Geronimo rolled a cigarette in an oak leaf. He lit it with a splinter from the iron stove’s fire, smoked to the four directions, and then passed it to Ih-tedda. She smoked to the four directions, feeling the smoke bite the insides of her mouth and nose, but was pleased that her husband honored her this way. She handed the cigarette back, and waited with her hands folded across her belly, patient and ready to hear his serious business.
He finished the cigarette and tossed the remains into the low yellow flames flickering just inside the stove’s open door. Outside, the winter wind swished through the tops of the tall pines, sounding like the surf at their last prison, Fort Pickens, on Santa Rosa Island. Here at Mount Vernon Barracks north of Mobile they at least had more privacy in their own cabins, but the air was still thick and wet like that at Fort Pickens and more and more of their friends and children were dying from mosquito bites and the worms the White Eyes called tuberculosis.
Geronimo spoke in the thin whispery voice of a vigorous old man. “Ih-tedda, I have decided you and Lenna must go.” He waved a hand toward the door. “Leave me. Return to your mother and father in Mescalero.”
Geronimo’s words made no sense and she felt as if he were beating her. Ih-Tedda glanced at the slits of the old man’s eyes, and the words from his thin, pitiless lips filled her mind with darkness. Only determination, the same unbending will that had carried him across many wars and the killing of many enemies, showed on his face. She stared at the dirt floor, her heart racing. She spoke slowly to keep her voice from wavering.
“Why do you say this? I had no man before you. You stole me from my people. I hated you then but learned to love you. I have been a good wife for you. Our place is always clean. You never have to wait to eat. I submit to you in our blankets when it’s proper. Our daughter is a delight, whole and perfect and filled with laughter. Have mercy on us. I beg you not to send us away.”
The pitiless lips said, “You must go. The Blue Coats may change their minds any time and kill us all. They plan to free the Mescaleros they took to Florida, but not the Chiricahuas and Mimbreños. You are Mescalero. I should be a Mescalero because I married you, but the White Eyes will never let me go. There is no reason for you to lose your life. I took you without courting you. Now you have a chance to be free. Take it! You are a fine wife. I never beat you much or hard. You nearly always please me. Our daughter, Lenna, is a good child, but if she stays in this bad air, this place of White Eye sickness, she will soon make the journey to the Happy Place and you will not be far behind her.”
“Please, husband, I want to stay with you.”
“Woman, you must go. That is all I have to say.”
Ih-tedda hated the train. Black grit in its smoke made her dirty and its clank and rattle pounded against her ears all the way from Mobile to El Paso. The train arrived late and the wagons from Mescalero didn’t have much time for the return drive before the sun began disappearing in a brilliant golden haze.
The light nearly gone, the little group parked the wagons in a circle and made a cooking fire near a water tank filled by a creaking windmill. Charlie Smith, the old Mescalero scout, who was their leader, said to eat and rest. It would be a long drive to Mescalero the next day.
Ih-tedda’s mother brought dried slices of baked mescal, blue juniper berries, and mesquite flour bread for them to eat. The mescal, sweet and sticky after it was warmed over the fire, filled Ih-tedda’s memory with the good years she had at Mescalero. Perhaps things will be better even without Geronimo. Maybe I can find a good husband at Mescalero to take care of Lenna and me.
Her father took a bite of the mescal, chewed, and sniffed before saying, “Daughter, it’s good my eyes see you again. Your husband has freed you from the Blue Coat prison. You come back to us without bride presents and have Lenna to care for because he stole you away. You must have a husband soon, one who can care for you. I think I know the man.”
She frowned. “A husband so soon, Father? Can’t I wait a little while? Who is this you know?”
A coyote yipped and was answered. Hearing the Trickster, source of many childhood stories, once more and smelling the burning piñon cedar made her happy, but her father’s words filled her with foreboding.
Staring into the dark, her father glanced at her and looked away. “Yes, it must be soon, or a bad reputation comes quick. You have come back to us and are now a rejected woman with a child. Few men want such a woman. I’ll find you a good man when we reach Mescalero. You must accept him. I don’t think there’ll be others. That is all I have to say.”
Coyote howled again, nearer and louder. In her despair, Ihtedda wanted to answer him, but dared not. It would not be proper.
The wagons left their camp in the gray light of dawn. Gold poured on the mountain edges as the sun peeked above the horizon and then floated higher into the cold morning air. Ihtedda, holding Lenna, sat between her mother and father, neither saying much as their wagon bounced along the road ruts to Mescalero. Seeing the desert again in the bright sunlight, even seeing it at the end of the Ghost Face Season, when the creosotes were thin, the mesquite had few leaves, and the yucca stalks stood tall and dry and shaking in the wind, stirred Ihtedda to happiness. To again see the mountains in the gray distance and to smell the sage and dust after four years in the piney woods was a blessing from Ussen.
Night had settled cold and black when they reached her mother’s tipi. After they unloaded the wagon, her father took the horse to rub down, feed, and water. Her mother built a little fire in the center of the tipi and began making them a meal.
The smoky smell of the tipi’s interior, seeing the old blackened coffee pot and heavy iron stew kettle hanging over the little orange and red flickering fire, and touching the furs and tanned skins folded, stacked, and ready for use filled Ihtedda’s mind with a flood of memories from the good days in Mescalero when she was still her namesake, Young Girl.
Since leaving the train, Ih-tedda had not been alone with her mother to speak heart-to-heart about private matters. Her mother said, “I cried out to Ussen when they told me you had been stolen. I thought I would never see you again. Now you are here and Ussen has blessed us with your child. I think soon you will have a new man. Did the man who took you treat you well? Did he break any bones when he beat you?”
Lenna stirred in Ih-tedda’s arms, yawning and chewing at her fist, then went back to sleep. “No, he never really beat me. The first time he took me he was gentle. I liked my man. But, to his enemies he showed no mercy. I have seen him smile and never look back after killing Mexicans. He sent me away because he wanted us free before the Blue Coats changed their minds and killed us all.”
Grease dripping in the fire made a pleasant sizzle and its smell made Ih-tedda’s mouth anxious for a piece of the beef her mother roasted. Of course, she and her mother couldn’t eat until her father returned and had his fill. She hoped he would come soon, but memory said he never hurried.
“Why is Father so anxious to find me a man, any man, who will take me? I want to be free of a man for a while.”
Her mother never lifted her eyes from her cooking. “Be quiet, Daughter. You have returned to us without a man. You have no husband. Now you must do as your father says.”
“But my moon time is late. What if I carry another child? No one will want me.”
Her mother smiled as she turned the meat. “Then all the more reason to take a man sooner rather than later. He won’t know if the child is his or not as long as you are quiet.” Ihtedda opened her mouth to answer, but her mother shook her head. “Be quiet and do as I tell you.”
The falling sun turned the rippling western clouds to purples, reds, and dark orange. Shafts of bright light flew through the tops of the tall pines to strike the far ridges in pools of yellow as a shadow appeared by the tipi door and a cough announced a visitor. Ih-tedda saw her father smile. So, the one man on the entire reservation who will take me comes.
Her father said in a loud voice, “Come. Our fire is warm and we have food. Join us.”
The blanket over the tipi door lifted. A head covered in long gray hair and a face shadowed with many deep wrinkles pushed into the tipi, nodded at the women, and moved to sit down in the place of honor to the left of Ih-tedda’s father. The man had crossed eyes, a broad nose, and thick smiling lips. Ih-tedda felt her stomach roll as though she had eaten bad meat. No, Father. Please, not Old Cross Eyes.
Old Cross Eyes and Ih-tedda’s father smoked and made small talk about reservation politics and how hard the Ghost Face had been. At their first long pause in conversation, Ih-tedda, at her mother’s nod, said, “Does our guest have hunger? Will he eat now?”
Old Cross Eyes grinned. “Hmmph. Woman, you have light behind your eyes. My belly is empty.”
Ih-tedda filled a gourd with a big slice of meat, wild potatoes, chilies, slices of mescal, mesquite beans, and crunchy acorn bread and handed it to Old Cross Eyes. Her mother handed a gourd to her father. Ih-tedda rocked Lenna in her arms while she and her mother sat back to wait until the men finished.
Old Cross Eyes emptied his gourd and handed it back to Ihtedda. “Will our guest have more? There is plenty.”
He shook his head. “My belly is full. You cook good. I like a woman who can cook.”
Ih-tedda stared at Lenna sleeping in her arms. “My mother taught me well before I was taken.” He wiped the grease from around his mouth and rubbed it on his boots with his blue-veined hands. From his Blue Coat scout jacket, he pulled tobacco and papers, rolled a cigarette, and with a twig from the fire, lighted it, smoked to the four directions, and then handed it to Ih-tedda’s father, who smoked and returned it.
Old Cross Eyes crossed his arms and studied Ih-tedda and Lenna like they were a mare and filly he might buy or trade. “So, your divorced daughter, who cooks good, has left Geronimo? Her child is a girl? She is ready to take a new man?”
Ih-tedda’s father looked at her with raised brows, his signal for her to answer. “Yes, I left Geronimo before the Blue Coats changed their minds and killed everyone. Yes, the child is a girl. She has two harvests.”
“Did Geronimo beat you often?”
“No. Not much and not hard.”
“I think you must keep your tipi clean and as I know already, cook good.”
“I do.”
“What is your child’s name?”
“Lenna. Soon she will be off the cradleboard.”
“Hmmph. The child looks well-cared-for despite being in prison with you and Geronimo.”
Old Cross Eyes turned to Ih-tedda’s father. “I like your daughter. I see she already has a tipi set up near you. She has courage to leave the warrior Geronimo and come here with her child. She is divorced. Still, I offer you a good pony and a rifle for her. Every moon the Blue Coats give me eight dollars because I’m too old to scout anymore. Eight dollars every moon is enough for us to live on, if she doesn’t waste it. I’ll treat her with respect and we’ll stay in her tipi nearby to be close to you and serve you. Will you accept my offer, Father of Ih-tedda?”
Ih-tedda knew her father’s answer before he opened his mouth. He had not expected to get anything for her. Old Cross Eyes was smarter than he looked. Ih-tedda wanted to take Lenna and leave, go anywhere, do any work, do anything not to be tied to this old man with ugly eyes. Only her late moon time stopped her from leaving. She should not be alone in the mountains, even in the Season of Large Fruit, to birth a child. The risk was too high that it would die if she had no help. After the child was born, she would have two children to care for. She needed to stay near her mother.
As it was proper, her father thought for a while. He then crossed his arms and looked across the fire at Ih-tedda, and seeing nothing to discourage his answer, said, “I accept your generous offer. I give you Ih-tedda to be your woman.”
Up the ridge a wolf howled in the cold darkness and was answered by another. Ih-tedda kept her face a mask of indifference, but she wanted to howl, too.
Old Cross Eyes grinned. “Good. I have horses I have promised to sell in Tularosa. Ih-tedda, I will come to your tipi in three suns as the sun goes into the mountains and we will begin our life together.”
“I will welcome you in three days. Your evening meal will be ready.”
Old Cross Eyes nodded, “Ussen blesses me.”
Ih-tedda waited. The shadows outside were growing long, the light from the fading sun dimming. Her first meal for her new husband was ready, her acceptance complete of the inevitability of becoming the woman of Old Cross Eyes while expecting her second child by Geronimo. Old Cross Eyes had taken her just in time. She might fool him into believing the child was his and puff him up in his assumed virility to ensure he took good care of her. Ih-tedda smiled and shook her head. Men are so strong and powerful, but like saddled ponies, are so easy to guide—all, that is, except Geronimo.
A shadow by the door appeared with a throat-clearing cough.
“A tipi and your new woman are ready. Come and eat.” The door blanket raised and Old Cross Eyes stepped in to stand across the fire from her. He wore new canvas pants. His Blue Coat jacket looked freshly brushed and clean, and he held his ancient campaign hat between his hands.
“Woman, I have come. Will you take me?”
“I will take you. Come, sit by the fire and I will serve you the good things I have cooked for our first night together.”
He unbuttoned his coat and, pulling it off, handed it to her. She folded it and laid it at the top of their blanket. He stepped around the fire and with a groan caused by stiff, arthritic knees, eased down beside her. “Hmmph. I have found a good woman. It is warm in her lodge when the wind is cold and her lodge smells of fine food.” His eyes followed her every move as she filled his gourd with venison, berries, chilies, potatoes, and dried mescal slices that she had carefully steamed back to their original cooked sweetness. She handed the gourd to him and sat back to wait, but he shook his head and waved a hand toward her. “Woman, join me in your feast. I’ve thought about you every day since your father told me you were leaving Geronimo. Your mother taught you good cooking, and I can see Geronimo has trained you well as a wife. I’m a lucky man to have you. Come, eat with me.”
Ih-tedda filled her gourd, poured them both cups of coffee, and sat down beside him, demurely folding her legs under her fine, beaded buckskin shift. She had to admit Old Cross Eyes had manners. He made very little sound eating.
After they finished and she had cleared her cooking fire, he rolled a cigarette, lighted it from a fire twig, smoked to the four directions, and gave it to her, and she too smoked to the four directions. She returned the cigarette back to him. He took another draw and tossed what was left into the fire.
He looked at her with his rheumy old man eyes and smiled. “Now that you’re my woman, the People will want to call you a name so everyone knows you are mine. I think a good name for you is Katie, Katie Cross Eyes. Since I have given you my name, I think the People should just call me Old Boy. Do you agree?”
Yes. Everyone must know that by taking me, you no longer have ugly eyes. It is I, your woman, who will carry them with your name. “Yes, I agree. Call me Katie Cross Eyes. Old Boy is a good name.”
He took a swallow of hot coffee and nodded toward Lenna’s cradleboard. “Lenna sleeps peacefully. Good. Does she do this often?”
“She is a good child. She never cries. I think we left the prison camp before its cold, wet air could make her sick.”
“Good. I’m glad she’s healthy. Tell me again how many harvests has she?”
“Two. By the Season of Large Leaves she will be off the cradleboard. She can already walk, but she does not balance good enough to be on her own without me for support.”
“Hmmph. When she leaves the cradleboard, you will have much training for her. It’s important that she be taught Apache ways while she’s very young. Then she won’t forget when she’s grown.”
Katie looked at her hands in her lap. Every woman knows this, old man. Why do you tell me? “My man is wise. This I will do.”
Old Boy rolled another cigarette and lighted it for the pleasure of a smoke. He offered Katie a smoke, but she shook her head and looked away. “Too much smoke makes the inside of my nose sore.” Taking a long draw, he looked up and blew his smoke toward the top of the tipi.
“I’m not too old to make a child. I would like for us to have one. Will you give me a child?”
Katie looked at her hands in her lap, her heart thumping with relief. Ussen is good to me. I thank him. “I am your woman. It is proper for a woman to give her man children, and I will give you yours.”
He smiled and nodded before he took another draw and blew it out the side of his mouth. “I have a good woman. When can we begin? When Lenna is off the cradleboard, will you be ready to make another child?”
Katie stared at the fire as though deep in thought before she turned to Old Boy. “Geronimo did not lie with me after Lenna was born. He preferred his other wife, Zi-yeh, even when I was ready for him to come to me.”
The breeze in the treetops paused and on a near ridge, Coyote, the Trickster, yipped to his brothers.
“My moon time passed just before we left the prison. I’m ready to make you a child. Will you come to me this night?”
A smile stretched across the face of Old Cross Eyes. “Truly, I’m a blessed man. I will come to you this night and many others. First, I must see about my horses. I will be back.”
Katie smiled and nodded. “I wait for you.” She knew Old Boy just wanted to find a place to make water. She checked Lenna, and then pulled off her beaded moccasins and buckskin shift, rolled them up, and laid them by his Blue Coat before sliding under their cold blankets trembling not from the cold, but worry that Old Boy might not be able to consummate their marriage or might somehow learn she already carried a child, feel cheated the child was not his, and treat her in a bad way.
By the time Old Boy returned, the fire had burned down, and glowing orange coals cast dim light in the tipi. He held his hands over the fire’s heat before he undressed and slid under the blanket with her. The shock of his cold body reminded her of the ice-rimmed creek where she had bathed early that morning. “You are cold. Lie close to me for a while. The blanket and I will warm you.”
“Katie Cross Eyes, you are very good to your man. Soon I’m warm enough to come to you.”
He held her in his arms for a while, neither of them moving. She noticed he had the same old man smell, only stronger, as Geronimo. He was gentle with her and she thought they had a good first night. It took him three or four days before he was ready to come to her again, and for this she thanked Ussen. After half a moon together, she told him her moon time was late and that she believed she carried their child and must wait for further intimacy until after it was born. Hearing this, Old Boy strutted around like a White Eye rooster, his chest out, saying to the young men that they should hope they were as much a man as he when they were his age.
Katie Cross Eyes had a son, born early, she said, in the Season of Large Fruit. She went to the agency to register the child as her son so they qualified for more rations as a family. The agent smiled at the little girl holding on to her long calico skirt and motioned Katie, carrying the baby on its cradleboard, to a chair across from his desk.
The agent verified she lived with the retired scout named Old Boy, that her name was Katie Cross Eyes, and that Geronimo was the father of her daughter. Then he said, “When was your son born?”
Katie looked him in the eye. It was a custom the White Eyes followed to show they spoke truth even if the Apaches believed it was rude to stare at someone. “My son was born in the Season of Large Fruit in the moon I think you name August.”
The agent made tracks on an agency paper with his little spear dipped in black water. He paused a moment, scratched at his chin, and said, “You were here seven months before the child was born. Are you certain the child is Old Boy’s and not Geronimo’s?”
Katie stared in his eyes and nodded. “I am certain Old Boy is the child’s father.”
The agent nodded. “And what will be the name of the child.”
She swallowed and again stared at the agent’s eyes. “My son’s name is Robert . . . Robert Cross Eyes.”
The agent made marks on the paper and then read the tracks back and asked if what they said was correct. Katie nodded. He laid the paper on the desk in front of her, pointed to a place near the bottom, and said, “Make your mark like when you draw rations.” She made her mark and he made his tracks beside it.
“Congratulations, Katie Cross Eyes. Your son is now officially on our records as Robert Cross Eyes and he will count in your family’s ration allotment.”
She smiled and nodded and walked out into the bright sunlight under a brilliant blue sky.
Robert was a bright child and did well at the agency school. When he was fifteen, the agent, a kind man who understood Apache culture, asked Katie if she would agree to let him send the boy to the advanced Indian school at Chilocco, Oklahoma. Katie told the agent she had to discuss it with Robert before she could agree. She knew feeble Old Boy would want whatever she wanted.
That afternoon as Katie prepared her evening meal, she thought back over the years. When sitting by the evening fire, Lenna and Robert heard Old Boy tell of his scouting days. Their eyes had grown big the first time they heard the story of how the feared and famous warrior Geronimo had stolen their mother, carried her off, and married her when she was Ih-tedda. Katie told them that Geronimo was Lenna’s father, but Old Boy was Robert’s father. Robert’s frown showed his disappointment that the famous Geronimo was not his father also, but a sharp look from Katie kept him from saying anything that showed any disrespect for Old Boy.
Katie smiled and shook her head, remembering how excited Lenna, who yearned to meet her father, had become when they let her go as a Mescalero representative to the Apache Village in the Indian Exhibit at the 1904 Saint Louis Exposition two years before. Geronimo would be there to represent the Chiricahuas. Lenna, a grown woman of fifteen, quiet and beautiful, was in high spirits when she returned from Saint Louis. She told Katie how thrilled she was to meet her father and he to see her. He was surprised when she told him Ih-tedda had given birth to a son the same year she returned to Mescalero. Unknown to Katie, Lenna, counting the months, told Robert when she returned that he might be Geronimo’s son but begged him not to say anything to Katie or Old Boy. Within a week he told Katie that Lenna had said Geronimo was his father and wanted to know if it was true. Katie, feeling her face flush with anger, swore Old Boy was Robert’s father and told the boy not to ask her about it again, but she saw the same outrage in his eyes she had often seen in an angry Geronimo’s years ago. It is a hard thing to lie to your child, but harder still to lie to a husband of fifteen years.
Katie and Robert ate their evening meal alone. She picked at her food, and then laid her fork down. “I spoke with Agent Carroll today and need to make a hard decision. Carroll says your mind is bright and that you should go to the advanced school at Chilocco in Oklahoma, and maybe later go on to the Carlisle School. He asked me to let him send you there. I told him I would speak with you first. Do you want to go to Chilocco?”
Robert, his eyes sparkling, nodded. “Yes. I want to go to Chilocco. I would learn much there, and I have looked at maps. Fort Sill, where Geronimo lives with the other Chiricahuas, is only about two hundred miles south of Chilocco, about half a day’s train ride. He goes as a famous man to be seen at national expositions and shows. He even rode his fine horse in the inaugural parade of President Theodore Roosevelt. I could visit Geronimo during a weekend by riding the train. Despite what you say, I believe he’s my father. I don’t look anything like Old Boy. I look like Lenna. I look like my sister, daughter of Geronimo. I feel the pull of his life force. Please, Mother, tell me if Geronimo is my father. I want to know. I have to know.”
Katie felt as if a knife had plunged into her heart. She bowed her head and shook it. Water lay at the corner of her eyes, but the dams held.
She knew Robert had seen the edge of her tears when he slapped the table so hard it rattled the tableware, and he shouted. “I knew it!”
Katie raised her face and stared at him with a look she knew would be burned forever in his memory and making his moment of truth feel hollow. “I have not told you it is true. You still do not know. Keep your opinions to yourself in this place. Do not shame Old Boy with your wishing.”
She watched him. Defeated once more, he slumped back in his chair staring at her, certain knowledge of his true father so near and yet so far away.
In August Robert told Katie and Old Boy goodbye and climbed on the wagon Agent Carroll drove to the train station in Tularosa, there to begin the long, meandering trip to Chilocco, Oklahoma.
A few weeks later, Katie stood at the door of Agent Carroll. Smiling, he motioned her in to a chair. “Hello, Katie. How’s your family? Robert liking Chilocco?”
She folded her hands across her belly and looked out the window. “My family is good. Old Boy still can walk with his stick and is strong for a very old man. Robert writes us nothing since he left.”
Carroll smiled and nodded. “He’s busy learning many new things. He’ll write soon. How can I help you?”
She looked him in the eye. “I need to correct an error in your records.”
Carroll raised his brows. “Oh? And what might that be?”
Her eyes stayed locked on his. “Robert Cross Eyes should be Robert Geronimo.”
He winced. “Is there anything else?”
She nodded. “Yes. Please send him tracks on paper that say your records now show he is Robert Geronimo.”
“I will, but . . .”
She stood. “That is all I have to say.”
W. Michael Farmer has published short stories in anthologies, and award-winning essays. His novels include: Killer of Witches, 2016 Will Rogers Medallion Award winner; Mariana’s Knight, 2017 New Mexico–Arizona Book Award winner for Historical Fiction; and Blood of the Devil, 2017 New Mexico–Arizona Book Award finalist for Adventure–Drama and Historical Fiction.