Boone's Lick (19 page)

I had never expected to see such a wild sight in my life—neither had Neva, or G.T. I kept a good hold on my mule—I didn't want the nipping dogs to spook him. When we were nearly to the gates we passed the very Arapahos who had led us across the stream—most of them already had their lodges up. We even saw the very mongrel who had tried to bite Nicky—he was quarreling with another dog over a scrap of hide. The woman who pulled him off Nicky and then led us across had just whacked a fat puppy in the head and was getting it ready for the pot.

“Hey!” Neva said, outraged at the thought that someone would eat a pup. She had tried to rear several puppies, only to lose them to the coyotes—there were so many varmints around Boone's Lick that pets didn't have much of a chance. We all knew that Indians ate dogs, but this was the first chance we had to witness how short life could be for a puppy in an Indian camp.

“Have
you
eaten puppies?” Neva asked Father Villy—she had come to regard him as her special friend.

“Yes, miss—they're tender,” the priest said.

Before Neva could question him further we passed through the big gates into the broad quadrangle of the fort; suddenly we were
inside
some place, for the first time in weeks. It was a large stockade, with room for hundreds of men and
plenty of animals, but we had had nothing but the broad plains around us for weeks on end. Being inside the fort felt a little close.

A burly soldier carrying a carbine came walking over to challenge us—he wobbled a little, when he walked. Ma pulled up and waited.

“Hello, Ned—have you come to arrest us?” Uncle Seth asked.

Hearing his name called out seemed to startle the big soldier. Then he noticed Ma on the wagon seat—it was snowing heavily enough that he had missed that detail—and he quickly stopped and took his cap off. He opened his mouth to speak but only came out with a big rumbling belch.

“Seth, is that you? It's dim light,” the soldier said. He had a glassy-eyed look. When he tipped his cap to Ma he lost control of it—the cap floated down into the mud, which seemed to embarrass the man greatly.

“Pardon me, ma'am,” he said. “I believe I've gone and et too much.”

When he reached down to pick up his cap he fell flat on his face in the mud—he didn't move. Ma had to turn the mules just to get around him.

“Dead drunk, I fear,” Father Villy said. “It's a frequent failing of our soldiers in these lonely outposts.”

“Lonely—I wouldn't say it's lonely,” Ma remarked. “There's more people camped around here than live in Boone's Lick, Missouri, I'd say.”

She was right about that. As many folks were camped inside the fort as outside—soldiers, trappers, a few people with wagons, Indian women,
dogs. Some sturdy cabins lined two sides of the big stockade, but most of the people seemed to be living outdoors.

“Who runs this fort, Seth?” Ma asked. “I want to find him quick and inquire about my husband.”

“General Slade runs it—Sam Slade,” Uncle Seth said. “At least, he did the last time I was here—I suppose he might have been replaced. But I don't know that we can just barge in and get an audience with General Slade, if he's here—we don't need to anyway,” he said. “Any of these fellows who's sober enough to stand up will know if Dick's around.”

“Then find someone sober and ask them,” Ma said. “And if there's a room empty anywhere, ask them if we can use it for the night. I'm tired of sleeping with snow in my hair.”

“Why, here's Johnny Molesworth—I expect he can help us,” Father Villy said. “I see he's been made a captain.”

A slim soldier stepped out of the gloom of smoke and snow and evening light and grabbed Father Villy by the hand.

“Villy, what a pleasure,” he said. “I see your beard's matured.”

Then the young captain noticed Ma and Neva, took off his cap, and made them a little bow.

“Hello, ladies—welcome to our muddy old fort,” he said. “I'm surprised you got across Laramie Fork—we've had a regular stream of people who nearly drowned out.”

“Some Indians helped us,” Ma said. “I'm Mary Margaret Cecil—I guess you know Seth.”

“He should know me—he put me in jail the last
time we met,” Uncle Seth said, in a chilly tone.

Captain Molesworth ignored the chilly tone and grabbed Uncle Seth's hand.

“Now, Seth, it was just for your own protection,” the captain said. “I was afraid one of those thieving Canadian skunks might shoot you.”

“Forgiven. Where's Dick?” Uncle Seth asked. “Mary Margaret is his wife and she's come a far piece to talk to him. We expected to find him here.”

Captain Molesworth seemed a little startled by that information—he looked at Ma in surprise.

“No, Dick's not here,” he said. “He's wood hauling up at Fort Phil Kearny—it's one of our fine new forts, just finished,” he said. “Dick went up with Colonel Carrington—they're predicting a hard winter and Colonel Carrington was eager to lay in lots of wood.”

“Drat the man—how far is that?” Ma asked.

“Oh, it isn't far—the distance wouldn't be the problem,” the captain said.

Ma just looked at him and waited.

“The Sioux would be the problem,” he went on. “They're testy with us over these forts.”

“That's right,” Father Villy said. “We ran into Red Cloud and he told us as much himself.”

“The Cheyenne are fractious too—it's a dilemma,” the young soldier said.

“For you, maybe—not for me,” Ma said. “I didn't build the forts. Is there a room we can bunk in for the night? I expect we'll press on tomorrow.”

“We do have a cabin, recently vacated,” the captain said. “Let me get someone to see to your livestock—we're lucky to have plenty of good fodder.”

“Now listen, Mary Margaret,” Uncle Seth began, as soon as Captain Molesworth walked off to find someone to tend our stock.

“Listen to what?” Ma asked. “You better not try to talk me out of going to wherever Dick is—that's the one reason I've dragged everybody all this way.”

“That wasn't my point, that's another point,” Uncle Seth said. “This wagon has been about shook to pieces—we need to give it over to the care of a skilled blacksmith for a day or two, or one of these days the whole bottom will drop out and we'll all be in a pickle.”

“I wouldn't mind resting for a day, but no longer,” Ma said. “If you do locate a blacksmith, instruct him to hurry—a day's all I can allow him.”

Captain Molesworth was soon back with two soldiers who took charge of our mules. Then he showed us where we would be staying—a big cabin with a loft just like ours at home. There was a good fireplace, but no fire in it yet.

“Why, this is a palace—I'm surprised it's vacant with so many people milling around in these parts,” Ma said.

“Just vacant two days—a sad case—suicide,” the young officer said. “I guess some people find the winter glooms too hard to bear, around here.”

“It was a woman, wasn't it?” Ma asked, looking around the room.

“Why yes—a young woman, married less than a year,” Captain Molesworth said. “How could you tell?”

“It's just a feeling I had,” Ma said.

T
WO
soldiers wheeled over a little cart stacked with firewood and we soon had a roaring fire going in our cabin. Nobody could find Charlie Seven Days—he had dropped off to visit with some of the Indians outside the fort—but Uncle Seth and Father Villy went off to pay their respects to General Slade. Captain Molesworth invited us all to partake of the officers' mess, but Neva was the only one who went—Ma even found a ribbon to tie in her hair.

I was hungry and would have liked to eat with the officers but once we were in our cabin, with the good fire going, a tiredness came over me like none I had ever felt before. I wanted food, but the thought of walking even two hundred yards to the mess hall seemed too much. I believe G.T. felt
the same. Ma handed me a little piece of bear meat jerky, but when I put it in my mouth I found I was too tired to chew. Ma later claimed she had to yank the jerky out of my mouth to keep me from choking, and it was probably true. After so many weeks in the open, the warmth of the room put me right to sleep.

When I woke the next morning bright sunlight was streaming in the windows of the cabin. Neva had come home at some point—she was dead to the world, with her feet nearly in the fire. I didn't see Ma or G.T.—they were both early risers. The snow had stopped. When I looked out the windows I saw blue sky. The air outside was chilly.

I supposed Ma and G.T. had probably walked off to the blacksmith's; no doubt Ma wanted to give the man a few instructions and make sure he meant to have the work finished by the end of the day.

It took my eyes a moment to adjust to the sharp sunlight. I thought I'd just explore the fort and maybe get a better look at some of the Indians camped around it. With the snow falling and all the smoke blowing around I hadn't been able to see them well. It occurred to me that if I could locate the mess hall they might give me coffee and a biscuit—maybe even a little bacon.

I had hardly gone ten steps when I spotted Ma, way up by the north wall of the stockade. She seemed to be talking to a plump young Indian woman who had a lodge of skins built against the poles of the stockade. A girl a little younger than
Neva had a skin of some kind pegged out and was scraping it with a knife. The snow had mostly melted, but two little girls were toddling around in what was left of it—one of them was Marcy, who had long since got her walking legs under her and could be counted on to wander off just when it was most inconvenient to retrieve her.

Ma motioned for me to come over. While I was walking across the wide quadrangle Ma squatted down on her haunches—she was watching the little Indian girl, who was just Marcy's height. The young Indian woman seemed to be enjoying the sight of two toddlers, playing in the melting snow.

“Come look at this fine little girl—she's Sioux,” Ma said, still squatting.

The child was a pert little creature, with bright black eyes. She and Marcy would stare at one another, solemn as judges, and then go dashing off to the nearest patch of snow.

“What do you think, Shay?” Ma asked.

Ma didn't seem angry, as she watched the little girls. She just seemed kind of bemused.

“They're just the right age to be playmates,” I said.

“I think they're a little more than playmates,” Ma said. “Take a closer look.”

It wasn't easy to get a closer look, because the two little girls were rushing around, squealing and kicking up snow whenever they came to it, but when I got them stopped and looked at them close I saw what Ma was getting at. Except for the fact that the little Indian girl was copper colored and
Marcy white, they
did
look like more than playmates. They looked like twins. What startled me most, once I stooped down to look, was that both girls had a deep dimple in their chins—the same as I had, and G.T., and Neva, and Pa.

“That's Dick's dimple,” Ma said. “These little girls are half sisters, like me and Rosie. This is your father's other family—or one of them—that we've come so far to meet.”

It must have been true, because the young girl who was scraping the hide was using one of Pa's old knives.

“Oh, you oaf!” Neva said, when I woke her and told her the news.

T
HAT
night it came another snow, a snow so thick and deep that it muffled the sounds of the fort. Even Ma, still eager to get north, saw there was no point in pushing off into it, though Father Villy and Charlie Seven Days did just that. Seeing them leave was almost as hard as watching Aunt Rosie sail on up the Missouri River at Omaha. I guess we all hoped they would travel on with us to Fort Phil Kearny, but that wasn't the direction they wanted to go. Charlie Seven Days had to report to the Old Woman, whose son he couldn't locate, and Father Villy still had it in his head to visit Siberia, which wasn't in the direction we were going.

“We're grateful for your help in getting this far,” Ma said.

Neva cried the most, when they left. She had enjoyed having Father Villy teach her those French songs.

“Don't stay long in the north,” Charlie said. He spoke a little sternly. “There will be trouble in the north.”

“I second that opinion. Good-bye,” Father Villy said.

With just a wave, they were gone.

“People
will
come and go,” Uncle Seth said. I think he was just trying to get Ma to ease up on him a little. It turned out that Uncle Seth had known about Pa's Indian family all along, but had never mentioned it, a fact that put Ma in a stiff mood with him, for a day or two.

She was also annoyed with the blacksmith, an independent Yankee who refused to be hurried when it came to repairing our wagon.

“I'll fix what I can fix when I can fix it,” he said, and that was all he said.

Neva and G.T. and I were glad enough not to have to rush right off from the fort. We liked watching the soldiers drill, and the Indians and trappers mill around. But the best part of our stay was getting to know Pa's Indian family, which was just about a perfect match for his Missouri family—that is, us. Marcy got to play with her little toddling half sister, Meadow Mouse, and Neva learned to scrape hides with her half sister Lark Sings, and Ma visited with Pa's Sioux wife, who was called Stones-in-the-Water. There was no language they both could talk in, but they seemed to
enjoy just observing one another's children and looking at one another's things.

It was not until the evening of the day of the big snow that G.T. and I discovered that we even had half brothers, nearly our own age—one was named Blue Crow and the other He Sleeps. It was Uncle Seth who explained the Sioux names to us. The two boys wanted to take us right out hunting, which Ma allowed, although I believe she was nervous about it. Of course, He Sleeps and Blue Crow had fast horses and rode them at top speed, like those Bad Faces had ridden that day when Red Cloud made his long speech.