Eagle’s Song (30 page)

Hawk sighed in resignation, a hint of a smile on his lips. His dark eyes drilled into his father’s gaze lovingly. “I would never, never dishonor you, Father.”

Wolf’s Blood stepped closer. “If I thought you would, I would not have seen that you and my wife were often alone. It is only that the Indian in me wishes to know his wife and children will always be protected and provided for when he dies.”

A look of determination came into Hawk’s eyes. “You aren’t going to die. I’m going to get you off, have the Monroe name cleared; and then we’ll get the best doctors in Denver to see what they can do for the arthritis.”

Wolf’s Blood smiled sadly. “You will not get me cleared. You can try, but I did what I did; that cannot be erased, especially since I am Indian. I will at least get the truth out, maybe make a few people understand
why
I did it. And nothing can be done about arthritis, Hawk, except perhaps to drink something for the pain; then, instead of dying just a crippled old man, I would die a drunken or drug-filled crippled old man. That would be even worse. I have often thought of turning to whiskey to dull the pain, but I do not want to go the way of so many
other Indian men. Stay away from the firewater, Hawk. Never lose your pride. Promise me that.”

A lump rose in Hawk’s throat. “I promise.”

Wolf’s Blood grasped his arm. “I do not know exactly what will happen, Hawk, but you will know when I choose the right time. I have asked Jeremy to be with us through all of it. Your uncle loves you as his own. He has been like a father to you, and that is good. You will still have him to turn to. You have not had me as a father for many years, but you have done just fine. I am proud of you, very proud.”

Hawk drew a deep breath. “And I am proud of you. You have never been afraid to be the Indian that you are, and by Indian law everything you have done has been right. But you have suffered so much over the years, Father, losing three different women you loved to white man’s bullets. I am glad you had your days of glory, your days of riding as a warrior with Swift Arrow.” He paused and frowned. “It’s grandfather, isn’t it?”

Wolf’s Blood’s eyebrows arched, and he stepped back a little. “What do you mean?”

“You want to be with him. You want to be with Cheyenne Zeke, with Lone Eagle.”

Wolf’s Blood’s eyes teared. “I miss him as much today as I did when I held his dying body in my arms at Fort Robinson. My father and I were one spirit, just as you and I are, Hawk. And as I know my father has always been with me, know that I will always be with you. When you hear the wolves howl, you will know that I am near, as I know my father is near when the eagle’s shadow passes over me.”

Hawk closed his eyes and swallowed. “Do you know what is really strange?” He looked at his father again, a tear slipping down his cheek. “All these years we’ve been apart, I haven’t been able to talk to you, ask your
advice, turn to you for anything; and yet I can hardly imagine life without you in it.”

Wolf’s Blood only nodded. He stepped closer, embracing his son, and they hugged tightly, both crying quietly.

“Does Grandma Abbie know?” Hawk asked.

“No one understands better than my mother.”

“She thinks as much of you as she did of Zeke. It would kill her if something happened to you.”

“No, son. It would kill her to see me die a crippled old man.” Wolf’s Blood pulled away. “Come. There is food waiting for us.”

Hawk quickly wiped at his eyes, then put an arm around his father to help him walk back to the house, where they were greeted with stares of worry and wonder. “What’s everybody looking at?” Hawk asked, irritated.

“Little Eagle told us how you rescued him,” Abbie said with a grin. “It sounded like quite an adventure.”

Hawk shook his head and took his chair. “It wasn’t anything. I got to him quickly, so he was easy to find. It scared us to death at first, but he’s all right.”

Wolf’s Blood looked at his mother, suspecting Little Eagle had told everyone that Hawk kissed Sweet Bird. He decided to change the subject. “I remember the story you told us once about rescuing a little Indian girl when you were first married to Father,” he said.

Abbie smiled. “What a long time ago that was! I was only sixteen. Zeke’s Indian stepfather gave me a knife and a blanket for saving the girl, and a warrior named Two Feathers gave me a coup feather to honor my bravery. I still have the knife and the coup feather in my trunk.”

Wolf’s Blood stood behind Hawk. He squeezed his shoulder as he spoke. “So my son gets some of his courage from his white grandmother.”

Everyone smiled. “Sit down and eat, Wolf’s Blood,” Margaret told her brother. “Sweet Bird went upstairs
to put the children to bed for naps. Little Eagle needs to rest this afternoon.”

Wolf’s Blood nodded. “I will go up and see him again first. I will say, Margaret, it is a good thing I did not have to live in a house like this. Climbing those stairs is not an easy task for me. I hate to admit that.” He sighed, leaving Hawk and heading toward the double sliding doors to the dining room. “I must tell you all I have decided I will go to Denver in two days. It has been good seeing all my family again. The time is near now to do what must be done.” He turned and left, and everyone sobered. Margaret looked at Hawk.

“What were you two talking about out there?”

Hawk reached for a biscuit, although his appetite had suddenly left him. “It’s personal.”

“You
can
get him off, can’t you, Hawk?” LeeAnn asked.

Hawk just stared at the biscuit in his hand. “I don’t know. It isn’t likely, but I’ll try.”

“All we can do is pray the Lord’s will be done,” Abbie told them all. “Whatever happens, we all have each other, and we’ll all be here for Sweet Bird and the children, and for Hawk.”

Wolf’s Blood could hear the conversation as he made his way to the stairs. Yes, this was a good, strong family. He would never have to worry about his wife and children. He painfully climbed the carpeted stairway to the room where Little Eagle and Laughing Turtle lay in a big bed together. Sweet Bird straightened from kissing them both. He watched her eyes as he came closer. Yes, she loved him. “It is all right,” he told her.

She ran to him, breaking into tears. “He is a good man,” she whispered.

“Of course he is. He is my son. Someday he will be your strength.”

Twenty-seven

“No, Mother, you will not go. If I have to have Morgan tie you to a chair, I will do it.” Wolf’s Blood sat on the porch swing with Abbie, watching the family members who lived in Denver and Pueblo load their baggage. The adults had responsibilities to go back to, and no one knew how long the situation with Wolf’s Blood would take to resolve. They would have to await the outcome. Wolf’s Blood had asked that only Hawk and Jeremy go with him to Cheyenne.

“You are my son, and after so many years without you, I have to be with you through this, Wolf’s Blood.”

Wolf’s Blood faced her, taking her hand, hating the agony in her eyes. “Father would not have wanted you at Fort Robinson, and I don’t want you in Denver or Cheyenne. Trips are too hard for you now, and if something should go wrong, perhaps your heart could not bear it. Stay home, Mother. Do it for me, and for Sweet Bird. She will also stay here, with the children. I do not want them to go through this in public. Besides, a place like Denver would frighten them. If the news is bad, they will need you. Please promise me you will stay with them.”

Abbie squeezed his hand, leaning forward and putting her head on his shoulder, unable to stop the tears. “My God, Wolf’s Blood, you mean so much to me. I might never see you again, and I’ve had you such a
short while. All my life I’ve only had you for a few days or months at a time, then you were gone again. You’re like the wind, as Zeke was.”

He put an arm around her and let her cry. “It was the only way we could be. You should not weep for me, Mother. This is what I want and if it ends badly, know that I am with my father. Nothing could make me happier.”

“I know,” she answered.

He gave her a squeeze. “I must tell you, there is no woman on earth who can compare to you in strength and courage. Father must have seen those things when he married you.”

She sniffed as she let go of him and wiped at her eyes with a handkerchief she held wadded in her hand. “I never want to forget your face,” she told him lovingly.

He touched her cheek with the back of his hand. “A mother never forgets.”

“I’ll go crazy wondering what is happening.”

“Jeremy and Joshua can keep you informed by telephoning Ellen in Pueblo. She can send messages to you.”

Abbie closed her eyes and kissed his hand. “Somehow I knew from the day you were born the course your life would take. From the first day you learned to walk, I could never catch you.” She studied every line of his face, his dark eyes, his long, black hair, now streaked with gray. He was dressed all Indian for this journey, in buckskins, a hairpiece and feathers in his hair. He even wore stripes of war paint on his cheeks. He wanted to be fully Cheyenne when he entered Denver, that city where thirty-five years ago a Colonel Chivington and the Colorado Volunteers had paraded through the streets showing off their “bounty” after raiding a peaceful Cheyenne camp and slaughtering hundreds of women and children. One of those women was the
young Indian girl Wolf’s Blood had loved. It was Sand Creek that had made a warrior out of him, for his heart had been filled with hatred and bitterness ever since. That awful slaughter had been the beginning of many years of warring by the Cheyenne.

“I’m glad I at least managed to get you out of that prison in Florida,” Abbie told him. “You had a few good years. I’m sorry you didn’t have longer with Jennifer.”

“Everything happens as the Great Spirit wills it. And now I must go, before the look in your eyes breaks my heart and makes me stay. I am doing the right thing, Mother.” He leaned forward and kissed her cheek, and she drew in her breath in the pain of sorrow when he quickly rose and moved away from her. “Last night I said my good-byes to Sweet Bird and the children,” he said. “It was very hard for her, but as I held her in my arms, so young and healthy and beautiful, I was even more certain she belongs with someone younger. Hawk has promised to care for her.”

The others came out to pack things into wagons, Zeke and Georgeanne and their children, Iris and her family.

“God go with you,
mi amigo
,” Raphael told Wolf’s Blood.

“
Gracias
,” Wolf’s Blood answered. “Take good care of your
esposa
, or the ghosts of her Apache relatives will come for you.”

Raphael grinned. He was rather awed by this father of his wife, a man who right now looked like a fierce warrior. “I will care for your daughter, as I have always done.”

A crying Iris hugged her father tightly. “We will be in Denver, should you need us, Father.”

He kissed her cheek and pulled away. “I want you to stay home with the children. Be there for them, Iris. Only Hawk and Jeremy should be with me. It is best.”

There came a flurry of good-byes then, as Wolf’s Blood walked off the porch to say farewell to the others, afraid to take too long saying good-bye to his closest loved ones, his sisters Ellen and Margaret. Ellen would stay here at the ranch a while longer with Abbie. Most of the others he would say good-bye to once they reached Denver.

“Look at him” Georgeanne commented to Zeke. “I can almost hear war drums and chanting when he looks like that.”

“He was always the most Indian of all the children,” Zeke answered, feeling sorry for his mother as she hugged her brother tightly and cried. Zeke put an arm around Georgeanne’s waist. “You might as well round up the children and get them into our carriage. We’ll make quite a caravan going back into Denver. It must be killing Grandma Abbie to stay here.”

“I’m sure it’s best she does.” Georgeanne loved the closeness in the Monroe family, something she’d never had. It still hurt to think of her father buried without ever acknowledging his grandchildren, but Margaret and Morgan were wonderful grandparents. They had all shown her more love than she’d ever known since her mother had died.

Brothers and sisters, nieces and nephews, cousins, aunts and uncles, great-grandchildren—all climbed into various wagons, until those who had come from Denver were ready to leave. Wolf’s Blood rode his own horse, as did Hawk. They would ride into Denver together, arriving later than the others, as they did not intend to take the train from Pueblo. Father and son would take their time, camp along the way.

All knew it was very difficult for Wolf’s Blood to mount and ride now, but from here on he intended to be a warrior, and warriors did not travel in wagons or on trains. Morgan had given him his finest Appaloosa
gelding for the journey, and the horse’s rump was painted, an eagle on one side, a wolf on the other.

Wolf’s Blood turned his horse to look at an upstairs window of the house, where Sweet Bird stood, holding Laughing Turtle. Little Eagle was visible beside her, waving to his father, his little face sober with fear. Wolf’s Blood felt as though his heart was being torn from his chest at the sight of his young family. His only solace came when Hawk also looked up at them, and Little Eagle finally grinned when he waved at Hawk. Wolf’s Blood ached to hold his wife just once more, but he had insisted she stay in the house when he left. What was the use of one last hug and kiss? The pain in their hearts was bad enough as it was.

He turned his horse and rode out ahead of the others, followed by Hawk. Margaret and Abbie clutched each other and wept, and from a window above Sweet Bird watched until her husband disappeared over a rise. It was then she noticed an eagle, silently winging its way in the same direction.

Even in the East there were newspaper stories about the half-blood Cheyenne called Wolf’s Blood who had murdered three white men in Cheyenne, Wyoming, scalping two of them right in front of a crowd of people; about how he had managed to escape and had been in hiding in Canada until he’d turned himself in to his son in Denver, Colorado. The stories varied in accuracy, as did most tales about Indians in those times, white men interpreting the truth as they saw it.

Nowhere were the headlines bigger than in the Denver papers. After all, the “wild Indian” called Wolf’s Blood was the father of the noted attorney Hawk Monroe, who had won the famous case of
Mrs. Edward Ralston
v.
the City of Denver
. And Wolf’s Blood’s own brother
was none other than Jeremy Monroe, one of Denver’s wealthiest businessmen. His sister was LeeAnn Lewis, the wife of Joshua Lewis, a top man at the
Rocky Mountain News
and the author of numerous magazine articles about Indians and the West. It was said he was also working on a book about one of Colorado’s pioneers, Abigail Monroe, LeeAnn’s mother and the woman responsible for the establishment of one of Denver’s first orphanages. Rumor had it that Abigail Monroe was living in seclusion now in an old cabin on her original homestead in southeast Colorado. Some wondered if she was even still alive.

Zeke Brown, one of Colorado’s wealthiest men and biggest landowners was Wolf’s Blood’s nephew. Iris Hidalgo, wife of a successful Denver contractor, was Wolf’s Blood’s daughter. It seemed amazing to Denverites that such a notorious Indian, who had once ridden in war against whites, and whose own uncle, it was said, had fought at the Little Big Horn and at Wounded Knee, could have a son and brother and other relatives so successful in the white world. Most were convinced it had to be the white blood in these people that gave them the intelligence and the ability to get an education and to do so well. They believed no full-blood Indian could possibly accomplish so much. Indians just didn’t have it “in them.”

Wolf’s Blood became quite an attraction. Crowds turned out to watch him be escorted from jail to the courthouse, all wanting to get a “last look” at a real warrior. Wolf’s Blood had expected as much, and he had deliberately brought along full Indian garb to wear, white deerskin leggings and shirt, beads tied into some of the fringes at the sides of the leggings and sleeves, a sunburst pattern of beads on the front of the shirt. He wore a bone hairpipe necklace at his throat, a beaded belt around his waist, beaded moccasins.
He had painted his face in his prayer color of white stripes leading vertically down the left side of his face, over forehead, eye and cheek. The same three lines were painted horizontally across his right cheek. He wore his hair long and loose, beaded rawhide wrapped into one narrow braid at one side, an eagle feather was tied into his hair at the crown of his head.

On the way to the courthouse, Hawk and Jeremy walked on either side of Wolf’s Blood. Young Zeke followed behind, Georgeanne at his side. LeeAnn walked with them, Jason accompanying her. Joshua was already in the courthouse taking notes for the newspaper. The courtroom was quickly filled to standing room only. Not only were people interested in gawking at Wolf’s Blood, but after Hawk Monroe’s famous case against Denver, they were anxious to see what he was up to now with his father. All rose when the Circuit judge entered the room and called the court to order with a pound of his gavel. As those present quieted, Judge Gerald Hanson studied Wolf’s Blood for a moment, then looked at Hawk, asking him to rise and declare the reason for this hearing.

“I am a busy man, Mr. Monroe, and I see no reason why I should have anything to do with exonerating Mr. Wolf’s Blood here of a crime he committed in Wyoming.”

Hawk rose, disappointed that he was not before the judge he’d had in the case against Denver. He was well aware that Hanson had been against that decision, which could prejudice the man against him in this case. “I am not asking that you exonerate him of any crimes, Judge Hanson,” he answered. “We are only asking for sanctuary here. Wyoming authorities are demanding my father be extradited to Cheyenne to stand trial, and the public opinion there will be so against him he could not possibly have a fair trial. He is not saying he is not
guilty, but his crime was a crime of passion, sir. One of the men he killed had threatened him and his family with a gun, then carelessly had shot his wife, my stepmother, killing her before my father’s eyes. She was white, not Indian, for the benefit of anyone who thinks it’s no great loss to kill an Indian woman. She was also educated, the mother of a young daughter by her first husband, a schoolteacher. She had taught right here in Denver before going to the reservation to teach after her husband died. The point is, her shooting was a horrible act, and my father, having just seen the woman he loved senselessly murdered, reacted in the way a lot of men would, Indian
or
white!”

The judge rubbed at his chin a moment, studying Wolf’s Blood again. He sighed, leaning back in his chair. “Mr. Monroe, I agree that a man might react by attacking and killing the man who had just killed his wife. However, I think I can safely say that such a man would not go on from there and kill the shooter’s friends, let alone scalp them. That is what I am told Mr. Wolf’s Blood did. The Indian people have to learn that they cannot commit such horrid mutilations. If your father had simply killed the man who shot his wife, this would be a much simpler decision.”

“I understand that, Judge Hanson, but the white man has never understood that Indian culture can’t be changed overnight. My father had been living on a reservation in Montana and was a law-abiding citizen. He owned a horse ranch there and was doing quite well. He had been in Colorado for a family reunion and was on his way home when the shooting happened. He reacted in the only way he knew how to respond to such a thing, with an inbred need to avenge his wife’s death. The other two men had taken part in the confrontation that led to my stepmother’s shooting, so in my father’s eyes, they, too, had to die. Scalping the enemy is a custom
that just naturally came to surface again when my father killed those men. I might add that scalping is something that was encouraged for a time by white men, mostly French and English. During their war they paid
money
for enemy scalps—white or Indian.”

A wave of whispers moved through the crowded room, and the judge pounded his gavel again. “I don’t need or want a lesson on Indian history and culture today, Mr. Monroe. Such things have no bearing in a court of law. I am only interested in deciding this case, and in the severity of the crime committed. Culture or not, natural or not, it happened; and by today’s laws, no man has the right to deliberately murder another because of a crime committed against him or his family. I am sorry for what happened to your stepmother, but your father should have allowed the law to do something about those men, not taken it upon himself to kill them. Be that as it may, it matters little here in Colorado. The legal aspect of this case needs to be decided in Wyoming. All I want from you is your reasoning as to why we should give Mr. Wolf’s Blood sanctuary here in Colorado.”