walked up the river, stopping often to study the sandy banks for tracks or looking up the sides of the canyon. I crossed Soldado Fiero’s trail and ran on from the ridge until I was almost directly above the stand of junipers where I guessed he waited. The junipers and other brush gave me good cover as I came down the ridge. Still, I worried that Tzoe might see me and give me away, ensuring we’d both be shot.
A hundred yards from Soldado Fiero’s grove of junipers, I found a place that gave me a clear line of sight to them and some protection if bullets flew in my direction. Tzoe, in a very dangerous position, would come within a hundred yards of the grove. I jerked out the Shináá Cho and studied the dark shadows where I thought Soldado Fiero waited. He was not there. Desperate, I searched other places under the junipers, but he wasn’t there, either.
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