The Indians looked to one another, and then to Old Bear. They were quiet.
“It is a hard thing to know,” said Old Bear.
The old Indian then left the group and went to stand near the ashes of the ceremonial fire. He looked up into the gray sky, and standing lifted his hands to the sky. Then, after so standing for perhaps a minute, he returned to the group. “Wakan-Tonka will decide,” said Old Bear.
Lucia Turner was brought from the blanket shelter, led by one of Drum’s warriors, accompanied by another. The strap which had bound her ankles had been removed and fastened, like a halter, about her neck. The girl’s wrists were still lashed behind her back, as securely as they had been the night before. The two braves had removed Totter’s greatcoat.
Lucia looked at Chance, frightened.
“I do not understand the meaning of Old Bear,” said Chance.
Old Bear pointed to Lucia. “Whose is this woman?” he asked.
“She is my woman,” said Chance.
“No,” said Drum.
“As warriors of the Hunkpapa you will fight,” said Old Bear, addressing both Drum and Chance. “But you will fight for more than this woman. If Drum wins, the woman is his, and the Hunkpapa and the Minneconjou will take the warpath. If Medicine Gun wins, the woman is his, and the Hunkpapa and the Minneconjou will go in peace to the reservation.”
“Wakan-Tonka will decide,” said Drum.
Drum took the rifle which he had taken from Grawson, and five cartridges. Old Bear gave Chance the rifle that had been Totter’s, and five cartridges.
“I must kill you, Medicine Gun,” said Drum, “for my people.” He looked at Chance. “My heart is heavy,” he said, placing a cartridge into the weapon.
“If I die,” said Chance, loading his weapon, “I am proud that it will be by the hand of Drum, who is like Kills-His-Horse, his father, a great warrior.”
Drum regarded Chance, no enmity or hostility in his face. “My heart is heavy,” he said, impassively, and then turned and, rifle in hand, disappeared into the arroyo at the head of the camp.
Chance waited a few minutes, feeling cold.
He looked at Lucia.
At a sign from Old Bear the brave who held the strap knotted about her neck permitted her to approach Chance. She did so and, standing near to him, lifted her lips to his, kissing him lightly. Her lips felt cool. “I love you, Edward Chance,” she said. Chance kissed her and then, carrying Totters rifle, began to walk slowly toward the long, winding arroyo. Somewhere ahead, down that path, Drum was waiting for him.
Chapter Twenty-one
Chance trudged down the arroyo, wading through the snow; in places it had drifted to his knees.
He saw Drum’s tracks ahead of him, extending indefinitely.
If I were Drum, Chance asked himself, how would I fight this?
His eyes searched the top ledges of the arroyo. That’s it, thought Chance, I’d make tracks for a way down the arroyo until I came to a bend; then I’d double back above the arroyo; when he passed under me, I’d shoot. Chance shivered a little. Drum might already be above and behind him. Chance paused, listened, heard nothing. Everything was still, white, rugged, calm, desolate.
He looked up the side of the arroyo. It was about nine feet above him on both sides. He began to climb, carefully, not wanting to kick loose much snow; even a soft sound would carry on the cold winter air.
Near the top Chance paused, wished he had a hat to lift over the top of the arroyo on his rifle barrel; then he thought it wouldn’t work; Drum would probably suspect such a trick; even if he did not, he would not be likely to fire until he had a fair, clean shot; shivering, Chance lifted his head just over the top of the arroyo, clearing it only to the level of his eyes.
He swept as much of the terrain as he could, which wasn’t much from that level; he couldn’t see anything but a few rocks, outcroppings, piles of drifted snow, the tops of ridges some hundred yards away or so.
Clutching his rifle, making certain his feet had solid footholds, Chance eased himself up out of the arroyo.
He was elated.
The snow at the top of the arroyo was clean, on both sides, as far as he could see; there were no tracks; the Indian was nowhere in sight.
He’s still ahead of me, ran through Chance’s head. He hasn’t come out to double back yet. I didn’t think he had. It was too soon.
Chance crawled behind some rocks that would shield him from the direction that Drum would come.
Chance wondered if the young Indian had left the arroyo yet, if he were now approaching him. It was possible, of course, that Drum had left the arroyo ahead and was simply waiting for him to trudge by underneath. Chance smiled. Drum would have a long wait. When he tired, perhaps thinking Chance had fled or not entered the arroyo, and when he came back to investigate, Chance would be waiting for him, shielded by the rocks, commanding the top of the arroyo on both sides.
Drum might, though, thought Chance, make a wide circle, perhaps behind those ridges in the distance. Probably not. That would take a long time, at least. He wouldn’t figure there was a point in it. And if he did he’d probably still close his circle and come out ahead of me. At any rate, thought Chance, I’ll worry about that in an hour or so.
Chance found himself thinking about having a smoke. He didn’t have any more tobacco, of course, and if he had had, he would not have smoked it at the time; a wisp of smoke, the odor of burned tobacco, might have revealed his position.
The wind blew across the Bad Lands, moving driven snow in strange patterns through the irregular formations; the air was cold.
Chance had no taste for the killing of Drum, or any man, but he had not made the choice; one or the other of them must die.
Drum will not expect me here, said Chance to himself; Drum will underestimate me, because I am white; he underestimated me on the prairie, and he will do so again, and it will be his last mistake.
I am sorry, Drum, thought Chance, I am sorry to have to kill you.
In Chance’s mind there passed the fantasy of returning to the Indian encampment, free, for Lucia, of holding her in his arms, of cutting her loose, putting her behind him on his horse and taking her from the captivity and the terrors of the Bad Lands, ending the nightmare of the Scalp Dance and the torture of Totter, the nightmare of the cold and the cruelty of bonds, of the halter on her neck, of the not knowing if she was to live or die, or to whom she would belong.
I am sorry, Drum, thought Chance, but I must kill you. I must lie here and wait for you, as quiet as the steel of a trap, and when you come I must kill you.
A shot rang out. The bullet struck Chance in the back of his left shoulder, smashing him against the rocks behind which he lay, moving upward, emerging through his upper left arm and breaking rock like popping glass about his chin and mouth. Not trying to turn and fire Chance threw himself to the side rolling to the edge of the arroyo and pitching over, falling down the steep side in a slide of gravel and snow, scrambling behind an outcropping of rock.
He knelt behind the outcropping, trying to brush the snow from his eyes and rifle.
He was aware, somewhat now as if it might be someone else, that he was hit.
But the bullet had come from his left, from behind somehow. Drum could not have been there.
There were no tracks, the snow was clean.
Chance’s shoulder and upper arm felt numb, as though a sledge hammer had struck him.
Gradually, as Chance knelt with his rifle high, scanning the rim of the arroyo across from him, the shoulder, someone’s, began to ache; then it began to feel heavy; the back of the inside of his shirt and his left sleeve started to feel wet and warm; Chance decided it was hot in the arroyo; he was covered with sweat.