“They are puzzling people,” Spotted Fawn remarked.
“They are as different from the Apsaalooke as dirt is from water,” Flute Girl said.
“In the morning I will ask Dryfus one more time what it is the whites wish us to do,” Raven On The Ground said. “If they do not have work for us, we will leave.”
“Maybe you should not go to him,” Lavender said.
“He is the only one who knows sign.”
“But he will just go to the one they call Geist, and Geist will say what he always says. Relax and enjoy ourselves.”
“What else, then?” Raven On The Ground asked.
“Go to the one they call Toad,” Lavender suggested. “He is their leader, is he not?”
“Chases Rabbits did say that Toad is their chief, yes,” Raven On The Ground confirmed.
“Yet not once has he to come to talk to us,” Spotted Fawn said. “He is not a polite host.”
“He is white,” Flute Girl said.
“Maybe he will give us work if we ask him face-to-face,” Lavender said.
It was worth a try, they all decided. Raven On The Ground would speak for them, as she had been doing.
So the next morning, shortly after the trading post opened and while there were yet few people, Raven On The Ground made sure her dress was clean and her hair was perfectly done in two braids. Then she went into the post to present herself to the white chief. Two of the others—Gratt and Berber, she believed their names to be—noticed her but went on about their business.
Raven On The Ground looked for Geist and Dryfus but didn’t see them, which was good, as she had grown concerned about them. It was their eyes. Something she saw in them, something she could not quite define, bothered her. She did not see it all the time. Usually when they thought she wasn’t looking at them, she’d catch an unguarded expression, the kind of expression that hinted at a hunger which had nothing to do with food.
Toad was behind the counter, as he nearly always was. She rarely saw him come out from behind it. The first day she had gone up to it to thank him for inviting them, and he had moved to the other end without saying a word to her. She had thought it terribly rude. But then she had reminded herself that he was a chief and she had not approached him through one of the whites under him, as she should.
This time she would do it directly. She marched up to the counter and calmly stood with her hands folded, waiting.
Toad had a fabulous stick in his hand that left black squiggly lines on flat white squares of paper bound together somehow. He glanced up and blinked as if he were surprised. “Good morning.”
Raven On The Ground had heard those words before, from Grizzly Killer. She did not know what they meant, but she repeated them and went on smiling.
Toad put down the fabulous stick. “I didn’t know any of you spoke English.”
His sounds were alien to Raven On The Ground except for the last sound, “English.” She knew that it referred to the white tongue. She repeated it. “English.”
“My God.” Toad looked apprehensively around. He motioned, beckoning for her to follow, and moved around the end of the counter and into a narrow space with doors on both sides. He looked around again, opened one of the doors, and gestured for her to go in ahead of him.
Raven On The Ground hesitated. She did not know what kind of man he was; she did not know if being alone with him was safe. But then, he was the white chief, and he had invited them, so she smiled and went through into a small room lined with shelves and stacked with trade goods.
Toad entered and quickly lit a lantern on a peg, then quietly closed the door. “We don’t have much time, so I will make this short.”
Again his tongue was alien. Raven On The Ground said in hers, “I do not understand.”
Toad suddenly seized her forearm. She tried to pull back, but he held her fast and stared into her eyes with an intensity that was frightening. “Please listen and heed me. You are not safe here, do you understand? You must take your friends and go. Slip away tonight after Geist and his gang have gone to sleep.”
The only sound that Raven On The Ground grasped was “Geist.” She said the name to show as much.
“He is evil. I didn’t realize it when I hired him. Not until he turned on me and took over and told me who he really is. He’s wanted for murder and some other things, and it’s those other things that you have to worry about.”
Raven On The Ground didn’t understand a single thing the white chief said. She responded as she had been doing. “Geist.”
“Yes, Geist. His real name is Ranton. But that’s unimportant. What matters are his plans for you and the other women. You must…” Toad stopped.
Raven On The Ground heard them, too: voices outside the door.
Toad’s face was a mask of fright. Suddenly he took a step forward and enfolded her in his arms, pressing his thick lips to her cheek.
Raven On The Ground was so startled that she hadn’t yet collected her wits to resist when the door opened, revealing Geist, Petrie, and Dryfus.
“What the hell do we have here?”
Chases Rabbits needed a new charm. He had one, but it had apparently lost its power. First there had been the bear, then the Ute war party, and now a new calamity.
Nearly all Crows, men and women, had charms. Objects of power or influence or protection, often purchased at great price. Once a famous warrior, when he was young, gave five horses for a piece of wood said to come from far away. The wood was as hard as the white man’s metal, and was purported to imbue in its owner invincibility in battle. The young man went on to count many coup and distinguish himself on the field of conflict. Another time, a man obtained a special seed that was said would keep its owner free of sickness and pain, and his whole life he was never ill or wounded. Other men had charms for other purposes. Women were fond of charms that would cause men to fall in love with them.
Chases Rabbits had an uncle to thank for his. Around his neck in a small pouch was a lump of yellow rock that gleamed brightly in the sun and was supposed to impart good luck. He had paid two horses for it several winters ago, and so far it had served him well. But now his luck had changed, and it had to be that his special charm had lost its power. Charms did that sometimes.
At the moment, he sat astride his pinto with the pouch in one hand and his rifle in the other, staring in dismay at the creature perched on a high boulder directly in his path. He had drawn rein in alarm when he saw it. “Go away!” he shouted. “Go away or I will shoot you!” It was doubly frustrating because he was close to King Valley. Another sleep, he figured, and he would be there.
The wolf stared back.
Chases Rabbits did not want to shoot if he could help it. He was not a good shot. He needed a lot more practice. And if he wounded the wolf, it was bound to attack. “Didn’t you hear me? I said to go away!”
“Bellow a little louder, why don’t you? They’ll hear you in Apache country.”
Around the boulder rode Zach King. He grinned and stopped below the wolf and nodded up at it. “Meet an old friend of mine.”
Dumfounded, Chases Rabbits saw the wolf descend and stand at the dun’s side. He switched to English. “You be brother to a wolf? How you do that?”
“I had him when he was a pup,” Zach said. “Raised him for years until he went off one day.” He nodded at it. “Blaze, this is Chases Rabbits, a friend of my sister.”
Chases Rabbits’s feelings were hurt. “Me not your friend, too?”
“Friends enough.” Zach brought his dun over to the pinto. “To what do we owe the honor of your visit? Have you come to see my knot-head sis?”
“What be knot-head?”
“Someone whose brain is all in a knot as hers always is.”
Chases Rabbits was confused. Zach seemed to be saying that Evelyn’s brain didn’t work right. “Me not savvy. Her brain be fine when me visit before.”
“You didn’t have to live with her. You didn’t have to put up with all her teasing. Or her kna
ck for getting herself into trouble. She was kidnapped once, for crying out loud.”
“She sleep a lot as kid?”
“What?” Zach snorted and then laughed. “Oh, I get it. No, she was taken once. But let’s forget about her and talk about you. This is the trail into our valley, so I reckon you’re on your way to pay us a visit, and if not to her, then who?”
“Me need speak your father,” Chases Rabbits said, annoyed that he got the white tongue wrong but doing his best.
“I don’t know if he’s back yet.”
“Sorry?”
“Pa and Shakespeare McNair went off hunting this morning. I don’t know if they’ll be back tonight or tomorrow.”
“Oh.” Chases Rabbits was crestfallen. He had ridden so far, endured so much.
“What’s wrong?” Zack asked.
“Ugly man at trading post want me bring him quick.”
“Toad?”
“That the one, yes.” Chases Rabbits related what Toad had said to him. He also told about his encounter with the bear.
“Sounds like you had a close shave.”
Chases Rabbits vaguely remembered what that meant, and rubbed his smooth chin. “Me not need shave. Crows not have hair on face like whites.” Except for one warrior named Hairy Face.
Zach chuckled, then sobered. “Why do you suppose Toad needs to see my pa so bad?”
“Him have problem with foxes.”
“What?”
“That what him say. Him have foxes in chicken coop. Which strange because he not have chicken coop like you and your father do.”
“It could be he wasn’t talking about real foxes and chickens.”
“Then why him say that?”
“Maybe it was his way of saying there’s trouble brewing.” Zach grew thoughtful. “You say that you took women there to work for them?”
“Me do, yes. Why?”
“Because chickens is another word for hens and hens is another word for women.”
The white tongue was so bewildering, Chases Rabbits despaired of ever learning it well. But he didn’t miss the most important part. “Trouble for women? What kind of trouble?”
“How about I go back with you in Pa’s stead and we find out?”
“Toad want Grizzly Killer, but maybe him make do with you.” Chases Rabbits pursed his lips. “You not be like last time and kill everybody?”
“That depends,” Zach King said.
Chapter Fifteen
“I will not put up with much more,” Flute Girl declared.
“Why have they done this?” Spotted Fawn wondered.
Raven On The Ground didn’t have an answer. She went over what had happened in the hope it would make sense. Toad had taken her into the small room. He was trying to tell her something when the door opened and in came Geist. Geist had been mad, and walked up to Toad and hit him. Incredibly, Toad hadn’t done anything. An Apsaalooke warrior would have pulled a knife and killed Geist; no man of their tribe ever let himself be struck with impunity.
Geist and Toad had argued. The whole time, Petrie pointed a rifle at Toad. The insult to Toad was monumental. He was their leader, their chief, yet they treated him as if he were an enemy.
Geist had Dryfus ask her in sign what she and Toad had been doing. She answered honestly that she thought Toad had brought her in to talk until he hugged and kissed her. Dryfus asked what they talked about. She answered that she hardly understood a word Toad said.
For some reason, Geist became amused. He pointed at her and clapped Toad on the shoulder, and called him a “horny bastard.” Whatever that was.
Toad acted sheepish, like a child caught taking food when he shouldn’t.
Petrie had lowered his rifle and looked at her, smirking.
Then Geist had Dryfus bring her to the lodge she shared with the other women. She did not want to be inside and had tried to go back out, but Dryfus closed the door and was still out there, refusing to let any of them leave.
“I will stab him and we will take our horses and go,” Lavender proposed. She alone among them wore a knife on her hip.
“That is too drastic,” Raven On The Ground said. She clung to the belief that there must be some sense to it all.
Just then the door opened and in strode Geist, followed by Petrie and Dryfus. Geist smiled and had Dryfus sign that if there was anything they needed, they had only to ask.
Raven On The Ground decided to get right to the heart of the matter. Question, she signed. You chief?
Geist and Dryfus talked, and Dryfus signed that Geist was.
Raven On The Ground asked why no one had told them.
Dryfus answered that the whites thought the women knew. He also signed that Geist was sorry about how Toad had acted toward her.
Flute Girl raised her hands and her fingers flowed. She told the whites that the women were tired of doing nothing. That if the whites wanted them to work, they should have them start. Otherwise, the women were leaving.
Geist bid them all sit in a half circle on the floor. Then he sank down with Dryfus on his left and gave a long speech, which Dryfus translated in sign.
Geist was happy the four of them had come. He was especially pleased at how lovely they were. Crow women, in his estimation, were some of the most beautiful he had ever seen. He went on for so long about their faces and their hair and how they wore their dresses that Spotted Fawn turned to Raven On The Ground and grinned and whispered, “Maybe he is in love with one of us.”
Through Dryfus, Geist explained that he was a businessman, like Toad, but not in the same business. The trading post was not his main interest. His real business, Dryfus signed, was women.
“Women?” Lavender repeated out loud. “What can he mean by that?”
Geist launched into a long speech about how he had heard a lot about the Crows before he came west to the mountains. How he had been informed they were a handsome people, and how he had first listened with great interest to an old trapper who related a custom of theirs. Was it true, he had Dryfus ask, that visitors who spent the night at a Crow village were allowed to have a woman?
Raven On The Ground answered with her fingers, Yes.
Did the visitors have to pay for the women?
Raven On The Ground signed that they did not.
Geist told them that the whites did not have such a custom. That so far as he knew, neither did any other tribe. Only the Crows. He thought it wonderful, and had Dryfus sign as how he had been doing the same thing for a long time.
By the looks on their faces, Raven On The Ground could see that her friends were as puzzled as she was. Question. You have many wives?
Not any, Geist replied. The women he gave to other men were not his, but women who wanted to give themselves on their own, as the Crows did. And here came the best part, he excitedly had Dryfus relay—the women were paid for being with a man. Some of the money was then theirs to keep and spend as they chose.
Flute Girl signed the thought that was uppermost in Raven On The Ground’s mind—what did any of this have to do with them?
Geist smiled broadly and had Dryfus sign that he had invited them to the trading post not to sew and cook, as he had told Chases Rabbits, but to sleep with men and be paid for it.
Raven On The Ground began to suspect the white man wasn’t in his right mind. We would never do that, she indignantly signed on behalf of all four of them.
Why not? Geist had Dryfus sign. They had already admitted that Crow women slept with other men, so why not be rewarded for it with trade goods or money?
To begin with, Raven On The Ground explained, the white men needed to understand a few things. Once, her people had been as numerous as the blades of grass on the prairie, many thousands of them, a strong and prosperous tribe able to hold their own against any enemy. But war and disease took a heavy toll so that now there were only about two thousand Apsaalooke, only eight hundred of which were men. Because of the disparity, most warriors had two or three wives. When a stranger visite
d their village, it was considered nothing at all for a wife to spend the night with him. But unmarried maidens were never offered, and Raven On The Ground, Spotted Fawn, Lavender, and Flute Girl were maidens.
Geist scowled. So you wouldn’t sleep with men for money?
To think we would is an insult, Raven On The Ground responded.
“We were lured here falsely,” Flute Girl said in anger. “This white man tricked Chases Rabbits.”
“We should leave this moment,” Spotted Fawn said.
Raven On The Ground agreed. She informed the whites that they were departing.
No, Dryfus signed at Geist’s command. You are not.
We are free to do as we please, Raven On The Ground told them. She was angry now, too.
Geist stood. No, you are not, he had Dryfus sign. He nodded at Petrie, who pointed his rifle at them.
“This can’t be happening,” Spotted Fawn said.
I need women, and you’re it whether you want to be or not, Geist made it clear through Dryfus.
Our people will learn what you have done, Raven On The Ground warned. Our warriors will wipe you out.
They won’t ever know, was Geist’s reply.
You cannot make us do what we do not want to do, Raven On The Ground insisted.
Watch me, Geist rebutted. He went to the door. We will talk more of this later, Dryfus signed.
The three whites went out. The instant the door closed, Flute Girl grabbed hold of the latch and lifted and pushed, but the door wouldn’t open. It was locked or barred.
“We’re trapped,” Lavender said.
“What do we do now?” Spotted Fawn asked anxiously.
Raven On The Ground had no idea.
Toad was measuring a bolt of cloth when Geist stormed into the mercantile, Petrie in his wake. Geist was so mad that he slammed the door. The half dozen Indian customers turned and regarded him quizzically.
Geist didn’t seem to care. He and Petrie came to the counter and Geist glared at Toad. “You lied to me, you son of a bitch.”
“About?”
“Don’t play innocent,” Geist snapped. “When I caught you and that squaw in the storage room, you claimed it was her idea as much as yours.”
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