Rising Wolf the White Blackfoot Part 9

"No, I have all that I need," he answered. "Eight are enough for a big robe. I shall lie upon it, sleep upon it, and the strength that is in the wolves will become my strength, so my vision told me. I am well satisfied."

"And I am glad to have learned how to catch wolves," I told him, and we packed the skins upon our horses and went home. Years afterward, along in the 60's and 70's, when wolf skins went up to five dollars each, I somewhat improved upon the old man's corral trap, making mine of logs laid up to form a hollow pyramid about ten by sixteen feet at the base, and four by ten feet at the top. This was much more quickly and easily built than the stake corral, which involved the digging of a deep trench in which to set the stakes, and the building of an incline to the top.

The wolves did not hesitate to step up from one to another of the inslanting logs and jump down upon the quant.i.ties of meat I placed inside, and there I had them. During one winter at St. Mary's Lakes, the winter of 1872-73, my sons and I caught more than seven hundred wolves in our pyramid log trap!

Although we saw nothing more of the Crows after their attack upon us, I kept thinking about them all the time. The big war party that had gone to raid their herds returned after a month or so without a single horse.

They reported that the enemy was encamped some distance up the Bighorn River, and that their horses were under so heavy a guard both night and day that they had not dared attempt to stampede them. Before real winter set in another party of our warriors went out, and had no better success. The Crows were still close herding their horses in the daytime, and keeping them in well guarded corrals at night.

It was in our lone camp on Arrow River that this thought came to me: If the Blackfeet would only make peace with the Crows, the latter might then accompany us north and trade at our post. I asked myself if it was in any way possible for me to accomplish this. Well I knew what a grand coup it would be for me if I could ride into the post and say to the factor: "Here I am, returned with a good knowledge of the Blackfoot language. I have been far, and seen much. I have had the Pi-kun-i and the Crows, after a desperate fight, make peace with one another, and have induced that far tribe to come and trade with us. They are here!"

Well, when I thought that, I became so excited that it was long before I could sleep. I thought about it all the next day, and determined to speak to Red Crow about it. When evening came, and we had eaten our fill of is-sap-wot-sists, and were resting on our soft couches, I said to him: "Brother, how is peace made with an enemy tribe? Tell me all about it!"

"Ai! You shall know," he answered. "If there is much talk of peace, the chiefs get together and council about it, and if they decide that it will be good to make peace with the enemy, they send messengers with presents of pipes and tobacco to the enemy chiefs, asking that they smoke the pipe. If the enemy chiefs accept the pipe, and smoke the tobacco with it, then their answer is that they will be glad to make peace, and they tell the messengers where they and their people will meet our chiefs and our people, and make the peace."

"If your father and the other chiefs will make peace with the Crows, will you go with me to their camp?" I asked.

"I don't know that I want peace with them! It is good to have enemies to fight and count coup upon; that is what makes us men, brave warriors!"

he exclaimed.

"Yes! And oh, how many poor and unhappy widows and fatherless children!" Mink Woman put in, much to my surprise.

"Brother, you shall know my heart!" I went on. "I want this peace to be made for two reasons. First, for the sake of the women and children, and all the old, dependent upon the hunters for their food and shelter.

Second, I want the Crows to go north with us and trade at our post. I want all this very much. Now, say that you will help me; that you will do all that you can toward making the peace!"

"Oh, Brother! As you love me, say yes!" Mink Woman cried.

"We all want peace, we women! Peace with all tribes!" said Rattle Woman.

"Well, I say yes. I will do what I can. Not that I want peace, but because you ask me to help you!" he answered.

So it was that, upon our return to camp, we began to urge Lone Walker to make peace with the Crows. At first he just laughed at us. Then got cross whenever we mentioned the subject, and went off visiting to be rid of us. But we kept at him, with a larger and larger following of women, and even men, and at last he called the council, and after long argument the chiefs decided to send peace messengers to the Crow camp as soon as the first geese arrived in the spring. Mad Plume was to be the lead messenger, because it was his sister who had married into the Crow tribe. Another was Ancient Otter (Mis-sum-am-un-is) and Red Crow and I the other two. Lone Walker at first declared that we should not go; that the mission was too dangerous for boys to undertake; far more dangerous than going on a raid. But in that, too, we had our way. On a sunny, although cold day in March, a flock of geese was seen flying north over the camp, and the next day we started, well mounted, with an extra robe each, and the peace pipe and tobacco in a roll upon Mad Plume's back, beside his bow and arrow case.

Yes! You shall know all: As we rode out of camp, and I looked back at my comfortable lodge home, my heart went way, way down! On the previous evening I had been told the tale of some peace messengers to the Snakes some years before. Upon entering the enemy camp and stating their mission, they had been set upon and all killed but one, he being told to go straight home and tell the Pi-kun-i chiefs that that was the Snakes'

answer to their offer. That might be, I thought, the kind of answer that the Crows would give us!

CHAPTER IX

THE COMING OF COLD MAKER

I well remember how warm and windless that March day was. There were patches of snow on the north side of the hills, and in the coulees, but otherwise the brown plains were bare and dry. The mountains, of course, were impa.s.sable, so we kept along the foot of them, traveling east, and that night camped at the foot of the Black b.u.t.te. The following morning we swung around the b.u.t.te and headed south by a little east, a course that would take us to the junction of Elk River and the Bighorn, my companions said. We crossed the Musselsh.e.l.l River at noon or a little earlier, and that night slept upon the open plain. The weather continued fine. The next morning also broke clear and warm and cloudless. We started on at sunrise and, topping a ridge, Mad Plume pointed to some dark breaks away off to the south, and told me that they marked the course of Elk River. I estimated that we were about twenty miles from them.

At about ten o'clock we marked a big wedge of gray geese coming north, and Red Crow, pointing to them, exclaimed: "See the sun's messengers! He sends them north to tell us that he is coming to drive Cold Maker back to his always-winter land!"

He had no more than said that than the geese suddenly broke their well-ordered wedge lines and, shrilly honking, turned and went straight south on wild, uneven wings!

"Ha! They have seen Cold Maker coming! Yes! He is coming; I can smell him!" Mad Plume exclaimed, and brought his horse to a stand and looked to the north.

So did we, and saw a black belt of fog all across the horizon and right down upon the ground, and coming south with frightful speed. It had advanced as far as the north slope of the Snowy Mountains when we turned and saw it, and even as we looked they were lost in its blackness! The air suddenly became strong with the odor of burning gra.s.s. I had never seen anything like it. The swiftly moving, black fog bank, apparently turning over and over like a huge roller and blotting out the plain and mountains, frightened me, and I asked my companions what it meant.

"Fearful wind, cold, and snow! Cold Maker is bringing it! He hides himself in his black breath!" Red Crow told me.

"We have to ride hard! Unless we can get to the timber we are gone!" Mad Plume cried, and away we went as though we were trying to outride a big war party. And then suddenly that black fog bank struck us and instead of fog it was a terrific storm cloud! The wind all but tore us from our horses; fine, hard snow swirled and beat into our eyes, almost blinding us, and the air became bitterly cold. I marveled at the sudden change from sunny spring to a winter blizzard. Like my companions, I had on a pair of soft leather moccasins, and over them a pair of buffalo robe moccasins, and on my hands were robe mittens, but for all their thickness and warmth both hands and feet began to numb in the terrible cold of the storm.

Mad Plume led us, we following close in single file. In front of me, not ten feet away, Red Crow and his horse were but dim shadows in the driving snow. I saw him dismount and begin running beside his horse, and I got down and did likewise. And so, alternately on foot and riding we went on and on until it seemed to me that we had traveled thrice the distance to the river breaks that we had seen so plainly before the storm came up. At last Mad Plume stopped and we crowded around him. He had to shout to make himself heard. "What think you?" he asked. "Is the wind still from the north?"

We could not answer that. To me it seemed to be coming from all directions at once.

"If Cold Maker has changed it we are sure to become lost and die. If he still blows it south we should soon get to shelter," he said, and led on.

"We are lost!" I kept saying to myself as we ran, and rode, on and on for what seemed to me hours and hours, the snow at last becoming so deep that we were obliged to remain on our horses. But just as I felt that I was beginning to freeze, that there was no longer any use in trying to keep going, we began to descend a steep slope, and at the foot of it rode into a grove of big cottonwoods and out of the terrible wind! Mad Plume led us into a deep part of the woods where grew great clumps of tall willows, and we dismounted. "Ha! We survive! And now for comfort: a lodge, fire, food! Hobble your horses and get to work!" he cried.

I couldn't hobble mine, my hands were so numb that I could do nothing with them; so I ran around swinging them and clapping them together until they became warm. I then cared for my horse, and with good will helped my companions gather material, dry poles, dead branches, brush, and armfuls of tall rye gra.s.s for a small lodge. We soon had it up and a good fire going. The cold air rushed in through a thousand little s.p.a.ces between the poles; we made a lodge lining of our pis.h.i.+mores--pieces of buffalo robe that we used for saddle blankets--and sat back on our rye gra.s.s couches and were truly comfortable, and very thankful that Cold Maker had not overcome us! Presently one of our horses nickered, and Red Crow went out to learn the cause of it. "A big herd of elk has come in!" he called to us, and we all ran out and followed him on their trail; they had pa.s.sed within fifty yards of the lodge. We soon saw them standing in a thick patch of willows, heads down, and bodies all humped up with the cold. They paid no attention to our approach and we moved right up close to them and shot down four with bows and arrows. We skinned them all, taking the hides for more lodge covering, and cut a lot of meat from a fat, dry cow that I had killed, and then we were prepared to weather the storm, no matter how long it should last.

The terrible wind and snow lasted all that night and far into the afternoon of the following day, and when it ceased the weather remained piercingly cold. When the sun came out I took up my gun and went for a walk, and going through the timber looked out upon a great river, the Sieur de la Verendrie's _La Roche Jaune_, (the Yellowstone). He had seen it, where it merged with the Missouri, in 1744, and upon his return to Montreal told of the mighty flow of its waters from the snows of the s.h.i.+ning Mountains. How many times I had heard my grandfather and others speak of it, and even talk of an expedition to explore its vast solitudes to its source. They were sure that they would be well rewarded with furs. The very name of the river suggested riches; rich mines of gold and silver! And here I was, actually upon the sh.o.r.e of this great river of the West, looking out upon its frozen stretches, and in quest of neither furs nor gold, but of peace between two warring tribes! I said to myself that the Sieur de la Verendrie and his men, and Lewis and Clark and their men had seen the mouth of the river, but that mine was the honor of first seeing its upper reaches, and oh, how proud of that I was! I did not learn until long afterward that upon their return journey from the Western Ocean, a part of the Lewis and Clark expedition had struck across the plains to the river, and followed it down to the Missouri.

I returned to the lodge to find my companions roasting our evening meal of elk ribs, and was soon eating my large share of the fat meat. When that was over we made plans for continuing our journey. While I had been out at the river, Mad Plume had climbed to the rim of the plain for a look at the country, and found that we were not far above the mouth of the Bighorn.

Said Mad Plume now: "No matter how cold it is in the morning, we must start on. The colder it is the safer we will be, for we will not likely be discovered by the Crow hunters, and that is what I most fear, discovery of us while traveling, and sudden attack upon us. I think that if we can reach the edge of the camp without being seen, we can go on through it to the chief's lodge safely enough; the people will be so curious to know why we have come that they will not then fall upon us."

"We can travel nights and escape being seen," said Ancient Otter.

"But we can't cover up our tracks; this fall of snow will last for some days. Well, we will make an early start, and anyhow keep traveling in the daytime if we find it possible," Mad Plume decided, and started to talk about other matters.

After a time Ancient Otter said: "Our camping here reminds me of the time that we made peace with the Crows just below, at the mouth of the Bighorn, and the young Crow, Little Wolf, with whom I became very friendly. I wonder if he is still living? I did not see him when we had that fight, some moons back. If he is still alive I know that he will be with us for making peace. I must tell you about him:

"On the evening of the day that we made peace, he invited me to dance with him and his friends, and I had a pleasant time. A day or two after that I asked him to one of our dances. Then we visited often in his lodge and in mine, and we became close friends. One day he said to me, in signs, of course, the Crows are fine sign talkers, 'We are five young men going south on a raid; you get together four of your friends and join us.'

"Two or three days after that we started, five Crows and five of us, Little Wolf and I joint leaders of the party. We went on foot, traveling at night, taking our time; we had the whole summer before us. We followed up the Bighorn almost to its head, then crossed a wide, high ridge and struck a stream heading in several mountain canyons, and running east into the great plain. At the mouth of one of the canyons we discovered a big camp of the enemy. We came upon it unexpectedly, soon after daylight, and after crossing a wide, level stretch of plain.

Looking down from the edge of the cliff we had come to, there was the camp right under us. People were already up and moving about, some of the men preparing to ride out to hunt. We dared not attempt to go back across the plain; there was but one thing for us to do; we wriggled down into a patch of cherry brush just below the top of the cliff and in a coulee that broke it, and felt safe enough except for the fact that the brush was heavy with ripe fruit; some women and children might come up to gather it.

"The cliff was broken down in many places, more a steep slope of boulders than a cliff, and it was not high. From where we sat in the brush the nearest lodges of the camp were no more than long bow shot from us. We could see the people plainly and hear them talking. They were the Spotted Horses People.[1]

[1] Kish-tsi-pim-i-tup-i. Spotted Horses People. The Cheyennes.

"The lodge nearest us was very large, new, and evidently the lodge of a medicine man, for it was painted with figures of two long snakes with plumes on their heads. A number of women lived in it; they kept coming out and going back, but their man never once appeared.

"The horses of the camp were grazing in the valley of the stream both above and below it and we looked at them with longing, for we could see that many of them were of the spotted breed. After a time a boy on a big, dancing, spotted stallion drove a large band of horses up in front of the snake medicine lodge and then the medicine man came out to look at them. He was a very tall and heavily built man. He wore a cow leather wrap, medicine painted. My Crow friend nudged me, pointed to the big stallion and then signed to me: 'I shall take that horse to-night, and others with him!'

"I laughed, and signed back, 'You don't know that for sure. I may be the one to seize him!'

"The medicine man was talking to the boy on the stallion, louder and louder until his voice became like the roar of a wounded bear in our ears. He suddenly reached up and seized the boy by the arm, dragged him from the stallion, and then picking up a big stick began to beat him with it. We groaned at the awful sight; almost we cried out at it, we who never strike our sons. The women had come out of the lodge; they were crying, no doubt begging the man to let the boy go, but he paid no attention to them, nor to the crowd of people hurrying toward him from all parts of the camp. He beat and beat the boy, at last struck him on the head and he fell as though dead; and at that the women ran forward and lifted him and hurried him into a near-by lodge. The man watched them go, then took up his fallen wrap and went into his lodge. Said my Crow friend to me, in signs, 'We must make that man pay big for beating the boy. He shall lose his horses, all of them, and his medicine, too!'

"'Yes! Let us, you and I, take all his horses, and our men take others as they will. But his medicine, no, not that; it would bring us bad luck,' I answered.

"All that long, hot day, thirsty, hungry, we sat there in the patch of cliff brush watching the enemy camp and its horse herds. We saw nothing more of the beaten boy, and the medicine man did not appear again until nearly sunset. He then went down the valley to his herd, which had been allowed to graze back to its feeding ground, and caught out of it the stallion, rode it home and picketed it close to his lodge. Other men brought in one or two of their horses for early morning use. The sun set. The moon came up. We climbed back to the top of the cliff, went along it for some distance, and then down into the valley below the camp to water. There, where we struck the river, was to be our meeting place.

After a long wait we scattered out, Little Wolf and I going together after the medicine man's herd. We had kept constant watch on it, and now went straight to it and drove it to the meeting place. Some of our companions were already there with their takings. We left the herd for them to hold, and struck out for the camp to get the big stallion. On the way up my friend again told me that he would take the medicine. I tried to get him to leave it alone, but his mind was set; the loss of the medicine, he said, should be the man's punishment for beating the boy.