by Cotton Smith
“Fear, mostly, I think,” he finally said. “Fear of somebody different than you. Negroes. Mexicans. Indians. Irish. It’s easier to go along with others than to try to understand somebody different. Or help him.”
“Aye, I be thinking they would’ve killed him if ye hadn’t stepped in.” Sean looked again at Crawfish.
“And you,” Crawfish said. “Bad things happen when good men just stand by and let them happen. Remember that.” He glanced down at the resting gun. “That’s what Vin is doing. Trying to save some friends from something bad. From white man’s fear. And greed, I reckon.”
“Is he going to be all right? We haven’t—”
“Vin Lockhart is going to be all right. He is a plainsman with few matching his skills,” Crawfish interrupted with more confidence in his voice than he felt. “What be the first thing ye said to hisself, the Indian? Was it…‘Mique wush tagooven’?”
“Very good, Sean. Very good.”
“What be its meaning?” Sean reached the front door first, opened and held it for Crawfish to enter.
“Well, thank you, my boy. I said, ‘Hello my friend.’ The Ute language is a Shoshonian dialect. Ah, it’s similar to the Shoshoni language. Maybe others are, too. I understand the Comanche language is also.” Crawfish stepped inside the house. “You know they originally came from around here. Live mostly in the region of Texas now, however.”
“How ye be knowin’ such?”
“Well, back when I was prospecting—in the hills,” Crawfish said, pursing his lips and frowning to help his recollection. “That was before Vin joined me. Once in a while, a Ute or two would visit. I learned some words to make them feel welcome. It was nice having company.”
“How ye be knowin’ about the Comanche? Did they visit, too?” Sean closed the door behind them.
Crawfish chuckled as he pulled the gun from his waistband and laid it on the big chair. “No. Glad they didn’t. Those boys are something fierce, I hear. I heard it from a Texican in the Silver Queen. You can learn a lot in a saloon—if you just listen.”
As he passed his mentor, Sean announced proudly, “Me be knowin’ some Irish. Words from the old country.” He swallowed and said, “Dia duit. That means ‘hello.’ And Sean is ainmdom. ‘Sean is my name.’ And.. and ‘Go raibh maith agat.’ Thank you.” He licked his lips. “Me know more. Just canna be bringin’ them to me mind ri’t now.”
“Webster-and-whistles, that’s terrific, Sean. You have an ear for words. That will take you far.” Crawfish studied the gun carried casually in the boy’s hand at his side.
“Thanks to ye, teachin’ me their meanin’.”
“You’re most welcome. It’s my plea sure. You’re a good student. Like Vin was.” The red-haired businessman held out his hand. “Why don’t you give me that gun and I’ll put them back.”
“Aye. ’Tis as if Vin hisself were with us, him seeing that these guns be ready an’ all.” Sean handed over the gun and headed directly to the kitchen.
Crawfish thought about that for a moment, then laid the open-top revolver next to the Colt. He would put them away later. Having them close at hand might be best right now.
When Crawfish caught up with him, Sean asked if the older man was worried about the four men coming back. Crawfish indicated he was not, but decided to himself that he would start carrying a pistol and be more careful about his comings and goings. They both began working on breakfast.
The subject of Falling Leaf’s safety came as Sean laid fresh bacon slices into the frying pan. “Falling Leaf, be herself safe, Crawfish? Here, I mean.”
“I won’t lie to you, Sean. It is troubling. The Custer tragedy has a lot of folks just plain scared. You saw what some people will try to do.” Crawfish studied the two eggs in his hand, selected from the basket on the counter, and laid them aside. Sean had gathered them earlier from the small chicken coop in the backyard. “But she wouldn’t last a day riding. Draw-a-deuce, who knows where her tribe even is? Or what agency?”
“Should we be takin’ herself to the ranch? Vin said she be good with horses.”
Settling on two more eggs, Crawfish reminded the boy of why he had told the lie about her leaving. Sean nodded, keeping his attention on the popping meat. They had been careful about keeping her hidden since then. When she went outside, mostly in the backyard, she was dressed in white woman’s clothes and wearing a scarf around her head, carrying her pipe bag. If asked, Sean was to say they had hired a cook. He hadn’t been asked. It had occurred to Crawfish that she could stay out at the ranch, but that seemed quite unfair to the Rhymers; they were excited about the new venture and their involvement in it, but having an Indian live with them was a stretch. For anyone. Except Lockhart—and now, them.
“Do ye think she be able to fire that old wheelgun? The one she be carryin’ in her bag?” Sean asked.
“I don’t know, Sean. It probably wouldn’t fire. Who knows how long those cartridges have been in there,” Crawfish said.
“Aye. Those French guns be used in the great War between the States, me hear.” Sean returned the frying pan, filled with fresh bacon, to the stove.
“Yes. I think so,” Crawfish said. “There were different kinds of center-fire revolvers from Europe. Britain. Belgium. Spain even. Many mountain men carried them; many travelers west, too. That Le Faucheux revolver was first made back some twenty, twenty-five years ago. The gun was ahead of its time.”
“Where do ye think she be getting such a gun?” The young boy studied the popping meat and pushed two slices apart with a long fork.
Leaving the eggs for later, Crawfish explained what Lockhart had told him about her escape as he spooned fresh coffee grounds into the coffeepot.
In the middle of turning over the sizzling bacon with the fork, Sean declared, “Fir. That’s ‘men’ in Irish. Canna be recallin’ what ‘women’ be.” He smiled and added, “Oh, and Le do thoil, that be ‘please.’”
Crawfish muttered his approval, but his mind was on Vin Lockhart. It never got too far from worry. Men were dying where Lockhart was riding. Men of white and red. He turned to see the Irish lad lift a piece of hot bacon from the pan with his fork and lay it aside. The businessman smiled again. He knew what that was to become. A tribute to the Great Spirit. Before every meal, they had taken a small morsel outside, given it to the earth and said a quiet prayer. The tribute was really to Vin Lockhart, but it was important to both of them. It was Crawfish’s idea for each to say a silent prayer that their friend be safe. Sean had embraced the idea with relish.
Over a breakfast of fresh bacon, fried eggs, hot steaming coffee and thick slices of bread covered with jam, they discussed plans for the coming day. Sean was eager to share yesterday’s horse-ranch events once more. He had told Crawfish about them last night. Twice. He and Harry had worked four geldings and two mares so all of their horses now had at least three “saddles.” Actually, Sean had done all the riding, but Harry had helped with the saddling. Harry thought the geldings would be prime for selling in groups of ten each. They planned on starting another round of training today. Sean was especially eager to ride Magic and was excited that four of the mares were now carrying his foals.
After complimenting him on the work done, Crawfish asked about progress on the house being constructed at the ranch for Lockhart and his friends to live in. He had hired some men to begin work on it two weeks ago. Almost on a whim. But he had been too busy with the grand opening of the finished hotel to get out to the ranch since then. The Black Horse Hotel was fully transformed as planned and customers were talking about the restaurant in glowing terms, expecially the fine cuisine. And the orchestra.
Sean’s face showed his concern before he stated it. “W-What if he not be finding them, Crawfish? W-What if the soldiers be findin’ them first? Didn’t yourself be readin’ much about how angry the soldiers be…because of General Custer? An’ the great American president hisself? W-What if…”
Crawfish’s face was controlled emotion, but he
was fast losing the battle to contain his worry. He took a drink of coffee and nearly choked. He understood the boy’s emotion; Sean had gone from thinking he must kill Lockhart to avenge his Irish friends to seeing the man as almost a father. Crawfish guessed that made him an uncle, sort of. A visit to the cemetery hadn’t come up for almost a month. The last time Sean had done so, the boy had commented afterward how little he knew of the Irishmen, not even their full names. Headstones with “Lightning Murphy” and “Big Mike” and the dates of their deaths had reinforced that fact. It was interesting that the boy hadn’t even commented on the two revolvers once belonging to his Irish mentors.
“All we can do, Sean, is keep praying,” he finally concluded. “Just keep praying.”
Sean stared at his plate and tried to eat a last piece of fried egg, but it wouldn’t go down.
Falling Leaf entered the room without a word. Both turned toward her, meeting her sudden appearance with forced greeting.
“Hau,” both said, having learned from Lockhart that the simple expression covered everything from hello to good morning to good evening.
She was dressed in a white woman’s dress Crawfish had purchased for her. At her neck was the fine choker she had worn when Lockhart found her. Barefoot, her gray hair hung about her shoulders. She had gained weight staying with them and had even learned some English—and taught them some Lakotan. This morning her face was taut; her eyes, bright with fear. At her side, the Le Faucheux revolver was held in her right hand.
Crawfish was puzzled at the sight of the gun. He knew she had been carrying it with her when she went outside, but he had never seen it out of the buckskin bag. Why had she felt the need to have it now? Did she hear the commotion outside earlier? Was this her way of preparing to help?
In a mixture of broken English and Lakotan, she told about having a nightmare and asked about Lockhart. “Hanble sica mitawa. Bad dream…Lok-hart. Kocizapi metanka. Big fight. He hurt. Tookiyaya hwo?…where he…Lok-hart?” She held up the gun as if this was an explanation of its appearance.
A tear found its way down Sean’s cheek and he looked away.
Crawfish didn’t know what to say. A few days before the Custer massacre she had told them about a dream she had of blue riders being killed by a great many Indian warriors. He thought it was just that, a bad dream. Now this.
“Tookiyaya hwo?…where he…Lok-hart? Where Wanagi Yanka?” she asked again, staring at both.
The corner of his mouth twitching, Crawfish reminded her that she knew Lockhart was going to be gone for many days—trying to say it in her language took much longer than his usual quick expression. She studied him without changing her expression.
A knock at the front door surprised all of them.
“Me get it.” Sean jumped from his chair.
“Let me, son. It might be them. Again,” Crawfish cautioned and rose, but Sean had already gone to the front window and peeked outside. He turned back and proclaimed, “It’s Ms. Bacon.”
“Mattie? Hop-a-bunny!” Crawfish said as he limped toward the door. “You know what she wants.”
“Aye. Herself be wantin’ Vin Lockhart.” Sean’s grin swept across this face.
Crawfish nodded and frowned. “Yeah, guess so—and he doesn’t want her. I’ve got no news about him either.” He shook his head. “Wish she would get the hint.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
A dream brought smells of sweetgrass, juniper needles and ground cedar gently to Vin Lockhart’s exhausted mind. In the otherworld of sleep, the anger of his wounds was gone. A warmth spread through him like a peaceful song. A small fire built from the materials he smelled was a few feet away. Above his head was a sacred circle made of curved branches and rawhide strings, with both the tail and breast feathers of the great eagle dangling freely. The large circle was suspended by a leather strip from a long stick jammed into the ground. Tied to the base of the circle was a killed badger; his slit belly emptied of its entrails revealing only congealed blood.
Now, through the dreamworld, Lockhart could see his face in the reflection from the blood’s hard surface. The reflected image was that of Lockhart as an old man. A good sign, he remembered. He would live a long time, according to Stone-Dreamer. Surely, his adopted father was near.
In his dream, the Denver businessman’s wounds were tightly bound with white soft bandages. A scent of medicine underneath the wrappings wafted into his awareness. Not sweet like cedar or mapled syrup; more like the smell of just-cut hay. The muscles in his right arm tingled; he had moved it without pain. Near his head was a tin bowl of crushed willow bark, a special medicine to be taken for pain. He recognized the bowl; it had been on his pack. He recognized the potion, too; Stone-Dreamer had used its curing powders on others.
On a spit over the fire was a roasting grouse. The delightful aroma danced over the odors of the kindling. A sack of roots for cooking was a few feet away. Around him were four slender sticks, stuck into the ground. Tied to each stick were buckskin bags of tobacco and willow bark, offerings to Wakantanka.
He felt his face; it was fully painted. From somewhere a mirror appeared in his hand and he saw the paint was red for good luck, with sacred white stripes over the darker crimson. His body was painted with light blue hailstone markings for protection. None of them touched the prideful chest scars of his long-ago Sun Dance ordeal; the sign of a great warrior.
A spotted robe of a young mountain lion skin lay across his legs and stomach. Red porcupine quillwork, a symbol of magic power, decorated the robe. Attached to the tiny doeskin medicine bag he wore around his neck was a stuffed chickadee, a hunk of shed buffalo hair dyed red, and four panther claws. Instinctively, his fingers felt for Young Evening’s choker necklace at his throat. It was gone. In its place was his old warrior choker. His sawed-off shotgun quiver was gone and, instead, hung a small parfleche holding precious bullets, a mixture of brass cartridges, copper, paper, linen and skin cartridges, and a pouch of powder and loose caps and balls. Just like he wore when he was an Oglala warrior. At his side was the decorated Henry carbine he had carried then, not his Winchester. His war belt carried a tomahawk and knife, not pistols.
He sat up, looked around and saw Touches-Horses. “Is that you, kola?”
“Aiiee, you were not easy to find. Took all of us to track you here. A strange place, a sacred place I think.”
“Well, it wasn’t anything I did. That horse you trained carried me here. I don’t even know where I am.”
Nearby, his dun was transformed into a fiery black horse, adorned with the markings of battle medicine; his own shield was encased and hanging against the horse’s flank. Feathers were tied to its mane and tail. Behind the fine mount was his dead pack horse, only it was alive and grazing.
Touches-Horses smiled and Lockhart looked around at the other Indians. All were from his old tribe; Thunder Lance, Bear-Heart, Spotted Horse and Sings-With-Stones, the four who had come to ask him to find his former brother-in-law a year ago. Even Black Fire was there, looking worried. He didn’t see Stone-Dreamer, but a growing fog had probably hidden him from his view. Now he sensed someone moving within the thick mist, coming toward him. He was certain it was Crazy Horse and not his adopted father. Where was Stone-Dreamer? Where was Morning Bird?
“None would leave without finding you, kola,” the Lakotan horse trainer said. “I told them to go on, but they would not. They wanted to find you.”
“I came for you. And Stone-Dreamer. And Morning Bird, if she wants to come.”
“She waits for you, my brother.”
With an explosion of pent-up emotion, they grasped each other’s forearm in the traditional warrior’s salute, then hugged each other heartily. Within the fog, Lockhart saw the tips of Oglala lodges and the shape of a man still advancing. The shape was that of Stone-Dreamer.
“I will wait for you at the horses,” Touches-Horses said. “The others want you to lead them against the evil wasicun.”
“Is that why you are painte
d for war?” Lockhart saw, for the first time, that his former brother-in-law—and all of the warriors—were adorned with their war-medicine markings.
“Yes, kola. We are ready for you to lead us.”
Lockhart looked into the mirror and saw that his face and body paint had changed into the war medicine he wore as Panther-Strikes. White paw marks, red claw lines and yellow lightning bolts. Across his nose and cheeks was a single line of dried blood, Young Evening’s blood. He had placed it there before going after the Shoshoni war party that had killed her. When his finger felt the mark, it became moist and dripping.
“I-I-I don’t know if I can, Touches-Horses, I-I-I am so weak. I thought I was going to die.”
The fog grew ever thicker; its fingers wrapped around Crazy Horse and pushed away. In his place was Stone-Dreamer. The holy man was wounded. In the same places Lockhart had been wounded against the Cheyenne. Stone-Dreamer held out his hand and vanished.
In the same moment, Touches-Horses transformed into a vague shape, then into a rail-thin white man wearing a woolen jacket with filled pockets, a worn slouch hat and smoking a pipe.
“He’s alive, Bill. Sure nuff. Got some lead in him, I reckon. Lost a lot o’ blood,” the white man said without removing his pipe.
All of the dreamworld Indians—and the Oglala medicine, paint, weapons, clothing, and sacred objects—disappeared as well. Lockhart’s wounds were as they had been, angry and crusted with dried blood. The glorious smells of roasting grouse and sweetgrass were overtaken by the acrid odor of sweat, horse and tobaccoed breath.
Lockhart stirred from a sleep that wouldn’t leave quickly, shedding the world of dreams as his mind fought to locate reality. Instinctively, he reached for the rifle in his lap as his left boot clanged against the dropped coffeepot.
“Whoa, mister. You’re safe.” The voice was gruff, but reassuring.
The thick-whiskered scout put a hand on Lockhart’s shoulder. “Yur with friends. We’re with the Fifth Cavalry.” He smelled of leather thick with camp smoke, stale sweat and horse; his hot breath was laced with pipe tobacco.