By his own evaluation, Trace was not fit to live with for the next couple of months. So he kept to himself and his own thoughts as much as possible. There were a few patrols, but they were organized more for training purposes than actual missions. Some of the free time was spent in the company of Sergeant Turley and occasionally Luke, but most of the time Trace sought his own company. Thoughts of White Eagle with a rope around his neck kept recurring no matter how hard he tried to put them aside. Several times he determined to pack up his horses and start out, snow or no snow. Each time he would have to remind himself of the distance he must ride, most of it through hostile country. His best chance of accomplishing all he needed to do was if he was successful in traveling through that territory unseen. He wouldn’t be doing himself or the boy any favors if he was wandering all over the territory, leaving tracks in the snow. Even though he would keep to the mountains as much as possible, the slopes were too treacherous for his horses when covered with snow and ice. And many of the passes would be blocked. He had no choice but to wait.
A week before Lieutenant Masters was scheduled to transfer back to Fort Kearny, Trace did have occasion to see Grace Turner. She made it a point to bump into him in the post trader’s store one Saturday morning.
“Well, hello, stranger,” Grace said, smiling. “Where have you been keeping yourself?”
“I’ve been around,” Trace allowed.
“We were talking about you the other night at supper. My fiance seems to think you’re a little too rough-cut for his liking.” There was a definite twinkle in her eye when she said it. “He says you lack the proper respect for an officer. What did you say to him, anyway?”
“Nothing that I recall,” Trace replied and quickly changed the subject. “I reckon you’re making big plans for your wedding. I surely wish you and the lieutenant all the happiness in the world.” Trace wanted to let Grace know that he harbored no resentment toward Masters, just in case she had the notion that he felt jilted by her. Hell, he thought, no woman in her right mind would tie up with a drifter like me.
Grace was outwardly pleased by his sentiment. “Why, thank you, Trace. You know I’ll always have a special place in my heart for you.”
Trace began to become uncomfortable. “Well, I guess I’d best get on about my business,” he said. “Hope you have a safe trip downriver.”
She caught his sleeve as he started to go. “Trace, I was thinking about taking a walk down by the creek to that spot Annie used to call her secret place—around four this afternoon, I expect.” Her eyes searched his, her smile warm and inviting. Then she turned to leave, but in case her message was a bit too demure, she paused and whispered, “If you’re out riding, you might want to take your buffalo robe with you. It’s still pretty chilly out.” Not waiting to witness his reaction, she promptly turned on her heel and was off.
Trace stood there a moment, watching her as she made her way toward the door. Finding it difficult to believe at first, he marveled at the woman’s blatant invitation, practically on the eve of her wedding. He thought back to the last time they had met by that creek. He had certainly been surprised at what came to pass at that meeting. He was more surprised now. Damn! he thought, I must have done something right. Wrestling with his emotions, he changed his mind several times during the balance of the morning.
But at a little before four that afternoon, he saddled the paint and rode off toward the cottonwoods that lined the creek behind Lamar Thomas’s house.
He saw her once more after that day, passing her on his way to the stables. They came no closer than twenty yards of each other. Neither spoke—Trace nodded a solemn greeting, Grace smiled warmly. There was an unspoken understanding between them, a bond created by a mutual fulfillment of a deep need. There was no need for words. Two days later, a mail wagon with an army escort made it through from Fort Kearny. Assured that the trail was passable, Grace and her husband-to-be left Fort Laramie the following day. From a low rise along the riverbank of the Laramie River near the site of the old fort, Trace watched them depart—none of the parties involved knowing that he had presented Ira Masters with a son for a wedding present.
* * *
“Come’ere, boy.” Booth Dalton jerked on the rawhide rope, causing the boy to stumble, almost falling on the floor of the tipi. On the other side of the lodge, sitting close by the fire, Charlie White Bull chuckled, always delighted by pain administered to others. “We need some more wood,” Booth said.
White Eagle silently began the routine that was now all too familiar to him. He reached up and started working at the knot that tied the rope to the noose around his neck. Once the rope was untied, he removed his moccasins and leggings. Next he pulled his shirt over his head. Down to his breechclout, he then left the tipi to gather wood for the fire.
Booth laid back by the fire, smug in the knowledge that he needn’t fear that the boy might run away. He felt certain that the desire to escape had been sufficiently dampened when earlier attempts had been dealt with severely. He smiled to himself when he thought of his latest method of clipping the little eagle’s wings. Jumping around barefoot and almost naked in the snow, while gathering wood, effectively discouraged any thoughts of running away. It also sped up the wood-gathering process.
“When you gonna let me have that boy?” Charlie asked. “These Gros Ventres ain’t gonna give you what you want for him.”
“Shut up!” Booth snapped, tired of hearing Charlie’s constant nagging. “It don’t give no profit to me, you skinnin’ that boy.” A thin smile cracked his stern countenance. “What you complainin’ about, anyway? Maybe you’d rather go git the wood.” He stretched his legs out to make himself more comfortable. “It suits my fancy to have me a slave, even if I can’t trade him.”
Near the center of the camp, Wounded Horse stood talking to Fire That Burns. Both men paused to watch the nearly naked boy searching along the riverbank for deadwood. After a moment, Wounded Horse spoke. “I do not think we should permit those two to remain in the village. There is a stench about them that offends my nostrils.”
Fire That Burns nodded, understanding the war chief’s feelings. Most in the village shunned the white man and his half-breed friend. They were only tolerated because the white man promised to supply them with guns—and the fact that the half-breed was said to be the son of a Blackfoot woman. “Maybe you are right,” Fire That Burns replied. “Maybe we should drive them out. I would have driven them from our camp before if we didn’t need the guns they promised.”
Wounded Horse frowned, his eyes still on the boy, who was now making his way back to the lodge through the snow. “They say they will leave in the spring to go get guns for us. I think they’re lying. I think they just want a warm place to spend the winter.” He looked back at Fire That Burns. “I don’t like the way they treat the boy. I think maybe we should kill them instead of letting them go free when the snow melts.”
“Maybe you are right, but we need the guns. Already, the Shoshoni and the Sioux have many guns. If this white man’s word is true, it would help us against our enemies. It might be best to let them stay until spring, and see what happens.”
“What about the boy?” Wounded Horse asked. “They claim he is white. He looks white, but he looks Indian, too. Maybe we should take him away from them. They ask too much to trade him—ten buffalo hides and four ponies—I say we should just take him.”
“Maybe. Let’s wait a while.”
Back inside the tipi, White Eagle dropped his load of firewood, and shivering with the cold, hastened to climb back into his clothes, ignoring the lascivious grin on Charlie White Bull’s face. Booth might be secure in his belief that White Eagle’s will to run away had been broken, but it did not escape the boy’s notice that the ice was beginning to melt along the riverbanks. It would not be long before the first signs of spring would appear. Then he would try again—clothes or no clothes. His spirit was far from broken.
Wounded Horse came out of his lodge to find Booth approaching his tipi, Charlie at his side, and the boy once again led by the rope around his neck. “Good morning, Chief,” Booth said, combining his scanty knowledge of the tongue with sign language. “I come to trade this white boy.”
Wounded Horse glared at the two men he had come to detest while some of the other people of the village came up to listen. Without warning, the boy spoke. His words came slowly as he was not totally confident in the few words of broken English he had picked up from Booth. “Not white—Shoshoni.”
“Shut your mouth!” Booth hissed and jerked hard on the rope. “He don’t know what he’s sayin’. He’s white, he was just raised by the Snakes.”
Wounded Horse was taken aback by the sudden announcement by the boy. The boy had never spoken before. Now, Wounded Horse could see that it had possibly been out of fear of punishment from Booth. “Go and find Three Toes,” Wounded Horse said to a warrior standing near him. Three Toes knew the Shoshoni tongue. Within minutes, he joined the gathering around the war chief’s tipi. “Ask this boy where he comes from, and who his people are,” Wounded Horse said, and all eyes turned to look at White Eagle.
“I am White Eagle, Shoshoni,” the boy replied boldly. “I am from Chief Washakie’s village in the Wind River country.” Pointing toward Booth, he said, “This man killed my mother and my grandfather.”
A low murmuring began to build within the growing crowd of spectators as Three Toes translated the boy’s words. The people of the village had little use for the white man and his half-breed partner, so White Eagle’s accusations were not surprising to them. When the boy spoke again, Three Toes jerked his head back abruptly, his eyes shifted briefly to fix on Booth Dalton, a look of shock on his face. Then he looked back at Wounded Horse and translated.
“The boy says that this white man and his friend were riding with a Sioux war party when the boy’s mother was killed.”
There was an immediate swell in the crowd, lifting the low grumbling of the previous moments to sharp protests of individual voices. In the next moment, all eyes were turned toward the two renegades. The Sioux were traditional enemies of the Gros Ventres. Instinctively, Charlie White Bull began to inch away from Booth’s side in a feeble attempt to disassociate himself from the white man.
“Now wait a minute, Chief, me and Charlie wasn’t riding with them Sioux, no sir.” His face a shade whiter than before, Booth blurted the denial so quickly that he forgot Wounded Horse couldn’t understand English. Seeing the stern face of the chief, he quickly groped for the proper Gros Ventre term, finally spitting out, “Captive! Captive! We were captives . . . The boy’s wrong.”
The situation had rapidly turned ugly for them, and Booth knew he had some fast talking to do. The little Shoshoni rat had thrown their fat in the fire for sure if Booth couldn’t convince these Gros Ventres that he and Charlie had taken no part in any raids with the Sioux. I told the little bastard to keep his mouth shut. I should have let Charlie skin him. Feeling the angry crowd of warriors closing in closer and closer, their faces reflecting the contempt they held for anyone who rode with the Sioux, Booth held up his arms, asking to be heard.
“Chief Wounded Horse and the great Gros Ventre warriors, know that I have always been a friend to your people. I have brought you guns and other gifts in the past, and I will bring you more in the future. This boy does not see the truth as it was. Things don’t look the same from the other side.” He gestured toward Charlie. “My friend, the son of a Blackfoot woman, and I were trying to steal guns from the Sioux to give to the Gros Ventres. But they caught us and made us captives. We got away the first chance we got, and came straight to our friends, the Gros Ventres.” He paused to examine the chief’s expression, hoping to see some sign that Wounded Horse believed him, but the chief’s expression remained stony. “We brought this boy with us—saved him from the evil Sioux—they would have killed him.”
“But you keep him tied like a camp dog,” Fire That Burns interjected.
Booth nodded in agreement, racking his brain for creative thoughts. “That’s for his protection,” he replied, “so he won’t run off and get caught by the Sioux again.”
“So you are protecting him,” Wounded Horse stated with more than a hint of sarcasm in his tone.
“Yes,” Booth eagerly replied. “Me and Charlie are protecting the boy.”
“And yet you want to trade him for buffalo hides and horses,” Fire That Burns said.
“Well, yeah,” Booth admitted, looking nervously from the chief to the medicine man, and feeling like he was not going to come out ahead on this discussion. “But only because I think the boy would be safer with you.”
Wounded Horse looked long and hard at the thin-faced white man before he spoke again. Glancing at the boy who was lost amid a sea of strange languages, the chief made his decision. “You are right, the boy will be safer with us. We will keep him.”
Booth forced a wide smile. “That would be a good thing—keep the boy.” Then he quickly added, “But I need the skins and horses—a fair trade.”
Wounded Horse gazed at Booth as if his eyes were tired of looking at the offensive white man. “We will trade,” he said, “but not for skins and horses. I will give you your life for the boy.”
Booth didn’t understand. “You wouldn’t kill me and Charlie, would you? We’re gonna git many rifles for your warriors.”
A wry smile parted Wounded Horse’s lips. “That’s why I am giving you your life. You and the other will leave my village now. When you come back with guns, you will get many skins and horses then. I think this is a good trade for you.”
“Well now, I don’t know, Chief,” Booth started, but Charlie grabbed his sleeve and pulled him aside.
“It’s a good trade,” he whispered in Booth’s ear. The half-breed had been gauging the temperament of the crowd gathered around them, and he didn’t like the surly looks he received. It was obvious that the chief’s decision to spare their lives was not a popular one with the warriors. He looked at the chief and nodded excitedly, “It’s a good trade. We’ll go to get the guns right now.”
Booth had always been the self-appointed brains of the partnership with Charlie White Bull, but it was the dimwitted half-breed who realized there might not be another opportunity to leave the village with their scalps. Many of the assembled warriors were already grumbling among themselves as they cast a hostile eye in Booth’s direction. “Come on, we go to get the guns now,” Charlie said, speaking for the benefit of the sullen warriors. Booth resisted, still intent upon turning a profit for the sale of the Shoshoni boy. But Charlie took him by the arm and forcefully moved him away from the chief’s lodge.
Angry at first, Booth then saw the look in Charlie’s eyes, and it suddenly occurred to him that his defiance of Wounded Horse’s will would most likely lead to a scalping party—with him and Charlie as the guests of honor. Realizing then what Charlie had already surmised—that their lives weren’t worth a plugged nickel—Booth nodded nervously, and stammered, “All right, all right . . . let’s git outta here.”
* * *
Three Toes removed the rawhide collar from White Eagle’s neck and held him by the shoulders while he examined the boy from head to toe. “They did not give you much to eat,” he commented.
The boy remained silent, looking around the tipi apprehensively. As far as he knew, his people, the Shoshonis, had never been very friendly with the Gros Ventres. The Gros Ventres were one of the few tribes who were close to the Blackfeet—and the Blackfeet were hated by most. White Eagle was not sure what his future would be with these people, but he was glad he had spoken up when Booth tried to trade him again. He was still a captive, but anything was better than staying with Booth and Charlie. This man, Three Toes, did not appear to mean him any harm. There was no hatred in the curious eyes that looked him over.
“You spoke of your mother and your grandfather,” Three Toes said. “Where is your father? Was he killed by the Sioux as well?”
“No,” White Eagle shook his head. “My father will come for me.” Although the boy had no way of knowing if Trace McCall would search for him, he truly believed that he would. Even though spending just a short time with his father, he felt a strong kinship for the tall man whose eyes had looked into his. White Eagle had seen no deceit there.
“Your skin is light,” Three Toes said. “Is your father a white man?”
“Yes.”
“How is he called?”
“Men call him the Mountain Hawk,” White Eagle answered proudly.
White Eagle was puzzled by Three Toes’s look of astonishment. The old warrior drew back as if he had seen a snake, or a rabbit had suddenly bolted across his path. He seemed to examine the boy anew, as if for the first time. Three Toes asked no more questions, but continued to watch White Eagle while the boy ate from a bowl of boiled meat Three Toes’s wife had brought for him.
White Eagle ate hungrily, causing Three Toes and his wife to exchange amazed glances. It was apparent that he was not accustomed to eating his fill. In truth, White Eagle had been surviving on the scraps left over after Booth and Charlie had eaten. For the first time since his ill-fated attempt upon Booth’s life, White Eagle forgot thoughts of escape. Content for the present to concern himself with filling his belly, he wasn’t even aware that his former captors had packed their possibles and were already hightailing it down the Yellowstone. Thoughts of vengeance would return, but for now the boy was content to be in the lodge of an Indian family, even if that family was Gros Ventre.
* * *
Wounded Horse looked up to see Three Toes hurrying across the open space between the tipis. From the serious expression on the old warrior’s face, Wounded Horse’s first thought was that something had happened to the boy. Before Three Toes could speak, Wounded Horse asked, “Is something wrong?”
Three Toes shook his head excitedly. “No,” he answered, “the boy is resting.” Seating himself beside the fire across from Wounded Horse, he could barely contain his news. “The Shoshoni boy is the son of the Mountain Hawk,” he said, then waited for the chief’s reaction.
Wounded Horse’s eyes opened wide, his usual placid features registering the depth of his surprise. “The Mountain Hawk!” he echoed. Could this be true? It had been rumored that this Mountain Hawk might be a white man—or spirit. “How do you know this?”
“The boy told me,” Three Toes replied. “There was no deceit in his eyes.” He waited while Wounded Horse digested this, then said, “He has said that his father will come for him.”
“I see,” Wounded Horse said, his mind now churning with questions regarding the possibility that the storied Mountain Hawk might descend upon their village. Their allies, the Blackfeet, had originated the name for the man, or spirit, that dwelled in the high mountain meadows. They claimed that three of their bravest warriors had been slain by his hand. Only a few others had seen him, and that was only a fleeting glimpse before he disappeared into the rocks.
There was one question that confronted Wounded Horse now, if the boy really was the son of the Mountain Hawk. Was the Mountain Hawk not a spirit, but simply a man? Or was the boy in part spiritual as well? He would have to discuss it with the medicine man—old Fire That Burns had a strong sense about things of this nature. The two of them got up from the fire and went to seek him out.
Fire That Burns was as amazed as Wounded Horse had been to hear the news his chief brought. “If what you say is true, then this is a very serious matter, and we must think on it a while.”
“How do we know that the boy speaks the truth? He may have only heard of the Mountain Hawk,” Wounded Horse suggested. “I do not doubt that the boy’s father is white, but he might not have the slightest idea who his father is.”
“That is possible,” Fire That Burns allowed, nodding his head slowly as he considered that possibility. After a moment’s thought, he said, “Bring the boy to me. I’ll know if he speaks the truth.”
Three Toes was off immediately to do the medicine man’s bidding, leaving Wounded Horse and Fire That Burns to speculate upon this fateful turn of events. “This could be a very important thing for our village,” Wounded Horse said, his mind already jumping ahead to thoughts of glory. “Our friends, the Blackfeet, have been trying to kill this spirit of the mountains for many moons but have failed. Our medicine would be very big in their eyes if we are able to lure him into a trap and kill him.”
“This is true,” Fire That Burns agreed, “but we must be careful. The Blackfeet are fierce warriors, and they lost three of their best trying to kill this spirit,” he reminded the chief.
Further discussion was delayed by the arrival of Three Toes with the son of the Mountain Hawk. With Three Toes acting as interpreter, Fire That Burns talked to White Eagle. Being cautious not to make the boy think he was anything other than welcome in the Gros Ventre camp, he first asked White Eagle if he had been offered food. When the boy replied that he had been treated like a friend in Three Toes’s lodge, Fire That Burns nodded solemnly, smiling. He then questioned the boy about his tribe and his mother, then finally, his father. White Eagle answered the medicine man’s questions, telling him all that his mother had told him of his father. When Fire That Burns asked why White Eagle thought his father would come for him, the boy told of his recent meeting with Trace.
“He is as tall as the pines on the mountainside, his shoulders wide, his arms powerful,” White Eagle boasted, eager to impress the Gros Ventre medicine man.
Fire That Burns believed the boy might be telling the truth, but he searched for more proof. He remembered the description of the mysterious Mountain Hawk told to him by one who had seen the legend. Little Bull, a Blackfoot war chief had seen the Mountain Hawk once. Although it was from a distance of perhaps that equal to one tall lodgepole pine, still he could see him fairly well. Little Bull had said that the Mountain Hawk stood on a rocky ledge above him, and when he and his war party climbed up to the ledge to capture him, the man was gone, but a hawk circled away above them.
“Your father,” Fire That Burns began, “I am told that he has hair as black as night, and black bushy hair on his face like many white men.”
White Eagle immediately shook his head, as the picture of Trace McCall returned to his mind. “My father is not a hair-face. His face is smooth, like a Shoshoni warrior. And his hair is the color of the mountain lion.”
“Ahh,” Fire That Burns responded. This matched the description given him by Little Bull. He turned to Wounded Horse. “The boy speaks the truth—he is the son of the Mountain Hawk.”
“Then you think he will come for the boy?” Wounded Horse asked. When Fire That Burns nodded, the chief’s eyes gleamed with excitement over the opportunity to capture or kill this mountain spirit. “We must call the elders to the council fire to talk of this.”
* * *
There was a great deal of excited discussion among the elders when they gathered to discuss Wounded Horse’s startling news. Not all believed the rumors that the Mountain Hawk was in fact a spirit of the mountains. One among them, Lame Elk, was particularly skeptical of the tales told by the Blackfeet, and spoke his contempt passionately. “I don’t think this Mountain Hawk is a spirit. I think he is a white man, like all the others who came to our lands to trap our beaver and kill our buffalo. He is just more clever than the others, staying high upon the slopes where the Blackfeet would not go to look for him. I say let him come and we will see if he is spirit or man when I shoot some arrows in his body.”
When Lame Elk sat down again, a few of those around the council fire nodded agreement with his words. But the majority of the warriors were not ready to refute the stories the Blackfeet had told of this hawk. If he was not a spirit, then he must surely be a man with special medicine. And it was the general opinion that Lame Elk might be taking the hawk too lightly.
“Maybe if we greet this hawk in peace, and give him his son, he may come as a friend,” Many Horses suggested.
The council rose against this idea almost to a man. Wounded Horse spoke then. “The Mountain Hawk is an enemy to the Blackfeet as well as the Gros Ventres. There are Blackfoot dead to tell us this truth. If he took a Shoshoni woman as a wife, how can we expect him to be a friend to the Gros Ventres?”
“Maybe we should send a runner to the Blackfoot camp to tell them this hawk is coming,” Fire That Burns said. “He has been their enemy longer than he has been ours.”
“No!” Lame Elk sprang to his feet. “This man is coming to our village to take the boy from the Gros Ventres. I say we watch for him and kill him. Then we will send his head to the Blackfeet to show them we did something they could not.”
“I think Lame Elk is right,” Wounded Horse said, and when the council was over, it was agreed that the village would prepare for the arrival of this special enemy. There was much discussion on when the hawk might be expected. Lame Elk maintained that if he waited until the snow had gone, it would be an indication that the Mountain Hawk was no more than any other man. If he were indeed a spirit, as the Blackfeet said, he would not have to wait for good weather. This seemed reasonable to the gray heads of the village, so they deemed it wise to prepare themselves now. The boy would continue to be kept under the care of Three Toes, since Three Toes spoke his language, but he must not suspect that he was a captive. This was in case the boy possessed special medicine himself and might be able to send a message to his father and warn him of the ambush. There followed a great amount of excitement in the Gros Ventre village as each warrior checked his weapons, eager to be the one who killed the Mountain Hawk.
* * *
While the Gros Ventres prepared a reception for him, Trace McCall was two hundred miles away, as the hawk flies, and making his way up the Powder River valley. Unable to wait until spring officially arrived, he decided to leave at the first break in the weather. He had tried to be patient throughout the long winter months, but each day that painfully dragged by only increased his anxiety over the welfare of the boy, and the unfinished business with Blue Water’s killers. So spring had not yet arrived when Trace informed Captain Benton that he was leaving.
Though his patience had worn through, he had not grown careless. Without having to concentrate on it, he naturally kept to the low side of the ridges, watching his back trail, and carefully looking over the trail in front of him before leaving cover. Luck seemed to be with him because winter had apparently lost its grip on the rolling hills with signs of runoff already spilling into the icy streams. In many places, the snow was little more than a light dusting. He was satisfied that it had been a good decision to leave when he did.
Although he could not make as many miles in a day as he would have liked, still he should be able to reach the head of the Yellowstone in a week’s time. Then he would have to find the Gros Ventre village.