Tecumseh, his blanket wrapped tight around him, sat on his horse, both of them blowing clouds of crystalizing water vapor into the freezing air. He’d driven the beast hard for most of the night, but they were here—in the pass between the low hills overlooking the hundreds of cabins, wegiwas, and tepees that made up the Shawnee village west of the Mississippi. The last time he’d looked onto this view was twenty-two years before, when he and Chiksika, Chaubenee, and the others had arrived on their youthful adventure. How different those times had been; how different he had been then. This time there was no reception party. The stars were still visible, with the barest hint of grey daylight coming up behind him. The village would be awake soon, but for now all was peaceful and still.
When he was one hundred yards from the village the first dog awoke, startled by his presence, and began to warn all others. Soon a small pack of the yellow curs ran barking toward him, forming a flanking, and noisy, escort. The first warrior was out of his cabin within moments, naked save for a blanket over his shoulder, musket leveled and ready to expand the alarm if necessary. When the young warrior saw only a solo Shawnee approaching, he lowered his weapon, pulled his blanket tighter around his shoulders, and waited patiently for the arrival of the half-frozen stranger.
Tecumseh spoke more directly than mannerly conversation would have called for. “I am Tecumseh. Where is Tecumapese?”
The young warrior’s expression took on a more serious tone. “You are welcome to our town, Tecumseh. Let me lead you to the lodging of our chief. It is he to whom you should direct your question.”
And with that he turned and started down the lane to the center of town. By the time they arrived, the sun was cresting the hill down which Tecumseh had just come. There was no warmth in it yet, but the light was enough to give anticipation of its coming. When they reached the largest cabin in the center of town, the young warrior stepped to the door and pounded with his open fist. Tecumseh slid slowly off his horse and wrapped the beast’s reins around the crossbar on the hitching post. He stood waiting, trying to draw as much warmth as possible from the rising sun, until an old man with disheveled hair came to the door and exchanged a few words with the young warrior. He stepped into the light and toward Tecumseh.
“I am told you seek your sister?”
Tecumseh nodded his head slightly in assent.
“She is not here,” the old man intoned very slowly, his voice weary in the saying. He said no more and waited for Tecumseh to respond.
“Where is she?”
The old man stretched his arms over his head and arched his back straight. When his arms were again at his sides he spoke. “Come in. You are cold and hungry. There is warmth and food inside. Let your young escort take care of your horse.” Instead of awaiting an answer, the old man turned and walked the few steps back to the cabin door. He opened it but rather than stepping in, held it for Tecumseh.
Once inside, Tecumseh shook off his blanket. An old woman took the frozen blanket from his hand and hung it on a peg near the fire. Then she pointed to a chair next to the hearth and the fire that was starting to build. Tecumseh extended his hands to warm them. The old man sat next to him but said nothing. Momentarily, the teakettle hanging over the fire began to hiss. The old lady took the kettle and returned with two steaming mugs of tea. Only after Tecumseh had taken a small sip and then a long one did the old chief speak.
“It is true your sister graced us with her presence. She had stayed with my woman and me and was a source of help to her and delight as well as wisdom to me and many others. Two weeks ago, she rolled her possessions into her sleeping mat, put her few others in a valise, dressed herself in boots, a riding skirt, and a hooded winter coat, and announced she was leaving.”
Tecumseh turned his head from his tea to look directly at the speaker but said nothing and looked back into his teacup, waiting.
“She did not say where she was going, but it was clear why. She was leaving with Francis Maisonville, the French trader who ran a small store at the western edge of the village.”
This time Tecumseh’s head snapped up with such force that he dropped his tin cup, which rattled across the hearth. “She what?”
The old chief said nothing for a moment. His wife scurried over, cloth in hand, to collect the cup from the hearth and wipe up the spilled liquid. Only when she was done and had stepped away, the teacup in one hand and the wet rag in the other, did he continue.
“She had been seeing Maisonville. Oh, they were quiet and discreet about it, but those who were paying attention knew. And now they have gone. None of us knows where.”
“Where is his store?” Tecumseh said.
Upon receiving directions, Tecumseh rose and departed without a word. He strode purposefully across the western half of the village to Maisonville’s Trading Post. A freshly painted sign hanging from the porch eave read, “McNess Trading Post.”
The small bell rang as Tecumseh opened the door. He stood silhouetted by the morning light behind him, not moving.
“Close the door, stranger. It’s hard enough to keep it warm even when it’s closed.” This came in with a twang from a young, tall, thin man with a head of unruly blond hair.
Tecumseh left the door open and walked with slow, deliberate steps toward the counter. “I come for my sister. Where is Maisonville?”
There was a momentary flicker of fear on the young man’s face before he controlled his expression, making it as placid as he could manage. “He’s no longer here. He’s gone.”
Tecumseh said nothing but stared hard and unblinking into the young man’s blue eyes.
The white man swallowed and then said, “I’m McNess. I worked for Maisonville. He sold the place to me and left. Two weeks ago.”
“Where did he go?”
McNess swallowed again and then with a small stammer said, “He . . . he didn’t say. He just left.”
Tecumseh, with the ease and speed of a compressed spring unleashed, vaulted over the counter, grabbed McNess’s neck with one hand, and twisted him backward across the countertop. With his other hand he drew the scalping knife from his belt and held the point of it against McNess’s Adam’s apple.
Tecumseh put his face within a foot of McNess’s. “Where?”
McNess’s breath came fast, terror spread across his face. “They said they were going toward New Madrid and would start a store somewhere along the river. Probably south of there.”
Tecumseh removed his hand from McNess’s throat, stood back up straight, and sheathed his knife. He walked around the counter and toward the door.
As he reached it the twang called out behind him, “You’re Tecumseh, aren’t you?”
Tecumseh stopped and turned to him. “Yes.”
“She said you wouldn’t understand. That’s why they left.”
* * * *
New Madrid, on the Mississippi River, lay due south of Cape Girardeau. It was quicker for Tecumseh to travel due south overland than to follow the river around the Kentucky bend.
Once Tecumseh got there, it wasn’t hard to get directions to the new Maisonville store some miles south of town along the river road. Even in midafternoon, it was cold and he could see smoke rising from the chimney before the trees revealed the little house. If Maisonville planned to build a store, it wasn’t up yet. Perhaps he was just working off the porch of the house. Tecumseh rode straight to the front door and tied his horse. He did not knock, nor did he kick the door open. He merely pulled the latch string and walked in.
Tecumapese looked up from her work as he entered. Her face registered momentary surprise and then she turned toward him, feet planted at hip width, face turned expressionless. Maisonville was nowhere to be seen.
“You found us quickly. The comet went over a month ago today. I thought you’d go back to Tippecanoe where you’d be needed to fight the war.” She spoke in an expressionless tone.
“I thought you’d be at the Shawnee village and there would be time to collect you first.” He responded in the same flat tone.
“And when you had to make a choice, you came after me instead? That makes no sense, Brother. You are needed elsewhere, not here.”
“Tell me, Tecumapese, what Indian would follow a man whose own family will not live by his code?”
The corners of her mouth held the hint of a sad smile. “Families can be difficult.”
“Pack!”
“No!”
“Sister, I need you now. More than just personally, my cause needs the symbol you provide. You are held in extraordinary esteem by all the tribes. For you to betray my trust may cost us all. I need you to be seen standing beside me. Now pack.”
“No. I told you I need to take care of myself. And I have. I will stay right here.”
Tecumseh walked to the fire, squatted before it, and extended his arms to its warmth. When the cold left his hands, it was still in his heart. He rose and faced her.
“Sister, you may stay, but not with that man. As long as there is hope for my cause, you cannot betray the fundamental rule. If you stay, I will kill him. It is up to you.”
The two stood staring at one another, neither speaking. Finally, she walked toward her mat, threw her clothes upon it, and started to roll it. “You will find my horse and tack behind the cabin. By the time you get him saddled and back to the front, I will be ready to go.”
* * * *
They traveled toward New Madrid, where they would find transportation for themselves and their horses across an inhospitably cold Mississippi River. Neither had spoken in two hours. Tecumseh’s gelding started to prance and move almost sideways. He tightened up the bridle to settle it. But it didn’t settle. Instead the horse reared straight up, and when it came down, tried to race. Tecumapese’s stallion began to do the same thing. While they struggled for control, there was a sharp cracking sound above and a foot-thick limb of oak snapped and fell, narrowly missing both. And then the ground began to rumble.
Tecumseh looked up at the road and saw it coming toward him in undulating sheets like a blanket tossing on a line. A sharp wind suddenly shot at them. Trees rose and snapped. The ground sounded of thunder. The earth opened and Tecumapese’s stallion stepped in a foot-deep crack and then was thrown forward as the earth came back together. The horse screamed in agony as its leg twisted at an unnatural angle. As Tecumapese fell, Tecumseh’s horse danced toward her body. It took all his strength to keep it from trampling her. He jumped off the beast, letting it run as he rolled along the ground. He tried to rise but was knocked down by a falling limb, so he got on his hands and knees and crawled to her. He pulled himself on top of her and stayed.
The rumbling continued for what seemed like fifteen minutes. When it finally stopped, everything became silent and still, the noise, the wind, the undulation of the ground. All of it just stopped.
Tecumseh and Tecumapese rose together. The forest and the road looked like the site of the Battle of Fallen Timbers times ten. Never had either seen anything like it. The only noise remaining was the periodic and softening scream of the horse, with its grotesquely distorted leg still entrapped in the earth. Tecumseh stepped over the fallen limbs and made his way to the horse’s head. He pulled the large pistol from his belt, stroked the beast’s nose with one hand, and pulled the trigger with the other. The pathetic screams stopped. He pulled Tecumapese’s bedroll from the horse’s haunch and threw it over his shoulder, untied the valise from the saddle, picked it up, and walked back to her. Tecumapese was brushing the dirt and bits of trees off her coat.
“Let’s go,” he said. “Hopefully, we’ll find my horse. If not, it will be dark and very cold by the time we get to New Madrid.”
* * * *
They found Tecumseh’s horse unhurt and nibbling grass a short distance away, but by late afternoon they were still miles from New Madrid. The going had been slow due to all the debris.
“A rider is coming,” Tecumapese announced as she peered into the gloom.
It quickly became apparent it was one rider with two horses, the trailing mount carrying supplies. When the rider was two hundred yards away, he stopped to take them in and then started toward them again. As he came closer, Tecumseh recognized the rider and looked up at Tecumapese. She was frowning. He knew she would be.
The horses came to a stop directly before them, and Tecumseh addressed his aging friend. “Hello, Wasegoboah. It is very good to see you, but a surprise. What brings you?”
“I came looking for you.” He looked straight toward Tecumseh as he spoke, never acknowledging his ex-wife. He stepped down from his horse, pulled a water bag from behind the saddle, and offered it to Tecumseh. “I come with news.”
Tecumseh sipped from the bottle and handed it to his sister. “You have supplies, I see. It is too late to reach New Madrid tonight. Let us stop here for the night, and you can tell us the news over a fire and dinner.”
Tecumapese stepped down to the ground and started the work of creating a fire and clearing places for their bedrolls. Wasegoboah began to unpack both utensils and supplies to prepare dinner. It was all done wordlessly.
The night sky was crystal clear and belied nature’s fierce destruction of the day. The fire gave both warmth and some small sense of protection from the devastation that surrounded them. Tecumapese lay with her back to a tree.
The two men sat on the ground beside the fire. Tecumseh produced a pipe that he lit with a glowing splinter. He puffed until the tobacco was burning smoothly and then handed the pipe across the fire to Wasegoboah. “Now is the time for you to tell, Brother, and begin by telling how you found us.”
Wasegoboah took a long and slow inhale from the pipe. As he began to speak the smoke came out of his mouth in small puffs. “Your escort came home without you but with the information that you’d gone to the Shawnee village west of Cape Girardeau. So, I went there. And there I found out you were here. It was not complicated. The news I have, however, is very difficult to tell. But the burden is mine.”
Tecumseh stared intently at Wasegoboah’s anguished face as he continued.
“Tensk allowed Harrison to come and meet him with our warriors, in defiance of your direct orders. He not only had our warriors meet Harrison, but he told them the Shemanese bullets would not harm them. So, they rushed forward madly. The first charge was so forceful that we killed or wounded perhaps two hundred and fifty of the Shemanese. But quickly Harrison gathered his men’s courage and they fought back. As soon as they did, it became apparent that the prophet had no powers. Our men, in the open, started to fall. We lost no more than forty, but all our warriors lost faith and ran. All this I hear; I was not there.”
Tecumseh sat as though in a trance, showing no emotion. “Why were you not there, Brother?”
“I was tied in the miskahmiqui. The night before the battle I’d tried to stop Tensk. He threatened to have me killed but had me tied instead.”
“Where has the village gone?”
“I moved the few hundred that chose to remain to Wildcat Creek. Then I came after you.”
“Does Tensk live?”
“Yes. He ran from the battle. We survivors took him. He is prisoner at Wildcat Creek.”
Tecumseh reached his hand across the embers of the fire to receive the pipe. “Tomorrow we head toward Wildcat Creek.”
* * * *
Tecumseh had Wasegoboah redistribute the supplies so the packhorse could be ridden. He loaded his gelding only with Tecumapese’s tack, bedroll, and valise. They kicked out the fire and stepped to the horses.
Tecumseh put his hand on Tecumapese’s shoulder and turned her to him. “Sister, you are free to do as you please.”
She let a look of startle cross her face but said nothing.
“I still need you, but the cause does not. There is no cause anymore. So, you are free to make your own choice. Come with me or go back to New Madrid and Maisonville. Your life is your own.”
She said nothing but turned and walked to the gelding, which she mounted and then turned toward Tecumseh. When she came beside him, Tecumapese bent down low from her saddle and kissed him on the cheek. She straightened up, looked at him momentarily, kneed her horse gently, and started back down the road to New Madrid.
* * * *
Tecumseh and Wasegoboah rode into the sad little village at Wildcat Creek. Two hundred survivors stood waiting. There were no cheers or friendly greetings. There was only the silence of failure and fear.
Tecumseh dismounted and said, “Take me to Tensk.”
He was led to a mean wegiwa and upon entering found Tensk tied by his wrists to a pole buried in the earth. When he saw Tecumseh enter, he awkwardly rose to his knees and whimpered in fear. Tecumseh strode into the room, followed by all who could squeeze in behind him. His face reflected nothing but cold rage. Tensk looked up as Tecumseh pulled his knife from his belt. His terror reduced him to crying with mewling begs for his life. Tecumseh said not a word, walked to him, reached down, and entwining his fingers into the filthy hair, yanked the one-eyed man to his feet, his arms jerking as his bound wrists bounced up the pole. When he had Tensk extended to his full height, Tecumseh pulled even more until the prisoner was on his toes. Tecumseh then tugged the hair back until the pleading eyes looked into his and laid the blade of his knife against the naked neck before him. He slowly drew the blade across the skin until blood oozed out.
“You miserable creature. In one day—one day,” his voice boomed, “you have ruined ten years of work. You have destroyed the aspirations of hundreds of thousands who placed all their hopes in our cause—the cause you have now destroyed. It was not William Henry Harrison who destroyed it. It was Tensk, the drunken, incompetent coward.”
Tensk’s one eye stared wildly at Tecumseh. His whole body shook with fear.
“Would that I let my hand have its way right now,” Tecumseh whispered in his ear. “But that would be far too easy a death for you.”
Tecumseh extended his knife to the back of the pole and sliced the leather bonds that held Tensk’s wrists. Then he let go the hair and watched him collapse to the dirt floor.
“You, pretend prophet, are no more. You are no longer Shawnee, no longer Indian, and no longer my brother. You are an outcast. You will live, wither, and die on your own. Be gone.”
Tecumseh reached down and again wrapped the fingers of one hand in the greasy hair and with the other grabbed the back of Tensk’s pants. Holding him so, he looked at the crowd and said, “This is my command. Let no man hurt this wretch in any way. But let no man give him comfort or aid.”
Then he threw Tensk into the watching crowd, all of whom stepped back, leaving a clear, sunlit path to the door. The half-blind half man scrambled to his hands and knees and scurried out of the village into the forest.
Tecumseh righted himself, regained his composure, and strode out into the daylight.
As the crowd pressed around, now to greet him, Wasegoboah came beside him and whispered into his ear, “Alexander McKee is here and wishes to see you.”
“Bring him to me by the creek. I need some clean air.”
Tecumseh stood, his hands folded into the small of his back, watching the small stream, frozen solid, before him. The trees were completely denuded of leaves and stood with dark, twisting limbs rising into the bleak winter sky. He heard the sounds of both horse and man crushing the brown leaves on the ground as they came to him. When they were just feet away, they stopped. Tecumseh neither moved nor spoke nor even looked toward him as Alexander McKee dismounted.
“I would, my old friend, that this were any other day.” McKee spoke very softly.
Tecumseh said and did nothing, his whole demeanor suggesting his mind was far away.
After a decent interval McKee spoke again. “Tecumseh, perhaps I am a small ray of good news on this most miserable of days for you.”
Tecumseh turned slowly until he was looking directly into McKee’s eyes and held his gaze unblinking but did not speak.
“When last I visited you, it was also a sad time. But even in your sadness you were able to be clear with me. You would not accept my offer to join the British in any future fight against the Americans. Britain asks again for your help. You will no longer be strong enough on your own, but together there is still hope for your cause.”
The two men faced one another, not speaking, just looking.
Tecumseh finally broke the silence. “You are wrong about one thing, McKee, and I think you know you are wrong. The British forces on the Lakes, even combined with the Indian strength, is not enough. When the war is over, the Americans will still be here.”
McKee’s face showed disappointment as he dropped his eyes.
“Nevertheless, my followers and I will be there when you call. I will fight this to the end. The end approaches but is not yet here.”
McKee looked up with a small smile, but he did not speak. He turned to his horse, reached behind the saddle, and untied a long, thin bundle extending across the flanks of his horse. He held it outstretched in two hands as he stepped back to Tecumseh. “This is for you.”
Tecumseh took the awkwardly shaped bundle and unrolled it from the cloth protecting it. As the cloth unrolled it revealed a brightly polished brass sheath from which extended a sword handle with a heavily ornate guard. Tecumseh held the sheath in one hand, held the handle in the other, and pulled the blade free. The steel gleamed even in the soft light of overcast. He held the blade to his face for inspection and tried to read the inscription down the length of it but could not. “What does it say?” he asked.
“It is Latin. It translates to ‘Bend to my will.’ It is a gift, Tecumseh. I was directed to give it to you whether you agreed or not. It is from Major General Isaac Brock, commander of His Majesty’s forces in Upper Canada. But General Brock, knowing your reputation of disdain for any gift designed to get an Indian to accept a white man’s offer, specifically instructed I was not to give it to you until the conversation ended and you had made your position known. It is, or was, Brock’s own. He wanted you to have it as a token of his personal esteem for the work you have done and the battles you have won.”
For the first time in over a week, Tecumseh’s face broke into a full-toothed smile. “It appears I now have a long knife. I am a Shemanese.”