Gear, W Michael - Novel 05 (86 page)

 
          
 
"You know the trade," Travis
countered. "We got ter go where the beaver is. How many beaver can ye
trade?"

 
          
 
The weary smile creased Big Yellow's lips.
"The time for easy talk is past, Bear Man. I will tell you how the Rees
think about trade. We trade among ourselves, but it is to make things balance.
Some do not have what they need, so we trade that all may share. In the
beginning, we thought the White men were like Nesanu, powerful, surrounded by
wonderful things inside and outside their bodies. We did not understand how you
could live in our houses, eat our food, and not share everything you had with
us, as we share with each other. Nesanu taught us to give something to
everyone. But you White men keep as much as you can for yourselves. We have
never understood how you could be so selfish. Until I met a White man, I did
not know the word ‘profit’."

 
          
 
"That's the way of trade." Travis
pulled at his beard. "A trader has to take all he can get. If n he don't,
he can't trade fer more knives, guns, and powder. Ree ways and white ways is
different. Killing traders ain't gonna fix it. Why'd ye pick a fight?"

 
          
 
Big Yellow rubbed a callused hand on his bare
arm. "It was because we thought you were our friends. It was because we
offered you everything, and then you left us to be killed by the Sioux. In the
beginning, when Nesanu made the world, he made it so that people would share
with their friends. How does the White man act when a friend stabs him in the
back? Does he not pick up his rifle and make war? Is that not what you did when
the British came to trade on the river?"

 
          
 
Travis rolled his jaw from side to side. Hell,
that's what they'd told the damn Injuns. Lisa had set in this very village and
explained the war that way.

 
          
 
"You do not need to answer, Bear
Man." Big Yellow straightened his back. "This chief understands now
that your ways are different, that you do not have Nesanu s words in your
heart. Some of my people have told me I am a fool for coming back here to the
river. They have said that I will die here, killed by the Sioux, or by the
Whites." He pointed across the heads of the watchers to a low dirt mound.
"My ancestors lay there, in that earth. I can feel their sishu, their
souls. That is why I am here. If we are to die, it will be on our land, among
our ancestors. So many of them are dead because of the wickedness in your
souls, my life would only be one more."

 
          
 
"Cain't nobody keep disease away."
Travis took a deep breath, his nerves tight as fiddle strings.

 
          
 
"Perhaps, Bear Man." Big Yellow's
bug-eyed stare drilled into Travis. "We are poor now. You see what we
have. When Green's boat comes, will you trade? Big Yellow understands that you
are taking most of your wonderful things to our enemies, but we will offer what
we can."

 
          
 
Travis chewed his lip, considering. A dirty,
moon-faced child watched him with round eyes. The kid's hair was matted, and he
sucked on muddy fingers.

 
          
 
"Reckon we'll trade some," Travis
admitted. "Ain't much, but it will help."

 
          
 
Big Yellow nodded slowly. "It will help.
Your men will have been long time without women. Once, we thought it curious
that you had no women of your own. It was believed that a man could give his
woman to you, and afterward, he could gain some of your Power by lying with
her. I think now that it was a lie. No man ever gained White Power through his
woman that way. If we had, we would not be like we are today."

 
          
 
"Boat will be up by dark," Travis
said. "Reckon we'll trade what we can. But, Big Yellow, yer a wise old
coon. It wouldn't do fer some warrior ter get outa sorts. Let's keep folks
separate fer the most part. Less likely ter be an accident that way."

 
          
 
"Reckon so, coon," Big Yellow agreed.

 
          
 
"So, what's happening?" Richard
wondered as they walked toward their horses.

 
          
 
"We're gonna trade," Travis
answered. "Hell, they ain't got squat but women to offer. Only thing we're
getting is free passage and a lighter load."

 
          
 
"But it beats a fight," Baptiste
replied, eyes half-lidded.

 
          
 
"Women?" Richard sighed.

 
          
 
"It's about all they got," Travis
reminded.

 
          
 
"I'd call that whoring."

 
          
 
"Not according ter their lights, and
it'll fill a couple of these kids' bellies."

 
          
 
Maria lay tied off on the bank below the
Arikara village. Laughter carried on the warm night breeze. A half moon hung
low over the dissected buttes east of the river, and stars dusted the sky. Far
to the south, flickers of lightning danced, but no sound of thunder reached them.

 
          
 
This is an awful place.
Willow
sat on the cargo box beside Travis. She
rubbed her smooth shins and watched the firelit bank. Unease, like a subtle
undercurrent, twined with her puha. She could sense the spirits here, troubled
and crying. It would be better to leave this place of sorrows.

 
          
 
Green stood just below them, a rifle in his
hands. Richard sat at the bow, his Hawken across his lap while Henri stood
guard at the stern. Baptiste was ashore with Big Yellow, keeping a wary eye on
the engages who dallied with the
Ankara
women.

 
          
 
Bonfires illuminated the ruined village in a
ghostly glow; human shadows wavered against the palisade and earth lodges.

 
          
 
"Looks a mite more peaceful than the last
time I was hyar," Travis said. "Reckon we'll get nigh away without
trouble. Green and me, we done decided, about an hour afore dawn, we're heading
out. Reckon them coons best wet their pizzles, 'cause we'll be humping backs
upriver hard. Leastways, until we make a distance atwixt us and the Rees."

 
          
 
Willow
filled her lungs with the musky scent of
the river and slapped a mosquito that landed on her arm. "Can you feel
them, Trawis?"

 
          
 
"Huh? Feel what?"

 
          
 
"The spirits. Some angry, others so
sad."

 
          
 
He cocked his head, concentrating. "Don't
know, gal. I been on edge ever since we got hyar. Reckon this place has done
gone sour. It's them kids. The way they was looking at me. I never give much
thought to kids afore. That's the saddest part."

 
          
 
"Green did not like giving them flour and
so much food."

 
          
 
"Nope. Might make things a tad tight come
winter on the Big Horn. We'd best hope we make a good fall hunt and the buffs
is down in the valleys this winter. Bellies might be a shade gaunted up
otherwise."

 
          
 
She reached out, laying a hand on his arm.
"If you are worthy, Tarn Apo will provide."

 
          
 
Travis sucked his lip for a moment, then
shrugged. "I had me a dream back when ye made that travois. Saw old Manuel
Lisa and his coons. They told me the river was dying."

 
          
 
"Baptiste says it is because of the White
men. I think he is right. The water may continue to run, but the river's soul
will wither."

 
          
 
"Yer a different sort,
Willow
. Ye see more than most folks."

 
          
 
"I have always been different." She
rubbed her hands together. "At times it has made my life hard. I have been
told I ask too many questions."

 
          
 
Richard shifted, and
Willow
couldn't help but watch him. If only . . .

 
          
 
Travis, ever keen, noticed and studied her
from the corner of his eye. "He's a good man. Reckon the two of ye'd do
right nice together."

 
          
 
She shifted on the hard deck. "We follow
two different trails. He to the east and his people, and I to the west."
But her soul was haunted by the warmth in his brown eyes, and the tender way he
touched things. If she closed her eyes, she could imagine the sensation of his
fingers on her skin, the warmth of his body against hers.

 
          
 
"Different worlds can join, gal. It ain't
always a gonna fall apart."

 
          
 
"The White world touched the
Ankara
. What do they have left? Begging for food?
Selling their women? I have heard the talk. The cut-throat Sioux say Arikara
are like women to them. They make things just so the Sioux can come and take
them away."

 
          
 
"Sioux is tough coons. Trouble is, they's
so many of them."

 
          
 
"They have strong medicine."

 
          
 
"Reckon." Travis rubbed his ruined
nose and mashed a mosquito that had settled from the humming hoard. "To my
way of thinking, it makes Baptiste's notions wrong. If'n whites destroy
everything in their path, the Sioux otta be about wrecked, too. But they ain't.
Seems to this child that they just get stronger and stronger."

 
          
 
"Perhaps."

 
          
 
They shared a long silence.

 
          
 
Travis asked, ''Something happened back at the
Grand Detour. Dick and ye, ye ain't been the same since. Each of ye is sad way
down deep in the heart."

 
          
 
"We saw truth in each other's eyes,
Trawis." She batted at the cloud of mosquitoes. "I cannot go to
Boston
. I am told it isn't my place. He would not
like life among the Dukurika. What more needs to be said?"

 
          
 
"He don't know that." Travis
resettled his rifle. "He figgered he'd hate the river. Hell, he still
thinks he hates it, but ye've seen the shine come ter his eyes. He's becoming a
man, Willow. He just ain't got his sights set straight yet. A feller don't know
what he's got until he can see forward and backward. I reckon Dick's still
looking back so hard, he can't cotton ter what's right afore his nose."

 
          
 
"I do not understand."

 
          
 
"He's fixed on Boston, and some gal named
Laura."

 
          
 
"Who is this Laura?" What was her
Power, that she could hold Ritshard from so far away?

 
          
 
Travis shifted nervously. "Wal, she's
little sister to a friend of his. Said she'd let him come court if'n he come
back. It ain't final, ye understand, just an agreement to pay court. Them
Boston folks do things that way."

 
          
 
"And she is a lady?" Willow's
stomach soured at the thought. "Is that what he wants? A lady in a box? To
be taken care of?"