Zeke suppressed a smile. “You can be a good warrior and have a wife, Wolf’s Blood,” he replied. “Swift Arrow speaks as a man full of bitterness. He lost his first wife to the white man’s disease and his second wife to the soldiers’ guns. That is why he does not marry again. He is full of hatred. He stays in the North with the Sioux, where the Indians still ride with more freedom, still hunt where they choose and do as they please. But now the soldiers ride hard against those in the North also. It will be bad for them.”
The last words were spoken sadly and quietly as Zeke took out his knife and began sharpening the huge blade against a rock that he held in his other hand.
“There is a new kind of war coming, son,” he went on, scraping the blade against the rock almost angrily. “You will have to understand this kind of war if you want to survive. It won’t be a war fought with guns and lances. It is a white man’s kind of war—one fought with power and riches, laws and the pen. And it’s part of the reason your mother thinks book learning is important. In that respect, she is right.”
The boy frowned. “I do not understand. How can a man fight without weapons?”
Zeke sighed, seemingly lost in thought. “There are all kinds of weapons, Wolf’s Blood, and sometimes there are ways to get what you want without breaking the white man’s law and getting into trouble. And there are some men who will look at you and smile and shake your hand, but who can do you more damage than the fiercest warrior you might face in physical battle.”
Wolf’s Blood reached over and petted his wolf, who lay lazily on its belly beside its master. He ran his fingers through the animal’s thick fur. Zeke stopped sharpening the knife and eyed the boy and wolf for a moment. The two of them fit together well, both wild, a part of the earth and things that are untamed. Wolf’s Blood met his father’s eyes then, seeing pain there.
“There is something you wish to tell me, Father,” he said. “It is about this other kind of war.”
Zeke nodded. “I want you to understand your enemies, Wolf’s Blood. Know who they are and be ready for them. Your worst enemies will be men like Winston Garvey, scheming, selfish, power-hungry animals. They’ll smile at you and shake your hand, but on the inside they are considering just how they can kill you and get you out of their way. They are men who will stop at nothing to get what they want, and they use white men’s laws and courts to back them. They are educated and clever, and you must always be prepared to outwit them.”
“Winston Garvey is the man who kept my aunt, Yellow Moon, as a slave? The one who is the father of her half-breed son?”
Zeke nodded. “You are the only child old enough to remember what happened to the child after Yellow Moon was killed by soldiers. The baby was badly crippled, his foot and leg twisted, an affliction the white man calls clubfoot. Abbie, who loves everything that walks, wanted to take him, but she already had four children of her own, and your brother Jeremy was only a baby himself at the time. I thought the burden of a crippled baby would be too much for Abbie. Besides that, the child needed help, the kind we couldn’t give him. We took him to missionaries north of Fort Laramie. Remember that?”
“Ai. The woman’s name was Bonnie.”
Zeke returned to sharpening his knife. “Yes. Bonnie Lewis. Her husband, Rodney, is a preacher up there, and her father, who is also there, is a doctor—a good one. A year before that I had saved Bonnie’s life when I rescued her from a band of outlaws. We became good friends. That was down near Santa Fe. She had told me then that if there was ever anything she or her father could do for me, that I should tell them. So Abbie and I took Yellow Moon’s crippled boy to Bonnie.” He smiled softly. “Bonnie is a good woman. Soon as she set eyes on that poor crippled baby, she wanted to take him and see if her father or one of the fine doctors they knew back east could help him. Abbie and I agreed. Bonnie’s father knew all the right people who could help the boy. So we left him there. As the months went by, Bonnie grew to love him more and more, until finally she wrote and asked us if she and her husband could legally adopt him. Bonnie can’t have children of her own—at least it appears that way. She’s been married several years now and still hasn’t conceived. That makes the boy even more special to her. She’s a kind, loving woman, and Abbie and I decided it was best for the boy to remain with Bonnie and her husband.”
He set down the knife and leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees.
“I’m telling you these things, son, for a reason. You knew we left the boy with Bonnie, but we never told you we received letters after that regarding the boy’s progress, operations he has had to help correct his crippled foot, or the fact that Bonnie adopted him. We haven’t said much about it because for one thing we want the other children to forget about their half-breed cousin. We don’t speak of him, and it’s best they forget him and know nothing about where he is. But you remember enough that you should know the rest so that you are prepared.”
The boy frowned. “I do not understand. Prepared for what?”
“Prepared for the fact that the boy’s real father, the one who kept Yellow Moon as a slave and fathered the child, might one day discover the boy’s identity. If he does, he will have the child murdered. The last thing Winston Garvey wants is for anyone to know he slept with Indian women or worse than that, fathered a half-breed son. You know enough that it’s dangerous for you not to know it all. If you know the whole story, you won’t be as likely to spill something that you shouldn’t. You and I and Abbie are the only ones who know of the boy’s whereabouts. Bonnie and Rodney and Bonnie’s father know the story behind the boy and will never reveal his origins to anyone west of the Mississippi. My white brother, Danny, also knows, because he helped us find Bonnie when we first took the crippled boy to her. But Danny knows he must never tell anyone. Even his wife knows nothing about it.”
Wolf’s Blood sighed and shook his head. “You are confusing me, Father. Why should Winston Garvey care that he had a half-breed son? Many half-breeds are born—to the trappers and mountain men. A man should want his son.”
Zeke thought for one painful moment about his own white father, but quickly pushed the thought away.
“Of course a man should want his son,” he told the boy. “But not men like Winston Garvey. If Garvey ever finds the boy, he’ll murder him. I’m sure of it, because I’m sure of the kind of man Garvey is. I found that out when I rescued Yellow Moon from him in the first place. He lived down in Santa Fe then. I’ve seen men like that before, Wolf’s Blood. He’s just like the kind of men who chased the Cherokees out of Georgia, rooting the Indians out of their rightful homes and sending them on a long walk of tears and death to Oklahoma. It was one of the most pitiful things I have ever witnessed, hundreds and hundreds dying along the way, all because the whites decided they wanted the Cherokee land. That’s the kind of man Garvey is. He hates Indians. He made that obvious when I went after Yellow Moon. He tortured Yellow Moon and kept her purely for sexual pleasures. The only way I got her out of there was to threaten to expose his sexual involvement with Indian women as well as the fact that I knew he consorted with a well-known prostitute. Garvey takes pride in his fine citizen reputation. He didn’t want that ruined. Besides that, I threatened to return to his ranch with all the Indians necessary to wipe the man out, and that I personally would take Garvey’s scalp. He apparently believed me. He handed Yellow Moon over to me. I couldn’t take her through violence because the man had a virtual army protecting his ranch. So I used white man’s tactics—threatening to expose his fine standing as a righteous, God-fearing ex-senator. Few people know what the man is really capable of doing, or that he is scheming at this very moment to own as much of this territory as he can get his hands on, and to rid Colorado Territory of most of its Indians—all of them if he can do it. The last thing he wants is for anyone to know he has a half-breed son. Hatred and resentment toward the Indians are being nurtured by schemes of men like Garvey, and the man has a son who is going to be worse than the father. That is w
hat I mean about understanding the trickery of the white man, Wolf’s Blood—about being prepared for men like Winston Garvey and his son, Charles. And because of the danger to the life of Yellow Moon’s half-breed son, you must be aware of all the details. The boy Yellow Moon gave birth to was fathered by Winston Garvey. And because Yellow Moon was first the wife of my brother, Red Eagle, she is considered a sister-in-law. After I rescued her from Garvey, your uncle, Swift Arrow, took her for his wife, because Red Eagle was dead. It is often the custom for a Cheyenne man to take in a dead brother’s wife. Then Yellow Moon gave birth to Garvey’s son, and even though he was not fathered by Red Eagle or Swift Arrow, we consider him your cousin, because he was born to Yellow Moon and she was a part of the family. Now the boy lives with the missionaries, Bonnie and Rodney Lewis. His name is Joshua, and he’s a cripple. He’s eight years old now.”
Wolf’s Blood picked up a stick and poked at the fire. “I think I understand, Father. But how would Winston Garvey know about the child? Joshua was not born until many months after you rescued Yellow Moon, and he was born far to the north, in Sioux country, after Yellow Moon went there to live with my uncle, Swift Arrow.”
Zeke picked up his knife and turned it in his hand. He knew he must explain the connection between Winston Garvey and Anna Gale, and how and why Anna Gale knew of the existence of Garvey’s half-Indian son. But to tell Wolf’s Blood that much would mean telling him that Zeke himself had slept with the notorious prostitute. How could he make a fifteen-year-old boy understand why he had done so? The thought of his infidelity still brought pain to his own heart, and now he must try to explain it to his son. He rose and walked to the edge of the hill, looking down at the little cabin far below and watching the younger children playing tag. It was such a peaceful picture. How he loved his family, and the love he had found through them.
“It’s possible Garvey would find out,” he answered his son quietly. “Because one other woman knows the boy exists—not his name or where he is, only that he exists.”
Wolf’s Blood looked up at his father. “Who is the woman?” he asked.
Zeke sighed. “Do you remember when we were in Denver, son, when we took your mother there because she needed to see a doctor badly?”
The boy’s eyes turned colder. “How could I forget Denver?” he hissed. “I hate Denver! The people there were cruel to us! That ugly white boy came down the street and called me dirty names! I jumped on him and beat him up good, but then a white man pulled me off and beat me and threw me in the street, where that horse rode over me! And when you tried to help me those men all jumped on you from behind and hurt you and took you to their jail. They were bad men, and that boy was evil! I saw the evil in his eyes.”
Zeke turned around and faced his son. “That white boy was Charles Garvey, Winston Garvey’s son.”
Wolf’s Blood’s eyebrows arched in surprise. “He was? Why did you not tell me this before?”
Zeke looked down at his knife. “Because I didn’t know how to explain it all to you, Wolf’s Blood.” His voice was strained and distant. He walked back to the small fire and knelt down across from his son. “When we went to Denver four years ago, I had no idea that Winston Garvey had shifted his interests to Colorado Territory. I thought he was still in Santa Fe. At the time you got in that fight with his son in the street, Garvey himself was away in the East, which was a lucky thing for us. If he had known I was in town, he’d have had me hung. He knows I can expose a lot of things about him, one of which is that he is very closely connected with the prostitute called Anna Gale.”
Their eyes held, and he saw the curiosity in Wolf’s Blood’s innocent gaze. “Anna Gale is the woman who helped to get you out of jail,” he mused. “And she got a doctor for me and gave me and my mother shelter.”
“That’s right,” Zeke replied. “You never questioned why Anna Gale helped us, son. And I never offered a reason. But I had known her before. When I was searching for Yellow Moon, I had traced her to Anna’s place back when Anna was still in Santa Fe. It was Anna who told me where I could find Yellow Moon, but she wanted a price for the information. I couldn’t beat it out of her because I was in a civilized town and she was well guarded. I had to think about Abbie and my family and getting back home to them. I couldn’t risk a noose around my neck or being labeled as a wanted man, which is what would have happened if I had made trouble in Santa Fe. I was a half-breed. I never would have got out of that town.” He gripped his knife tightly, frustrated by the times when he could not use it to get what he wanted because of the white man’s laws and trickery. “Anna Gale wanted only one thing from me, son. So I gave it to her.”
He met the boy’s eyes again, and the boy’s heart began to race a little faster as it suddenly came to him what his father was telling him. “You … slept with her?”
Zeke saw the desperate disappointment in the boy’s eyes. “It isn’t what you think, Wolf’s Blood. I’m only telling you all of this so that you understand the connection—between Winston Garvey and Anna Gale, and me.”
The boy blinked back tears. “But … you love my mother!”
“Of course I love your mother! I’d cut out my eyes for your mother! But I’m trying to explain to you about the other kind of war, Wolf’s Blood! The white man’s war!”
The boy shook his head. “Women like that—they are filth!”
Zeke threw down the knife. “Damn it, Wolf’s Blood, I’m trying to explain something to you!” Their eyes locked for a moment in both love and anger. Then Wolf’s Blood looked down at the flames.
“Tell me what I should know, Father,” he said quietly, his voice dejected. Zeke’s heart ached with a longing to have the boy understand.
“I was desperate by then to find Yellow Moon, son. I had rescued Bonnie and got her back to safety, but I’d been shot in the process and my wound still wasn’t healed. I was tired and I was lonely for Abbie and my family. I had already come close to losing my life more than once in my search for Yellow Moon and had killed a lot of men to get that far. I was close, Wolf’s Blood! So close! All I had to do was sleep with Anna Gale to get my information and I could find Yellow Moon and go home. There are many things about men and women you don’t understand yet, but some day you will discover that there can be sex without love. There is no beauty in it, no pleasure, no satisfaction. I did nothing more than provide stud service to a scheming whore. But it was my only weapon at the time. I played the white man’s game to find out what I needed to know. Anna Gale used me, but I also used her. And there wasn’t a moment when your mother was not on my mind. What I did tore at my soul, but I had to find Yellow Moon, and I could only pray your mother would understand that, because I knew I could not and would not hide it from her.”
“She … knows?”
“Of course she knows! And she knows how it pained me to be untrue to her, because I made myself suffer. I made my own atonement, punished myself physically so that she would understand, so that I could offer some sign to her that I did not sleep with Anna Gale for the pleasure of it. When I left Anna’s place to go after Yellow Moon, I made a sacrifice. I turned to the Indian ways and chose to make myself suffer physically so that the pain on the inside would not be so great.” He held up his left hand; most of the little finger was missing. “I did this.”
Wolf’s Blood’s eyes widened. “You … you said that was an accident!”
“It was no accident, son. I’ve never known quite how to tell you. But now maybe you’re old enough to understand, and it’s our secret now. Yours and mine and your mother’s. It took more courage than I’ve ever needed to do this, Wolf’s Blood. But I knew it was necessary. I found a quiet place alone and I cut off my finger. And then I wept, Wolf’s Blood. I wept for a long time—and prayed to the spirits that Abbie would understand and forgive, for such things are hard for a white woman to understand. And I hope you, too, will understand. This is my sign, Wolf’s Blood.” He held the finger closer. “This is my atonement—proof of how muc
h I love your mother.”
Wolf’s Blood studied his father’s eyes. He knew the true heart of this man he worshipped and admired, and he knew how strong was the love between Zeke and Abigail Monroe. Of that love he had no doubt, nor did he now doubt his father’s reasons for sleeping with Anna Gale. He grasped Zeke’s hand.
“If my mother could understand, then I, too, understand,” he told Zeke. “This Anna Gale. She is the link, then, between you and Winston Garvey, a way he might find out about Joshua?”
Zeke nodded and squeezed the boy’s hand lovingly, then rose, walking to his horse and retrieving a small pipe from his parfleche. He began stuffing it with tobacco. “Anna knew Garvey years before, back in Washington,” he explained. “Garvey would find clients for her, and she managed to get information from them that Garvey could sometimes use later against them.” He lit his pipe. “Then Garvey set her up in business in Santa Fe during the Mexican War, where he planned to come out himself after he retired and get himself set up—buy up land, establish banks, and in general increase his wealth tenfold by getting out here before the whites began surging west to settle. Garvey more or less owned Anna for years. She hated the man, but she was at his beck and call. When gold was discovered in Denver, they both headed north to reap the benefits from the miners and new settlers. That’s how Anna ended up in Denver at the same time we were there. And then when she saw us in trouble she decided to help us.” He puffed on the pipe quietly for a moment. “I guess in spite of what she was, she had developed fond feelings for me after the night I spent with her. I don’t know why, for she was a woman who took in men and cast them out like you cast away nutshells after eating the meat, but she considered me special, and for some reason she had fond memories of me. So she helped us when you got hurt and I got thrown in jail.”
Embrace the Wild Land Page 11