Bower, 1874-1940 - The heritage of the Sioux

A couple of rods nearer the rock wall Happy Jack was grumbling, across the canvas pack of a little bay, at Big Medicine, who was warning him against leaving his hair so long as a direct temptation to scalp-lifting. Luck had already mounted and ridden out a little way, where he could view the country behind them with his field glasses, to make sure that in the darkness they had not passed by anything that deserved a closer inspection. He 156

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came back at a lope and motioned to Andy and the Native Son.

" That red automobile is standing back about half a mile," he announced hurriedly. " Empty and deserted, looks like. We'll go back and take a look at it. The rest of you can finish packing and wait here till we come back. No use making extra travel for your horses. They'll get all they need, the chances are."

The red automobile was empty of everything but the upholstering and a jack in the toolbox. The state license number was gone, and the serial number on the engine had been hammered into illegibility. What tracks there were had been blown nearly full of the white sand of that particular locality. There was nothing to be learned there, except the very patent fact that the machine had been abandoned for some reason. Luck took a look at the engine and saw nothing wrong with it. There was oil and there was " gas "— a whole tank full. Andy and Miguel, riding an ever-widening circle around the machine while Luck was looking for evidence of a breakdown, ran across a lot of hoofprints that seemed to head 157

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straight away past the rim-rock and on to the hills.

They picked up the trail of the hoofprints and followed it. When they returned to the others they found the boys all mounted and waiting impatiently like hounds on the leash eager to get away on the chase. Six horses there were, and even old Applehead, who was in a bad humor that morning and seemed to hate agreeing with anyone, admitted that probably the four who had committed the robbery and left town in the machine had been met out here by a man who brought horses for them and one extra pack horse. This explained the number in the most plausible manner, and satisfied everyone that they were on the right trail.

Riding together — since they were on a plain trail and there was nothing to be gained by separating— they climbed to the higher mesa, crossed the ridge of the three barren hills that none of them but Applehead had ever passed, and went on and on and on as the hoofprints led them, straight toward the reservation.

They discussed the robbery from every angle they could think of, and once or twice someone haz-158

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arded a guess at Annie-Many-Ponies' reason for leaving and her probable destination. They wondered how old Dave Wiswell, the dried little cattleman of The Phantom Herd, was making out in Denver, where he had gone to consult a specialist about some kidney trouble that had interfered with his riding all spring. Weary suggested that maybe Annie-Many-Ponies had taken a notion to go and visit old Dave, since the two were old friends.

It was here that Applehead unwittingly put into words the vague suspicion which Luck had been trying to stifle and had not yet faced as a definite idea.

" I calc'late we'll likely find that thar squaw putty tol'ble close to whar we find Bill Holmes," Applehead remarked sourly. " Her goin' off same day they stuck up that bank don't look to me like no happenstance — now I'm tellin' yuh! } W if I was shurf, and was ast to locate that squaw, I'd keep right on the trail uh Bill Holmes, jest as we're doin' now."

" That isn't like Annie," Luck said sharply to still the conviction in his own mind. " Whatever faults she may have, she's been loyal to me, and 159

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honest. Look how she stuck last winter, when she didn't have anything at stake, wasn't getting any salary, and yet worked like a dog to help make the picture a success. Look how she got up in the night when the blizzard struck, and fed our horses and cooked breakfast of her own accord, just so I could get out early and get my scenes. I've known her since she was a dirty-faced papoose, and I never knew her to lie or steal. She wasn't in on that robbery — I'll bank on that, and she wouldn't go off with a thief. It isn't like Annie."

" Well," said Big Medicine, thinking of his own past, " the best uh women goes wrong when some knot-headed man gits to lovemakin'. They'll do things fer the wrong kinda man, by cripes, that they wouldn't do fer no other human on earth. I've knowed a good woman to lie and steal — fer a man that wasn't fit, by cripes, to tip his hat to 'er in the street! Women," he added pessimistically, " is something yuh can't bank on, as safe as yuh can on a locoed horse! " He kicked his mount unnecessarily by way of easing the resentment which one woman had managed to instil against the sex in general.

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" That's where you're darned right, Bud," Pink attested with a sudden bitterness which memory brought. " I wouldn't trust the best woman that ever lived outa my sight, when you come right down to cases."

" Aw, here! " Andy Green, thinking loyally of his Rosemary, swung his horse indignantly toward the two. " Cut that out, both of you! Just because you two got stung, is no reason why you've got to run down all the rest of the women. I happen to know one —"

" Aw, nobody was talking about Rosemary," Big Medicine apologized gruffly. " She's different; any fool knows that."

" Well, I've got a six-gun here that'll talk for another one," silent Lite Avery spoke up suddenly. " One that would tip the scales on the woman's side for goodness if the rest of the whole sex was bad."

" Oh, thunder! " Pink cried, somewhat redder than the climbing sun alone would warrant. " I'll take it back. I didn't mean them — you know darned well I didn't mean them — nor lots of other women I know. What I meant was —" 161

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" What you meant was Annie," Luck broke in uncompromisingly. " And I'm not condemning her just because things look black. You don't know Indians the way I know them. There's some things an Indian will do, and then again there's some things they won't do. You boys don't know it — but yesterday morning when we left the ranch, Annie-Many-Ponies made me the peace-sign. And after that she went into her tent and began to sing the Omaha. It didn't mean anything to you — Old Dave is the only one that would have sabed, and he wasn't there. But it meant enough to me that I came pretty near riding back to have a powwow with Annie, even if we were late. I wish I had. I'd have less on my conscience right now."

" Fur's I kin see," Applehead dissented impatiently, " you ain't got no call to have nothin' on your conscience where that thar squaw is concerned. You treated her a hull lot whiter'n what she deserved— now I'm tellin' ye! *W her traipsin' around at nights 'n'—"

" I tell you, you don't know Indians! " Luck swung round in the saddle so that he could face 162

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Applehead. " You don't know the Sioux, anyway. She wouldn't have made me that peace-sign if she'd been double-crossing me, I tell you. And she wouldn't have sung the Omaha if she was going to throw in with a thief that was trying to lay me wide open to suspicion. I've been studying things over in my mind, and there's something in this affair I can't sabe. And until you've got some proof, the less you say about Annie-Many-Ponies the better I'll be pleased."

That, coming from Luck in just that tone and with just that look in his eyes, was tantamount to an ultimatum, and it was received as one. Old Applehead grunted and chewed upon a wisp of his sunburned mustache that looked like dried cornsilk after a frost. The Happy Family exchanged careful glances and rode meekly along in silence. There was not a man of them but believed that Applehead was nearer right than Luck, but they were not so foolish as to express that belief.