Heaven Is a Long Way Off (23 page)

Sam said, “Don't you remember the words?”

He let Fiddlin' Red take the tune this time, and he sang the words himself.

“Now comes the chorus,” he cried. “Join in.” Coy yipped twice.

No voice lifted up with Sam's. He plunged onward.

After this verse, though, he got discouraged. Not a single voice joined in. Didn't they remember the captain, and admire him and the outfit that was the first to go to California? He gave them one more verse with the whistle alone and abandoned music for the night. He felt unaccountably sad, and lonely.

He stopped behind one circle. The boys were playing old sledge, and for a moment Sam thought Tomás was playing. Then he saw that Tomás didn't have a hand and was only watching over one man's shoulder.

A heart was led, and Tomás's player followed with a lower heart.

“Why didn't you trump it?” whispered Tomás.

All four players shushed him.

Sam didn't like this sight. The boy had been fascinated by Grumble's skill with cards.

Tomás said something softly to the player, and the man handed him his whiskey cup. Tomás sipped.

Coy eased up and sat next to Tomás. He gave Sam a begging look.

“Tomás,” said Sam, “bedtime.”

The boy threw Sam an angry look and then shook his head slowly. “I'm having fun.”

Sam walked off and Coy followed. “It's none of my business,” he told the coyote.

Coy whimpered.

In the wee hours somewhere Tomás crept into the tent and stretched out on his blankets between Sam and Hannibal. As soon as he lay down, he vomited where he lay.

“God help us,” said Sam. He marched the boy to the lake and cleaned him up. Except that Tomás vomited again. They moved knee deep into the lake and Sam held an arm around his waist. Tomás vomited again. And then one more time that seemed to be the last.

Coy stood on the bank, pranced, and squealed.

Sam decided no words were necessary and held the wobbly Tomás on the way back to the tent. Hannibal had moved all three sets of blankets outside—the night was clear.

The boy passed out like a match in a gust of wind.

“Not grown-up yet,” said Hannibal.

“Too near and yet too far.”

 

S
AM WOKE UP
with his mind a muddle. He'd felt out of sorts the entire rendezvous. He could still smell Tomás's throw-up. Everything was askew, and nothing felt right.

He sat up to look around and saw Bell Rock standing a few steps away, gazing at him.

Bell Rock! And behind him four other members of the Kit Foxes.

Sam stood up. Suddenly everything was changed. He must enter a world of Crow customs, Crow manners. This was a time to do things right.

He introduced Hannibal and Tomás briefly and said, “I will take you to Flat Dog's lodge.” Your kinsman, the man you are looking for.

He could see the questions in their eyes, but it was not his place to speak. In the Crow way Meadowlark was a member of Flat Dog's family, and Bell Rock's. Her husband wasn't her relative, and a relative must bring the news.

They walked to Julia and Flat Dog's tipi, Tomás and Coy trailing. Sam felt an irrational flicker of anger at Tomás.

Flat Dog and Julia were sitting around the outside fire, eating deer meat. The two children played busily. Flat Dog stood up immediately, strip of tenderloin in hand. He looked at his relative and the other Foxes. Sam knew what he was thinking:
This isn't how things are supposed to be done, and now there's no way to do them right.

Flat Dog motioned for the visitors to sit down, and they did, Tomás next to Sam.

He addressed the five Crow visitors with a thick tongue, “My sister is no longer living.”

The Crows were struck silent with the knowledge:
A member of my family is dead—a woman of my village is dead.

They thought of their responsibilities, how they would inform her parents and all the people of the village, and the grieving that must ensue.

Sam thought,
This is my life. For better and right now damn well for worse.
He reminded himself of correctness.

Azul squalled, and Julia gave him one of her breasts. Esperanza played outside the circle of grown-ups, picking up ants, chewing stems of grass, and letting out the occasional war cry.

At last Flat Dog said to the visitors, “She died giving birth. This is her daughter, Esperanza.”

Here was the intolerable contradiction. A life taken, a life given.

Sam knew he must make a gift of horses for the life taken. He wondered how the new life would be received—
My daughter.
Except that Esperanza was not his daughter, not as the Crows saw it—she belonged to Meadowlark's family. Already, in a practical way, she belonged to Flat Dog and Julia. Sam didn't count. His heart twisted like a rag being wrung out.

Flat Dog said, “This is my wife Julia.”

Crow eyes took in the woman and the knowledge.

“This is our son Azul.”

Eyes smiled at the gift of a new life.

Everyone sat without speaking further. The obligations, mourning and rejoicing—the responsibilities, the grief to come—all was overwhelming.

Sam was swamped with memories. Bell Rock had befriended him, and was his guide to the Crow way of understanding the world. This medicine man introduced him to the sweat lodge, made his pipe, and dedicated it. Most of all, Bell Rock sponsored the sun dance that Sam gave after the death of Blue Medicine Horse. Bell Rock was Sam's spiritual father.

Bell Rock did not have to tell Sam why he and his companions had come to rendezvous. Two years ago Sam had run off with Meadowlark against her parents' will. Red Roan, son of the chief, and her relatives came to Sam and Meadowlark's lodge, where they had spent a few idyllic days absorbed in each other, and took her back by force. After a few days she told Sam that she loved him, but he had to leave the village.

He got out, surrendering Meadowlark in his heart.

At rendezvous a couple of months later, here came Flat Dog escorting Meadowlark. She had run away, and her brother supported her gesture of the heart. Incredible. She and Sam got married in a mountain man ceremony. They were deliriously happy. They went to California so she could see the ocean. And then…

An interminable time passed in silence. Finally, Flat Dog asked if the visitors would accept food, and Bell Rock said they would.

When they had eaten, Sam said, “I will go with you to the village, present their granddaughter to Gray Hawk and Needle, and make a gift of horses.” In other words,
I will face up to what I have done like a man.

Bell Rock looked at him for a long moment. Then he said, with sorrow in his voice, “Red Roan has already made a pledge. If you come back to the camp, he will kill you.”

Sam tried not to let his surprise show.

“He didn't even know…”

Bell Rock held Sam's eyes. “No one will stop him.” Meaning,
I cannot help you.

Everyone stared at these awful facts.

Sam looked at Flat Dog. The Crow raised his eyes. “I am your friend.” He took a deep breath and let it go. “I offer to fight Red Roan for you.”

They all knew why. The white man would never win that kind of fight.

Sam said only one word. “No.”

He reached to one side and rubbed Coy's ears. He stared into space.
The village is against me. Even Flat Dog and Bell Rock cannot defend me. I am finished there.

 

S
AM AND
H
ANNIBAL
prepared for the fight.

They talked first, but that was short.

Hannibal—“Why go there at all?”

Sam—“I have to face up to what I did.”

They looked at each other. Going to the village and refusing to fight would never work. Sam would be branded a coward. Then any man in the village might attack him from behind any tree at any time. An arrow would whiz and…

“Tell me about Red Roan.”

“Most Crow men are tall and rangy. He's taller and rangier. He's a war leader—
the
war leader in that village—and has lots of coups. He's cocky as hell. Arrogant.”

“And what does he think about you?”

“He thinks I'm an ignorant white man who got his cousin killed. And stole his girl.”

Hannibal pondered. “What are his advantages?”

“Experience with hand weapons.” This would be fought lance, war club, knife, or shield, no firearms, no ability to kill at a remote distance. A face-to-face confrontation, and a true battle of honor. “And he's mostly had the upper hand with me.”

“Tell.”

Sam was embarrassed to recount the stories. Red Roan courted Meadowlark while Sam skulked in the shadows and watched. Red Roan set up Sam to be humiliated in an arrow-shooting contest with his nephews. And when Sam and Meadowlark ran away for their honeymoon, Red Roan came, snatched Meadowlark away, and marched Sam back to camp as a prisoner.

“He's got mind domination on you,” Hannibal said. “He's made you think he's stronger than you.”

Sam started to protest, thought, and fell silent. “What do I do about that?”

“Awe him,” said Hannibal. “Awe everyone.”

So they set out to do what was necessary. First, they traded for a lance, a war club, and a shield made from the thick skin of a buffalo bull's head. Among the Shoshones Sam found a lance and stone war club that felt good. He started carrying them everywhere he went, to get used to the heft and balance. He also practiced all afternoon each day. Throwing a lance at trees didn't seem particularly odd, but bashing them with the war club was very strange. He knew his new skills with his weapon would count for little against the experienced Red Roan.

Second, in the mornings they made some special preparations that might make all the difference. Very special. Before long they were ready, and told Flat Dog so.

Flat Dog had finished the business for the three of them. He sold the last trade goods they wanted to let go of, keeping some back for gifts to Meadowlark's family and for trade to the other Crows. He dealt with Tom Fitzpatrick and got company credit for their share of the beaver they'd traded for. This credit would last Flat Dog, Sam, and Hannibal a good while.

And they got a surprise. Jim Beckwourth asked if he could go along with them. “I like the Crows,” he said. Sam remembered that during the winter he spent in Rides Twice's village, the mulatto had had an active social life. They agreed—another hand going to Crow country would be good.

The last evening Sam, Hannibal, and Flat Dog decided to divide up the rest of the horseflesh, twenty animals. When the three got to the herd, Tomás tagging along, Paladin came trotting over to Sam, her colt behind her. Sam spoke one word, and Coy jumped up on Paladin's back and stood up on his hind legs. Tomás burst into laughter—he always loved that trick.

When each man had picked out stallions, mares, colts, and fillies, they started back toward their tents. Sam had picked out four to give to Meadowlark's parents, the obligatory gift. “We're well arranged,” Hannibal said.

That did it for Sam. He turned to Tomás. “What are you planning to do, go with Esteban and Plácido?”

The Taoseños had signed on with a group of free trappers intending to trap South Park, the country around Pikes Peak. Then they'd winter in Taos.

The boy shook his head no.

Sam indicated Hannibal. “Go to Flathead country with him?”

Same shake of head.

“Well?”

“I want to be with you.”

Sam was flabbergasted. Flat Dog and Hannibal seemed kind of tickled.

Sam waited until they sat at the fire in front of Julia's lodge. He began with, “In two weeks I may not be alive. Probably won't be.”

Tomás looked the other way, but Sam thought his eyes were teary.

“Talk real with me,” Sam said. “I probably won't be alive.”

Tomás turned to face Sam with a hard expression. “So? I don't have nobody now, I won't have nobody then.”

The men looked at each other and at Tomás.

The talk took all evening, with Sam, Tomás, Hannibal, Flat Dog, and Julia. Esperanza toddled around and played in the dirt. Azul crawled around and sometimes ate dirt. The adults talked. Tomás didn't get to say much, and his sullen look didn't help his cause.

In the end it all came down to—well, why not?

“All right, you can hang around. If Red Roan doesn't kill me.”

Hannibal said, “If Sam's dead, I'll be glad to have you along.”

But Sam had to ask Tomás straight. “Why do you want to be with me?”

“Too soon to separate a colt from its mother,” Tomás said with a crinkly smile.

This was a little fraud. Paladin's colt could suckle any of eight or ten mares.

Sam frowned. “Look, I'm a Crow.” This was half true. “My daughter is a Crow. I'm a member of the Kit Foxes. I speak the language. I carry the sacred pipe. Don't be fooled by my skin.”

“Or your hair?” Tomás asked with a sly smile.

Sam tugged at his white locks. He thought about it. He realized what Tomás's fantasy was. “I think you don't understand. If I survive, I'm not going to be a trapper and roam the country. I'll live in another Crow village. I'll be a warrior like the other young men, and a buffalo hunter.”