Buckskin Brigades E-Book

L. Ron Hubbard

• Herausgeber: WS
• Kategorie: Abenteuer, Thriller, Horror
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2005

Seitenzahl: 385

Beschreibung

Filled with action, passion, and drama, Buckskin Brigades is a panoramic journey across the pages of American history—the story of a proud, courageous man pushed to the limits of endurance, and of a country on the threshold of a bloody conflict that will change it forever.

Leseprobe

Selected fiction works by L. Ron Hubbard

FANTASY

If I Were You

Slaves of Sleep & The Masters of Sleep

Typewriter in the Sky

SCIENCE FICTION

Battlefield Earth

Final Blackout

The Great Secret

The Kingslayer

The Mission Earth Dekalogy:*

Volume 1: The Invaders Plan

Volume 2: Black Genesis

Volume 3: The Enemy Within

Volume 4: An Alien Affair

Volume 5: Fortune of Fear

Volume 6: Death Quest

Volume 7: Voyage of Vengeance

Volume 8: Disaster

Volume 9: Villainy Victorious

Volume 10: The Doomed Planet

Ole Doc Methuselah

To the Stars

HISTORICAL FICTION

Buckskin Brigades

Under the Black Ensign

MYSTERY

Cargo of Coffins

Dead Men Kill

Spy Killer

WESTERN

Branded Outlaw

Six-Gun Caballero

A full list of L. Ron Hubbard’s fiction works can be found at GalaxyPress.com

*Dekalogy—a group of ten volumes

Thank you for purchasing Buckskin Brigadesby L. Ron Hubbard.

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BUCKSKIN BRIGADES

© 1987, 2001 L. Ron Hubbard Library. All Rights Reserved. Any unauthorized copying, translation, duplication, importation or distribution, in whole or in part, by any means, including electronic copying, storage or transmission, is a violation of applicable laws.

Cover design by Peter Green Design and Mike Manoogian

Cover artwork © 1998 Galaxy Press All Rights Reserved.

No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

Mission Earth is a trademark owned by L. Ron Hubbard Library and is used with permission. Battlefield Earth is a trademark owned by Author Services, Inc. and is used with permission.

EPUB ISBN: 978-1-59212-500-5Kindle ISBN: 978-1-59212-089-5Audiobook ISBN: 978-1-59212-221-9

Published by Galaxy Press, Inc.7051 Hollywood Boulevard,Hollywood, California 90028GalaxyPress.com

Contents

Maps:

North America, circa 1806

North America, detailed map

Introduction

Preface

Buckskin Brigades

Chapter 1: The Echoes of a Shot

Chapter 2: Two Smokes for Trouble

Chapter 3: The Request

Chapter 4: Yellow Hair Receives Orders

Chapter 5: Arrival of the Brigades

Chapter 6: Strange Men and Strange Manners

Chapter 7: McGlincy Is Inspired

Chapter 8: The Butter Tub

Chapter 9: The Winter Passes

Chapter 10: The Ambush

Chapter 11: The Nor’Westers Submit

Chapter 12: Yellow Hair Declares War

Chapter 13: The Ghost-Head

Chapter 14: Under Fire

Chapter 15: To Trial and the Gallows

Chapter 16: Grapevine

Chapter 17: York Factory

Chapter 18: The Friendly Elements

Chapter 19: McGlincy Departs

Chapter 20: The Chipmunk

Chapter 21: Reunion

Chapter 22: Yellow Hair Persuaded

Chapter 23: The Dangerous Trek

Chapter 24: The Reception

Chapter 25: Who Is Yellow Hair?

Chapter 26: His Lordship Sees

Chapter 27: Tidings of War

Chapter 28: Duel Without Code

Chapter 29: A Use for the Renegade

Chapter 30: Yellow Hair Sees

Chapter 31: Brigades Westward

Chapter 32: Death to the Blackfeet!

Chapter 33: Let There Be War

Chapter 34: The White Runner

Chapter 35: Wolves

Chapter 36: Charge

Chapter 37: Hyai, Pikunis!

Chapter 38: Triumph

Chapter 39: The Grand Coup

About the Author

Glossary

Introduction

It was a land of legends.

Men heard fantastic tales about its violent waters and towering mountains, about gigantic monsters and beavers seven feet tall and gold nuggets as big as your fist.

The land was huge. It stretched from the Great Lakes to the Pacific Ocean, from what are now the states of Oregon and Montana all the way north to the Arctic Circle. A man could be baked alive on its wide open plains or he could freeze to death on glacial rivers so huge and powerful that they carved mountains out of the rocks.

It was the great Northwest, the stage that L. Ron Hubbard chose for Buckskin Brigades.

The novel opens in 1806, when the American republic was only thirty years old, younger than most of its citizens. The young nation could claim only fifteen states at that time, and the Mississippi River was the boundary of its western frontier.

Texas and the great battle of the Alamo were still three decades away. The “West” as we have come to know it, with its cowboys, its stagecoaches and cattle drives, were yet to be born. But the Northwest was booming.

Since the beginning of the seventeenth century, the Northwest had been a rich source of furs—fox, lynx, mink, otter and beaver. The English controlled most of it through the Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC), on the southernmost rim of that great bay. Chartered in 1670, the HBC was declared “the true and absolute Lordes and proprietors” of the great Northwest.

The only serious challenge to its authority came from a group of brawling, defiant individualists called the North West Company, which was formed in 1775. Known as “Nor’Westers,” they were equally as willing to fight each other as they were the members of the HBC.

Unlike the HBC, the Nor’Westers journeyed from their headquarters in Montreal and from the northwest shore of Lake Superior into the wilderness to trap their own furs, build their own fortified trading posts and barter with the Indians they encountered.

To defend its rich empire, the HBC sent out “brigades” to build forts, take over the wilderness territories, and fend off the Nor’Westers.

While this conflict expanded into what is now the Rocky Mountains, American President Thomas Jefferson was preparing to send an expedition into the same area. It was called the Corps of Discovery but history would know it more by its leaders, Lewis and Clark.

Before the expedition could leave, the United States bought the Louisiana Territory, 900,000 square miles for 15 million dollars. No one, however, consulted the actual owners—the Indian nations who lived there.

Meanwhile, the expedition gathered the rest of their thirty-man team and the supplies they would need—their largest single expenditure was to be $669.50 for presents for the Indians—cooking utensils, mirrors, shirts, handkerchiefs, needles, rings and peace medals that had a likeness of Jefferson on one side and two hands clasped in friendship on the other.

They left St. Louis, Missouri, on May 14, 1804. They journeyed north up the Mississippi and then west up the Missouri River. It took a year and a half for Lewis and Clark to reach the Pacific Ocean via the mouth of the Colombia River. The expedition arrived without incident. It paused, rested, and then began its fateful return.

On July 3, 1806, just after entering what is now Montana, the expedition divided into two parties. Clark turned south. Lewis continued east to explore the head-waters of the Marias River.

On July 26, 1806, Lewis encountered his first Blackfeet Indians, and thus begins L. Ron Hubbard’s Buckskin Brigades.

It is the story of Michael Kirk, a very blond white man who was raised by the Blackfeet, called by the name “Yellow Hair.” The viewpoint is a synthesis of the worlds of Michael Kirk and Yellow Hair, of the white man and the Indian, of 1806 and today. At times, the reader will feel he is crouched by a fire, listening to the story being told by those who were there, or those who heard about it, in the way that all good stories should really be told.

On the Indians’ side of the ledger, this story is meticulously accurate. No detail was omitted, even down to such esoteric parts of Indian ritual as the fact that when pipes are passed in a lodge, they are never passed across the open door but must retrace their step until they reach the other side of that portal.

The fate that finally befell the Indians is not told in Buckskin Brigades. The story that is told is one of pride, of courage, of a great people and a great nation—the Blackfeet—before the immorality, the diseases and the drugs of the white man took their toll.

L. Ron Hubbard knew the Blackfeet well. He grew up in Montana and had been made a blood-brother. He listened to their stories, sang with them around the fire and shared in their dances and rituals.

When he wrote Buckskin Brigades he was living in the heart of the country he was describing, the fur-trading Northwest. But this novel represented more than just a personal familiarity. It was an opportunity to capture a portion of American history and tell it the way it really happened.

To assist the reader, a glossary has been added which includes not only terms colloquial to the nineteenth-century Northwest but also several other words and terms that were in use during the period covered in the book.

Maps have also been created so the reader can better follow the adventure.

But the best news is the story itself.

The discovery of the original manuscript in the author’s literary archives allowed the publisher to include details of the full story as it was originally written by the author, without any of the alterations that had appeared in earlier versions.

For all the avid readers and collectors of L. Ron Hubbard’s works and those of you who are discovering his fiction for the first time, we are proud to present to you this new edition of his masterful history of the Northwest.

Preface

Another novelist in another place has said that only a very brave man would attempt to write a preface to his work.

It is my contention that only a very brave man would have attempted this novel at all.

My surprise will be very great indeed if no man’s indignation prompts him to score this book as a thorough lie. If this does not happen I shall be very hurt and feel that this book has not been read.

Flattery, however, has too long been practiced on this subject by my worthy hard-working brothers, the Beadlepenny-a-liners. From them the prevailing tone of this type of book has been, “And another redskin bit the dust.”

It required a peculiar kind of courage to condemn one’s own race, a worse kind of cowardice to malign men dead these hundred years.

But I stand with my right hand on a stack of affidavits. I face a library full of facts. And in this book I have tried to set forth the fur traders, not as they are thought to have been, but as they were.

I have overdrawn no picture with my McGlincy—now yours. Look, if you will, to the greatest authorities of those times and you cannot but corroborate my statements.

But my interest has been, primarily, with the Blackfeet. When I was two and a half years old I am told that I danced one of their dances to the throb of their drums. I have forgotten. But I cannot forget everything I have found to their credit and in this book I have tried to present them, not as they are, but as they were at the height of their power—the mightiest body of fighters on the plains; the truest of gentlemen.

If I have erred in presenting them, I am not conscious of that error. I have only tried to show what it was that the voracious trader wiped out.

L. RON HUBBARD

Buckskin Brigades

Chapter 1

The Echoes of a Shot

They never saw each other, they were utterly dissimilar and neither ever heard the other’s right name. And yet upon their lives and upon this almost-meeting hangs the bitter and bloody saga of the West.

One of them was Captain Meriwether Lewis, the great explorer, former secretary to the late President Thomas Jefferson and governor of the Louisiana Territory.

The other was Michael Kirk, who was better known among his adopted people, the Blackfeet, as Yellow Hair, scout and warrior, whose exploits rolled on every tongue from the Shining Mountains to Quebec.

They almost met on the banks of the Marias River, according to the journal of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, under the heading of July 27th, 1806. The entry has been overlooked because it was on this very date that Captain Meriwether Lewis shot a Blackfoot chief.

It is generally agreed by his friends that Captain Lewis acted in his own best interests. This proves to be very true when it is remembered that, although Captain Lewis indulged his misplaced sense of justice to his own satisfaction, the shot he fired found its echoes in the dying screams of white traders without number and in the wails of Blackfoot women mourning their own dead.

It is significant that famous Hell-Gate in the Rockies was not named because the river there was turbulent. It was so called because at Hell-Gate white men, spurred by greed for profits in furs, entered the forbidden hunting lands of the Blackfeet.

Patriotically, the people of the Territory have condemned the British trader, saying that the Nor’Westers harangued the Blackfeet into making continual war upon the Americans.

Nothing could be farther from the truth in spite of the fact’s general acceptance. The British trader was too interested in his own scalp and too altogether powerless to hold any such sway over a tribe such as the Pikunis.

No, the truth can be found on the banks of the Marias River whose mute bluffs stared down upon the wanton scene.

Not the British trader but Captain Meriwether Lewis was to blame. With insufficient cause he provoked the wrath of the mightiest tribes on the Great Plains.

Yellow Hair was nearby, innocent of any knowledge of the affair when it happened. But Yellow Hair was to bear the brunt of that sad meeting, and the entire course of his life was to be changed by a man he was never destined to see. He was to suffer the effects of a bullet he had not even heard or felt.

To be just and fair and to further qualify the startling beginning of Michael Kirk’s renown, it is necessary to borrow a few lines from one of the most memorable documents of the West, the Journal of the Expedition of Lewis and Clark:

Saturday, July 26, 1806.… At the distance of three miles we ascended the hills close to the riverside (Marias), while Drewyer pursued the valley of the river on the opposite side. But scarcely had Captain Lewis reached the high plain, when he saw about a mile on his left a collection of about thirty horses. He immediately halted, and by the aid of his spyglass discovered that one half of the horses were saddled, and that on the eminence above the horses several Indians were looking down toward the river, probably at Drewyer. This was a most unwelcome sight. Their probable numbers rendered any contest with them of doubtful issue; to attempt to escape would only invite pursuit, and our horses were so bad that we would most certainly be overtaken; besides which, Drewyer could not be aware that the Indians were near, and if we ran he would most certainly be sacrificed. We therefore determined to make the best of our situation, and advanced towards them in a friendly manner. The flag which we had brought in case of such an accident was therefore displayed, and we continued our march slowly toward them.

Their whole attention was so engaged by Drewyer that they did not immediately discover us. As soon as they did see us they appeared to be much alarmed and ran about in confusion, and some of them came down the hill and drove their horses within gunshot of the eminence, to which they then returned as if to wait our arrival. When we came within a quarter of a mile, one of the Indians mounted and rode full speed to receive us; but when within a hundred paces of us, he halted, and Captain Lewis, who had alighted to receive him, held out his hand and beckoned for him to approach; he only looked at us for some time, and then, without saying a word, returned to his companions with as much haste as he had advanced. The whole party now descended the hill and rode toward us.… Captain Lewis now told his men that he believed that these were Minnetarees of Fort de Prairie.…

When the two parties came within a hundred yards of each other all the Indians except one halted; Captain Lewis therefore ordered his two men to halt while he advanced; and after shaking hands with the Indian, went on and did the same with all the others in the rear.…

Captain Lewis now asked them by signs if they were Minnetarees of the north and was sorry to learn that his suspicion was too true. He then inquired if there was any chief among them. They pointed out three; but though he did not believe them, yet it was thought best to please, and he therefore gave to one a flag, to another a medal and to a third a handkerchief. They appeared to be well satisfied with these presents, and now recovered from the agitation into which our first interview had thrown them, for they were generally more alarmed than ourselves at the meeting.

In our turn, however, we became equally satisfied on discovering that they were not joined by any more of their companions, for we consider ourselves quite a match for eight Indians, particularly as these have but two guns, the rest being armed with only eye-dogs and bows and arrows.

As it was growing late, Captain Lewis proposed that they should camp together near the river; for he was glad to see them and had a great deal to say to them.

They assented; and being soon joined by Drewyer, we proceeded towards the river, and after descending a very steep bluff, two hundred and fifty feet high, encamped in a small bottom. Here the Indians formed a large semicircular tent of dressed buffalo skins, in which the two parties assembled, and by means of Drewyer the evening was spent in conversation with the Indians.

They informed us that they were part of a large band which at present lay encamped on the main branch of the Marias River, near the foot of the Rocky Mountains, and at a distance of a day and a half’s journey from this place. Another large band were hunting buffalo from the Broken Mountains, from which they would proceed in a few days to the north of the Marias River. With the first of these there was a white man.…

Captain Lewis in turn informed them that he had come from the great river which leads toward the rising Sun; that he had been as far as the great lake where the Sun sets; that he had seen many nations, the greater part of whom were at war with each other, but by his mediation were restored to peace … that he had come in search of the Minnetarees in the hope of inducing them to live at peace with their neighbors.…

They said they were anxious of being at peace with their neighbors, the Tushepaws, but those people had lately killed a number of their relations, as they proved by showing several of the party who had their hair cut as a sign of mourning.…

Finding them fond of the pipe, Captain Lewis, who was desirous of keeping a constant watch during the night, smoked with them until a late hour, and as soon as they were all asleep he awoke R. Fields, ordering him to arouse us all in case any Indian left camp.…

Sunday, 27th of July. At sunrise, the Indians got up and crowded around the fire near which J. Fields, who was then on watch, had carelessly left his rifle near the head of his brother who was still asleep. One of the Indians slipped up behind him and, unperceived, took his brother’s and his own rifle, while at the same time two others seized those of Drewyer and Captain Lewis.

As soon as Fields turned round he saw the Indian running off with the rifles, and instantly calling his brother, they pursued him fifty or sixty yards, and just as they overtook him, in the scuffle for the rifles, R. Fields stabbed him through the heart with his knife; the Indian ran about fifteen steps and fell dead.

They now ran back with the rifles to the camp. The moment the fellow had touched his gun, Drewyer, who was awake, jumped up and wrested her from him. The noise awoke Captain Lewis, who instantly started up from the ground and reached to seize his gun, but finding her gone, drew a pistol from his belt and, turning about, saw the Indian running off with her.

He followed him and ordered him to lay her down, which he was doing just as the two Fields came up and were taking aim to shoot him, when Captain Lewis ordered them not to fire as the Indian did not appear to intend any mischief. He dropped the gun and was going slowly off as Drewyer came out and asked permission to kill him, but this Captain Lewis forbid as he had not yet attempted to shoot us.

But finding now that the Indians were attempting to drive off horses, he ordered three of them to follow up the main party who were driving horses up the river and fire instantly upon them; while he, without taking time to run for his shot pouch, pursued the fellow who had stolen his gun and another Indian who were trying to drive away the horses on the left of the camp.

He pressed them so closely that they left twelve of their horses but continued to drive off one of our own. At the distance of three hundred paces they entered a steep niche in the river bluffs, when Captain Lewis, being too much winded to pursue them any farther, called out, as he did several times before, that unless they gave up the horse he would shoot them.

As he raised his gun, one of the Indians jumped behind a rock and spoke to the other, who stopped at the distance of thirty paces, when Captain Lewis shot him in the belly. He fell on his knees and right elbow, but raising himself a little, fired, and then crawled behind a rock.… Captain Lewis, who was bareheaded, felt the wind of the ball very distinctly … and … retired slowly toward the camp.…

We, however, were rather gainers by this contest, for we took four of the Indian horses and lost only one of our own. Besides which we found in the camp four shields, two bows with quivers and one of their guns, which we took with us, and also the flag which we had presented to them, but left the medal round the neck of the dead man, in order that they might be informed who we were.

The rest of the baggage, except some buffalo meat, we left; and as there was no time to be lost, we mounted our horses … and pushed as fast as possible … to the south.…

In itself, the affair was small enough, had not Captain Lewis made two great errors. He thought these people were Minnetarees when, actually, they were Blackfeet. And he had underestimated the necessity for civilized conduct amid those people he termed barbarians. In the years to come, that shot would be cursed and its echoes would take the form of red, running rivers.

But, at the moment, Yellow Hair, known also as Michael Kirk, knew nothing of either Captain Lewis or the United States of America.

Chapter 2

Two Smokes for Trouble

To Yellow Hair, farther down the stream, about six miles away, it was not the 27th of July, 1806, and the country about him was not part of the Louisiana Purchase. The date, to Yellow Hair, was merely a late midday in the Thunder Moon and the wide, vibrant country about him was indisputably the southern portion of the Pikuni country, owned, policed and governed by the Three Tribes. As usual, he was impatient. Tushepaws had dared raid a Pikuni camp and the interlopers were to be intercepted by the war party which Yellow Hair and White Fox were supposed to join, but which, unknown to either of them, was being entertained through the courtesy of interlopers worse than the Tushepaws—the United States of America.

Restlessly, Yellow Hair stamped up and down the river bank, scanning the green and red bluffs, pausing occasionally to snap a word or two at the imperturbable White Fox who crouched immovably beside a small, smokeless fire, slowly broiling strips of tender buffalo meat.

“Why don’t they come?” demanded Yellow Hair. “They know where we are.”

“They will probably come in due time,” said White Fox without moving his gray head. “Of course you can never be certain, but they said they would come and we must wait.”

“You told me that yesterday. Find something new to tell me today. Stop ogling that meat and take a glance at this sky. Disgusting! Motionless. Not even a cloud moving. Not a leaf! Not a puff of dust to be seen. And look at those herds. Look at those herds! They act as though they had never seen a hunter.”

“Patience,” said White Fox, annoyed but little.

“Patience!” barked Yellow Hair. “What use have I for patience? Those Tushepaws came and killed our people. They have no eyes and cannot read our boundaries. They have no ears and cannot hear our laws. They have their own hunting ground and yet they come rolling into ours like so many ill-mannered bears and murder us.”

“Save it for the Tushepaws,” said White Fox, calmly turning the willows on which the strips were impaled.

“I’ll save it for the Tushepaws,” roared Yellow Hair with ferocity. “If we let this invasion pass without an attempt at punishment, they’ll come again and expect us to welcome them as brothers. Hyai, the Pikunis will be the laughing target of the Plains. And that Low Horns! What does he know about raiding? He and those seven old fools have probably stopped to hunt rabbits. That’s the game for them. Rabbits. Big, fierce rabbits with long teeth.”

“Maybe sweating would cure it,” said White Fox, mildly, seeming to address the meat instead of Yellow Hair.

“What?”

“Love,” murmured White Fox thoughtfully.

“What about love? I was talking about the Tushepaws and I’ve certainly no love for those wolverines.”

White Fox had the ghost of a grin floating about his slightly cynical lips. But he kept the joke to himself and slowly turned the buffalo strips, carefully tucking up the sleeves of his hunting shirt.

Yellow Hair paced down the bank like a panther, turned and came up to the fire again, raking the bluffs with optical broadsides.

“Hyai, what I’ll do to those Tushepaws,” said Yellow Hair.

“Others of us will be there,” commented White Fox. “At least, we might be there.”

Yellow Hair snatched up the elkskin case which contained his rifle, untied the thongs, withdrew the lengthy weapon and carefully looked to the priming. Satisfied, he restored it, and then with a decisive jerk, lifted his saddle by one stirrup and tossed it over his shoulder.

“You can wait all day if you like,” said Yellow Hair. “You can wait tomorrow and the next day. When it gets to be Falling Leaf Moon, I’ll come back and ask you if they’ve come.”

White Fox turned the strips again and glanced sideways at Yellow Hair. The youth evidently meant what he said. And White Fox knew what lay behind this anxiety to be gone.

A girl with shapely face, stormy eyes and soft hands, a girl who could ride like a warrior, was the cause. Bright Star, daughter of Running Elk, had quite ruined Yellow Hair’s reason. If he were ever to find favor in Running Elk’s estimation, he would have to roll up a good war record and acquire many horses.

“Little fellow,” said White Fox deliberately. “You look very brave in your white buckskin. But will the Tushepaws think so?”

Yellow Hair’s voice cracked like lightning. “Are you trying to insult me? You think I’m a coward? Well, then! Alone I—”

“Alone you stay with me,” said White Fox, quietly. “You have forgotten that you were allowed to come only to carry my Thunder Medicine Pipe, my robes and my shield. If you were a real warrior, now, and if you had a grand coup or two in your pretty beaver cap, you could go. But—”

Angrily, Yellow Hair slammed his saddle to the ground. Walking like a mountain cat he came back to the fire and loomed over White Fox. As Yellow Hair was very tall, judged even by Pikuni standards, and he was in the best of condition, it was easy to see that he could have eaten up White Fox in two gulps.

White Fox casually turned the meat, his old weathered hands very steady.

Suddenly Yellow Hair’s blue eyes softened. His big mouth spread in a good-humored grin and he slapped White Fox so hard upon the back that he almost knocked him into the fire.

Laughing, Yellow Hair sat on his heels and deftly raked a strip of meat off the willow grate.

“Love,” said Yellow Hair, “might do a lot for a man’s bravery, but it never did much for his reason. I think about Bright Star and then I think how Running Elk demands that I show what kind of man I am and … well …”

“Another piece of meat?” said White Fox. “It’s roasted through now.”

“Ah, but what I’ll do to those Tushepaws,” said Yellow Hair. “Hyai, how I’ll wade through them! They will think a prairie fire has hit them. And I’ll take their horses—”

“Some others of us will also be there,” said White Fox, mildly.

Yellow Hair laughed in high good humor and took another strip. “The way I feel today, I could whip the whole Tushepaw nation all by myself— Look, White Fox. Smoke!”

They leaped up and went higher on the bluff.

Far to the west across the dun-colored hills and the green prairies, a column of darkness stuck like an eagle plume out of the river bottom. It was abruptly cut off and then again released.

“Two smokes,” said White Fox. “There’s trouble.”

“Perhaps they’ve met them already,” said Yellow Hair, very worried at being left out of it.

They brought in their horses and saddled. They jammed their possessions into their war sacks and mounted.

Peeling his rifle as he went, White Fox led the swift way toward the smoke plume.

Frightened antelope fled at their approach. A herd of chunky brown buffalo stampeded. Small prairie dogs popped out of their holes to inquire in impudent whistles what the matter was.

Yellow Hair flayed his gray war pony into greater effort and very soon they drew near to the high bluff of the Marias River.

But instead of a fight they were confronted with a group of dejected Pikunis who stood listlessly before a tall lodge.

Propped up by a folded robe, Running Elk tried to lie still in his agony. Covered by another robe was the slowly stiffening body of Wolf Plume.

In amazement Yellow Hair bounced off his horse, looking everywhere for a sign of enemy dead. He would have spoken had not White Fox silenced him with a commanding sign.

The war party which had left the Pikuni village so jubilantly had undergone a horrible change.

Divested of their war bonnets, their shields and their horses, they were bewildered at the disaster that had overtaken them from such an unexpected quarter. Their keen, intelligent faces were still stamped with disbelief that this thing had happened.

Low Horns, a powerful member of the Kit-Fox Society, was now senior warrior of the group.

“It is useless to pursue them,” said Low Horns. “We have no weapons.”

“I still have mine,” said Yellow Hair. “White Fox and I—” They signed him again to silence.

“They are very powerful people,” said Low Horns, shaking his head. He straightened to his tall height and turned to face White Fox.

“Today but one,” said Low Horns, “we were coming down the river to meet you and search out the Tushepaw party. We saw a white man walking down along the bank and we stopped to watch.

“A moment later we understood that we were in a trap. While this white man by the river had distracted us, other white men tried to come up on us from the rear. When we understood that they did not mean to go away, we thought to make a fight and die at least honorably in spite of their many guns.

“But the leader,” continued Low Horns, making a sign with two spread fingers before his mouth, “attempted to take us another way. He was the same liar, the same Kitchi-Mokan, who appeared with so many of his people two years ago among the Mandans.

“All night long he talked to us, as we have heard he talked to the Mandans. He talked of how we must not go to war with anyone, just like he told the Mandans. You will remember that when the Mandans believed this Kitchi-Mokan spoke true, they forgot their sentinels and, in spite of what this Kitchi-Mokan had promised them about the Sioux, were attacked and made to suffer great losses at Sioux hands.

“Then we knew who he was and that he spoke false as he did toward the rising Sun two winters past. He told us again and again that we should all be friends, and to be polite, we let him talk away most of our sleep.

“But he had already said that he had another party of whites soon to join him and he made certain that we would be ready for their killing when the other party arrived. Thus, he posted sentinels to make sure that we did not try to leave and showed that he had other plans for us than friendship, as he did not have the politeness to trust us as we had trusted him.

“In the night, Running Elk and I became very worried, knowing that we might be killed. As we had only two rifles and little ammunition, and as our horses were too far away along the river, we could not fight in case of attack, and yet, if we fled, we would be shot down as soon as the sentinel gave warning.

“Then, the only thing for us to do, we did. To keep from being shot, we must take their guns. This we tried, never thinking that death would be the penalty.

“Wolf Plume snatched a rifle and raced away with it just at dawn. But the sentinel quickly overtook him and although Wolf Plume made no effort to shoot him, which he could easily have done, the sentinel plunged a knife into Wolf Plume’s heart.

“Then we all ran away and tried to get our horses as quickly as possible. Running Elk and I went up the river, but this leader, he of the forked tongue, ran after us, shouting. At last I thought I understood what this Kitchi-Mokan was saying and I shouted to Running Elk, ‘He tells us to stop!’

“We stopped and too late we realized that he only wanted to have us as standing targets. I yelled a warning to Running Elk and dived behind a rock, but before Running Elk could move, this Kitchi-Mokan, although his order was obeyed, shot Running Elk.

“They stole four of our horses, took all our baggage as we had known they would do, and left us here with our dead.

“I have finished.”

White Fox lifted the robe and looked sorrowfully at Wolf Plume, whose smooth bronze chest was jagged with its knife wound.

Yellow Hair knelt beside Running Elk and tried to take the old man’s hand. Instinctively, Running Elk drew away.

“Your brothers, the whites, have done this,” said Running Elk, voice jerky with pain.

“My brothers,” gaped Yellow Hair. “You are delirious. White Fox, get some water.”

White Fox did not move and the boy realized with a jolt that the others were looking at him with hard eyes. He swept the circle about him with his glance and then came uncertainly to his feet, fingers unconsciously searching out the knife in his belt.

The silence continued for a long while and then, at last, Yellow Hair cracked.

“Stop it! What’s the matter with you? Is there something wrong that I have done? Have I spoken out of turn?”

Swiftly he searched their impassive faces for the answer to his question and failed to find it. Low Horns, Hundred-Horses, Double-Coup, Singing Bear and Lost-in-Mountains all wore the same expression. He had seen it before when they had gathered to pass judgment in the Grand Council. Their big, weather-stained faces were unreadable and their brown eyes were narrow. The wind moved the white fringes of their hunting shirts. Otherwise they might have been clay medicine figures.

They were not actually threatening him. It was more deadly than that. They were just looking at him, appraising him, taking in his tall, straight body, his white, sensitive face, the alarm in his usually reckless blue eyes.

Yellow Hair glanced down at his white skin leggings, his shirt and his belt as though there might be something wrong with them, but they were all in perfect order.

The echoes of the shot from Captain Meriwether Lewis’s rifle had not died between these high bluffs. Soundless, but roaring, it was increasing and would continue to increase for years, decades, even centuries.

And the first one slapped by the echo stood gripping the handle of his skinning knife, facing the elders of the tribe.

Yellow Hair took hold of himself. In bold, even sarcastic tones, he said, “Because you have been surprised and beaten, you are looking upon the youngest here as a likely target for wrath. You are old warriors, mighty and honored, and your war bonnets stop the wind with their plumes and coups. But your heads grow as stiff as your joints. Why are we standing here like women? Why do we let this lying Kitchi-Mokan escape unharmed after he has slain one of us and wounded another? It is because you are afraid. You tell me you have no horses and cannot follow. You tell me they have taken your weapons. You say they are great warriors so that your own cowardice will not loom so large. Why did you not kill them if you suspected their treachery?”

“Peace,” cautioned White Fox.

“Peace! You’ll have no peace now. When you return to our lodges, do you think Wolf Plume’s sisters will give you peace? Ah, but you are too old. Your bravery is beyond question. They will not give you women’s clothes to wear. Not you. Low Horns, head of the Kit-Foxes—hyai, I would hate to be you!”

“Silence, whelp!” snapped Low Horns.

“Ah, to be sure. Silence! But do not look to me to carry your blame. The story you could tell would be simple. You bring me out on my first war party and I bring you bad luck. Oh yes, I could take the blame, but I won’t. I am going to follow up that party of Kitchi-Mokans and challenge this Fork-Tongue to personal combat. You—all of you—stay here and wail like the old women you are.”

“Stop!” ordered White Fox. “Warriors, you forget that he is young. Do not punish him. He does not know what he is saying.”

“I know what I am saying,” said Yellow Hair. “Oh yes, I am young. You can stand there and stare at me if you wish.… Stop it!”

Low Horns recovered himself a little. He nervously glanced up at the butte to see if his scout had signaled any news about the Kitchi-Mokans. When he looked back, he said, “So long have I seen this youth in our lodges that I had become used to the whiteness of his face, the light color of his hair.”

“Low Horns,” said White Fox, quietly, “your memory has turned bad. Have you forgotten Many-Guns, Yellow Hair’s father? It is many winters since he first came to us with this boy and only a few less winters when he died. Have you forgotten that Many-Guns was a Kitchi-Mokan? I see that you have.

“Remember, Low Horns, when you were younger, this Many-Guns helped us against our enemies, the Snakes. Remember how his fine shooting turned back a Snake charge and saved us all?

“Remember, Low Horns, how this Many-Guns grew to be a great warrior with us? How he led a large party far, far south into the territory of the Almost-Whites across the deserts? Look, Low Horns, the rifle this boy carries is that one last carried by Many-Guns. Look at his face, Low Horns, and you will see the face of his father.

“It is true that this boy is not of our blood. It is true that he is often impatient and reckless and mischievous. But he is no less a Pikuni.”

Low Horns looked uncomfortable. He searched the faces of his four warriors as though trying to shift the blame upon them.

“Yellow Hair,” said Low Horns in a throaty voice, “I did not mean anything by this. If I have injured you, I am sorry. But it came as a shock to me that you were white, and I think it came as a shock to all of us. So long have you been in our lodges we had forgotten, and also, I am ashamed, we forgot the debt we owe your father. We cannot permit you to follow this white Fork-Tongue because he would certainly set his men upon you and have you killed as they killed Wolf Plume. Forget this, Yellow Hair, as though it had not happened. Hyai,” he added, feeling better, “do you think we are as cruel and cunning as these Kitchi-Mokans? Quickly, build us a new fire with your pistol lock. Running Elk must have broth and medicine.”

Yellow Hair’s spirits did not immediately rise. He lit the fire and nursed the small blaze until it was large enough to take care of itself. After that he wandered down the river to a quiet eddy and bent over to wash the single black stripe of joy from his head.

But before he stirred the quiet water he saw his reflection looking back at him and he knelt to examine it.

In the past he had fitfully wondered about the color of his scalp and the lightness of his skin, but he had never actually given it any intensive thought. He had been only a few winters old when his father had died and he remembered very little about it except the depressed sadness of the village at the time. He connected the shiver, which he always experienced when he saw a fully covered sleeper, with the death of his father, but that was all.

And now as he knelt beside the river, studying his blue eyes, it came to him as a shock that he was not really a Pikuni at all. True, he was a member of the All Friends Society and aspired to the Society of the Horns, but even that did not make him a Pikuni.

His lip curled a little and the reflection sneered back:

“Kitchi-Mokan!”

He spat and the image was shattered by the ripples of the startled pool.

Chapter 3

The Request

Running Elk died late that night.

Everyone knew that he would die, as the slug had torn him horribly. But he knowingly hastened his death by talking.

With only the flicker of sparse flames lighting up the interior of the lodge and showing where most of the warriors slept, Yellow Hair did not notice at once that Running Elk was beckoning to him.

Yellow Hair was on guard. Lost-in-Mountains had reported that the Kitchi-Mokans had gone swiftly out of the country but both White Fox and Low Horns had agreed that a guard was necessary.

Finally Running Elk spoke.

Yellow Hair turned and saw the moving hand and crept over to the edge of the willow-wand bed.

“I did not mean to draw away today,” whispered Running Elk.

“I have forgotten it.”

“That is well. In a little time, Yellow Hair, I will find the place the Great Spirit has reserved for me in the Sand Hills.”

“It will be a mighty place, Running Elk.”

“I will know the stories of our people who have not come back to tell them, but, Yellow Hair, I will never be able to tell Bright Star.”

Down in the cottonwoods an owl hooted dismally. It knew that a great man would die.

A wolf’s quavering howl sounded far off on the darkened plains.

“Hear?” said Running Elk. “He knows too. Yellow Hair, I have been a foolish old man. I have been too vain. I have held my head too high to see the path before my feet, and now that I trip, it is too late. We are a day and a half’s journey from my people, and I understand that I have been wrong. Someday, Yellow Hair, you will be a great man in the tribe. The Pikunis will need you to guide them. You are swift and strong, Yellow Hair. You are brave. The Pikunis will need all their brave men.

“When I was young, standing outside my father’s lodge to watch the girls pass by, only one white man had touched our country. That was long, long ago. He came to us on the big river to the north and he asked us to follow him down to trade in our beaver pelts. He said the white men were many and powerful and had many things to trade us. Guns, blankets, cooking pots.…