Nodding and speaking to everyone he met, José made a slow progress through the crooked streets. Through it all, Rachel sat patiently on her burro. Her mouth twitched in a flitting smile, tickled by hidden little thoughts, like insects crawling in one's clothes. It was dark when they finally drew up in front of a long, low fortress with walls three feet thick. The rafter beams stuck out under the roofline, looking almost like cannons in the dim light. The two windows were narrow and barred and set far back in the adobe. The big door was also recessed and made of heavy planks several feet wide and eight inches thick. When José pounded on it with his bone-handled quirt, it opened slowly, creaking on its wooden hinges.
"Who is it, La Paz?" A woman's voice, speaking English, echoed through the hall behind the servant as he stood blocking the door. Tears welled up in Rachel's eyes. When the door opened far enough to admit Mrs. Donaho's round face, Rachel could hardly speak. For a few moments she was totally sane again. Her words had to force their way through the tightness of her throat. They came out in a harsh, strangled whisper, the English sounding strange in her own ears.
"Please, for the love of God, help me."
The Donahos dispatched a message to Independence with a trader who was headed there. From there the message was to be sent on to Rachel's husband in Texas with whomever was going that way. And there would certainly be people going. Independence was a funnel, a spillway of humanity, sending settlers and trappers westward.
Santa Fe wasn't safe. Two plagues stalked its streets, typhoid and revolution. The first punched holes in its victims' intestines, invaded their arteries and rotted the marrow of their bones. It left them to die in their own vomited blood. The Pueblos were responsible for the revolution. Every hundred years or so they were pushed too far by the authorities and rose up against their masters, leaving corpses as fodder for the rooting hogs.
Violence lurked among the baskets of fruit and vegetables in the market and blew around the comers of the buildings. And so the Donahos only ventured out when necessary. They decided to risk the uncertainties of the Santa Fe trail rather than stay where they were. As soon as Rachel was well enough to travel, they hitched up their own small caravan, left their adobe fortress in the care of La Paz, and began the eight-hundred-mile trek to their small frame house in Independence.
It took the Donahos six weeks to make the journey. When Comanche stopped them and demanded the customary tribute, Rachel cowered, hysterical, among the barrels and boxes under the wagon's cover. Mrs. Donaho crouched next to her, her plump arms encircling her, and murmured while her husband handed over the goods he had brought along for just such a possibility. Mrs. Donaho chattered cheerfully for eight hundred miles, up mountains and down, across boiling rivers and baking deserts. She gossiped through torrential rains and mud that mired the wheels and collected into heavy and heavier weights on the soles of their shoes.
Starved for a woman's ear and understanding, she talked to Rachel while they leaned into the wind, their voluminous skirts billowing out behind them. She was still talking as their wagons wound through the mud and noise and turmoil of Independence, Missouri. She was the first to spot the sagging roof on their cabin.
"Looks like the porch could stand some repair, Mr. Donaho. Like as not some riffraff has been camping on it all summer and fall. There's probably someone keeping house in the necessary out back."
"I wouldn't be surprised. Housing's short here," Donaho answered.
"So are necessaries. This place smells worse every time we come back." Mrs. Donaho began setting her hair to rights, chasing stray gray wisps and herding them back into her bun. "Looks like we have company."
He was waiting for them, sitting on the corner of the low porch, his legs hanging over the edge. The message had been delivered to Rachel's family.
"Mr. Plummer, we're glad you're here." Mr. Donaho held out his hand. L. D. Nixon's face became even pinker than usual as he took the hand gingerly.
"My name is Nixon. Lawrence Nixon. I'm Rachel's brother-in-law. I live in Independence now."
"And where is Mr. Plummer?" called Mrs. Donaho from the wagon. "Did anyone deliver the message to him that we were coming?"
"Yes, ma'm. The Parkers are beholden to you for ransoming Rachel." L. D. cleared his throat and looked up at his sister-in-law, sitting in the wagon. She spoke so low they could barely hear her.
"Have they found little Jamie, L. D.?"
"No. There's been no word. Your father has been searching, though. We hoped you'd know something, Rachel. Your aunt Elizabeth was ransomed a year and a half ago.
"Where's Luther? Is he alive?"
"We're all glad to Have you back." L. D. helped her down from the wagon and held her at arm's length, trying to keep the pain out of his face.
"Where is he?" Her hands fluttered like birds, but her face was still, except for a small tic in the corner of her right eye.
"He's alive. But he couldn't come."
"But I'm his wife, L. D."
She would have to be told, but he couldn't do it now. He avoided her eyes.
"Rachel, the past two years have been hard on him. Losing you and little James Pratt, and not knowing..."
"The past two years have been hard on him." Rachel started to laugh, tumbling into hysteria. L. D. shook her to make her stop. The light went out of her eyes and wasn't rekindled during the long trip home.
She crossed James and Martha Parker's doorsill in east Texas on February 19, 1838. She never saw her son or her husband again, although Luther and his new wife, Angelina, lived in the next county. She died in her parents' house at eighteen, exactly one year later.
CHAPTER 28
As time went on, Comanche raids on the settlements intensified. While President Sam Houston sent envoys to bribe the Indians with presents and honey talk, Texans were tortured and scalped, mutilated and murdered. Others would come home from plowing or hunting and find the smell of smoke and death, a pall over their homes. They found the mangled bodies of their families or an empty cabin and a bloody trail.
Some of them, like John Wolf, went mad. John found his wife naked and dead and almost slashed to ribbons. His two teenaged daughters were still alive, but they didn't live long. They had been stripped and raped repeatedly, then nailed spread-eagled to the wall. Their breasts had been cut off before they were scalped. They died as their father was lowering them down.
John Wolf became a Comanche hunter. They called him Lone Wolf, and he roamed the frontier for years, ghosting in and out of Ranger camps. He made everyone nervous with his wild talk and his string of black scalps. But everyone fed him and in their hearts wished him well. Hollow-eyed and filthy, with gray hair and beard as matted as the tangled felt of a goat's fleece, he dangled his strings of scalps like fish on a small boy's line. Women's scalps. Children's. It didn't matter to John. Just as long as they were Comanche.
And it didn't matter to many of the Texans. They wanted the freedom to rid themselves of the Comanche forever. So they elected Mirabeau Buonoparte Lamar, the man who would give it to them. "Mark the boundary of the Republic with the sword," he said. He was a poet, and not a man who looked the part of a warrior. But then, he didn't have to lead the charges, just charge the expenses. He was willing to drive the country deeply into debt to rid Texas of the plague of Indians.
"Put honor before expense", said President Lamar, and the Texas legislature voted a million dollars to buy Comanche blood. Two thousand men volunteered to join the army, newly formed to fight Indians.
"He wants us to do what, Sergeant?" Noah Smithwick didn't mean to be insubordinate. He just wasn't sure he heard the order correctly.
"The colonel says to dismount and prepare to attack."
"Dismount?"
"Dismount, Smithwick. Dismount!" The sergeant rode along the line passing the word to the sixty volunteers. There was a jingling and a clanking, bridles, saddles, spurs, and weapons ringing the changes of war. Noah's stomach cramped with hunger. The food had almost run out, and they
were all on short rations. They were sharing out the last of the mule that had frozen to death on bivouack.
Some of the men were suffering from frostbite after the snowstorm had caught them. They had huddled in the rye bottoms of the Lampassas for two days, sleeping together to pool their bodies' warmth. Now, from the sleeping Indian camp somewhere around the hill Noah could hear the faint sound of dogs barking, horses neighing, and roosters crowing. Stolen, no doubt, from a Texas farmstead. The comforting sounds taunted them as they shivered in the icy wind.
Above them, on a hill overlooking Old Owl's scattered camp, Colonel Moore sat with Chief Castro of the Lipan Apache. His scouts had done well. The camp was still asleep, its people staying in bed longer this winter to conserve their scanty food and fuel supplies. The village spread along the clear San Saba River. Thin lines of gray smoke, like pencil strokes against the lavender sky, rose from the smoldering cooking fires. It was a tranquil scene, but Moore didn't appreciate it.
Smug bastards. They haven't even posted lookouts. We'll teach them that they're not safe anywhere. Colonel Moore turned his horse and rode down to join his men, dislodging pink granite rocks and pebbles as he went. Leaving his mount closely tethered with the others, he waved his men in behind him. The column started through the cedar brake and around the base of the hill toward the sleeping village.
Noah Smithwick passed through the thick growth of cedars that scraped along his leather pants and jacket. He had a strip of torn blanket wrapped around his neck and more strips stuffed into his moccasins. There was an uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach, somewhere between last night's dinner and this morning's hurried meal. He had fought Indians before, but never this deep in their own territory and never in a village. His friend, Rufus Perry, walked alongside him. Old Rufe was seventeen, and he usually followed Noah when they patrolled together with the Rangers.
"You always look so calm, Noah. I'm as jittery as a bird in a butter churn." Rufe spoke in a low voice that carried less than a whisper.
"Don't be fooled, Rufe. I took too large a helping of fear with breakfast, and it isn't sitting well with me."
"I'd feel better on a horse."
"I'd feel better back home in bed."
"I know what you mean. It's different, isn't it? It's so quiet down there. All of them asleep."
"And no telling how many there are, nor any trees to hide behind. No, sir. Line 'em up and let 'em yell, out where I can see and hear them. Rufe, I don't like this at all."
Then the sergeant turned and made a chopping motion, and their talking ceased. The company's single file became a rank as they lined up for the charge. Noah grinned over at Perry.
"Time to put all that fear to work." He tensed his chest and shoulder muscles and crouched, ready to sprint toward the lodges, plainly visible now through the brush and scattered trees. The men broke into a trot and then into a full run. As they ran they screamed whatever occurred to them. "For Texas" was the most popular. Followed by "Remember the Alamo," which had become an all-purpose phrase. But Noah had his own war cry. He bellowed it as he ran, the wind blowing his long red beard behind him. "Sheeeee-it!"
The Texans' war cries and their rifle fire-woke Cub. His heart pounding, he sat up, disoriented from sleep. If this was an attack, where was the sound of galloping hooves? And that wasn't an Indian war cry. His father had his breechclout and moccasins on and his weapons in his hands before Cub could even find his clothes. Cub's hands trembled as he dressed. How humiliating it would be to die without his breechclout on. And it seemed to take forever to find his left moccasin.
"It's white eyes. Scatter. Head for the horses." Arrow Point left the lodge at a stooping run and cut his war pony's tether with one slash of his scalping knife. He mounted as the pony reared and started running. Cub hesitated. Should he stay with his mother? Should he stand and fight with his father? Should he take anything with him? Should he look for Old Owl? What he never asked himself was if he should try to join the white attackers.
Then a bullet ripped through the lodge wall and buried itself in his tumbled sleeping robes, in the spot still warm from his body. He bolted after his mother. The camp was in chaos, the lodges laced together with smoke and noise. Horses reared and whinnied, and the din of rifle fire was deafening. Cub could smell the powder and the blood and the horses' fear.
The People fled in all directions, their robes and blankets flapping like a covey of quail taking flight. Afoot or on horseback, the men followed the women and children, covering their retreat with arrows and lances and their old rifles and muskets. They withdrew slowly in a ragged, expanding circle, out of the camp and after their women.
As Cub ran, he looked back over his shoulder for a glimpse of the white men. They were the first he had seen in three years. One of the camp dogs darted between his legs, and Cub went hurtling over him. He sprawled on the ground, his head ringing and his elbows and knees raw. Cactus was imbedded in his chest. He scrambled to his feet and started running again.
He didn't see Noah Smithwick draw a bead on him, squinting through the dust and smoke. What Noah saw was a small, brown Comanche boy, his thick braids dark with grease and his upper body bare in the January cold. He held his rifle steady, but he couldn't shoot the child. Colonel Moore and President Lamar might be demanding brutal force with no regrets, but Noah had his limits.
He swiveled and aimed for the slender warrior just whirling his pony and heading after the boy. Noah swore when the ball only hit the man's arm and he kept riding. The boy had already dived into the underbrush and disappeared.
Colonel Moore and his men were left alone in the camp. Their victims and enemies had scattered like chaff in a high wind, and they could hear only the moans of the wounded as they tried to crawl to safety. One of the men walked through camp methodically shooting those who still lived, and several others began arguing about who would get the scalps. Smithwick could hear them laughing about it, and he winced when he heard the pistol go off. Most of the wounded were women and children. - "Are they any better than the Indians, Noah?" Rufe looked out from under his wild thatch of curly black hair.
"Maybe not as good. Not as smart, anyway." Noah turned slowly in a circle, taking in the whole situation. "Start easin' toward the horses, Rufe. They've foxed us."
The colonel planted himself in the center of the empty dance ground. With his hands on his hips, he looked around him like someone who's just caught his best friend cheating at cards. His face was purple and his hair blew in tatters around his head. What kind of cowards were these people, that they wouldn't stand and fight like men?
"Set fire to their tents," he bellowed against the moan of the wind. "They can warm themselves at a big fire. Burn everything." He swung his arm wide, enclosing the whole camp in its sweep. But before his men could obey, they heard shots from the hills around them. Chief Castro rode up with his mounted scouts behind him. His gaunt face held no more emotion than a snake's, but the fury at Moore's stupidity darkened his skin ever so slightly. More shots landed among them as the hunters became the hunted.
"Retreat to the horses. We'll regroup there." Moore started running before he had finished shouting. Castro yelled after him.
"Too many late, Colonel. Horses all gone. Comanche take him." Castro spat something else in his own language, then wheeled and led his sixteen men away at a gallop, leaving the white soldiers to their fate. Shielded only by a small cavalry patrol, the Texas volunteer army backed down the Colorado River. With their newer rifles they held off the swarming Comanche, many of them mounted on the soldiers' horses. All in all, Colonel Moore only lost one man, but Texas couldn't afford many victories like that one.
Looking like a discarded buffalo robe that someone had dropped in a heap. Cub huddled in the lee of the lodge. He was trying to overhear what the men of the war council were deciding. Their voices were muffled, and he could understand only what the loudest were saying. As he listened, he dreamed of the day when he would be a teenager and allowed inside
to light the ceremonial pipe and tend the fire.
It was an honor for which he'd have to compete. He couldn't count on having it just because he was Old Owl's grandnephew and Arrow Point's son. But it never occurred to him that he wouldn't earn the right. Just as it never occurred to him that he might not sit on the war council itself someday, or lead his men on raids.
Inside, Old Owl was chanting a prayer for the souls of those who had been killed in the white men's raid a few days ago. This was the first place they'd stopped to set up camp since then. They had slept only a few hours a night, traveling hard to get as far away from the white men's reach as possible. Their dead had ridden with them, strapped to travois, or lying across the ponies.
They had been frozen when it came time to bury them, finally, in this place. Those who had lain across a horse's back had to be buried in that position. The crevices around camp all had bodies in them and offerings of food and weapons at their edges. It was late at night, and the stars glittered like ice shards flung across ebony. Still Cub could hear the wails of the women mourning and the dogs howling in sympathy.
Cub wanted revenge. Revenge on those who had murdered his people. He strained to hear if the men would be riding to avenge the attack. If they did, he planned to sneak away and join them. Lots of boys did it, though he had never heard of a nine-year-old going on a raid before. Food was low this winter, and he worried about how much he should take from his family's stores. Perhaps he should just depend on his wits to find game.
He was startled from his thoughts by the clink and jingle of the bells and shell decorations on the men's leggings and shirts as they stood to leave the council lodge. Cub shrank farther back into the shadows and pulled his robe entirely over his head. The younger men filed out, led by Old Owl's nephew, Arrow Point, who had his arm bandaged over the hole left by Noah Smithwick's ball.