Buffalo Trail

by Jeff Guinn

  Bat waved his hand dismissively. “In a few weeks, C.M., maybe a month at most, these hills will be crawling with buffs and echoing with the sound of gunfire. A few beers ahead of that won’t cause either of us to go financially amiss.”

  “I need every cent, Bat.”

  “Ah, you have no idea of the amount of money we’re about to come into.”

  Still upset by the snub from Billy, Bat stalked rather than strolled the half mile back into camp. McLendon followed at a more leisurely pace, thinking again about Gabrielle. Now that construction was almost complete, some of the teamsters were heading back to Dodge City in the morning. Charlie Rath would be waiting there to load their wagons with his own supplies prior to setting up shop in newly built Adobe Walls. The teamsters would carry letters to mail in Kansas, too, and bring back any missives addressed to denizens of the camp. Perhaps there’d be a letter coming from Gabrielle—she’d had time now to receive the latest one from him and decide how to respond. The slightest hint of further encouragement would help McLendon get through what he knew would be a summer of hard, messy work.

  • • •

  IT WAS TWO FULL WEEKS before Billy Dixon and his three crewmen returned. They reported that they’d ridden east and encountered a few stray buffs here and there, but not the main herd.

  “It’s early yet, only April,” Billy said. “They’ll surely show by month’s end, or the beginning of May at the latest.”

  Everyone at Adobe Walls was restless. They did some hunting, held shooting competitions, which Billy Dixon invariably won, and played cards. Since nobody had much money—and wouldn’t until the great herd arrived and sales of hides could commence—they played for markers to be redeemed at a later date. A few of the men ran up considerable debts, a hundred dollars or more. Markers were also used to purchase food and dry goods at the Myers and Leonard store, sit-down meals prepared in the store mess hall by Old Man Keeler, and libations served in Hanrahan’s saloon. Crew skinners and cooks drank liquor, but to McLendon’s surprise most of the hide men limited themselves to beer and an odd concoction known as “bitters.” Masterson explained that bitters, named for a somewhat unpleasant taste, was believed to promote good digestion and bowel health. Curious, McLendon squandered two bits for a glass and nearly gagged on the first sip. So far as he could tell, besides tasting bad, bitters had the kick of pure alcohol.

  Inevitably, there were physical flare-ups. Brick Bond got into several near brawls, which were broken up by Billy Dixon, Jim Hanrahan, and a few of the other men. Mike McCabe and Dutch Henry Borne had a fistfight over who was first in line for a rabbit hash breakfast served up by Old Man Keeler. Bat Masterson, who’d been so sunny-natured back in Dodge City, now acted touchy much of the time. He found insult in the most innocuous comments, and once when McLendon kidded him about his black mood, Bat challenged him to fight right then and there.

  “What the hell, Bat, I’m your friend and you know it,” McLendon protested. “Why in the world would you want to fight me?”

  “I really don’t,” Bat admitted. “But ever since Billy put me down a few weeks back, ever’body’s been treating me like the camp buffoon. I won’t stand for it.”

  “That’s foolishness. It’s true the others like to josh with you, but they did that back in Dodge, too, and you always joshed right back.”

  “It’s just that I want to prove myself here,” Bat said. “I don’t want to be the goddamn kid brother anymore.”

  McLendon patted Masterson’s shoulder. “You’ll feel better when the herd arrives and there’s plenty of action to keep you occupied.”

  “Well, I wish those damn buffs would get here. This waiting is tedious.”

  • • •

  IN EARLY MAY, Charlie Rath came down from Dodge at the head of a dozen wagons loaded with dry goods. He brought with him a dozen employees, including a Swede named Andy Johnson who would be in charge of the Rath store, and also William and Hannah Olds. William Olds’s cough was more wracking than ever, and his wife’s nerves were as shaky as McLendon remembered. Rath hired members of the hunting crews to build him a sod structure about the same size as Jim Hanrahan’s saloon. Since the men had nothing else to do, it was completed in three days. Its attic-like storage area, which included glass windows commanding a view of the meadow, could be reached only by ladder. The Oldses slept up in the attic to preserve Hannah Olds’s privacy. As the only woman in Adobe Walls, she was afforded great courtesies by all of the men. She was always addressed as “Mrs. Olds,” never “Hannah.” They went out of their way to ease her obvious discomfort in such rough surroundings. They built a spacious outhouse so, unlike the men, Mrs. Olds wouldn’t have to relieve herself in the brush. A pregnant mare gave birth, and the skinner who owned her gave the tottery colt to Mrs. Olds as a pet. A special stall for the foal was built in the Myers and Leonard stable, and in the mornings and evenings Mrs. Olds went there to feed it by hand.

  A well was also dug just inside one of the walls. That meant, during inclement weather or in the event of a siege, it would be possible for anyone in the Rath store to get all the water they needed without going outside.

  Once his store was ready to open for business, Rath and Andy Johnson took Fred Leonard aside for a private chat. The hunters and their crews had hoped for store price wars, with each trying to undercut what the other charged for popular goods. But what happened was the opposite. Prices in both stores were identical—and, in almost every case, higher than what had been charged for the same items back in Dodge. A can of tomatoes that went for thirty cents in Kansas cost forty in both the Rath and Myers and Leonard stores. The hide men and their crews were accustomed to spending a dollar for each pound of tobacco they smoked in their clay pipes. Now the charge was a dollar twenty-five.

  “That ain’t fair, Fred,” Frenchy told Leonard. “With my own ears, I heard you promise back in Dodge that you’d keep prices down here the same.”

  “I don’t deny that,” Leonard said. “But what I failed to realize, until Andy Johnson and Charlie Rath pointed it out, was that I got to factor in shipping costs now. These teamsters charge exceeding high for every wagonload of goods they haul. There’s where the extra few cents comes in. Surely you can understand.”

  “I understand that I’ll have one or two less pipefuls to smoke a day,” Frenchy groused. “There better be a damn sizable herd of buffs about to arrive here. I’ll need the extra money to buy your outrageously priced tobacco and make you a rich man by so doing.”

  Almost everyone in camp ran up extensive bills at the stores and saloons. One of the few who didn’t was McLendon. He only imbibed at the saloon when someone else was standing drinks, and his meals consisted of the cheapest fare available, usually crackers and cheese sliced from a mighty wheel in Myers and Leonard’s. Hannah Olds couldn’t give him occasional free suppers as she had in Dodge. Charlie Rath watched everything like a hawk, and when he went back to Dodge after two weeks in Adobe Walls, Andy Johnson exhibited the same watchfulness.

  The days dragged, growing increasingly warmer. Some of the men gladly volunteered to help when Andy Johnson added a small bastion to the corner of the Rath store. Inside the bastion, they dug another well, so that water was available indoors as well as from the outside well and nearby freshwater springs. Billy insisted on everyone taking turns on guard duty at night, but eventually even he conceded that there didn’t seem to be any Indians to guard against.

  “Damndest thing,” Billy mused. “Still, I want one or two sets of eyes alert ever night. Indians got to be out there somewhere. They can’t all have moved on from the region.”

  Most mornings, some of the hide men rode out, most of them going southeast in hopes of catching the first glimpse of the approaching herd. A few went in other directions, hunting or else simply avoiding camp tedium. During the third week in May, there was considerable commotion when almost twenty men rode into Adobe Walls. Their le
ader was J. W. Mooar, who announced that anyone who wanted was welcome to leave the camp and come with him.

  “The buffs may come any day now, but it appears to me that you’ve been too quick to pick this location,” Mooar said. “The main herd might pass by close, but then again it might not. You may sit here all summer and not see a single buffalo. My boys and I, on the other hand, will remain mobile and find and hunt them wherever they may be.”

  Most of the Adobe Walls hide men told Mooar that they felt fine right where they were. Mooar made disparaging remarks about the camp—“It looks like the ground took a couple of craps and those things you call stores and a saloon resulted.” Then he bought his crew members and anyone else who was thirsty some beer in the saloon. As everyone drank, Mooar repeated that all the “Dixon” hands willing to come with him instead would be welcome. When he and his men rode out an hour later, four of the Adobe Walls contingent—two skinners, a cook, and hide man Buck Firth—went with them.

  Afterward, Billy Dixon, Fred Leonard, Andy Johnson, and Jim Hanrahan conferred, then called the camp together. They began by offering everyone another free beer.

  “We can’t have attrition,” Hanrahan said after passing out the bottles. “Our best chance for not only success but safety rests in staying together. Nobody here should be so green as to conclude that there are no Indians about just because we haven’t seen any. Now, we’ve all allowed ourselves to get into quarrelsome moods, and that has to cease. It’s going to, starting now. Anyone who absolutely wants to go, well, pack up. Some of the teamsters are heading back to Dodge in the morning to fetch additional supplies, and you can travel with them if you like, or else you can set out on your own and hope to join up with J. W. Mooar or the Cators or whoever. Everyone else, we’re going to liven spirits by giving ourselves a few days of festivity, with all kinds of tests of skill. Fred, Andy, and me are going to put up some prizes, tobacco and knives and such. Right now, drink down your beer, and for the rest of the night the price per bottle is reduced from fifteen cents to ten.”

  • • •

  THE NEXT TWO DAYS were much more pleasant. Everyone enjoyed the games, especially the footraces and the marksmanship events. In one of those, Billy Dixon even lost to Bermuda Carlyle, who shouted with joy after his victory and proudly accepted a pint of bitters as his prize. Old Man Keeler and Hannah Olds served up especially tasty stews, offered at half price, and at night Mirkle Jones and his fiddle had everyone dancing. Being the only woman in camp, Mrs. Olds was everyone’s choice as a partner. For a while, she stopped acting nervous and spun and giggled like a young girl. Only afterward, as they lay in their blankets under wagons or else on the floors of the stores and saloon, did most of them remember that it was now late May, and still the buffalo had not come.

  NINETEEN

  It took Quanah some time to set the newest aspect of his plan in motion. First, he and Isatai had to convince their own Quahadi camp. Bull Bear and the other older men were especially stubborn, but eventually they gave in. Then Quanah and Isatai had to travel to all the other places where bands of the People camped—the Yamparika, the Nokoni, the Penateka, and the Kotsoteka, and also those among the People who had taken refuge on the white man’s reservation. In each village they heard the same objection, had to respond with the same logic: No, of course Kiowa and Cheyenne aren’t the equals of the People. But we have to make them think that we believe they are. It’s the only way they’ll join us in the fight that Buffalo Hump’s spirit wants us to make.

  Afterward, Quanah thought that if he’d been by himself, he could never have made all of them see the sense of it. Though he still considered Isatai to be a pompous fraud, the fat man proved to be an invaluable ally. Drawing himself up, exhibiting a sort of thoughtful dignity Quanah would have previously considered beyond him, Isatai gravely lectured about the importance of obeying the spirits, and that ultimately made the difference. In the end, they had what they needed—an agreement among all the scattered camps of the People to convene in one place at the end of the current moon cycle and, once there, to arrange things in the way that the spirit of Buffalo Hump required.

  And that was just the first step. Next, Quanah and Isatai traveled to see the Kiowa and Cheyenne, including again the members of those tribes living on the reservations. They invited them to join the People at their great convocation, which would be held along the banks of the wide red river dividing the places whites called Oklahoma and Texas. Everyone greeted this news with surprise: never in living memory had all of the Comanche gathered together in one place. But when they inquired as to why this was happening, Quanah was coy. Something special would take place, he promised, something that would prove that the People now accepted the Kiowa and Cheyenne as equals, and would even after the whites were finally driven from Indian land.

  Lone Wolf and Satanta of the Kiowa were doubtful. They said that the Comanche would never consider anyone to be full partners. There must be some trick involved. But Quanah and Isatai persisted: They should come and see, then decide. Mamanti, the Kiowa medicine man, howled at his leaders to stay away from the Comanche gathering, but in the end curiosity overcame them.

  “We will come, but we make you no promises,” Lone Wolf told Quanah. “And we’ll expect to be your guests in matters of food.”

  “All of our men are out hunting,” Quanah promised. “There will be every kind of meat except for buffalo. The herd is late this season. But the feasting will please our Kiowa friends.”

  Lone Wolf said that the Kiowa would be there, and Quanah and Isatai departed for the camp of Gray Beard and the Cheyenne. It was a long ride, several days, and Quanah spent it alternately imagining the great battle with the whites and fantasizing about rolling in his blankets with Mochi. Isatai, as usual, closed his eyes and hummed as he rode. By now Quanah was so used to the annoying sound that he could block it out.

  The Cheyenne camp was still in the same place, but larger than when the two Quahadi men had last visited. After Gray Beard greeted them and invited them into his tent for food and a smoke, he explained that many more of his tribe had come to the village from the white reservation.

  “They’re tired of the lies,” Gray Beard said. “The Kway-kers said more meat was coming and it never did. They ordered all of the men to bury seeds in the ground and grow plants to eat.”

  “Plants,” Quanah said dismissively. “They wanted your men to be farmers.”

  Unlike the Kiowa chiefs, who immediately demanded to know why Quanah and Isatai had come, Gray Beard made friendly conversation with his Quahadi guests for a while. Stone Calf, White Shield, and Whirlwind, tribal leaders who’d recently arrived from the reservation, were summoned and introduced. Medicine Water, leader of the Cheyenne dog soldiers and Mochi’s husband, came into the tipi too. Everyone continued to chat and smoke for a while. Quanah appreciated the courtesy. Finally he said, “We’re here with an invitation.” The People were coming together for a gathering, and wanted their Cheyenne brothers to attend. A great thing that Quanah could not reveal would happen.

  “But it will prove to you that the People want to be one with the Cheyenne,” Quanah said. “And after that, we will plan our attack on the whites.”

  “Buffalo Hump’s spirit promises that the time for this fight has come,” Isatai added. “He has given me medicine to protect us, and his wisdom will guide us to victory.”

  The Cheyenne chiefs looked at each other, and Stone Calf whispered something to Medicine Water, who glanced at Isatai and then whispered back.

  “It would be a hard thing to take everyone here and move our camp all the way down to the wide red river,” Stone Calf said. “You should tell us more about what we’ll see there.”

  Quanah shook his head. “I can’t. But when you see it, you’ll understand.”

  Stone Calf looked again at the other Cheyenne leaders and said, “Then we’re sorry, but if you don’t tell us more, we won’t come.”


  Before Quanah could respond, Isatai stood up, his great bulk filling an entire side of the tipi. “Listen to the spirit. He says, ‘Come,’” and for that single word, Isatai’s voice took on a sort of guttural majesty that made the hair on Quanah’s arms stand up. The Cheyenne chiefs cringed. They whispered frantically among themselves. Isatai, arms folded across his thick, flabby chest, glared at them, daring them to disobey.

  Finally, very quietly, Lone Wolf spoke for them all. “We will come.”

  • • •

  TWO DAYS LATER, the Cheyenne camp was packed and ready. Every tipi was pulled down, and each family’s possessions were tightly tied to a travois. They set out in a long procession, with the tribal chiefs, Quanah, and Isatai riding in the lead. The pace they set wasn’t brisk. Though there were enough horses for the men to ride, all of the women and children were on foot. Much to Quanah’s dismay, Mochi walked among them. He was able to catch only occasional glimpses of her. He’d hoped to spend at least some of the march regaling her with tales of his prowess in battle, which surely eclipsed that of her current husband. Medicine Water and the other dog soldiers spent most of their time riding ahead as lookouts, so he wouldn’t have been there to object. But apparently it was traditional with Cheyenne on the march for men not to mingle with women, a foolish thing in Quanah’s mind and further evidence so far as he was concerned that this tribe was vastly inferior to the People.

  When they stopped that night, the women immediately spread out blankets, lit fires, and cooked meals for their families. Because camp was always made beside streams, they had to fetch water too. Then men who weren’t posted as guards sat and smoked while their supper was prepared. After they ate, they smoked some more and played simple gambling games with sticks and cards made from squares of dried animal hide while the women cleaned up. Everyone turned in early.

  Quanah was too restless to sleep. He sat by one of the fires, staring into the flames and brooding. Much depended on the People properly preparing the big new camp; for maximum effect, it had to look perfect when the Kiowa and Cheyenne arrived. Anything less, and the plan would fail. Maybe some of the Cheyenne would still agree to fight, but the Kiowa never would. Quanah had instructed Yellowfish and Wolf Tongue of the Quahadi to guide the Kiowa in. He’d warned them both not to bring these visitors until all the construction was complete. What if they arrived too early? He’d emphasized they had to wait until the moon was whole in the sky. It was so frustrating when he had to rely on anyone other than himself. Isatai, at least, was doing surprisingly well. The way he’d said the word “Come”—it really seemed like the voice of a spirit, not of a man.