Marco and the Devil's Bargain (28 page)

“
It won't cry.”

“
What do you mean? Babies always cry when they are hungry.”

“
Not babies of The People. When they cry, we ignore them. When they are silent, we feed them. It doesn't take long, even for a baby, to understand that.”

And this silence keeps the whole village safe from enemies
, Paloma thought. She left the tipi with Toshua's woman. Snow fell again, and they stood close together as she told Eckapeta about last night on the trail, when Ayasha shook her by the chin and forced her into silence.

“
You learned a good lesson, señora,” the woman said. “Ayasha has no one now, which means she has every one of us.”

“
No parents?”

“
Not for a long time. See the scars on her face? Last summer her husband was gored in a buffalo hunt.”

“
She's so young,” Paloma said, wondering what she would do if Marco died. “Where does she go? Is there anyone for her?”

“
Ayasha helps an Old One and we all spare what food we can. That is the way of The People.”

“
I have learned many good lessons today,” Paloma said.

Darkness came early in the high-walled canyon as she returned the baby—not more than a month old—surrendering it with huge reluctance. She lingered there, watching the baby root and then grab at the mother's nipple. While she watched, Paloma tore off chunks of her last ball of pemmican and gave them to the woman.

“
Which one is your baby?” she asked, hoping the young mother understood Spanish.

“
The one sleeping,” she said in Spanish at least as good as Antonio's, and indicated the smaller infant curled into the tight ball of a newborn. “My sister ….” She looked down at the child who nursed, and her eyes filled with tears. “Her husband is deeper in the canyon, and I know he worries.”

Weary with sorrow, Paloma rose to leave when she heard a horse galloping into the village. Startled, she opened the flap to see a warrior on horseback practically in front of the tipi. She turned around at an exclamation from the woman, who obviously knew the sound of that particular horse. Paloma stepped aside as a warrior with blood on his face crouched inside the tipi. He held out a lump of meat and wasted not a moment in cutting off small raw bites for the woman. He touched her face with a bloody hand. She gave him such a look as she chewed and swallowed.

Paloma cleared her throat, and he looked around, startled to see her. “Please, señor, is my husband …?”

He understood Spanish, too, to her relief. “Your man sent me ahead with this meat for my woman.”

“
He would do that,” Paloma said, proud of her man. “Would you like me to slice some of this?”

Scarcely taking his eyes from his wife, the warrior sliced some smaller bits for her, then left the larger portion on a stone by the fire. He took another knife from a sheath tied to his waist and held it out to Paloma, handle first. Funny how only a few days ago Paloma would never have touched such a knife, the kind of knife she remembered with painful clarity as she hid under her mother's bed in terror.
What is done, is done
, she told herself again, and took the knife from him. She sliced the venison into thin strips, the same as she and Sancha had done with venison and beef on the Double Cross. For a moment, she longed for her clean, well-lit kitchen, with
ristras
of chilis hanging from the ceiling, and cloth-covered cheese and eggs.
Some day again
,
God willing,
she told herself as she sliced venison.

When she finished, there was a neat pile for the woman to cook on the hot rocks or parboil, once the babies were fed. Paloma took another long look at the child she had carried all afternoon and left the lodge.

She hadn't the heart to go far, because she yearned to gather the baby close to her again. Paloma stood there in silence, her hands clasped in front of her, waiting for her husband to return.

She hadn't long to wait. As the wretched village far below in the deep canyon lost the last bit of light, she saw Marco and Toshua coming, leading their horses burdened with two deer. She walked toward them, her heart lifting at the sight of his wave and smile.

She forgot her own yearning when she saw how tired he was. Still, there was a gleam in his light brown eyes, determination she was familiar with.

“
You will eat and go directly to bed,” she told him, trying the light scold she knew he was familiar with, from life with her on the Double Cross. It didn't work in the Indian village.

“
We will finish butchering these deer, my love, and stuff ourselves like Comanche. They are thin from winter, but we will feast. We should also talk tonight about Antonio's gift of life.”

She tried again. “It can wait for morning. Once everyone is full, everyone will sleep. Antonio would only be a cricket sawing on the hearth.”

“
I daresay you are right.” He put his arm around her and walked toward the center of the ring of tipis, his horse following like a big dog.

By now, women had gathered with their knives. The men and children with any strength left helped Toshua and Marco pull the dead deer from their horses. Others led the horses away to the stream and what pasture remained. Everyone had a purpose. The work of reducing the deer to hide and bones went on by the light of a roaring fire built by Toshua and Eckapeta. There was nothing puny and defeated about this blaze, a far cry from the tiny pinpoints of light in the tipis last night, barely glimpsed through the storm. Paloma could tell they had starved before and survived.
I have, too
, she thought with pride that took the weariness out of her back and the longing from her heart. Her man was back and there was food. She gently tucked away the yearning for the Comanche baby and moved closer to help.

T
rust a woman to worry about her dress, even here
, Marco told himself as he stripped with his eyes closed, not even caring if Eckapeta and all the Kwahadi women in Comanchería stood in the tipi and stared. He patted his bulging stomach—ordinarily flat and his secret bit of vanity—amazed that he could cram down so much venison. He sank to his knees, stupefied with food and exhaustion and feeling every year of his three decades and a little bit more.

Paloma must have shooed out everyone else, because she was stripping, too, muttering to herself about the blood and brains on her dress. Or maybe it was just the two of them anyway. He crawled between the buffalo robes and reached for her.

“
How in heaven's name do I clean brains from my skirt?” she asked, not unwilling to be towed to bed, but unhappy about her skirt.

“
I haven't a clue.” He patted her stomach, which bulged a little, too. “Have you ever eaten that much in your life?”

“
No. And Eckapeta kept handing me more and more. Why do they
do
that?”

“
The People eat when they can, and so do we now.”

She started to tell him something about two babies and an exhausted mother, and he tried to listen, he really did, except that he could not keep his brain awake. He remembered a little sigh and someone kissing his chest—he assumed it must be his darling—and then he slept.

When he woke up, the sky was light and Paloma was gone. He lay there in perfect peace, all things considered. After several days of gloom, the sun finally shone. Was he one of those simpletons who needed sunlight to improve his mood?

He glanced across the fire pit to the other side of their temporary residence with Señor and Señora Toshua and saw two sleeping mounds. He got up quietly and dressed, sniffing at his own clothing with some displeasure.
I am getting ranker by the minute
, he thought. Paloma had said something last night about trying to clean her clothes, but all he could really remember was her warmth as she cuddled close.

As a good rancher ought, Marco checked his horses first, then went in search of his wife. The Indian camp was silent, everyone sleeping off a prodigious feed. No one stood guard, but what was there to guard but weary, defeated people and tired horses? The Comanche who had ridden with them yesterday—the man with a wife and two babies to feed—had explained the lack of dogs. “We only eat dog when we are starving,” had been his simple statement. The warrior had been infinitely helpful. He knew the canyon as well as Toshua. He had been fueled by even more desperation than most as they hunted, considering his family obligations.

Marco stopped. The babies. He knew where Paloma was now. He walked to the trail and looked toward the little village, trying to remember where Paloma had been standing when he and Toshua walked in with their kills. “It would help me if you Kwahadi decorated your tipis,” he said out loud. Each one looked the same—plain, wet, and sagging at this time of year. There wasn't much artistic sentiment in the average Comanche.

And there she was. Paloma had just crouched out of the tipi opening, a baby in her arms. He raised his hand in greeting and she walked toward him. It seemed to Marco that he probably could have seen her smile from the rim of the canyon, hundreds of feet above. She carried a child and she smiled; it was that simple, and yet complicated beyond belief.

“
You were making some fearsome gurgling noises this morning,” she said by way of greeting, so wifely. “Woke me right up.”

He held Paloma close, the baby between them, and looked down to see bright brown eyes and a little mop of hair that probably was as soft as dandelion puffs to the touch. The child regarded him in silence, but with much interest. He knew the look because he had seen it many times on the faces of his dear twins, puzzling him out at first, because Felicia had been their tether through nine months. Somehow when the twins divined in some baby way his part in the scheme of things, they permitted him all sorts of fatherly liberties. The emotion struck him hard, and made him puff out his cheeks and blow to stop the tears.

“
Kahúu just finished nursing her. She has ever so much milk this morning, thanks be to God and you and the deer.”

“
Is this Kahúu's child?”

“
No, her sister's baby. Her sister delivered this little one, then died of
la viruela
.”

We can't keep her
, he wanted to say.
The Kwahadi would never in a million years permit such a thing
. He remained silent, but put his arm around Paloma's waist and walked with her along the stream.

“
I'll take her back when she starts to squirm. She never cries, but she squirms and I know she wants milk.”

There was something so wistful in his wife's words that he felt his heart crack. He knew she wanted more than anything to open her own bodice and nurse this baby, and it harrowed his soul in a terrible way that she could not.

“
You're good to be so helpful,” he finally managed to say, but it was a poor, poor attempt.

Her eyes filled with tears. “Would that I could nurse her,” she whispered.

He hugged her closer and they continued their slow pacing.

She tried normal conversation, and failed. They walked in silence. She began to hum finally, and he recognized “
Te deum laudamus
,” which had somehow become the anthem of this journey. He hummed along with her, comforted, as he knew she was, because she sang the words when she could.

When she finished, she stood still with a wry expression, the old Paloma again. “Do you think I am breaking some Comanche rule to sing such holy things to a baby of The People?”

He laughed softly, unwilling to wake up a baby. “I don't think The People take much interest in rules, do you?”

He sighed inwardly with relief, because the terrible moment had passed, and she was his again. He looked toward the distant camp now. He saw smoke rising from tipis, and women emerging, ready to begin another day, one with considerably more hope to it. He could almost sense a new optimism.

“
Now is the time, my love. We have to gather The People and convince the rare few who have escaped
la viruela
that they need to be inoculated, which means they will feel sick and even nigh unto death for a few days, and that most will recover, but perhaps not all. I shudder to think of their reaction. Can we convince them?”

“
You can do it, because everyone is in your debt, yours and Toshua's.”

He kissed her cheek, a loud smacking kiss accompanied by a growl, that made a woman picking through the remains of the deer feast look up and smile. “I believe you, even though thousands wouldn't,” he told her.

Marco knew later that they owed their success to Toshua, a warrior rejected by The People, and Paloma, a woman who never should have cared so much. A skeptical man—after all, he was a
juez de campo
—Marco never would have thought they could have gotten the attention of thirty people accustomed since childhood to act independently. He remembered all too well the ferocity of every single warrior on the field of battle at Rio Carlos in 1779, each man doing his best, without regard to his neighbors.

He had never seen a band come together, but this one did, and with laudatory speed. Maybe they understood their great weakness. Maybe they knew that to survive meant more sacrifice. Or maybe they trusted him a little, he who had brought food and a kind woman.