Sacred Is the Wind (36 page)

“Oh,” Kate said, spirits sagging.

“Hum, I have had more cheerful greetings,” the priest replied. “But then, I suppose the early Christians had worse.”

“I'm sorry. I thought you were Michael.”

“Hoped, you mean.”

“Yes,” Kate said. Hillary's honesty was infectious. She stood aside as the priest entered, toolbox in hand.

“You're worried about him. So am I,” Father Hillary said.

“I feel so helpless.”

“You brought the letter to Gude. You've done all you could. They brought Michael over and are talking to him now.”

“How …?”

“I've been building a planter box for Tyrell, which happens to be outside an open office window.” Hillary brought a single cutting in a clay pot out of his toolbox. His broad square features brightened with mischief. “Now, if someone were to take this cutting over and plant it in the planter box, that someone would hear what was going on.”

Kate grabbed the clay pot, hugged the priest, and darted for the door, stopped and turned to the priest.

“I forgot. Some of the children were coming over today. Probably Susan and little Sara …”

“I'll tell them to wait for you.” Hillary smiled. “Just show me where you keep the candy.”

Washington, D.C.

August 20, 1889

My dearest Katherine,

Wonderful news. As of my meeting with Charles Dolph, the director of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, I have been personally assured that if Panther Burn surrenders himself to the authorities, his case will be given all due consideration and if no life has been lost due to his escape, he will be subsequently discharged to the confines of the Northern Cheyenne reservation with the understanding that he may not leave the reservation. To do so would be to jeopardize his freedom once and for all.

I daresay this decision has cost me plenty. But not nearly so much as a “decision” of my own lost these many years ago.

Trust you will present this letter to Agent Gude, who no doubt will instruct the garrison there.

God bless you, my dear daughter. And please know, I love you.

Sincerely,

Sam Madison

Michael glanced up from the letter. Seated across from him, at his office desk, Tyrell Gude studied Michael over the edge of his teacup. Next to him stood Sabbath McKean, shoulder against the back wall, slouched forward, sheepskin coat unbuttoned, a star pinned to his gray vest, his gaze unwavering. To Michael's right sat Bragg, and Marley. Both men appeared uncomfortable, as if they wanted no part of deeds done in bright daylight. James Broken Knife sat on a narrow bench by the front door. His eyes darted from Michael to Bragg and Marley. It was obvious he wanted to be out of the room in the worst way. As for the others …

“What do you want?” Michael said. A day in the stockade had left him in a mood to be direct.

“Well … uh …” said Gude, looking to the others for support. He took a clay pipe from the humidor rack on his desk, filled it with the tobacco, and struck a match. He touched flame to the brim of the bowl and puffed a gauze cloud of aromatic smoke.

“I want you to help me find your father,” McKean said.

“Go to hell.”

“Probably,” said McKean, tucking a wad of tobacco in his cheek. “And more than likely I'll see a few of you boys there. No help for it, though. It's plumb out of my hands. But here, in this old world, I can do something. I'm told no one knows the res as good as you. Might be you have an idea where he's holed up. Take me to him and save his life.” He leaned forward and spat a brown stream into the spittoon on the floor near Gude's filing cabinet. Bragg and Marley shifted uncomfortably in their black frock coats. Bragg endured. Playing along with McKean was a means to an end. “You tried to save his life once before,” Michael sneered. He ran a hand through his dirty hair. The manacles James had put on his wrist scraped a patch of flesh from his forehead. “Get these darn things off me or take me back to the stockade.”

Gude looked to McKean, who nodded. James hesitated. “Do it,” said McKean. James Broken Knife stood and brought over the key. He unfastened the cuffs and walked back to his bench. The iron cuffs and chain dropped with a clank to the hardwood floor. McKean pushed off from the wall and sat on the corner of Gude's desk. Michael massaged his wrists and continued to study the lawman.

“I was lied to, same as Panther Burn,” McKean said. “I wasn't in charge then. I am now.”

“The letter says if no lives have been lost,” Michael replied. He started to pass the letter over to McKean, then decided to return it to Kate in person and tucked it in his shirt pocket.

“Denny will have a sore belly, nothing more. The bullet hit him square in the buckle between the U and S,” Gude spoke up. His gaze shifted to McKean. “And the marshal tells me that the reports of your father's escape were exaggerated. A guard was hurt, yes. But he will recover.”

Michael looked questioningly at McKean.

“It's true, lad. I wouldn't lie. Believe me or no, but I've nothing against your pa. I rode with him and agin him and never had anything but respect for Panther Burn. I am trying to help him now. Be truthful, lad. Can you find him?”

“I can find him,” Michael slowly said, his gaze lifted to the map of the United States on the wall behind Gude. Such a mighty country with civilization stretching from coast to coast. Was there a place in all that United States for a man like Panther Burn?

“Will you?” McKean asked.

“I have to think on it,” Michael said.

“You'll help or else,” Marley warned. McKean straightened and fixed him in a murderous glare. Marley began to study the throw rug underfoot. Michael rose from his chair and headed for the door.

“Where are you going?” James muttered.

“Stretch my legs. I'll take this letter back. Then I'll give you my answer.”

“Let him go,” McKean snapped. James slumped down on his bench. Michael sauntered past him and out the door. He rubbed his wrists and started down the street to the clinic. A breeze stirred the dust underfoot and carried the cool heady fragrance of the pines. He was grateful to be free again and he wondered how Panther Burn could have endured so many years in prison and not gone mad. But then, perhaps he had.

“Going my way?” asked Kate, moving up alongside him.

Michael glanced around, surprised. “Where did you come from?”

“I was listening at the window,” Kate explained. “Well, after all, it was my letter.”

“Watch out, you might wind up in jail with me.”

“Oh, would that be so bad?” Kate laughed. Shadows drifted across the valley floor as heavy white clouds lumbered through sunlight. Kate reached out and took his hand.

“Be careful,” Michael warned. “I hear Henry Morbitzer is a jealous man.”

“He has nothing to be jealous of, except what he has imagined,” said Kate.

“It is all the same to some men.”

“Are you really worried?” Kate looked sharply at him now.

“No. But then, he left this morning to try to catch my father.” Michael grinned. He looked at the clinic and tugged at her arm. “Come with me.” Kate nodded, unsure of what he meant. In truth, her own heart was a mystery to her. She was drawn to Michael by emotions beyond her understanding, much less control. Perhaps she recognized a kindred spirit in him, for they were very much alike in one important way, as he had said: they were both a part of, yet strangers among their own people—Kate because of birth and the legacy of her father's wealth and the education it had provided, Michael through his desire to rise above his situation. He was drawn by a dream that the reservation, rather than being the end of his people, could also be the beginning.

They walked together in the warmth of the afternoon, through the shifting shadows, out from the settlement, past a cabin where two women scrubbed clothes on a wash-board in an iron tub, past the sawmill where half a dozen men labored at a steam-driven ripper, turning fresh-cut timber into one-by-twelves to be sold at Forsythe, where there was a ready market for prime building material.

They followed a deer trail up into the hills until they reached the rounded summit of a hill overlooking the settlement. Kate spread her shawl on the ground and sat, spreading her gray skirt out over the yellow grass. Michael knelt beside her. He looked at her pinned-up black hair.

“I will make you some braid holders one day, then you will have to let down your hair and become an Indian.” He laughed softly and lay back on the ground. He plucked a reed of Russian thistle and stuck it in his mouth.

“Father Hillary is worried about you. We all are.”

“All two of you?”

“All three. Don't forget Uncle Joshua.” Kate watched the patches of light and darkness play upon the land. “Three people who worry for you and care what happens to you is three more than most have.”
How like life this ever-changing pattern on the valley floor. Each of us stands in sunlight, knowing where we are and what we must do, then in shadow, when we are lost, with no clear direction or course of action. Yet we hope for the light and it always returns
.

“What will you do?” Kate asked.

“Maybe I will take you in my arms,” Michael said. “The stockade was a cold hard place. What would you do, Kate Madison, Doctor Kate, if I took you in my arms and—” Michael turned toward her. Kate's eyes widened, yet she held her ground. Michael reached for her. “Maybe all the answers I seek are in your arms, Doctor Kate.” Suddenly he stopped and looked past her, his hand frozen in midair. Kate was thoroughly confused and turned to see what had caused him to stop. Three children sat on the ground ten feet behind them. Kate recognized them, for they had become frequent visitors to her house along with all the other children in the settlement as word of her miraculous jar of peppermints spread from child to child. But these three were the first who had ever come calling, and they had a special place in her heart.

“Jonah Yellow Leg, what on earth?”

Jonah glanced at the two little girls beside him. Susan and Sara Pretty on Top brightened into broad grins. “We come to visit you,” said the boy. All three of the children laughed and stood and walked over to the couple. Michael was profoundly grateful he had only reached out to Kate, and nothing more. Jonah sat beside him.

“I seen your pony once. You have a little gray pony.”

“Yes.”

“Where is your pretty pony?” Susan asked. She wiped a patch of red clay from her cheek and managed to smear it down to her neck.

“Pony!” Sara echoed, her eyes large and lovely and full of innocence.

“He is running the high meadows with his mama. But when I bring him down to the lowlands I will make a wagon and hitch him to it and the three of you can ride up and down the valley. Would you like that?”

“Yes!” the children said as one.

“Will the soldiers not take us away?” Jonah asked. Michael looked at Kate, a frown on his face.

“Why should the soldiers take you away?” Kate asked, putting her arms around Sara and Susan.

“My papa said that now Panther Burn is back there will be trouble and people will get hurt and the soldiers will become angry and take us away from our valley and put us all in jail.”

“They will take our mountains away forever,” Jonah added, his voice thick with alarm.

“No one is going to take you away,” Michael said, patting Jonah's arm.

“Can we stay with you? It's pretty here,” Susan replied, her fears easily allayed.

“Bring candy?” Sara asked hopefully.

“No,” Kate said, smiling. She hugged the little girl. “No candy.”

“I wish.” Sara sighed.

“It's all right. We can go home with her and visit there too,” Susan explained to her little sister.

“I sure would like to ride that gray pony,” Jonah wistfully added.

“You will,” said Michael determinedly. And Kate could tell by his tone of voice, in the way his eyes ranged the valley floor, that there among the shifting patterns of his own life Michael had seen the path he must take.

21

R
ebecca awoke at sunrise. Panther Burn lay sleeping. In his stillness, he seemed carved of wood, an idol depiction of primitive strength and indomitable will. He and Rebecca had made love by moonlight. Hours ago, at morning's earliest moment, when the world slips past midnight and desire becomes an unquenchable thirst, their silvery limbs were entwined in passion. Now Rebecca waited alone by the medicine fire she had built, with only the sun-kissed peaks and vast reaches of a lonely sky for comfort. She waited and watched as the last of the stars winked out.

Now. The magic time. When the
maiyun
were trapped between dreams and dawn. Her hand closed around the pouch she wore at her throat, the medicine bag given to her by Star more than twenty years ago. Then she set fire to the sweet grass she had gathered the day before and soon had a merry blaze. Behind her, Panther Burn emerged from the lodge and stood for a moment watching the sunrise. He wore breechcloth and leggings and moccasins. A bandolier of rifle cartridges hung across his naked chest.

“Will you eat?” she asked.

“First I must check the passes.”

“No one knows of this place.”

“My son does. You said so yourself,” Panther Burn replied.

“He is still your son whether he walks the Great Circle or not. Michael would never betray you,” Rebecca said.

“Still I will ride to the passes,” Panther Burn replied, squatting down in front of her. “My shoulder …” The tone of his voice was more a request. Muscles rippled beneath the white scar tissue that crisscrossed his dark flesh. Rebecca took a bowl of medicine herbs and sprinkled a few dried leaves into another bowl that contained a paste made of deer fat. She blended the mixture and covered her hands with it and then held them over the fire until they were warm. Then she placed both hands on his shoulder and kneaded the muscles. Panther Burn winced, then sighed softly as the pain eased. They had not spoken of prison. Some memories Panther Burn would not share. And Rebecca respected his wish.