CHAPTER 29
Mackey and Billy had left the train at Chidester and sent the telegram from there. Now they made their way through the mountain pass where the Blackfoot tribe had once lived. It was almost nightfall by then, and Mackey knew they would need to make camp before they headed into Dover Station the next day.
Billy once again broke the silence that had fallen over them. “You think Wolf Child still lives around here?”
“If he’s still alive,” Mackey said, “then he still lives here. He bled for this land. He won’t give it up so easy.”
Billy pointed at the scalp hanging from a string on Mackey’s pommel. “You going to get rid of that thing? It’s likely to give Wolf Child the wrong impression if he sees it.”
Mackey had forgotten it was there until Billy mentioned it. “If anyone could understand why it’s there, it’s Wolf Child. Why do you want me to get rid of it?”
“It’s grisly.”
“It sets a tone,” Mackey told him. “Besides, since when have you been bothered by a scalp? I recall a time when you had more hanging from your pommel than I did.”
“Those were Apache and Kiowa scalps,” Billy reminded him. “Different time and different reasons. We were different men, too, Aaron. We did all of that on Rigg’s orders.”
“We did it because it needed doing,” Mackey said. “Rigg just happened to give the order. Another officer might’ve done the same. Maybe even me.”
“Maybe,” Billy allowed, “but like I said. We’re different now. And you’re a better man than the kind who takes scalps.”
“Would be nice to think so,” Mackey said. “Wish it was true, but it’s not.”
Both men drew up short when they heard a crack off to the side of the trail. Someone else would have mistaken it for a snapping twig or a branch. Maybe a porcupine scurrying through the overgrowth.
But Mackey and Billy had both heard a hammer cock enough times to be able to tell the difference.
A man spoke to them in Siksika. “You used to be more careful, even for a white man.”
Mackey recognized the voice and responded in the same language. “We are not here to harm you, Wolf Child.”
“If I thought otherwise,” the man said, “you would not still be alive.”
The old Blackfoot chief stepped out from a stand of trees onto the narrow path. Had the light been better and if they had been paying more attention, Mackey knew they might have spotted the old man among the overgrowth. But in better conditions, Wolf Child would not have been standing there. He would have found another spot to greet his visitors.
“If you still remember where my village was,” Wolf Child said, “go there. I left some game in the woods I have to bring for supper. Unless you have become too important to eat with an old man, Máóhk Ki’sómma.”
The old man never had been able to say his name properly, even the rare times he had chosen to speak the Devil’s Tongue. “Wait and let us help you with the animal you killed.”
“Go to my village and wait,” Wolf Child said. “Accepting help from the white man only makes us weak.”
The old man disappeared back into the overgrowth.
Billy understood the language, but not well enough to speak it. “Still a nice old Blackfoot, isn’t he?”
“We’re off to a good start.” Mackey kept riding. “At least he didn’t shoot us.”
* * *
At the old Blackfoot camp, the three men ate venison and drank a pot of Billy’s coffee. People usually made a point of complimenting Billy on his coffee, but Wolf Child did not. If he liked it, he hid it well.
As they ate, Mackey spoke to the chief in his native tongue. “I did not think we would find anyone here.”
“Figured,” Wolf Child replied, “seeing as how you made enough noise for a deaf boy to follow. The vengeance trail has made you careless, Máóhk Ki’sómma.”
Mackey stopped eating. “How did you know?”
He gestured toward Adair, who joined Billy’s mount in eating the tall grass that had sprung up around the old village site. “The scalp you have dangling from your saddle tells me so. A man like you does not do something like that without purpose. That purpose for you would be a vengeance trail.”
“I told you to get rid of that thing,” Billy said from the other side of the fire.
Mackey went back to eating. “Never could get much past you, Wolf Child.”
“That is true.” The Blackfoot motioned to get Billy’s attention and spoke at him. “When his father first showed him this place, Máóhk Ki’sómma used to sneak out here at night and watch our customs and see our ways. He used to hide behind that large rock over there. All he would do is watch, but never approached the village. We came to call it Watching Rock for the young boy who looked at us.”
Mackey bit into another hunk of venison. “Didn’t know you knew about that.”
“A wise chief knows everything about his village. And all that is around it.” He regarded his own hunk of meat. “I was a good chief.”
Billy asked in English, “If you knew Mackey was there, why didn’t you invite him in?”
“Because it was not our place to invite him. Our village was always open to the people of his village. At least to those who came in peace. His father, Barking Dog, was always welcomed in our village and brought He Who Follows with him many times.”
Mackey almost spat out his food. He had forgotten the Blackfoot tribe used to call Pappy “Barking Dog” because his brogue sounded like a dog barking to them. Sim Halstead never had the heart to tell Pappy the truth, back when Sim still spoke, so he told Pappy it was their term for “Great Chief.”
Mackey smiled at the memory, but the smile did not last long. Both of them were gone now. Sim and Pappy. Taken from him from men not fit to empty their toilet water.
Mackey felt Wolf Child’s hand on his leg. “I know what happened to your father. I saw the flames from the high place and heard the screams of your people. A man leaving this place stopped to say goodbye to me and told me all that had happened in your village. I mourned your father. I mourn him still. He was a fine white man.”
“Yeah.” Mackey set his venison aside, suddenly losing his appetite. “He was.”
“And you have come this way to avenge him. You and the Dark One here.”
“Not just him,” Billy said in English, “but that’s part of it.”
Wolf Child set aside his own food on the blanket and grew quiet. When he felt he had been quiet enough, he said, “What you seek to do is a dangerous thing, Máóhk Ki’sómma. You already have a great blackness in you. This is clear. But the blackness can grow blacker still if you water it with blood. You have killed white men and Apache and Comanche and Kiowa and Lakota. These were good things, because these are bad men who caused many of my people to fall under their blade. But what you seek to do now is different. What you seek to do now is for yourself, to stop your own pain. I fear what will happen to you when you find blood only makes the pain harder to cure.”
Mackey watched the fire dance. “I look forward to finding out.”
Wolf Child shook his head. “You may think the blackness inside you cannot grow any darker, but it can. I have seen it grow in good men, both white and red. I have seen how a spirit can be poisoned by the blackness, growing blacker until it no longer lives. I do not wish this for you, Máóhk Ki’sómma. Your father was a great man, and no great man wishes such a thing for his son.”
“The men we hunt have blackness of their own,” Mackey said. “A blackness that threatens my village and all of my people. Maybe even you, some day.”
The old man looked up at the stars high above the fire. It was a clear night, and there was much to see. “I am near a place where the blackness cannot follow me. It no longer holds any power over me. But both of you are young men. You have much time before you become as I am now. You have many things to see and do, for yourselves and your people. But you cannot do these things if your eyes are blinded by darkness, just as we could not see the sky if it was covered by clouds.”
Mackey looked to his left and saw a dead prickly bush with what appeared to be a pale rock beneath it.
But Mackey knew that was no rock. “And what do you say about your friend over there?”
Wolf Child pitched forward to see the place where Mackey was looking. “Ah, that is, as the white men say, my ‘chamber pot.’” He seemed pleased with himself to be able to pronounce English words so well. “That is my enemy. I remind him of his shame each morning when I make my water.”
Mackey knew that was the spot where the Blackfoot tribe had buried Darabont alive after he had turned the outlaw over to Wolf Child’s scouts. They had buried him up to his neck and poured honey over his head to attract the ants. Mackey had no idea how long it took for a man to die from something like that, but however long it had taken, it still was not long enough for Darabont.
“I used to make my droppings there, too, when my people moved on to another place. But the prickly bush grew and I could no longer do that.”
Billy had been able to follow the conversation well enough to say, “Sounds like a fitting end for him.”
“I will do it,” Wolf Child said, “as long as I can make water. When I die, I hope a skunk or a possum will do the same. Maybe a wolf, though that is too noble for him.”
“You have your chamber pot,” Mackey said. “I have my scalp and my vengeance. How are they different?”
“Because I knew when to stop.” Wolf Child looked at him for a long time. “Do you? Or will the blackness blind you until you have wandered too far within it to find your way out again? Until you cannot see the stars above or the good ground around you.”
The chief grabbed Mackey’s arm with a strong, bony hand. “The dead are lonely and beg us to follow them. Do not do this, Máóhk Ki’sómma. Not even for your father. Kill who you must, but not all, for all need not die to avenge him.”
For the first time since Billy had told him Pappy was dead, Mackey felt different. It was not peace. It was not comfort, just different.
It was why he said, “I’ll kill enough to end it once and for all.” He watched the fire dance among the logs. “As many as it takes, but no more than that.”
Wolf Child joined him in watching the fire. “I hope that number is small enough for you to escape the blackness.”
Billy sipped his coffee and watched the fire with them.