Gear, W Michael - Novel 05 (69 page)

 
          
 
He fingered his chin. "Blackfeet and Crow
will have these things. Guns give warriors a big advantage in a fight."

 
          
 
"The A'ni and Pakiani seek out the
Ku'chendikani just to take their horses. The Dukurika high in the mountains are
mostly left alone. The A'ni and Pakiani don't like to ride their horses up the
mountains. And the Dukurika have nothing they want to steal."

 
          
 
"Sheepeater," Green said,
understanding in his eyes. "You're not a Snake? Which tribe do you belong
to?"

 
          
 
She shrugged. "We are just the People.
Some live far to the west and call themselves the Agaidika, the Fish-eaters.
Some are the Po'hoganhite, the Sage-people. It depends on where the People are
and what they do."

 
          
 
Green ran his thick fingers through his hair.
"
Willow
, it's going to happen. If I don't set up a
post and trade, someone else will. You and your people have to understand. The
white traders will go any place they must to find hides. They'll fight for
trade just as hard as the Blackfeet and Crows fight with each other. If the
river can be made safe, many traders will race for your country. Take my word,
they'll come. Just as winter follows summer."

 
          
 
Just as winter follows summer? The words
settled in her soul. She couldn't help but stiffen at the thought.

 
          
 
"This place you will make, it will be
like
Fort
Atkinson
?"

 
          
 
"No, not that big. Just a small post. A
couple of houses, a storehouse, and the trading house."

 
          
 
"And what if it isn't good for us, for my
people, Green?"

 
          
 
"You've seen the things we have. Wouldn't
life be easier with them? A copper pot doesn't wear out like a buffalo gut.
Glass beads are brighter than porcupine quills. A good steel knife works a heap
better than a stone one. That can't be bad.''

 
          
 
Water slapped at the bow, splashing whitely
against the brown water. Despite the magic of a huge boat that moved with the
wind, she couldn't shake the sense of worry.

 
          
 
Someday my people will regret the coming of
the White men. And she couldn't help but think of Coyote, who promised
wonderful things—and brought disaster.

 
          
 
''That wasn't fair!" Richard picked himself
up off the grass and wiped his bloody nose. Every muscle ached, and his nose
stung. The only saving grace was that
Willow
was on the boat and didn't have to see him
look a simple fool.

 
          
 
They stood out in the open on the bluffs west
of the river. The horses watched them with pricked ears, then lowered their
heads to crop at the fresh grass and challenge the limits of their ground
picket. A brisk south wind tugged at Richard's shirt and ruffled his sweaty
hair. Out in the grass a meadowlark trilled the most peaceful of songs. Beyond
wave after wave of grassy hills, the horizon lost itself in the distance.
Patches of white fluffy cloud contrasted to the crystal blue heavens.

 
          
 
Travis stood with feet planted, thumbs in his
belt. The insolent wind teased the long fringes of his tawny hunting jacket.
"Dick, the thing about fighting is that yer supposed to win."

 
          
 
Baptiste laughed and added, "Boy, you
gotta figger that Trudeau ain't a gonna worry about fair, neither. He ain't no
gentleman. And, Dick, you gotta savvy this: Out heah, winning means
living."

 
          
 
Richard stared at the bright blood on his
fingers. "So what am I doing wrong?"

 
          
 
"Yer holding back. Now, try her again.
Give her all ye've got. Fight with yer heart. C'mon. Try me." Travis
gestured him onward.

 
          
 
Richard tasted blood and spit. ''This is just
practice. Do I have to bleed?''

 
          
 
"Hell, yes! Fighting ain't painless,
coon. That nose ain't shit ter what Trudeau'll do ter ye. Here I come."

 
          
 
Richard squared his shoulders, knotted his
fists, and Travis closed. This time, Richard blocked two of Travis's blows
before a third landed in his gut. Richard doubled, thumped into the ground, and
wheezed fer breath.

 
          
 
"C'mon, ye silly girl!" Travis
cried, bounding from foot to foot. "Get up, ye stinking Yankee. Yer dog
shit, boy! Farting philos'pher! Ye've got the guts of a buzzard!"

 
          
 
The mocking tone goaded him. The humiliation
of that last blow, the indignity of his dripping nose, all broke loose at once,
and he threw himself at Travis, a red rage burning free inside.

 
          
 
Clawing and scratching, Richard kicked and
gouged, heedless of the blows that rained down on him. But Travis slipped
inside, backheeled him, and dropped him to the ground.

 
          
 
"That's it!" Travis leapt back, a
grin on his ruined face. "Ye turned yerself loose!"

 
          
 
"You son of a bitch!" Richard
staggered to his feet.

 
          
 
''Them's fighting words!" Baptiste
crowed.

 
          
 
"Whoa, now!" Travis held his hands
wide. 'That's just the first step. When yer a-fighting, rage is half of it.
T'other half is in yer head. That's what we gotta work on next."

 
          
 
Richard glared, fists knotted.

 
          
 
"All right, coon. Come over hyar. Now,
grab a-holt of me. What I just did was wrap my leg around ahind yers and push.
Give her a try."

 
          
 
Richard did, while Baptiste pointed out the
proper place to put his feet.

 
          
 
"Gonna have you all fit to whup Old
Ephraim hisself," Baptiste declared. "Ain't nobody on the river knows
knuckle and skull like ol' Travis Hartman."

 
          
 
Richard threw the hunter, surprised at what
he'd done.

 
          
 
"Now, coon," Travis told him from
flat on his back. "Jump plumb in the middle of my lights, and I'll show ye
how ter gouge a man's eye out. Ain't gonna do her fer real, mind. I got lots
ter see afore I goes under."

 
          
 
''Gouge a man's—"

 
          
 
''When ye fights, coon, ye fights fer yer
life."

 
          
 
''But, Travis, a man's eyes? My God,
that's—"

 
          
 
Baptiste stepped close, his black face grim.
''Make yor choice now, white boy. Life ain't fair. It ain't just. Fighting
ain't nothing more than two animals going at it to see who wins. Ain't no rules
out heah. You win, yor alive. You lose ..." Baptiste ran a suggestive
finger across Richard's throat.

 
          
 
Reluctantly, Richard nodded. ''All right,
Travis, how do I gouge a man's eye out?"

 
          
 
Hours later, Richard picked at his blood-crusted
nose as they waited by the side of the river for the Maria.

 
          
 
Travis sat cross-legged, peering intently at
the ABCs scratched into the dirt. Baptiste lounged on his side, watching with
amused interest. Laboriously Travis scratched out: T-R-A-V-I-S. Then wiped it
out and started again.

 
          
 
''Gives a coon a curious feeling, a-wiping out
his name like that. Injuns, they figger words got power, heap of medicine in
'em. Most like a-stepping on a grave."

 
          
 
Richard winced as he shifted his abused body.
"Well, think of it this way. As long as you can write it again, you're
still alive. And unlike the spoken word, the written one can last forever. Like
those of Socrates, who spoke two thousand years ago. Were it not for writing,
his thoughts would be long gone. All that wisdom, vanished forever."

 
          
 
"Tee. Are. Ay. Uh—"

 
          
 
"Vee."

 
          
 
''Yep. Vee. Eye. Snake. That's what it
is."

 
          
 
"Ev

 
          
 
"Wal, she looks like a snake ter me,
coon. Them letter sign, wal, it's some harder ter cipher than this poor child
ever figgered on."

 
          
 
Baptiste chimed in. "Where I comes from,
it's agin' the law fo' niggers to larn to read."

 
          
 
"It's an immoral law," Richard
replied. "They're afraid of what slaves would learn if they started to
read. You might pick up a copy of Rousseau, or Hegel, and get ideas that might
cause dissent."

 
          
 
"What

 
          
 
''Unrest. Rebellion. As long as the slaves are
ignorant, they can be oppressed. In
Boston
, there are abolitionist factions who would
change that."

 
          
 
Baptiste gave him a blank look.

 
          
 
''Abolitionists," Richard repeated.
''People who want to abolish, do away with, slavery. It's quite fashionable
among the intellectuals."

 
          
 
Baptiste picked a twig from the ground, cocked
his jaw, and one by one, began to trace out the letters Richard had drawn.
"Reckon I could larn, too. If n it's agin' the law, this coon's fo'
it."

 
          
 
Richard moved his sore arm, watching both men
make letters in the sand. Here I am, a prime candidate to die by violence,
learning to fight like a ruffian, and teaching an escaped slave to read.

 
          
 
But the memory of Trudeau, of the triumphant
look in his eyes, had burned into Richard's soul. One day, Trudeau, you 're
going to regret that punch to the belly. So help me, God.

 
          
 
The anger of that promise sobered him enough
to wonder, What am I becoming?

 
          
 
Richard climbed slowly to his feet, walking
out into the trees. One nostril was still plugged with blood. Had that been
him, clawing and kicking in red fury?

 
          
 
I was a wild man. The antithesis of everything
I’ve ever believed. He stopped to watch a squirrel dashing through the
cottonwood branches overhead. Beyond the belt of trees lining the river, the
plains stretched endlessly toward the western horizon. A man stood alone out
there, naked to the eye of God. And from what Travis had told him, the plains
stretched on for weeks, months—endless grass, caressed by the sun and wind,
home of the buffalo and the Indian.

 
          
 
"You can't lock Tarn Apo into a lodge,
Ritshard. He is everywhere . . . and can only be known here. '' And
Willow
-had pointed to her heart. For the first
time he fully understood the truth she'd taught.