Kid Calhoun

by Joan Johnston

  Anabeth smiled. “At least he won’t be able to complain later about my work.” She took a deep breath and poked the needle through a flap of torn flesh.

  Dog flinched, but Jake held him down and spoke soothingly to him. “You’re going to be fine, boy. Anabeth will have you on your feet in no time.”

  Anabeth’s hands were slippery with sweat by the time she had stitched the deeper of Dog’s two knife wounds. “I think the other cut will be fine if I just wrap it up tight.” She sacrificed the rest of Jake’s shirt and soon had Dog bandaged. “There. I’m done.”

  “He looks like a mummy,” Jake muttered.

  “I was worried that he might start bleeding again while we’re traveling.”

  They worked together to rig a small travois and attached it to one of Anabeth’s horses. Then Jake carefully lifted the wounded animal and carried him outside. Anabeth was ready with another blanket to cover Dog.

  They walked the length of the grassy valley one last time, leading their horses past the plot where Anabeth had raised vegetables, past the pond, and up the deer trail that led them finally over the rim and down onto the malpais, the volcanic wasteland that surrounded the valley.

  “Where are we going?” Anabeth asked.

  “South,” Jake said. “To Window Rock.”

  Anabeth sighed inwardly with relief. She had yet another reprieve from jail. And the hangman’s noose.

  Jake’s eyes were constantly trained on the hills, watching for an ambush. Apparently Wat Rankin didn’t like his chances when his opponent was armed and expecting him, because they didn’t see hide nor hair of him the entire distance to Window Rock.

  It was quite a homecoming when Jake showed up at the ranch house with Anabeth.

  “Claire’s gone!” Shug said the minute he saw Jake.

  “I know,” Jake said.

  “You know? Do you know where she is? Is she all right?”

  “Let me get Dog settled inside, and I’ll explain everything.” Jake was appalled at how empty the house felt. He moved quickly through the parlor to Jeff’s bedroom and laid Dog on the rug beside the bed.

  “I just want to make sure he’s comfortable,” Anabeth said. “Then I’ll join you.”

  Jake headed back through the house to the kitchen, where he found Shug pouring three cups of coffee.

  Shug handed Jake a cup, then took one himself and said, “I’m all ears. Where is she?”

  Before Jake could answer, Anabeth joined them. Jake gestured her to a seat at the table. He took a sip of coffee, swallowed it and said, “She was stolen by an Apache.”

  Shug’s face blanched. “Merciful heaven help her. We have to find her, Jake. We can’t leave her to those heathen savages.”

  “She wasn’t taken by a savage,” Anabeth said.

  “What?”

  “Anabeth knows the man who kidnapped Claire,” Jake said. “He’s a friend of hers.”

  “You’re the first I’ve known to call an Apache friend,” Shug said. “I say let’s saddle up and go hunting.”

  Anabeth turned stricken eyes to Jake.

  “Let it be, Shug,” Jake warned. “I’ll get Claire back in my own way. I don’t want a lot of innocent people getting killed.”

  “I don’t like it,” Shug said.

  “I’m doing what I think is best for Claire’s safety,” Jake said. “Let it be.”

  Shug’s mouth twisted in disgust, but he didn’t argue further. “I’ve got work to do. Let me know what you decide.” He left by the back door.

  In the silence that followed Anabeth asked, “What are we going to do now?”

  “I go looking for Claire. Alone.”

  Anabeth’s eyes were haunted. “You won’t find her.”

  “Not if I don’t try.”

  “I’m going with you.”

  “No! You stay here until I get back. Shug will make sure you have everything you need.”

  “I can’t stay here, Jake. Have you forgotten I’m wanted by the law.”

  Jake felt as though he had been punched in the gut. She had just reminded him with a vengeance that he was in love with an outlaw. One he had sworn he would send to jail. One who was destined to hang. Even if he was willing to pretend that things were different, she was not.

  “All right,” he said. “We’ll leave after we pick up supplies and get some shuteye.”

  Anabeth slipped a hand around Jake’s nape to draw his mouth down for her kiss. Her lips were as soft as butterfly wings against his.

  Jake tore his mouth away from hers. “What was that for?”

  “For taking me with you.”

  His eyes were bleak, his voice harsh. “You didn’t give me a helluva lot of choice.”

  Jake picked her up and carried her to the bedroom. If they were going to be bound together by this unholy alliance, then he was damn well going to take what he wanted—what he needed—from her while he could.

  18

  With the threat of winter not far off, Claire spent most of her days gathering ripe chokecherries, mulberries, and wood sorrel. But she watched closely as Wolf began the training that would mold He Makes Trouble into a fierce Apache warrior.

  She had been relieved that although Wolf made a real bow for He Makes Trouble, he had given the child small willow arrows with wooden points to practice with. She heard him tell He Makes Trouble, “You can hunt birds or squirrel or any small animals you find. You may have to crawl on your belly to sneak up on a wild thing, because it will see you as soon as you see it. Thus you will move as the wild animal who must be silent to survive. These things a warrior learns.”

  For a long time He Makes Trouble did not bring home anything for the dinner pot. Claire noticed the child was impatient and often scared the animals away before he could release the arrow from his bow. At last the day came when He Makes Trouble shot a quail. He brought it directly to Wolf, who told him, “A hunter must eat whole the raw heart of his first kill to ensure that he will always be skillful with his bow.”

  Claire’s eyes went wide with horror at the thought, but one look from Wolf stilled any protest she might have made. She couldn’t watch as He Makes Trouble did as he was instructed by the Apache brave. Claire reminded herself that the Apache ate raw meat as a matter of course. Only she had to think of something else to keep from gagging when He Makes Trouble turned to smile at her with his blood-rimmed mouth.

  Claire felt her heart leap when Wolf put a hand on the boy’s shoulder to praise him. It was plain from the reverent look in He Makes Trouble’s eyes that the Indian boy would have lain down and died for Wolf. To be commended by his idol was a great moment in his life.

  It was only the first of many such moments. There was the day Wolf demanded that He Makes Trouble run from the village to a far mountain and back again without stopping for water.

  At first Claire thought what Wolf was demanding was cruel beyond belief. “You can’t make that child run all the way to that far mountain and back again without any water. He’ll die of thirst!”

  “He will have a pebble to put in his mouth. It will keep him from feeling thirsty.”

  “What if he swallows it?” Claire demanded.

  Wolf smiled. “Then he will have a heavy belly.”

  “You can’t allow this!”

  Wolf had taken her by the shoulders and stared down at her with his dark eyes. “In the land of the Apache a man must be able to travel great distances without water.”

  “He’s just a boy!”

  “He goes a boy’s distance. When he is a man he will journey much farther.”

  Claire had pleaded with Wolf, but he had remained obdurate. She had stood stoically in the dawn light as He Makes Trouble began his sojourn. She was standing there waiting for him when he arrived back after dark that same night. His lips were parched and he was staggering, but he had done it.

  She had offered him water, but he had refused it saying he must see Wolf first. When the Apache put a hand on the boy’s shoulder, Claire saw the
child’s fatigue fall away from him.

  “It was well done,” Wolf said. “You will get better with practice.”

  Claire had swallowed the lump in her throat and watched as Wolf offered the boy water from his own gourd.

  The greatest day in He Makes Trouble’s life came when Wolf brought a spotted pony to the door of the wickiup and called the boy out to him.

  “He Makes Trouble, here is some work for you. Here is a pony for you to take care of.”

  The boy’s chin dropped in amazement. “For me?”

  “He is called Wind Rider.”

  When Claire saw the joy on He Makes Trouble’s face it brought tears to her eyes. She quickly dabbed them away and watched in astonishment as the tiny Indian boy put his foot on the horse’s leg, got hold of the mane, and crawled up onto the animal’s back. He Makes Trouble grabbed the rawhide reins and kicked the horse into a gallop.

  “When did he learn to do that?” she asked in an awed voice.

  Wolf shrugged and said, “All Apache boys spend time playing with the herd where it is hobbled in the woods.”

  Claire’s admiration for Wolf had slowly but surely grown over the summer and fall as He Makes Trouble had grown in self-confidence like a tree bud unfurling. When the boy had become less troublesome he had been shooed away less often by the rest of the tribe. Soon he was actually invited to join games with the other boys. Which was when he came into contact with White Eagle.

  To her despair, Claire had made no progress with her own son. Jeff stubbornly refused to talk with her, or even allow her to speak to him. Finally she had spoken to White Eagle’s Apache father, Broken Foot.

  She caught him sitting in the shade of a cotton-wood making arrows. She sat down nearby and waited patiently for him to acknowledge her. At last he did.

  “You have words you wish to say?”

  Claire’s command of the Apache language was good enough to make herself understood as she said, “I want to know why you stole my son from me.”

  The Indian kept right on working. He split the arrow shaft of carrizo and inserted a flint arrowhead, then began wrapping the shaft tightly with moistened sinew. At last he said, “It is not a good thing to speak of the dead. It brings only sorrow. But I will tell you my story, so that you will understand.

  “I had another son,” he began. “He went to hunt one day. When he did not come home, I went to look for him. And I found him.”

  With a sharp stone, Broken Foot scratched three channels on the shaft in line with the three hawk feathers. He laid the arrow aside and took another piece of carrizo from the stack beside him.

  He continued speaking as though he had never paused. “One Who Was My Son said the soldiers caught him. They laughed as they dragged him behind their ponies.

  “I took him home to his mother. But she could not make him well. The shaman could not cure him, either.”

  He looked off into the distance. “I was proud of him. He did not cry out from the pain. One Who Was My Son died bravely.”

  He busied himself again with the arrow in his lap. “My son’s mother cut off all her hair. She cut her arms. She cried for many moons. I could no longer look at the tears of my wife. So I decided to get her another son.

  “The white man took my son from me, so I took a son back from the white man. Now my wife smiles again, and she is happy.”

  Claire was silent. What words could ever apologize for such a travesty? “I am sorry to hear the story of your son. But surely you can understand my loss. The boy called White Eagle, the one you stole, he is my son.”

  Broken Foot looked up sharply. “Do not speak so foolishly, woman. White Eagle is Apache. You have no son in this village. Your son is gone.”

  He rose abruptly and left her.

  Claire was chagrined to discover later that Broken Foot had gone directly to Wolf and complained. Wolf had fiercely scolded Claire to leave both Broken Foot—and White Eagle—in peace.

  As a result, her battle for her son had become a thing of subtleties. When the boys went to the river to swim, she went there also to wash clothes. When White Eagle shot at a target of twisted grass thrown into the air, she gathered a bundle of wood from the ground nearby. When he played hide-and-seek or tag, had foot races, played tug-of-war, or wrestled, she was always there.

  And she listened. As Claire’s grasp of the Apache tongue improved, she began to understand exactly what her son said—especially his ridicule of Wolf’s woman. But there was never a time when he made reference to his life before he came to the Indian camp.

  She was relieved to discover that Broken Foot was not an unkind father, and that Jeff’s Indian mother, Cries Aloud, was a friendly woman. But it was small comfort when what she wanted was to be a mother to her own son.

  She began to despair of ever reaching him. So one day when White Eagle went hunting by himself, she followed him. It was a sign of how well trained the boy was that he discovered her presence right away.

  He turned and spoke to her in Apache. “Stay away from me. I do not want to talk the white man’s words with you.”

  She spoke in Apache, hoping that would make him stay and listen. Her speech was halting because she was constantly searching for the Apache words for what she wanted to say. “Do you remember a time when you did not live with The People?”

  White Eagle stared warily at her. “My true life began when Broken Foot brought me here to be his son.”

  “You had another father. Do you remember him?”

  White Eagle nodded abruptly.

  “He is dead now,” Claire said. She watched closely for some sign of the tremendous loss she knew this would have been to a small boy named Jeffrey. This boy’s features remained stony. “I am the mother who bore you,” she continued doggedly. “I thought you had been killed by The People. I did not know you were alive, or I would have searched for you until I found you.”

  There was a slight trembling in the boy’s chin, but he tightened his jaw to stop it. It was the first sign Claire had seen that Jeff had any feelings at all about the tragedy that had occurred—that her son had any regrets about the fact that savages had dragged him from two loving parents and thrust him into a harsh foreign world.

  He does remember me! He did wish for us to find him!

  “My white parents did not want me anymore,” White Eagle said.

  “Who told you that?”

  “Broken Foot said that if you had wanted me you would have come for me.”

  “And you believed him?” Claire asked incredulously. “The only reason I never came after you was because I thought you were dead!”

  “Your son is dead,” White Eagle said with finality. “Only the son of Broken Foot lives. Go away Wolf’s woman. Do not bother me again.”

  With that, White Eagle turned and ran off toward the village.

  Claire knew it was useless to follow him. She had already been warned to stay away from him, and she was certain to be punished if she was seen chasing him. Claire wasn’t altogether sure he wouldn’t tell his Indian father and mother what had happened here anyway.

  She didn’t care if they punished her for talking to him. If they beat her maybe she would be able to weep the tears she couldn’t seem to shed for her son. But how could she cry when he was well and whole and happy?

  I want him back. He’s my son! I bore him and nursed him at my breast. I held his tiny hands when he took his first steps. I want the chance to watch him grow into a man. I want to hold my grandchildren on my knee.

  When Claire felt the hand on her shoulder she whirled to knock it off. How could anyone dare to offer her comfort? There was no comfort to be had for the calamity that had torn her only child from her bosom.

  Claire fought Wolf with fisted hands as he grabbed her by the shoulders and forced her to her feet.

  “Let me go! I hate you! Why did you bring me here to see my son day after day and know he wants nothing to do with me?”

  “You know why you are here,” Wolf said.


  She sneered in his face. “To be your woman? That’s a joke! I know all about The People now, Wolf. I know that no self-respecting Apache would take a white woman for his wife. Why can’t you leave me alone to grieve in peace?”

  Wolf shook her hard. “It is time for you to leave the past behind. I will give you another child to suckle at your breast. You will be too busy then to weep for one that needs you not.”

  “What?” Claire froze, stunned by what Wolf had said.

  “When the sun leaves the sky I will come to you, and we will make a child between us.”

  He left her standing there and stalked away.

  Claire’s mouth remained rounded in an O of surprise. Her hands remained paralyzed in mid-air. Her breath was stuck in her throat. Had Wolf meant what he said? Of course he had. He never said anything he didn’t mean.

  A baby. Another child to hold in her arms. A baby to love as she had loved Jeffrey.

  Her first thoughts were euphoric. Oh, to hold a tiny, sweet-smelling baby in her arms again! To feel its petal-soft skin, to feel a tiny hand clasped around her finger, to have that small mouth suckle at her breast. It was an idyllic picture that made her ache with longing.

  A baby whose father would be Apache. A child who would be raised as an Apache warrior if he were male or who, if female, could look forward to working from dawn to dusk to make a home for her Indian family.

  She would not do it! She could not do it! It would mean living the rest of her life among the Apache, or taking a half-breed to live among the whites if Jake was ever able to rescue her. Or, God forbid, leaving yet another child behind to live his life among the savages.

  Only they weren’t savages, Claire had learned. The Indians laughed and played and loved as much as any white family. They hunted and gathered food, rather than planting it. Yes, they were vicious to their enemies, but so were the whites.

  Claire could not escape, and there was no one to say Wolf nay. She could fight him, but there was no doubt who would win such a battle. Tonight he would come to her. Claire felt a frisson of fear—or was it anticipation?—run down her spine. Wolf was a virile man. He would bed her until he got her with child. She had no doubt of it.