Cheyenne Winter (31 page)

“What does this have to do with — anything?”

“He’s the one.”

“You don’t know that.”

“No, but he’s the one.”

“That’s not going to help you a bit.”

Guy sighed. “That’s the trouble. I don’t have a thing to tell you.”

“How do you know? I mean, Guy — you have a name. What else?”

“Every American Fun trader and factor along the river — Sarpy, Chardonne, Kipp, even Culbertson, thought it was the act of a lone man, not a company thing. I’m not so sure, Davey. How would an engage without a
centime
afford three rundlets of pure ardent spirits? Why would he? They all suggested he had a grudge against Brokenleg, but  . . . that’s not the way a man with a grudge acts. No. Raffin had a silent partner or two, and this was directed at my company.”

A wry smile lit David Mitchell’s face. “If it was your company’s spirits that Gillian poured into the Missouri then you must be dry up there on the Yellowstone. But if you’ve spirits up there, then those rundlets were planted. All you have to do, Guy, is swear you have your own spirits on hand, the casks you probably loaded at Sergeant Bluff or somewhere near there  . . . But now you’ll tell me you haven’t a drop of contraband at Fitzhugh’s Post.”

Guy didn’t answer. He couldn’t answer.

Mitchell laughed raucously. He hawked and spat at the stove, and the gob popped into steam. “Let’s go back to Raffin. How d’you know?”

“He’s there with the Cheyenne. Brokenleg traded for a lot of robes and some horses while Raffin hung around — and when Brokenleg started back, he was robbed of everything, including the horses.”

“By?”

“Arapaho.”

Mitchell shook his head. “What does that prove?”

“Why — that Raffin is destroying our Cheyenne trade. His marriage is the one advantage we have over American Fur. Someone — maybe even Cadet — pulled him off his regular duties, bought the rundlets of spirits, had Raffin plant them and alter the cargo manifest — and then head out to the Cheyenne to keep on making trouble with us.”

“Guy, can Raffin read and write?”

“I didn’t ask.”

“If, as you say, someone added those casks to Captain Sire’s cargo manifests — that someone had to read and write. Maybe you’d better find something written in Raffin’s hand. I’ve got Sire’s cargo manifests right here — they’re evidence. Get a sample of Raffin’s hand and you might have a case, eh?”

Guy felt dumfounded. He’d missed the obvious.

“Cadet might have something written by Raffin — if you can get it,” Mitchell said. “Which you won’t. He’s not dumb. But you haven’t much time, Guy. I postponed the hearings until January second to give you a chance up the river. I have half the reformers in the East on my back — saying I’m kowtowing to the corrupt fur lobbies. Maybe they’re right. I can’t hang on, Guy. You’ll have to be here — or your counsel — on the second.”

“What will happen?” Guy asked.

“Three affidavits from Bellevue. Foster Gillian’s, his wife’s, and one from his factotum, a young divinity student with fire in his eye named Marshall Landreth. They can’t leave Bellevue — not with river ice, in winter. But Captain Sire is here and’ll testify. And several others who saw it.”

“It’s a trial?”

“Nope. Indian Bureau hearing. All we need to pull a license. But we follow ordinary rules of evidence. By several acts of Congress spirits aren’t allowed in the Indian Territory, except for boatmen’s rations. The law’s been broken — by someone. We — I mean myself and whoever they send out from Washington City — if we find it against you, we’ll pull your trading license end of this robe season.”

“The southern post, too?”

“Both. Same company. I’m sorry, Guy.”

“But Dance’s in Mexico.”

“Trading with our tribes. Sendin’ robes back over our territory.”

“And what do I need for a defense, David?”

Mitchell shrugged. “Not for me to say, really. None of this is for me to say. But you need to prove someone else did it — it wasn’t your stuff. Maybe you could prove it by swearing you’ve got your own stuff up there.” A quirky grin slid onto Mitchell’s face and stuck there. Guy wanted to laugh with him, but it hurt too much.

Fitzhugh’s Post was dying. A great Crow encampment clamped the post like an eagle’s talon, letting nothing in and nothing out. It formed a great arc, pinning the post from all sides except the river.

Maxim knew the end was near. But he didn’t know what end or what to do. They’d run out of firewood, and now they huddled under robes against the brutal December air. They’d run out of meat; the hunters couldn’t leave. When they tried, they’d been driven back by volleys of arrows. In the yard, the two remaining saddlehorses and the pack mule starved. The woodcutters couldn’t get out to cut cottonwoods and strip the logs of good green bark, which made a winter feed for livestock.

They were running out of water. Brokenleg had meant to dig a well but it hadn’t been done. Instead, he had filled several kegs with river water and stored them against emergencies. Most of that foul-tasting water was gone and the remaining keg was frozen solid. The stock hadn’t been watered but the engages had chipped ice from one keg and melted it over kindling made from butchering a bunk — and quenched their raging thirst.

“We can slaughter the mule,” Trudeau said. He and Maxim stood in the yard, staring disconsolately at the animals.

Maxim nodded. They could do that. “We could try to dig a well. We’re only fifteen feet above the river,” he said.

Trudeau laughed. “Starving men digging a well?”

“There’d be mule meat.”

“Ah, young Maxim, where would it lead us?”

“Brokenleg never gave up. He said in the mountains you never give up.”

Samson slid into silence, staring at the cottonwood palisade around the yard. “They haven’t fought us. They could overwhelm us easily. A few engages against so many. Maybe we could try the white flag again — try to parley again.”

Maxim thought they might try, but he knew they’d be driven back. This village and its headmen were under the thumb of Julius Hervey and would do nothing that was not Hervey’s design. “What’ll we offer them?” he asked.

Trudeau shrugged. “It’s for them to say — if they’ll parley.”

“I think they’d let us go — if we left everything behind. Walk out,” Maxim said. “That’s what Hervey wants. For us to walk out and leave the spoils.”

“We could fight,” Samson said.

They’d considered that a hundred times, with every growl of their hungry bellies. The Crows had pitched their lodges out of effective rifleshot. A naked plain, whited with packed snow, surrounded the post. For six days and nights the engages had peered over the stockade and counted the lodges and debated war. This Crow village could field somewhere between a hundred fifty and two hundred warriors, most of them armed with trade rifles.

“I don’t want to if I can help it,” Maxim muttered.

Samson Trudeau became very gentle. “Ah, young Maxim. All the ones who’ve been in the mountains, the beaver men, they’ve been in corners as tight as this. Against the Pieds Noirs mostly. Fate — Fate sometimes decrees a victory if brave men seize it.”

Maxim blinked. “We can escape with our lives — if we walk out. That’s what Hervey wants.” A wave of anger engulfed him. “And that’s what he’ll get tomorrow. Time’s running out.”

“There’s one thing, Maxim. I am many years in the mountains and this I know. Indians don’t like sieges. They’re impatient. They love another kind of war — swift attack and ambush on horses. But they are not made for this,
non.
Maybe tomorrow they will pack up and leave.”

Maxim laughed bitterly, and yet Samson had given him a thread of hope. “Let’s try, Samson. Fitzhugh would try. We can tear down that shed for firewood. We can slaughter the mule for meat. And we can start on a well — if we can chop through the frozen ground.”

A wry twist of a smile built on Trudeau’s lips. “All because we hope to wear them out. Very well, young Monsieur Straus. We will do this.”

That gray morning, under Samson’s direction cold-numbed engages began chopping down the commodious shed in the yard, where harness and saddles and prairie hay and cottonwood fodder had been kept. It had a sod roof over logs, and would give them a lot of heat. Jeannot Provost and Gaspard Larue slaughtered the bleating mule, letting its hot blood gout from its throat. The engages watched hungrily. The rest tackled the new well. Lebrun and Grevy hacked at the frozen clay with axes and discovered the frost went down only a foot. The rest found shovels and spuds and began loosening and pulverizing the resisting clay. It gave them something to do and they became cheerful.

“We dig a grave for us all,
oui?”
joked Bercier.

Gallows humor.

Several times they spotted Crow warriors peering at them through the chinks in the stockade. Maxim clambered up to the shed roof where he could see out, and found the Crow camp in some sort of excitement, blanket-clad warriors eyeing the post. Some of them hastened north — to tell Hervey of these things: engages digging a well; a mule being cut into usable pieces before it froze solid; smoke from the post chimney.

They toiled all that brutal day, driving the six-foot diameter well down four feet, hoisting out rock and clay, and hammering one boulder to pieces. They devoured stringy mule meat as fast as it could be boiled and softened, and eyed the remaining horses expectantly. Night fell along with the temperatures, but still they hacked and chopped and snatched pitiful bits of icy clay out of the deepening hole. The starving horses nickered and bleated, wanting water and food. The anemic white moon quit them before midnight, and the engages piled angrily under their mountains of buffalo robes, shaking with cold.

At dawn the next morning Julius Hervey sat his dun horse before the post. “Little Straus,” he yelled.

No one had seen Hervey ride in. He was simply there as the day brightened, his breath pluming the hazy dawn. Maxim peered through a crack: Hervey waited alone. His Crow allies stayed well back — out of rifle range.

Maxim opened the door a bit, saying nothing. His scattergun felt comfortable in the crook of his arm.

“Ah, little Straus. You can leave safely, you know. On down the river.”

Maxim shook his head.

“You’ll die, little Straus.”

“And you’ll be out of American Fur — the scandal will be too much.”

“Where’s St. Louis did you say?”

“Then we’ll die.” Maxim didn’t feel like dying but he said it because Fitzhugh would say it.

“The Kicked-in-the-Bellies are great friends of mine, little Straus. They know where to trade.”

“I’m through talking,” Maxim said. Some fiery impulse flooded him. He lifted the fowling piece, aimed it, and squeezed the icy trigger. The explosion rocked the piece into his shoulder. Buckshot hit the dun, which screeched and began bucking. Hervey flew off, catapulted slowly to the frozen earth, bounced, tumbled, and lay still.

Maxim stared, shocked at his own act. Had he murdered a man?

Slowly, Hervey sat up, shaking his head, recovering his wind. The horse sagged to earth, its lifeblood spilling from a dozen holes in its chest and withers.

Julius Hervey stood, shakily, and the wild look in his eye terrorized Maxim.

“You’re dead little Straus,” was all he said.

Maxim slammed the post door, just as several lead balls from Hervey’s pepperbox smacked into it.

Something bright and predatory kindled in Raul Raffin’s eyes. Little Whirlwind noticed it as she settled herself in the woman’s place and undid her red capote. The heat felt delicious. Chief White Wolf waited patiently for her to settle herself. Unlike white men the People were never in a hurry.

“Our daughter of the village has returned to us,” he said at last. “Is your man with you?”

“He’s coming. I saw the village from the bluffs and put heels to my pony.”

“Is he alone, Little Whirlwind?”

She knew the question contained a lot of questions. “No, my chief. He brings his wives, my sisters, and a whole trading outfit — many pack loads — and two other white men to help.”

Raffin listened with bright curiosity and she saw something like triumph flare in his eyes, which left her uneasy. He’d said nothing and yet his eyes had spoken to her already: they roved over her face and figure, caressing her, possessing her. And they revealed amusement, too. She hadn’t liked him winters ago when he and Brokenleg both courted her, she liked him less now.

“They are coming, then. I’ll summon the wolves to help them.” He rose slowly and walked around the sacred altar and the central fire, which billowed smoke in his wake. He vanished into the twilight and she knew he would send the village police, the dog soldiers, out to escort Brokenleg.

“Ah, Little Whirlwind,” said Raffin. “I’ve waited for this moment.” He spoke in accented Cheyenne.

“You’ll have to keep on waiting.”

He laughed. “I will have you,” he said. “Stiffleg never was a match.”

She formed a sharp retort but White Wolf clambered through the oval entry and closed the door flap behind him. He settled against his reed backrest in the place reserved for him exactly opposite the lodge door. His rheumy eyes peered at each of them, as if he’d sensed that an exchange had occurred in his absence.

“My daughter, I will hold you only a moment. You are eager to fly to the lodge of One Leg Eagle and Antelope. They will welcome you with joy. Our village rejoices that you and the Badleg have come  . . . ” He nodded toward the white man sitting in the place of honor. “You know this one, I am sure. We have welcomed him here many winters.”

“I do.”

“Tell me, will the Badleg and his men need a lodge?”

“I think they do, my chief. They have two little cloth tents that have no warmth in them.”

“It will be done, then. The widow, Makes the Doe Come, has a great warm lodge. I will invite her to stay here. She’ll be happy to have someone to talk to. My wives will make good company.”

“The white men will be grateful, my chief. They are called Abner Spoon and Zachary Constable.”