Cries from the Earth (19 page)

To greet Howard and Watkins as they stepped down the steamboat's gangplank was a small crowd of townsfolk, mostly curious people who showed up every time one of the steamers puffed its way upriver to Lewiston. On the dock stood the man in charge at Fort Lapwai, Captain David Perry.

Saluting the post commander, Howard next held out his hand and addressed Perry by his brevet, or honorary, rank. “How are things with Joseph, Colonel?”

“All right, by last accounts, General,” Perry replied, then shook hands with Watkins before turning back to Howard. “The Indians are, I think, coming on the reservation without trouble.”

That was the sweetest piece of news Howard had heard in years. He grinned within his neatly trimmed beard. “Praises be, gentlemen. We've circumvented a war by holding firm—steadfastly firm, I might add. I venture to say the Indian problem is all but put to rest now.”

Charles Monteith, the agent's younger brother, who was serving as reservation clerk, finished introducing himself to Inspector Watkins, then told Howard, “The Indians appear to be acting in good faith, so we suppose they will make no trouble in coming in.”

All around this group a small crowd of curious and interested Lewiston residents cheered those hopeful sentiments and gave the general three hearty huzzahs for dousing the fears of an Indian war. It had been a long, long time since Howard had experienced this kind of praise and adulation.

These people have been scared,
he remembered.
They've been afraid for the better part of a year that war could break out at any moment, with the slightest provocation. But you've done it, Otis. By Providence! You've gone and saved them from a war!

“Mr. Watkins has some matters to attend to here in Lewiston for the next two or three days,” Howard announced as the small group turned and started toward the ambulance Perry had brought up from Lapwai.

“I'm seeing to the civilian contracts for the Umatilla and Nez Perce reservations,” Watkins explained.

“Then I'll be taking you to the fort alone, General?” Perry asked.

“No, Colonel—I believe I can keep myself busy here in town,” Howard told the officer. “Now that it appears affairs with the Nez Perce are quietly falling into place, I think I'm going to enjoy a few days of peace in Lewiston myself.”

Chapter 13

Season of
Hillal
1877

“You mustn't run away!” Joseph cried at a small group pushing past him on their way out of camp by the time he and Ollokot reached the village at
Tepahlewam.
“No reason to be afraid—you have done nothing wrong!”

“The soldiers will come looking for us!” White Bird wailed as he stepped up between the lodges. “All must join now. There is blood. We will be punished if we delay our escape!”

Joseph dismounted. “We look guilty when we run away,” he explained.

White Bird shrugged, turning slightly to gesture at the frantic activities of those breaking camp. “I am afraid it is too late for talk now—the war has started. Look at these people—they are running for their lives before the soldiers come searching for the killers and find us instead.”

“We must wait for the soldiers to come,” Joseph protested. “Then we can make us some kind of peace with Cut-Off Arm. It would be better than running and fighting, because too many women and children will die—”

“Too late, too late,” White Bird groaned, wagging his head.

“Why do you say it is too late?”

“I told Sun Necklace not to go; I argued with Toohoolhoolzote,” White Bird explained, “said they mustn't take all my young men with them. That would leave my people with no protection when the soldiers come.”

“But there doesn't have to be a fight when the soldiers come,” Joseph consoled him.

“There will be a lot of fighting,” White Bird whimpered in protest. “So we must join in the war now.”

Joseph reached out and put his hand on the older man's shoulder. The venerable war chief turned and looked into Joseph's face. “Where will you go, White Bird?”

“
Sah-pah-tsas,
”
1
he answered with regret. “The Drive-In near the Red Rocks.”

“Yes, on the Cottonwood.” Joseph reached down and seized White Bird's wrist affectionately. “We will see you soon.”

The old man gripped Joseph's wrist tightly, refusing to let go, and asked, “You are coming to join us there?”

“I don't know,” and Joseph shook his head. “My wife—she is about to give birth.”

“Her time is soon?”

“Perhaps today. Tomorrow at the latest.”

Finally releasing the taller man's arm, White Bird scrutinized Joseph's eyes carefully, as if to read what lay behind them. “Will you turn your back on the rest of us and take the Wallowa into the reservation now?”

Sensing such heavy responsibility weighing upon his shoulders, Joseph said, “Some of my people will surely want to surrender now that there is trouble, now that the smell of blood is on the wind. But the Wallowa will gain nothing by giving up to the soldiers. No matter what has happened, who committed the murders … I know the white men will look at all the chiefs the same. In their eyes now, you and I and looking Glass are equally as guilty as Toohoolhoolzote or Sun Necklace.”

“Then we must run away to the hills and prepare to fight, Joseph.”

He wagged his head sadly. “For now, I know we can't run away. We must have time to think, to figure out how to put but these first flames of war.”

White Bird stared into the taller man's face, saying, “Those first flames are no longer small enough for you or me to put out, Joseph. Sun Necklace and his warriors are fanning the fire hotter. Already the flames are out of control.”

“I cannot stand by and do nothing. I must do what I can,” Joseph vowed.

“May the Creator guide your steps,” White Bird said. “No matter what path you choose for your feet.”

Without another word, White Bird turned away to rejoin his people already streaming away from
Tepahlewam.

“Ollokot.”

“Yes, Joseph.”

“See that our people do not tear down their lodges and run away before I can talk to them.”

Ollokot caught Joseph's arm and asked, “Where are you going?”

“To see my wife,” he said, his eyes turning sad, “to learn if I have become a father again.”

*   *   *

“What the hell you fellas doing back here so damn quick?” asked John J. Manuel as he stepped off the porch. The two horsemen brought their lathered mounts to an ungainly halt in the yard of the house Arthur Chapman had built at the mouth of Chapman Creek, here beside the White Bird.

“Never did get anywhere near Mount Idaho,” explained forty-year-old Patrick Brice, an Irish immigrant who had come to Amerikay in the stinking hold of a ship filled with those who were fleeing the third potato famine to devastate the old sod.

Despite his seventy-four-year-old bones, James Baker swung out of the saddle like a young cavalryman and landed right in front of Manuel. “We see'd a war party up on the divide, John. Better clear out and pronto.”

“Coming this way?” asked George Popham, Manuel's father-in-law, his eyes narrowing with concern as he stepped onto the porch.

“We damn well didn't stay long enough to ask 'em,” Baker snorted, grabbing hold of Manuel's vest with one hand. “Now you gonna believe me and get your family out of here, son?”

“Where the hell you 'spect us to go?” Manuel demanded defensively. This was the home he had bought from Chapman a few years back; this was his business—where his family was sinking its roots. He glanced quickly at his wife, then at his six-year-old daughter, Maggie. “They catch any of us out on the road to Grangeville, there ain't no getting back. Better we stay here—”

“My place,” Baker huffed. “It's better'n yours here case they put us to siege. I cleared the trees clear round the place, and I got a good field of fire from ever' side of the house. And if they try to burn us out, I allays got that stone cellar they can't burn. You ain't got much time to get your family away from here, John.”

A few hours earlier old man Baker had been down near the Salmon River Road when the Benedict girl came riding up the White Bird Trail, scampering for the Brown homestead bawling the news that her father had been shot through both legs by the Injuns and had just reached home, bleeding something terrible. So just before noon Baker gathered up his most trusted hired man, Conrad Fruth, and together they rode off for the Manuel place, a little more than a mile on up White Bird Creek, intent on spreading the alarm among the local folk.

At first he was planning to ride on over the White Bird Divide with Fruth, alerting the settlers near the Camas Prairie like Paul Revere himself, but at his first stop John Manuel talked him out of that notion.

“We don't know for sure what's going on,” Manuel argued. “You know Sam Benedict's played hell with them Nez Perce, and they may just be squaring things with him. I doubt it's a war, Jim. Why don't you and Fruth go on back to your place? You both'll be one helluva lot safer there than you will be up on the divide, should any young bucks catch you two out with their blood all worked up over shooting Sam.”

Baker had relented and taken Fruth back to his place down White Bird Creek. But the old man was back about an hour later, this time with Patrick Brice along. The Irish prospector wasn't about to sit around Baker's place and wait for a war party to come pay their respects. Together the three had decided that safety lay in numbers and ridden for the Manuel ranch. After John, his father-in-law, Baker, and Brice argued it all over again … Baker and Brice decided they would head off to Mount Idaho to let folks know something evil was afoot.

But here they were, back again, turned around by a band of horsemen they had spotted heading up the White Bird Divide.

“Them Injuns might've followed you boys back here. Damn it all,” Manuel drawled, maintaining a strong vestige of his thick Virginia accent. He set his jaw, having come to a decision. “George, s'pose you get Jennet and the chirrun saddled up—”

“I ain't going, John,” George Popham interrupted sternly. “I figure to stay here and fight 'em off when they come. That way, I'll give the rest of you a little more time to get clear of the place.”

Manuel felt a sudden swell of sentiment burn in his breast as he gave his father-in-law a quick, fierce embrace. Amid the swirl of her long, honey-blond hair, Jennet Manuel pressed against her father the moment her husband, John, knelt to sweep up their eleven-month-old son from the porch.

Manuel held out his hand for his daughter. “C'mon, Maggie.”

After Jennet had climbed into the saddle, John handed the boy up to his mother.

Patrick Brice stopped beside the horse and waited while John Manuel mounted, then hoisted six-year-old Maggie up behind her father. Brice stepped back from the horse. “I've decided to stay with George.”

For a moment Manuel measured the immigrant with no small admiration. He cleared his throat and said, “Lock the doors ahint you, Patrick. There's extra shells in the chest by the door, and a rifle in the corner, too.”

“Better you get now,” Popham growled, slapping the rump on his daughter's horse.

“I love you, Father!” Jennet cried as they kicked their horses away from the house.

Baker spurred his animal to the front of the line, leading them downstream along the narrow trail. They were bound for the sanctuary of the old man's stone cellar. Just the place John Manuel figured he could keep his family safe from all harm.

*   *   *

Little Maggie had never seen her mother so frightened before. Jennet Manuel's tanned cheeks were almost pale as the bleached muslin of her apron by the time they got on horseback and started out of the yard.

The old man, clearly older than Maggie's own gran'pa, kicked his horse vigorously so he could ride in front of them all. Maggie clung to her papa like a deer tick, pressing her cheek against the damp warmth of his back.

“Christ Jesus in heaven!”

The moment that gray-bearded old man swore, Maggie poked her head around her papa's side to give a look, discovering some two dozen warriors suddenly appearing on the road that was taking them toward the Salmon—as if they had sprouted right out of the ground!

What devils they looked to be, their faces mean as they started shouting.

As close as the horsemen were to old man Baker, it was no wonder they hit him so many times with their arrows. Maggie could hear the bowstrings
pung, pung, pung
as the shafts were rapidly released. And she could hear the old man grunt as each one struck him, even though her papa was already wrenching their horse around, yelling at Mamma to get moving.

“They got me, Jack!” Baker cried as he flopped to the ground. “Good-bye!”

Maggie twisted herself around as far as she could while still clinging to her papa, finding Baker lying in the middle of the road, his chest, back, and arms bristling with the shafts. Then Maggie realized she and her father were in just as much danger as the warriors screeched and yowled, galloping their way. But the Indians weren't all using bows.

Maggie heard the
pop, pop
of the guns behind them … just before her father groaned and suddenly he wasn't there for her to hold onto anymore. She was just righting herself behind the cantle on the broad, bare rump of the horse when the first arrow pierced her upper arm.

Squealing in pain, she twisted to look at the shaft quivering halfway through her tiny arm, the pointed end glistening with her own blood. Before she could take another breath, the day got bright as a meteor show and she found herself on the ground.

With her head pounding like a drum, wondering why she was so dizzy and sick to her stomach, Maggie put her hand to the back of her head—feeling how the arrow had hit her skull, slashed along under the scalp, and was now hanging there beneath a flap of skin and her long blond hair, the same honey color as her mama's.