Bass suddenly looped an arm around Solomon’s neck and playfully rubbed the top of his mangy blond hair with a handful of knuckles before allowing the struggling man to go free.
“Where’s Wyeth?” Bass asked. “I heard tell when we come in yestiddy that the Yank was already in from the East.”
None of them answered at first, until the stocky Isaac Simms said, “He’s yonder. More’n a couple miles on down the creek. On past them Nepercy what’s camped close to Sublette’s tents.”
“That’s Sublette off yonder, eh?”
Caleb nodded. “He’s doing a handsome business.”
Of a sudden it struck Titus. “Why you boys camped in here with Rocky Mountain Fur? You ain’t thro wed in with the company men, have you?”
Wood toed the grass a moment before answering. “It ain’t been so good for us since losing … J-jack,” he said quietly.
Bass looked around at the others, most of whom did not meet his gaze. “Been two summers now, ain’t it, boys?”
Graham swallowed and answered, “Y-yeah. Two year, Scratch—since them god-blamed Blackfoot got him in the Pierre’s Hole fight.”
“But when I saw you fellers last summer on the Green, seemed you’d done fair for that first year ’thout Jack Hatcher in the lead,” Titus declared.
“The more we talked about it last ronnyvoo,” Elbridge explained, “the more we figured we ought’n try some new country up north when we pulled away from ronnyvoo.”
Solemnly, Isaac said, “But a man’d be stupid to ride north ’thout a brigade round him.”
“So you boys throwed in with one of the outfits, eh?” Bass inquired.
“Bridger’s, it were,” Caleb volunteered. “Fitzpatrick was going to the Powder, so we signed on with Bridger.”
Titus could see it written on their faces—how the toll of losing their leader had marked every man jack of them. No matter how they had spouted and spumed in protest at Mad Jack Hatcher, not a one of them was leader enough to take the reins and make an outfit of them once again. They were good men, hard-cased and veterans all. But they were followers still. No man could fault them for realizing that before every last one of them lost his hair.
“It’s a good thing,” Scratch told them, “for the easy beavers been took already. To go where the beaver still plays, a man needs to go in goodly numbers. Wise you boys chose to throw in with Bridger’s brigade.”
And he watched how his words visibly struck each one, bringing relief and smiles to eyes and faces.
“Where’s that Josiah, the young’un you brung with you to the Pierre’s Hole fight?” Simms asked.
“He was with you last year on the Green,” Rufus said.
Bass sucked down some wind. “Left him in Taos with his wife and boy, ’long with some trade goods to set up shop.”
Caleb eyed him. “You figger to be a trader now?”
With a wag of his head Titus answered, “Just Josiah. He’d tempted Lady Fate’s fickle hand enough while we rode together. Time was for me to give him his leave.”
Scratching the beginnings of his potbelly, Elbridge asked, “Who you riding with come autumn?”
“On my own hook, boys.”
“By jam—just you and the woman?” Isaac inquired.
“And our girl.”
“You ought’n throw in with us, Scratch,” Caleb observed.
“That’s right,” Gray said. “Bridger knows you. He ain’t got nothing ’gainst a man packing a squaw along.”
With a shake of his head, Titus quieted their suggestions. “Time’s come for me to go it alone. Moseying with a brigade’s gonna be the best for most fellas. But there’s hard-assed pricknoses like me what’re better off on their lonesome. Thanks for the asking. If I was to lay down my traps with any bunch, it’d be you boys … and only you boys.”
Solomon asked, “Got time for some whiskey?”
Titus looked at the five slowly, his eyes narrowing. “You figger this here nigger got stupid in the last year? Course I got time for some whiskey and some stories. Then I ought’n be on my way to find Wyeth.”
“But Billy Sublette’s got his trade tents just past the bend in the creek,” Caleb said. “Hell, he’s so close I could throw a rock and likely hit one of his whiskey kegs!”
“No thanks,” Bass said as he turned around and took up both the reins to the horse and Samantha’s lead rope. “From what I heard ’bout the underhanded jigger-pokey Sublette pulled on Wyeth—I don’t care to have nothing more to do with Billy Sublette.”
“So I s’pose you’ve heard there ain’t no more Rocky Mountain Fur?” Isaac asked.
“But we’re still working for Bridger’s company,” Rufus explained.
“From the sounds of things,” Bass said, “Fitzpatrick and Bridger can call their company what they want … but Billy Sublette still owns ’em and calls their tune.”
Elbridge suddenly placed the flat of his hand against Bass’s chest to bring Scratch to a halt. “Then I take it you’re a nigger what won’t drink none of Billy Sublette’s whiskey.”
Titus thought on it a moment, careful that his face remained gravely pensive. “Is Sublette’s whiskey as good an’ powerful as it ever was?”
“Damn right it is!” Caleb roared.
“Then I ain’t above accepting a free drink of that low-down thieving Sublette’s whiskey,” Bass declared boldly, “not when I get me the chance to drink that whiskey with the likes of you boys!”
* BorderLords
3
As the sun had eased down on rendezvous that day of revel and reunion, Bass had crawled atop the bare back of the buffalo-runner, looped Samantha’s lead rope around his hand, and groggily pointed them north. It was twilight before he reached their tiny camp where Waits-by-the-Water had a fire going and thick slabs of antelope tenderloin sizzling in his old iron skillet.
“You find the trader you went in search of?”
“No,” he said to her voice at his back as he loosened knots securing those packs he had tied to the back of the mule. Crow words came hard with his thick, swollen tongue that wasn’t near as nimble as it had been when he left camp hours ago, so he settled for English. “Ran onto some old friends.”
She stepped up to him, their daughter straddling one of Waits’s hips, clinging like a possum kit to her mother. For a moment she only stared at her husband’s eyes, then leaned in close, inches from his face, and sniffed.
Bass jerked his head back. “What you doing?”
With a tinkle of laughter Waits replied, “You’ve been drinking the white man’s bi’li’ka’wii’taa’le, the real bad water!”
“Just because you don’t like whiskey don’t mean I cain’t enjoy having some ever’ now and then!” he protested slowly, struggling to keep his tongue from getting as tangled as were the knots his fingers fought.
“Here,” she said, taking his hand and turning him, starting toward their fire. Waits convinced him to settle upon their blanket-and-robe bedding. “Take our daughter,” and she passed the infant down to him. “I’ll see to the animals.”
“Y-you’re a good woman,” he said to her back as she yanked free the first of the ropes and pulled off one of the beaver packs.
It was a few moments before he grew aware of his daughter’s chatter. There on his lap she played with her fingers, popped them into her mouth, licked them, then pulled them out and played with them again as she babbled constantly. Struck dumb, he listened with rapt attention, concentrating on the infant as she played and talked, talked and played, her skin turned the color of copper by the fire there at twilight.
Why had he never really listened to her until now? Was it the whiskey that had numbed most of his other senses, dulling them so that her chatter somehow pricked his attention? He laughed—and the baby stopped her babble, gazing up at him with widening eyes.