Green Grass Woman tried to smile at Scar, but it was plain she didn't have much heart for it. Scar looked unhappy and shuffled his moccasined feet faster. Then she noticed the observers. Her reaction to Charles was sudden and obvious.
So was his. The stiffness startled him. Embarrassed about being attracted to someone so young, he turned to one side, hoping nothing showed. He eased his conscience by telling himself it was merely the girl's beauty, the talk of sex, and his relatively long deprivation that caused the reaction.
Black Kettle observed the exchange of glances and chuckled. "I heard that Green Grass Woman regarded you with favor, Charlee."
Scar saw it, too. He glared, stepping between the white men and the girl and turning his back on them. He spoke to her rapidly. She replied with equal speed and obvious tartness, irritating him. He deluged her with more pleading. She tossed her head, grasped the edges of the tipi hole, and stepped over. Before she disappeared, she cast another lovelorn glance at Charles.
Scar's face wrenched, a mask of black and copper in the light of a nearby fire. Clutching the flute, he stamped off.
Fen shot into view, chased by the yellow dog. A baby howled. Wooden Foot sighed.
"Well, I know it ain't your fault. But now that no-good bully's got one more reason to hate us."
Next day they began trading. The weather turned unusually warm for early winter, enabling Wooden Foot to lead Boy to the riverbank at dusk. There, out of sight of the tipis, the trader gave his nephew a much-needed bath, something Boy couldn't do for himself. Charles stripped, waded out, and washed himself clean. He felt reborn.
During the trading sessions, Wooden Foot did all the bargaining. Charles fetched and displayed the goods and tended the horses given in exchange. Along with exposure to the details and complexities of Cheyenne society came a growing respect for the tribe. In some ways the Indians remained primitive; sanitation in the village was negligible, with food scraps and night soil carelessly thrown about. In other respects, Charles found the Cheyennes admirable: instruction of the young, for instance.
The Cheyennes considered manhood not merely something inevitable, but a privilege, carrying great responsibility. At night the sides of this or that tipi would be rolled up and tied while members of one of the warrior societies met inside at the fire, fully painted and dressed in society regalia. A large crowd of boys always gathered, as intended, and watched the men speak and dance and perform some of their less secret rituals.
He never saw any of the village children disciplined, but one afternoon all of them were summoned to Black Kettle's lodge, where a man who had stolen another's buffalo robes was to be punished. The young boys and girls watched as the possessions of the thief and his weeping wife were brought forward. Their blankets were torn and cut to shreds with knives. Other families joined in to smash the thief's clay pots and stamp on his woven backrests. Finally his tipi was slashed apart and the poles thrown on the fire. When the punishment was over and the crowd dispersed, the children took with them a vivid impression of what awaited them if they committed a similar crime when they grew up.
Two Contraries lived in Black Kettle's village. They were bachelors because the honored role of contrary required that. Singled out for exceptional bravery and their ability to think deeply about the ways of the tribe, they lived in tipis painted red and carried great long battle lances called thunder-bows. Their special rank demanded special, difficult behavior of them. They walked backwards. If invited to sit, they remained standing. The first contrary to whom Charles spoke said, "When you are finished trading, you will not leave us." Wooden Foot explained that he meant they would leave. The Contraries were a small, strange, mystical order, each member greatly revered.
The trading continued briskly and profitably for eight days. On the ninth morning Charles woke early to find the dawn sky threatening rain. Wooden Foot wanted to get going. They dismantled and packed their tipi in six minutes — beating their own time was a game Charles now thoroughly enjoyed — and after an hour of elaborate farewells to Black Kettle and the village elders, they rode south, herding fourteen new ponies ahead of them.
The wind smelled warm and wet. The tipis on the Cimarron disappeared behind them, and then the thin columns of smoke rising from them. Jogging easily on Satan, Charles thought of Green Grass Woman, whom he'd encountered often in the little village. Each time, her pretty face left no doubt about her feelings. She was smitten. That flattered his vanity but it also made his hermit's life somewhat harder to bear. One night he'd had an erotic dream in which he lay with the girl. But every time he met her he did nothing more than tip his hat, smile, and mutter pleasantries in English. He wondered if, when he returned to St. Louis, Willa Parker might —
"Look sharp, Charlie." Wooden Foot's sudden warning yanked him from the reverie. He pulled out his Colt as a mounted Indian burst from a stand of cottonwoods beside a meandering creek ahead of them. For a moment Charles expected a war party to follow. But no other horsemen charged out of the trees.
The lone brave galloped toward them. Charles recognized Scar.
Gloomy, Wooden Foot said, "He rode mighty fast and mighty far to get ahead of us. Somethin' must be burnin' him bad — as if that's a big surprise, huh?"
Scar trotted his pony up to them. His dark eyes fixed on Charles. "I have words to say."
"Well, we didn't figure you come out here to take the healthful waters," Wooden Foot said, aggrieved. The sarcasm went right by the Indian, who jumped from his pony and took a wide, solid stance.
"Get down, Charlie," Wooden Foot said, dismounting. "Gotta observe the formalities, God damn it."
When the two traders were on the ground, Wooden Foot keeping hold of the rein of Boy's horse, Scar stamped a foot.
"You shamed me before my people."
"Oh, shit." Wooden Foot sighed. "Anybody shamed anybody, it was you shamed yourself, Scar. We did nothin' to warrant killin'. You know it, and Black Kettle knowed it, and if that's your complaint, why —"
Scar grabbed him, furious. "We will meet at the Hanging Road. You will travel it." His eyes jumped to Charles. "And you."
Dark as a plum, Wooden Foot said, "Let go my shirt." Scar merely twisted it more. The trader shot his hand forward, caught the thong of Scar's breechclout and snapped it. Scar yelled, released him, leaped back as if snake-bit.
"Why, what's this?" Wooden Foot said with exaggerated surprise. He pointed at Scar's exposed genitals. "Sure-God ain't a man."
Inexplicably, Scar screamed and leaped for Wooden Foot's throat. Charles yanked his Colt from the leather. "Hold it!"
The warning brought Scar up short, his fingers inches from Wooden Foot's neck. The trader showed Scar his breechclout. "Gonna have trouble courtin' that girl 'thout this." He tucked the clout under his belt. "Yes, sir, a lot of trouble."
Scar clearly wanted to fight for it, but Charles's Colt, pointed at his head, kept him from doing so. Quietly, Wooden Foot said, "Now you get goin' 'fore my partner puts a bullet where your balls used to be."
Used to be? What the hell was going on?
Scar's departure, for one thing. His disfigured face looked more scarlet than brown. Puffed up as if about to explode, he sprang into the air, caught his pony's mane, flung a leg over, and galloped away.
Charles exhaled as the tension drained. "You're going to have to explain what you did."
Wooden Foot pulled the breechclout from his belt. " 'Member what I said about Cheyennes cuttin' their hair? This is kinda like it. You take a man's clout, he loses his sex. He thinks he ain't a man any more."
Charles watched the Indian galloping fast into the north. "Well, now you and I are even. You gave him a reason to hate us too."