Comanche Dawn

by Mike Blakely

  “As you would trust me.”

  “And the bag. Full of gold?”

  “Four thousand pesos to put back in the treasury. It is only the first installment. We have many good French guns to sell, my friend. The prices are high. The buyers will come to us.” Jean could feel himself beginning to relax, finally, after months of hard travel, hiding, fighting, guarding his goods. He had not let his guard down, even in his sleep, until this moment.

  Yet it was Del Bosque who seemed more relieved. He sat down and heaved a huge sigh. He seemed almost ready to weep. “Thank God. I thought you were dead out there. What happened?”

  Jean pulled his chair close the governor’s and told about Quivira, the stabbings of Night Hunter and Henri Casaubon. “It is strange, but there are rumors out on the plains. Some Tiwas at Tachichichi claim they have seen Henri Casaubon leading a party of raiding Pani.”

  “But, you have just told me you stabbed him to death at Quivira.”

  “I stabbed him good. I thought he was dead. It seems impossible, but perhaps he could have survived.”

  “He will be looking for you.”

  Jean chuckled. “I am safe in Santa Fe. If Casaubon survived my blade and desires revenge, he will have to catch me out there some other time.”

  Jean went on with his tale, describing the Osage battle where he recovered the governor’s ill-gotten gold. “The Comanches suffered two dead, and more wounded in the fight. They refused to go on with me, and I do not hold them at fault. I gave them their share of the horses, and went on by myself after we recovered the gold from the Osage thief. I have heard that the Comanche camp on the Rio Napestle was attacked by Battle Scar’s band of Apaches in Acaballo’s absence. The Comanches have split over the entire escapade. Now there are two bands, and the one under Whip is raiding the settlements in the north for horses.”

  “Forget the Comanches,” Del Bosque said. “The trade, Juan, the trade. How did you do it alone?”

  “I never should have attempted it, but I thought that perhaps I could fill the void left by Casaubon before any other courier de bois knew he was dead. I traveled mostly at night until I reached Arkansas post, where the Rio Napestle empties into the Messipe. I traded the horses and gold for guns, along with some trade goods, iron, lead, cloth, honey, and other things. I am wanted for treason in Canada, but the potential profits resulting from a trade with New Mexico are worth more to the couriers de bois at Arkansas post than the price on my head.”

  Del Bosque nodded. “How did you get back across the plains?”

  Jean shrugged. “I rode.”

  “You rode alone? All the way from the Messipe to the Rio Grande?”

  “Not always alone. I traveled well south of the Rio Napestle to avoid the Osage and the Raccoon-Eyed People. I passed among nations I had encountered with La Salle. The Tejas, and the Caddoes. I even met a Frenchman whom I had known. He deserted from La Salle’s expedition, many years ago. His name was Mousset, but he did not remember his name, nor me, nor even La Salle. He could not speak French.”

  Del Bosque frowned. “It is odd how easily white men turn heathen and forget their teachings. Did the savages trouble you?”

  “I gave each chief a gun. The Caddoes guided me west of the timbers, but would go no farther for fear of Apaches. I went on from there alone. I came to the base of a great escarpment. Ascending it, I rode west across a vast plain—a high, treeless void—following a river that gradually dwindled as I went west.”

  “But, you had water all the way?”

  “No. The river vanished in a series of draws and dry tributaries. I was completely lost, Antonio. Two of my horses died of thirst, so I had to cache the guns. I knew I had to go west to get back to New Mexico, but I also knew the rivers ran east out there in the land of the cows. So, I went north, hoping to find another stream. I was lucky. The only horse I had left survived until I reached a river I knew by its red water. I found a village of Faroan Apaches whose chief I had traded with before. I traded them six ponies for six guns.”

  “You only had to give them six guns? I am amazed that the Apaches did not simply kill you for all the guns, my friend.”

  “I was too smart for them,” Jean said, motioning for the governor to fill his empty glass. “When I cached the trade goods, I hid all but six guns in a different place. The Apaches were convinced that I had only six guns. They took the guns and left me to load the other things—the lead and iron bars, the kegs of sulphur for making gunpowder, the deerskins filled with honey and tallow. To further assure that they would not kill me, I promised to bring them more guns from the east on my next trip. I camped for two days to make sure they would not return, then loaded the rest of the muskets I had hidden—almost two hundred.

  “After seven days, I was out of water again, but God was with me. A party of Towa hunters found me out on the llano and took me back to Pecos Pueblo. I gave them all the honey and tallow, but I had the guns wrapped in deerskin by pairs, and I convinced the Towas that they were stocks for shackling Apache slaves. The Towas approved of this idea very much. You know how they have suffered from Apache attacks lately.”

  “Where are the guns now?” the governor asked.

  “Most of them are hidden at my hacienda. Some are already in El Paso del Norte. I arranged months ago for a buyer to wait for me in Santa Fe and take them south into New Spain.”

  “And the profits?”

  Jean gulped his wine and grinned. “Sinful. We have perhaps fifteen pesos invested in each gun, so rich are the French in muskets, and hungry for gold and horses. I sold the first shipment of guns to my buyer for two hundred pesos each. He will demand twice that much in New Spain.”

  “Gracias a Dios,” Del Bosque whispered. “This is a feat beyond any I have ever heard. From the Messipe to the Rio Grande. Alone, from Arkansas post to Santa Fe! It is a pity that history cannot record your adventure, my friend.”

  Jean chuckled. “Forget history. We are going to get rich. It is not necessary to go every year, for the inventory will sustain us through two, maybe three years. We do not want to sell our goods too quickly and draw attention to our trade, or bring the prices down. In time, we will supply good French guns to every Spanish officer and rico in New Spain. The Crown will benefit from its own ignorance of our secret trade. Even our own colonists will gladly pay a year’s wages for the security of a good weapon. I told you long ago, Antonio, that such a trade would make us wealthy partners. New Mexico will become our kingdom.”

  The door opened and a girl entered with a carved wooden platter stacked with steaming tortillas, sliced goat cheese, sausages, scrambled eggs, peppers, chopped wild onions, and an olla filled with butter.

  “Teresa!” the governor said. “Why do you behave as a servant?”

  Jean stood, realizing that it was the governor’s daughter who had brought the food. He had not recognized her at first, for she become a young woman since he had seen her last.

  “Forgive me, Father,” the girl said. “The servants have gone to bed. I saw Señor Archebeque arrive, and decided I should help the cook.” She placed the platter in front of Jean and looked up at him. “Señor, you look very hungry,” she said. She reached for his face and brushed her fingers across the hollowed cheeks and the tattooed chin.

  “That will be enough of that,” Del Bosque said. “You are too young to consort with a rogue such as the intrepid Archebeque, my dear. Now, run along and play with your dolls.”

  Teresa fumed and turned away, yet she paused at the door to glance over her shoulder at Jean, the dark pupils hard against the corners of her glistening eyes.

  The governor clapped Jean on the shoulder and pushed him into a chair that stood in front of the food. “My daughter has no idea how much embarrassment you have saved her, Juan. Now she will live without care because of you. How will I ever repay you?”

  Jean shrugged and reached for a tortilla. He had an idea of how the governor might repay him. Teresa had blossomed in the past year. Though only
sixteen, she had already mastered many of the wiles of the provocative señorita, Strange to think of it, Jean mused, imagining himself paying court to the governor’s young daughter. He had come to this colony a penniless, tattooed traitor. Once, an audience with the governor would have struck fear through his heart. Now, the governor came to him for help in his hour of darkest need.

  Perhaps it was only the fact that he had not lain with a woman in months that made his flesh prickle with desire for young Teresa, who was, after all, more than twenty years his junior. Perhaps tomorrow, as he woke in the arms of his favorite harlot, who even now waited for him across the Santa Fe plaza, he would cast off even the most cursory thought of the virginal Teresa. Perhaps.

  Still, the image of himself with the señorita hinted at certain advantages beyond the possibilities of conjugal pleasure. Across the plains, he might be hanged as a traitor. Here, he was a hero of the colony for defying the edicts of the very crown under whose flag he flourished. The governor poured wine for him. The governor’s daughter made eyes at him. Perhaps Jean L’Archeveque was, as Horseback had lamented, a man without a nation. On the other hand, he was, perhaps, a nation unto himself, chief among chieftains, the Sovereign of the Southern Plains.

  60

  Shaggy Hump’s lodge felt cold when he woke before dawn. His heart pounded a hoofbeat in his chest, and sweat covered his body. His breath came like that of a man in battle, rather than a man sleeping peacefully in his lodge. The moon had passed over the mountains, and the lodge was dark as the den of a great bear. For a moment, Shaggy Hump wondered where he lay. Was this the land of humans, or the Land of Shadows? Then he tossed the robe aside and let the cold, dry air of the plains night chill the sweat on his body.

  He was alone. Looks Away had slept in her own lodge since River Woman’s death, so that Shaggy Hump might concentrate on his grief. Now, he thought of River Woman as though she lay nearby, as she had done many winters ago, in the days before the demons possessed her. “My sits-beside wife,” Shaggy Hump said under his breath, thinking of River Woman as she had been in those times of youth. It seemed as if the memories had been made yesterday.

  River Woman, do you bear these glorious and terrible dreams I have dreamt? Do you call to me from the Shadow Land? Have you opened the way to the time that comes? I am a warrior. I have lived well. I am ready. I will die bravely.

  He lay still for a while, and young River Woman faded further from his thoughts. For many winters she had served him, aggravated him, amazed him, confused him. Now she was gone. She had possessed mysterious powers. He would not disappoint her. He knew what he must do.

  As he listened to the wind fret the smoke flaps above, he began to feel very alone. He groped for the rawhide strap that ran from his lodge to Looks Away’s. He found it tied to the lower end of a lodge pole. He pulled on it sharply several times, and faintly heard the noise of the rattles made from deer dewclaws in Looks Away’s lodge. She took only a few moments to enter his lodge. She was a good wife. Obedient and willing. She knelt beside him.

  “Lie with me,” he said.

  She pulled her deerskin dress off over her head and lay down next to her husband, gasping when she felt his sweat-soaked body. “My husband,” she said, “are you well?”

  “Very well. Better than well. I have been dreaming.” He pulled the robe back over him, and even this felt clammy with his own sweat. When he felt Looks Away reach between his legs, he caught her hand, and said, “Just lie with me, woman. Make me warm.”

  “Hah,” she said, snuggling close to him. “What have you been dreaming about?”

  “Times to come.” He said nothing for a while. Owls were hooting to each other in the night. “My son’s warhorse is beautiful, is it not?”

  “Hah.”

  “He knew Medicine-Coat would come. He has good, strong puha. Sometimes the spirits tell a good warrior what will happen, so the warrior will know what to do.”

  Looks Away said nothing. She always listened well and spoke little.

  “There is going to be a council. You know our duty is to avenge our dead.”

  “Hah,” she said.

  “I have dreamed of this vengeance. I am ready. My son has dreamed of a war pony. Medicine-Coat has come. My son is ready. The people in this camp believe in my son again. When Medicine-Coat came, they gasped at the beauty of such a pony.”

  “That is a beautiful pony,” said Looks Away, who rarely spoke in judgement of anything, good or bad. “A spirit-pony.”

  “You speak well, my wife. Now, listen. I am a warrior. My scars make my medicine coat. I do not wish to die an old man, making arrows and telling stories in the lodges of winter. I do not wish to burden my grandchildren.”

  “You are strong,” she said, gripping his arm. “You will burden no one for many winters to come.”

  “Listen. I have dreamt. The war with the Na-vohnuh comes. I wish to die in battle. My brothers have all gone before me. You will be alone.”

  She nestled closer to him. “Do not speak of it,” she begged.

  “Listen, woman. The old ways are changing. Once, a wife would follow her husband to the Shadow Land. She would kill herself over his grave, or the people would kill her. But that was in the old country of poor lands, where a woman could not live alone, or expect another man to take her as a second wife. Here it is different. A man should have many wives. A warrior should wait for his wife in the Shadow Land. She will come along in good time. I will speak of this in council under the sun that comes now beyond the eastern plains. The people will know. When I am dead, you will live. You were born to the Yuta people, when the True Humans made war upon the Yutas. Now everything has changed. We are at peace with the Yutas. When I am gone, you may return to your old people if you wish. Your brother, Bad Camper, will take you into his camp.”

  “My brother?” she said.

  “Yes. I know. I have known for a long time. My sits-beside wife told me. She knew things. When I am gone, you will not be killed over my grave. You may return to the Yutas if you wish.”

  Looks Away lay beside Shaggy Hump a long time in silence. Finally, she spoke, her voice steady and low. “I will stay with the Horseback People. I love my son, Horseback, very much. He is not of my blood, but he is my son. If you die in battle, my husband, I will remain a True Human.”

  Shaggy Hump rolled toward her and threw his leg over her. Her warmth had beaten the chill of the sweat that had covered him. “You are good, my wife. You are better than good. Now, I am going to sleep beside you. Wake me when the sun comes.”

  * * *

  A lively council convened under the following sun. Shaggy Hump spoke first, for he was the elder in the camp of the Horseback People. He told the tales of his exploits in battle, the scalps he had taken, the battle strokes he had counted, the ponies he had stolen. He had survived many raids. He spoke a long time. He said nothing of days to come, except for a vehement insistence that wives should no longer die over the graves of slain husbands.

  “No woman is a burden in this land of buffalo,” he insisted. “Here, a man needs many women to cure the hides of the animals he kills. If a warrior dies, another must take his widow. I have spoken.”

  Other seasoned warriors followed Shaggy Hump, relating tales of their many victories. Bear Heart repeated the story of the first visit to the land of the Metal Men and of the return of all five searchers under the leadership of Horseback.

  Finally, Horseback’s time came to speak, and he rose. Just then, a raven called overhead. It circled the camp and flew to the southeast. Through the southeast side of the council lodge, which had been left uncovered to catch the southern breeze, Horseback watched the raven in silence until it disappeared in the distant sky. Then, he began to speak.

  “The time comes for every True Human to decide. Will you live and die in the new country of the buffalo and the pony, or will you go back to the old Noomah ways in the land of stinging snow? There the True Humans must hoard pine nuts and pemmican or starve th
rough the cold moons. Here we will hunt buffalo and grow fat, even through the snows of winter. In the old country, the cold days before the moons of spring were called the Time When Babies Cry for Food. Here, there will be no such time. Here, there is tallow, and meat, and marrow, and pemmican, and fresh brains, and liver, and paunches to cook in, even through the Moon of the Snowblind.

  “When I was a boy, our camp lived in terror of attack from the Northern Raiders, and Crow, and Flathead, and Yuta. Now the Northern Raiders and Crow and Flathead fear our horse power, and we are far away from their camps where they could not harm us even if they had the courage. The Yutas make peace with us, for they know we are powerful.

  “The Metal Men do not matter. Only their soldiers fight, and they have few. The Wolf People, and the Osage, and the Raccoon-Eyed People are far away. They will seldom bother us. The Tiwas at Tachichichi live under a truce. They attack no one.

  “Our true enemies now are Na-vohnuh. They have attacked our camp to remind us that we must avenge our ancestors. The Na-vohnuh do not know how to ride. They get off their ponies to fight. In the winter they follow the buffalo, but we will find them, take their scalps and ponies, and avenge our dead. In the spring they will go back to their villages. They will be easy to find then. We will hunt buffalo and attack the Na-vohnuh camps. They have many more warriors than we have, yet new Horseback People come with every moon from the old country. Our enemies do not know how to possess the power of ponies, as we do. Our enemies do not have the protection of powerful spirits. Yet, the war will last many winters, for our enemies number like pebbles in a riverbed. Our young braves will learn to fight and win glory. When it is over, the land of buffalo will be ours.

  “The spirits have summoned us to this good place to bring a nation out of the mist. Yet, they do not give us this land. The spirits say we must avenge our ancestors. We must destroy our ancient enemies. We must win the good land. We must conquer our new country. Upon all the earth, no land is better. There is much meat. Much meat! Plenty of humps and ribs and backstops and briskets.