The Arrow Keeper’s Song (5 page)

By late morning the August sun rode high overhead, baking the earth until even the yellow grass seemed to bow beneath the weight of the sunlight. At this time of year Father Kenneth always kept his sermons brief and to the point, releasing his parishioners to seek their own respite from the heat. The settlement showed little activity. Women gossiped beneath the willows or laundered their clothes on the banks of the Washita. Men swapped lies on the shade side of their houses or wandered into town to gather in the mercantile and sample Luthor White Bear's cider while philosophizing over the cracker barrel. A handful of children chased one another across the meadow. Cattle clustered in a grove of oaks, now and then bestirring themselves to follow the shifting shade or meander down to the banks of the Washita for a drink.

At his desk in the Bureau of Indian Affairs office, Tom Sandcrane tried not to brood about his father and concentrated on the pleasant fact that he had nowhere to be right at the moment. He tilted back on the rear legs of his chair and balanced precipitously between the wall of the office and the edge of his desk, rolled a smoke for himself, struck a match on the underside of the chair, and touched it to the tip of the cigarette. Exhaling a cloud of smoke, he shifted the papers in his hand and began to reread the tabulation of votes that showed the tribe's overwhelming approval of the land reforms. Tom had been touting the benefits of the Public Land Act for the past six months, crisscrossing the reservation, stopping at every creek camp, farm, and hardscrabble ranch from the Canadian River south to the Washita. The reservation, almost a million acres, was bounded on the west by the Texas panhandle and on the east by the unassigned lands of Indian Territory. Tom was certain he'd ridden across every acre and figured he'd worn out the seats of at least five pairs of britches. But he'd got the job done. And here were the results of the recent ballot in Cross Timbers.

For over a week the Southern Cheyenne had been coming to the BIA office, casting their votes either to approve the termination of the reservation or to contest the matter in the courts. Some of the elders of the tribe had spoken out against the arrangement, but Tom had led a coalition of young and old alike who were eager to cease being wards of the state and secure full citizenship for one and all.

Under an agreement reached between the tribe and the U.S. government, each male head of family would receive 160 acres free and clear, plus 90 acres for each family member. Every Cheyenne man, woman, and child would also receive a cash settlement, the amount of which had yet to be determined. The funds could be used to purchase additional acreage from the government before the remaining reservation lands were open to the public. An industrious family could carve out an empire of fertile grasslands for itself along the Washita or choose to gamble on the oil deposits to the north. Some of the Cheyenne intended to sell off a portion of their land grants to the white settlers who were unable to locate a free claim during the rush. There would be towns and jobs, industry and prosperity. The Cheyenne would own a piece of the future instead of being tied to the past, subsisting on grain allotments and the often uncharitable whims of a capricious government. With the end of their reservation status the Southern Cheyenne would be masters of their own fate, with the protection and freedoms afforded every U.S. citizen.

Tom glanced up as a mud dauber circled heavily in the afternoon light, its tiny wings stirring a galaxy of dust motes as it drifted off across the room and vanished into Allyn Benedict's office. A warm breeze stirred the papers on Edith Stands in Timber's desk, one fluttering to the floor like a leaf. The BIA secretary ruled with a firm hand and assigned every missive its proper file, allowing not so much as a bookmark to remain out of place. She'd have a fit come Monday if Tom left a mess. A plaintive meow sounded from Allyn's office, and a black cat with a blaze of white fur on the tip of one ear trotted through the door and made its way toward Tom. He chuckled and reached down to scratch the creature's neck. The animal, a stray, had made the BIA office home, and managed to sneak into the building at every opportunity.

“Hey
pohkeso
, how did you get in here?” Tom softly said. The cat arched and purred deep in its throat. “Now, my father would say you are a spirit, a trickster come to work mischief on me. Well … do your worst, eh?” The cat looked up at the sound of Tom's voice, its dark eyes full of primal wisdom. “No pranks? Hmm. I think you are just
pohkeso
, a kitten, nothing more or less.” The cat meowed and scampered off, giving chase to shadows or a breeze-stirred scrap of paper.

Tom closed his eyes and allowed the chair to tilt back against the wall, enjoying a moment of quiet bliss. The BIA office was closed, as it was every Sunday. No one was around to disturb his reverie. A man had to take his peace where he found it. His lazy fantasies carried him from an oil-rich field to a pretty stretch of grassland lying between two tree-crowded ridges and fronting on Coyote Creek, a meandering ribbon of water that emptied into the Washita. He'd described the place to his father and suggested they split their land grants, gambling for a fortune in “black gold” while laying claim to Coyote Creek so father and son could build a place together. But Seth had resisted his son's overtures of friendship. The loss of the Sacred Arrows weighing heavy on his heart, Tom's father had begun to seek solace in the bottom of a bottle.

Tom was determined to change his father's mind. He'd see things differently once the Public Land Act went into effect. It was only a matter of time now. The land rush would commence at seven
A.M.
on the first of September, just one week away, when the reservation would officially become public domain. Like the other men of the tribe, Tom intended to have his property already claimed and recorded when the rush of white settlers began. He intended to sign his name to a stretch of oil-bearing land as well as the meadowland along Coyote Creek, from its bubbling source down to the Washita. Too bad Seth's dreams didn't reach further than the next drink.…

Tom frowned and shifted his thoughts to another, much more pleasant subject. And just as Emmiline Benedict took shape in his mind, a hand reached out and snatched the cigarette from his lips. Tom nearly fell over backward. Instead, he rocked forward and slammed his knees against the desk. A green-eyed, black-haired nineteen-year-old woman laughed, perched herself atop the secretary's desk, and took a deep drag on the cigarette. She exhaled, then took another, reducing the cigarette to no more than a stub, which she crushed beneath her boot, leaving a smear of ashes on the office floor.

Emmiline was wearing a split pale-green riding skirt, with a matching jacket over a white cotton blouse. She propped her right foot on an open drawer and leaned forward on her bent knee.

“Smoking isn't proper behavior for a lady,” Tom ruefully observed, rubbing his bruised kneecaps.

“I'm an Indian agent's daughter. Who said anything about being a lady?” Emmiline pursed her lips a moment, then lowered her head until her long black hair spilled forward and she looked out at Tom through the strands. “Do you think I'm a lady, Tom? Is that why you've never kissed me? Or are you afraid of the scandal, a Cheyenne man and a white woman? What would the ladies in Tulsa say? But, of course, things are different on the reservation. Who's to take offense, other than my brother? Maybe you're afraid of him.”

Tom gulped and shifted uncomfortably in his chair. The collarless striped shirt he wore suddenly felt two sizes smaller and damn near began to cut off his wind.

“You looked mighty handsome in church today, Tom,” Emmiline continued, running a hand along a sleeve of the frock coat he had draped across the secretary's desk. She lifted the empty sleeve and draped it across her bosom. “But then you have always looked handsome.” The agent's daughter could tell she was having an effect on the man. “You could put your arm in the sleeve of this coat if you wanted.”

Tom hesitated, tongue-tied.

“Well?” she asked.

Tom took a deep breath and reined in his carnal instincts. “Maybe I'll wait until you're done playing with it first,” he replied.

Emmiline realized he had broken free of her spell. “Oh, you …” She tossed the coat at him. Tom caught it in front of his face. Now it was his turn to laugh.

“You think you are so smart,” Emmiline pouted. She stood as he rose from the desk to don his coat. “You've gotten awfully full of yourself since the passage of the reform.”

“Where's your father?” Tom glanced at the front door he'd left open to permit the cross-breeze. That was how she had managed to enter so soundlessly. He spied a surrey waiting in the street.

“How do you know he isn't with me?” Emmiline asked.

“Because you behave yourself when he's around,” Tom answered with a chuckle.

“And so do you, Mr. Tom Sandcrane. You're the perfect gentleman when father has his eyes on you. But just who was it asked me to go for a moonlit stroll after the church social last week?”

“Your father suggested I walk you home,” Tom said, although the idea had delighted him. He played his feelings close to the vest, like a gambler his cards, and wasn't about to reveal just how smitten he had become with the Indian agent's daughter.

“Did I hear my name?” a voice called from outside. Allyn Benedict stepped through the doorway. He was a tall, spare man with sandy hair, graying at the temples, and friendly, boyish features that belied the fact he was almost fifty. Emmiline, with her back to her father, made a face at Tom to show the young man that he didn't know her as well as he liked to think. Benedict turned in the doorway and waved a hand as if to indicate everything was all right. Tom checked the window and spied Emmiline's brother, Clay Benedict, cradling a Winchester carbine in the crook of his arm as he stood alongside the surrey. Clay, a slender, devilishly handsome man of twenty-one, had arrived in Cross Timbers from Connecticut only a couple of months before. According to rumors supplied by Edith Stands in Timber, the dour, secretive young man had been expelled from the Yale Law School for some episode of misconduct regarding a test.

At his fathers signal, Clay, with what seemed an air of reluctance, returned his carbine to the scabbard he kept under the bench seat. He leaned against the surrey, hooked his thumbs in the pockets of his woolen trousers, and studied the front of the building, a band of shadow beneath the brim of his black cap masking the upper part of his features. Allyn's son had a deep and abiding mistrust of the Cheyenne. He saw them as a conquered people and little more than savages. The more Emmiline made herself available to Tom, the more belligerent Clay became. Yet despite Clay's animosity toward him, Tom felt a peculiar sense of kinship for Emmiline's brother, who, like the Cheyenne, was struggling to be the kind of son his father expected.

“Have you come to arrest me, Mr. Benedict?” Tom asked.

Benedict appeared embarrassed. “I was visiting Luthor White Bear over at the mercantile when Clay comes riding up and tells me that he and Emmiline have noticed the BIA office door is wide-open. Well, the first thing I think of is some drunken sorehead is after the ballots. Then I find Emmiline has taken it upon herself to investigate without waiting for me, so I came on at a run, until I spied that nasty-tempered roan of yours hitched around to the side.…” The agent's explanation trailed off, and he grinned sheepishly and shrugged. “Oh, hell, there's been some angry talk around the reservation this week. I'll keep expecting trouble until after September first.” He glanced toward his office. “Come to think of it, why are you here, Tom? My God, I should think this is the last place you'd want to come after all the work you put in.”

“I don't know,” Tom said, shrugging. “I left church and wandered down the street and just sort of wound up here. Force of habit, I guess.” He walked over to the territorial map hanging on the east wall. The Southern Cheyenne reservation was outlined in black and apportioned by a pattern of red lines, as if covered with a spiderweb. Tom Sandcrane had traveled every strand of the web for Allyn Benedict and the BIA, not for the money the bureau paid him, but because he believed it was the right thing to do.

“I knew you were the man for the job, Tom,” Allyn said. His shadow fell across the map. “No one could have pulled this tribe together like you did. What happens next will be in no small part your own doing. You ought to be proud of yourself.” Allyn patted the younger man on the shoulder.

“Ask me after the first of September,” Tom said.

“I won't need to,” Allyn replied. “Think of it. There'll be towns, schools, maybe a real doctor or two. The future will be right here. And one day this territory will be a state, mark my words. A state! Why, you might even be the first representative!” Allyn turned to his daughter. “Congressman Tom Sandcrane of Oklahoma—how does that sound, Emmiline?”

“Nice, Papa,” the girl said. “Real nice.”

Tom's cheeks reddened, and he looked out the window at the quiet, dusty expanse of Main Street. The agent's enthusiasm was contagious. A Cheyenne representative in Congress—now, there was a thought. He imagined the settlement bustling with life, the street just one of many, and all of them crowded. “That kind of thing is a long way off,” he said.

“It's closer than you think,” Allyn told him. “Say, why don't you two spend Sunday together? I promised the troopers over at El Reno I'd oversee the baseball game between A and D companies. Seems I'm the only one who knows the rules, and the men of both companies trust me to be impartial.”

“I cannot for the life of me figure out what is so special about a bunch of grown men hitting and chasing a ball and one another around a hot, dusty field,” Emmiline added. She walked over and put her arm in Tom's. “You are my escort for the day, sir. And I will not take ‘no' for an answer.” She led Tom to the door. “Come along. I'll pack us a picnic basket.”