He had learned the Crow tongue to some degree, but that didn’t make him a friend of other young men his age, who preferred to socialize with their own kind. He talked with Beckwourth now and then, which helped mitigate the loneliness he felt. He knew now how Victoria had felt during their years with the trapping brigades. She had been desolately alone among white men. Now it was his turn.
The oncoming cold worried him. Even now, in the twilight, he felt its bite. The peaks had already been dusted with white. He had only an old summer robe for warmth, which he wrapped about him as he contemplated his fate. Below, the cookfires glowed and blue smoke eddied over the camp. The village of the Kicked-in-the-Bellies was a happy place, strong, secure, and comfortable there on the big bend of the Yellowstone. The beauty of it struck him; there, in a corner of the mountains, layer upon layer of blue and black vaulted upward, while at his feet lay an orderly collection of tawny lodges, their tops blackened by smoke. The Yellowstone glinted in the last light, while the reflections of the first stars danced on its swift dark water.
He had spent his days hunting on foot because he lacked a horse, and he had occasionally made meat for Victoria’s family. In those cases he usually borrowed a packhorse, one that would tolerate the smell of blood and death, and if he was lucky—mostly he wasn’t—he brought back his quarry, usually a mule deer. These additions to the larder were welcomed, and the hides, which Victoria tanned, kept him in powder and lead and moccasins. Beckwourth bought any dressed skin that Skye could provide.
But it wasn’t much of a life, and with winter racing toward him, he ached for a lodge, some horses, a pile of blankets, some thick buffalo robes—and privacy. He hardly knew where to turn.
He watched a lean figure toil up the slope toward him, and recognized Beckwourth. The man who had adopted these people as his own dressed like them. His long hair had been coiled into a knot at the nape of his neck, and from it poked two eagle feathers, his war honors. He had wrapped himself in a red Hudson’s Bay blanket with black stripes.
“Knew you’d be here, Mister Skye,” he said.
Skye nodded and motioned Beckwourth to sit.
“I’m taking a little party out in the morning, and thought to invite you. I’ll lend you a horse and saddle, and I expect before we’re through you’ll have several more. We’re heading north, toward the Musselshell or the Judith country, and our plan is to reduce the horse herds of the Blackfeet, count some coup, and make all the mischief we can. It’s a grand opportunity for a man to win some prestige and maybe walk off with all the booty he can handle. You might even get a lodge out of it. Should be a lark, Barnaby. I’m taking twenty men, the best in the village, including Rotten Belly’s sons. You be ready at dawn. Should be out four or five days. I’ll bring a good robe for you. You’ll have a chance to use that mighty Hawken if all goes well.”
“And if it doesn’t?”
Beckwourth smiled. “You’ll have even more chance to use the Hawken.”
“I don’t look for chances to use my Hawken on two-legged game.”
“Well, it isn’t likely”
“Let me think on it. I’ll let you know directly.”
Beckwourth nodded and retreated down the slope.
A bold band of blue behind the western ridges was all that remained of this day. Skye knew that before that sliver of light disappeared, he would have to make a fateful decision.
He watched Beckwourth stroll down the slope and felt that he was being pushed into a corner. He had known this decision would come sooner or later, but he was still unprepared for the moment.
He sat in the gathering chill, his eyes on the winking cookfires but his mind elsewhere. He remembered the Kaffir wars, fought in the name of empire, planned and executed by the lords of the Horse Guards. The sailors and marines had traveled upriver, pursuing the bloody natives until the Kaffirs turned the tables on them and nearly enveloped the whole force. A hail of spears had decimated the marines; the fierce natives had then attacked with machetelike weapons that could slice off an arm or cut a head in two. Many a jack-tar and redcoat had died in those weeks, all for empire.
He had fought Burmese river pirates from ’tween decks, watching shot pour through the gun ports, rake his shipmates, blind Will Fellowes, pulp the face of Higgins, blow off Billy Burns’s right hand. All for the Crown. He had watched maimed men, the detritus of war, receive their discharges and begin a life as mendicants, wearing their medals on their shabby coats. No hope. He had seen tears, heard howls of pain, listened to the onslaught of death as it captured a man. He had held a dying seaman named Harry Combs in his lap while the man sobbed out the Lord’s Prayer and bled out his life.
No, he didn’t like war. But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t fight. It only meant that there had to be grave reasons, larger than commerce or personal honors. That was a distinction the Crows didn’t understand. For them, waging war, stealing horses, trapping enemy hunters, all had a preemptive quality: do that to the Siksika or Lakota, and the Absarokas would be all the safer.
But which side had started it? And was a horse raid offense or defense? A new provocation or a retaliation for old troubles? The tribes didn’t lack scores to settle. He had always believed he would fight ferociously in defense of those he loved, but he would never start a war. But that didn’t make sense out here, when strife among the tribes was ongoing, unending, deadly, and involved the very survival of each tribe. His old, European notions of just war didn’t work very well here in a wild land where a tribe warred or died away.
There might be good in it, as Beckwourth predicted. He might return in a few days with horses, a captured lodge, scalps, prestige, power, wealth, medicine, and a say in village councils. He might yet be able to serve Rocky Mountain Fur, repay the lost trade goods, win the respect and allegiance of the war chiefs, Rotten Belly, the headmen and shamans, and bring them all to rendezvous next year with loads of pelts to trade. That would be a grand thing, leading the Crow nation to the rendezvous and the trading tent. If he could do that, the Rocky Mountain Fur Company would forgive him what he had lost.
The night had lowered. He stood, stretched the stiffness from him, wrapped his summer robe about him, and descended into the village, enjoying the savory tang of the woodsmoke in the still air. He paused at Beckwourth’s lodge to tell him that he would be ready at dawn, and went to his people. He found Victoria in her parents’ lodge and decided to bare the issue at once.
“Beckwourth invited me to go on a horse raid at dawn—and I will go.”
She stared at him, the firelight glinting in her black eyes.
“I’m not one for picking fights. But this will help your nation. There are a lot more Lakota and Siksika than there are Absaroka. Maybe I can help even things up.” He smiled tentatively.
She beamed, delight swimming in her face.
“I’ll need to borrow some things. A horse, for one. A robe.”
“I will ask.”
“I might not come back.”
“You have bear medicine, Skye.”
He needed more than bear medicine. The Blackfeet fielded some of the best mounted warriors in the world, and the seaman Skye knew he was no match with lance, club, arrow, or sheer horsemanship. He wished he had her easy confidence, but he didn’t.
Victoria’s mother ignored him, as she was required to do, but Victoria’s father eyed him amiably from his place of honor at the rear of the lodge. With a glance at Victoria, Skye explained his intent to her father and asked for those things he might need in war: a fast horse, a war club, a robe to cover him at night.
“And what does your medicine say, Man Not Afraid of the Pawnee?”
“Grandfather, I have not examined my medicine.”
“Your ways are strange to us. When you know, come to me.”
Skye understood. He would seek help. He pulled aside the lodge flap and walked into a chill night. He needed to find a small gift, anything, and remembered what had been warmly appreciated before. He hiked into the
murky cottonwoods, waited for his eyes to adjust, and then hacked at dead limbs with his hatchet until he had an armload.
These he carried to the small, isolated lodge that was the sole worldly possession of the seer, Red Turkey Head. He scratched gently on the lodge, the polite way of announcing himself, and eventually heard the old man’s voice inviting him in.
He ducked inside and found the frail old man sitting in a cold lodge, entirely without light.
“It is the husband of Many Quill Woman, Grandfather,” he said. “I have brought you some wood.”
“Build a fire so I can see you. Then we will smoke.”
Skye did, patiently striking sparks into tinder, until finally a tiny pinch of it glowed, driving the darkness back. He blew on it until it burst into a tiny flame, and swiftly added twigs. It took a long time to build a lodge fire for the old man, and even then the icy lodge didn’t warm much.
In time, the fire burned merrily in its pit, but the old man didn’t seem to notice. Skye realized Red Turkey Head was not far from blindness.
They smoked, and then the shaman waited.
“I will go with Antelope on a horse raid, Grandfather,” he began. “They ask me what my medicine tells me.”
“Grizzly bear medicine.”
“I don’t follow you, Grandfather.”
“Yours is the way of the bear.”
Skye touched his bear claw necklace, symbol of honor and power among these people. “Sometimes I am a bear, Grandfather, and sometimes I am not.”
“No, Man Not Afraid of the Pawnees, you have the bear spirit. That is your path. I will tell the war leaders that you follow the way of the bear.”
That puzzled Skye. “What is the way of the bear?”
The old man coughed. “The bear fattens in the fall, before he goes to sleep.”
Skye waited, quietly.
“It is right for you to go with Antelope. You saw truly that this is so. Follow your path, Man Not Afraid of the Pawnees. You will become a blessing for the People. Go now, and tell Walks Alone I wish to talk with him. I will tell Walks Alone that his daughter’s man follows the way of the bear, and it is a good way, and he will be proud of his daughter’s man.”
eight
Skye marveled at Beckwourth. The war leader had an unerring instinct about where to find their quarry. For three days, Beckwourth had taken them north, arriving one noon in a mountain-girt basin he called the Judith country. The whole grassy plain was dotted with buffalo as far as the eye could see.
“Where there’s meat, there’s Blackfeet,” he told Skye. He led them west, staying low and out of sight, every warrior alert. By dusk they had reached a rough water-chiseled land under a brooding butte, a place somehow melancholic and foreboding. That was when Bad Heart, one of the Absaroka warriors, paused, sniffed, and announced that smoke was on the breeze, which was eddying in from the northwest.
“We are dose,” Beckwourth said. “And now, Barnaby, you will see a horse raid. Somewhere nearby, probably in a river valley we’ll reach shortly, we’ll find a hunting party hunkered down for the night out of sight of the buffalo so as not to alarm the herd. They’ll have their best runners with them. A good buffalo runner knows how to gallop close to a running buffalo so the rider can sink an arrow into the sweet spot. They’re fast, and they’re valuable—and they’ll be ours!”
Skye nodded. Night settled while Beckwourth held his warriors in a small hollow, well hidden. Then, in full dark, he led them north again, through a chill night when the stars glimmered in moving air. He left the group and went ahead on foot, returning a half hour later.
“Just as I figured,” he said to Skye. Then in the Absaroka tongue, which Skye could at least follow, he explained. The Blackfeet were camped in a creek bottom hemmed between steep bluffs, out of sight of the buffalo. Their horses were being kept in a natural canyon with night herders penning them in. Two prized horses were in the camp itself, saddled and ready for emergencies. There looked to be about fifteen Blackfoot hunters at the fire, plus two herders keeping an eye on the horses, which weren’t picketed because they were in a natural pen. But he found a rough passage to the top of the bluffs; the horses could be stampeded up and out. He and several Crows would descend on foot, surprise the herders, and drive the horses over the top. Others, on top, would steer the stolen horses south.
“And you, Barnaby, will settle on the edge of the bluff where you can see the camp and keep ’em pinned down with that big Hawken of yours. Shoot anyone who tries to follow.”
Skye nodded.
After that, the long wait began. Beckwourth didn’t want to start the affray until the Siksika were asleep and the night was well along. Skye sat quietly, his back to a tree, wondering whether he could shoot a buffalo-hunting Blackfoot who was simply gathering meat for his people. He had shot at Indians many times, and yet this was different. Always, in the past, he had shot to defend himself and whoever he was with. But not this time.
His bones ached from the cold, and time dragged. But finally Beckwourth nodded. His party left their horses with young horse-holders and crept into place. Skye settled on the bluff, trying to locate the camp in the deep mysterious dark, wondering whether the Blackfeet had more sentries out and whether he would find out too late—when a knife or arrow pierced him. Some embers glowed; a sliver of moon gave just enough light to see the vague shape of things.
He waited tensely, hearing soft disturbances in the dark, then the movement of many horses, and suddenly, the victorious howls of the Crows. Everything happened at once. The Blackfoot herd stampeded up the bluff, Crow horsemen on top steered it south, the sleeping camp erupted, and Skye saw faint, blurred movement below. A Blackfoot untied his pony and swung onto it to give pursuit. Skye shot, dropping the horse and throwing the rider. The boom of the Hawken changed the complexion of the night. Swiftly he moved to a new locale, knowing his muzzle flash had revealed his position, reloaded, and fired at another mounted rider giving chase. He missed. He reloaded again, and shot a third time, right into the embers, which shot sparks and light into the dusky camp. Other Blackfeet were running, gathering quivers and bows and lances, hunting for horses, swarming toward their herders, who lay in the grass, either dead or dying.
He’d seen enough. The Crows and Beckwourth were already half a mile away, and Skye knew he would have to get out fast. He reloaded, trotted back from the rim, mounted his borrowed horse, and rode south, steering his horse toward the howling of the Crows and the thunder of the stolen herd. A while later he caught up and rode down the long dark night to the music of the hooves.
Thus they traveled until exhaustion overtook them and Beckwourth decided they were out of danger. They rested until dawn and then examined their booty. Forty-one horses, some of them magnificent. One scalp, too. And several coups. No losses, no wounds. A great victory! Beckwourth had proven his medicine prowess once again.
“That big mountain rifle of yours kept ’em at bay, Barnaby,” Beckwourth said. “You did just fine. You’ve won some war honors now.”
“I think we were lucky,” Skye said.
Beckwourth laughed. “Look at those ponies,” he said. “There’s some buffalo runners in there. That’s more horses than we’ve gotten out of a raid in a long time.”
The multicolored horses did look magnificent. Some of them bore the medicine markings of their owners; a white handprint on the chest, or yellow stripes painted on the side, or amulets plaited into their tails. One magnificent black caught Skye’s eye. He would give anything to own that one.
The solemn Crow warriors kept a sharp lookout for pursuit, but no one came, and late one October afternoon they returned to the Kicked-in-the-Belly village. Beckwourth was ebullient. As far as Skye could fathom, the rest took war too seriously to exult, but he did catch the flash of joy and pride in their eyes. The Siksika had lost a lot of horses and one herder. The other herder, it turned out, had warded off his assailant and fled into the darkness. A victory, yes. But there would be revenge,
somehow, someplace, and the tables would be turned.
They paused just outside their village. Skye watched the warriors paint up, using the small kits of paint they had taken with them. They would enter the village in triumph this time, wearing their medicine insignia, wearing their war honors. They didn’t neglect their horses either. They groomed the ponies and painted them. This would be a great day for these people. Skye watched, sensing how important this ritual was to these fellow warriors, sensing the pride, status, power, and honor attached to this ritual. But Beckwourth outdid them all, garbing himself like an oriental potentate.
When at last they were ready, Skye marveled. These warriors reminded him of a hundred bagpipers in their plaid kilts, their pipes howling defiance and death. What was grander than a victorious army dressed for a parade?
Villagers swarmed to meet the victorious warriors, crowding the lane leading to Chief Rotten Belly’s lodge, where they would each, under the seal of absolute truth, tell their tales to the elders, the chiefs, the shamans, and the delirious crowd who had come to celebrate. At first the village women looked sharply for signs of tragedy, the empty saddle, the horse carrying a burden, a wounded man, death painted upon the faces and chests of these greathearted men. But they found none. This party had gone out into the dangerous world and returned in glory, driving forty-one horses before it. Nineteen men, forty-one warhorses that had once belonged to the despised and dangerous Siksika. Forty-one duns, browns, chestnuts, appaloosas, paints, and the proud black, as dark as coal, that walked with an easy gait and a calm that wasn’t evident in some of the other nervous animals. That one fired Skye’s imagination, and he felt a pang. There was a horse.
Leading this marvelous assemblage was Beckwourth himself, grinning, wearing the softest white buckskins, a bone necklace over his chest, his hair tucked into a knot that bore two downturned eagle feathers, white and black. A scarlet sash completed his ensemble. He was thoroughly enjoying himself and absorbing the waves of acclaim that washed over him as he passed women and children, old men, yearning boys, and even the blind, who had been led to the parade so they, too, might experience this splendid event.
Dark Passage Page 5