Reason To Believe (41 page)

"Who told you this?" His head came away from the pillow. "Not my son."

"No," she said, too quickly. "Well, not in words, but..."

"But in the way he treats you?"

"He never raised a hand against me, even when he was drinking." She leaned closer, nodded and smiled encouragingly. "I want you to know that because I don't want you to think that he ever... hurt me in that way."

"It's too bad he had to hurt you at all. And it's too bad you had to hurt him." The turn of phrase surprised her, but he raised a finger to warn against contradiction. There was hurt on both sides. "Looks to me like you've both kept it up long enough."

"Maybe I'm just as unsure as he is, but one thing I do know is that I wasn't able to satisfy him. As a woman, a wife." She had told no one else, and she shouldn't be telling Dewey, not even a hint. But she had no one else, and this man was like... no, he
was
a father to her, even though she had failed his son. "I wasn't enough for him."

"Maybe you were too much for him."

She gave him an incredulous look.

"I don't mean too much sex. There's no such thing. I just mean too much woman. If I'd'a been just a few years younger..." He coughed, but the cough soon faded into a weak chuckle. "Now, you see. This is why, the Lakota way, a man does not speak directly to his son's wife."

"I know you didn't mean anything by that."

"Course I did. I meant something. I got a bad leg and bad lungs, but my eyes are still workin' pretty good." Again the long, thin hand patted the side of the bed. "I mean no disrespect, and I don't mean to be meddlin'. If my son wasn't satisfied, it was because he didn't know his own heart. He needs his family. He wants his freedom. He thinks he's a cowboy. He
knows
he's an Indian. He's not sure how all his parts fit together. He's been lookin' for answers here, there, everywhere." The old man bounced a clawlike finger against his own bumpy, scantily clad chest. "They're in his heart. You can tell him, I can tell him, he ain't gonna listen to us. Not until he listens to Tunkasila first."

"That's what he's doing now." Clara nodded vigorously. "I really think so."

"That's what we're all doing on the ride. It's a healing time, healing from the inside out." Again the coughing came, the sickness inside nagging the old man's breath away. Clara poured a glass of water, but Dewey waved it away in favor of finishing what he had to say. "Your husband has his scars. You have yours. Proud flesh, they call it on a horse. Like a callus, hard skin that covers the raw places on the inside. On this ride we open all that up and let the air heal it from the inside out."

She curled both hands around the glass, studying the clear contents. "But how can we keep it from happening again?"

"Well, you can die. Like I'm gonna do pretty soon. Like Sitanka did that day a hundred years ago. Him and most of his people. But not all, and the ones who lived, they still hurt after that day, and from time to time they probably got to thinkin', it hurts too much. Still they survived, and some lived a long time. Your husband is here because of that, and your daughter."

She looked up, her eyes pleading for promises. "Can I believe him when he says he loves me, when... when he hurt me in the worst possible way?"

"Can I believe you?" he asked gently. "Your people hurt my people in the worst possible way, but you are my daughter. Will you betray us again?"

"No. Never."

"How do you know that? How can I trust you?"

"Because I love you. I mean, you're more a family to me than..." She floundered, gesturing desperately. "I would rather die than to—" She stopped, drew a deep breath, then expelled it with a self-conscious laugh. "Boy, that sounds like a line from a bad movie, doesn't it? But I would never hurt you intentionally."

"My son shamed himself, and he hurt you. In two years I have watched him die a little. But what part of him still lives?" When she could not answer, he told her, "The part that loves."

She rolled her eyes ceilingward and sighed. "I want to believe that that part loves me."

"Your mind tells you what to think, and your heart tells you what to believe. They work together. Try to see the man as he is now." Dewey smiled knowingly. "He's like you. He wants to be the best, but the best what?"

"The best he can be?"

"Maybe. But that keeps changing. We get older, we do better at this, not so good at that. It's good that it keeps changing."

"Makes life more interesting?" She shook her head. "I like to know exactly where things stand."

"Then you get up in the morning and you look to the east. The sun will always be there, even if you can't see it. Each day that is exactly where things stand. The old day is gone. You put it behind you and start a new day. And you thank Tunkasila that people can change."

"But not always for the better," Clara insisted.

"No, not always. A man's promise is just the word of a man. Take it for what it is, and don't expect more. It may be a lie, or it may be the truth as he knows it." He lifted that instructive finger of his. "One thing you
can
count on. Tunkasila does not change. Be thankful for that."

She nodded, realizing that at least one more thing was certain. She couldn't go on living in limbo.

"If Ben continues to serve as the keeper of the pipe after the ride, where will he... I mean, is there a certain place he has to be?"

"You mean, like a Lakota Vatican or something?" Dewey's eyes lit up with the old familiar merriment. "My house don't look like St. Peter's too much, does it?"

"I was thinking his hesitancy might be..." Her voice dropped near a whisper. "I think he wants to come home."

"I think he wants to be with his wife and child. As for where he'd wanna be livin', we don't have no residency requirements. We're kinda nomadic at heart. But then you know that." Dewey's eyes glistened with a father's pride in all his children. "He could take the pipe to the North Pole if he wanted to, but he wouldn't find too many Lakota people there."

He chuckled, but when the merriment faded, the wisdom remained. "It's just a pipe. Like the ones you've got up in the museum. If it's used in a sacred way, it helps people find the spiritual part of their lives, the part that makes all those warring parts come together.
Wolakota."
He shrugged. "It's just a pipe, and he's only the keeper."

"But he's needed here."

"Well, we all have choices to make."

She nodded. "And you've chosen not to go to the hospital in Sioux Falls."

"If they took me there, I would not come out. I want to go somewhere, but not Sioux Falls." He lifted his head from the pillow again and signaled for the water.

Clara held the glass for him, and he touched her hand to guide it to his mouth. His skin felt cold and dry. Like death, she thought fearfully, remembering when she'd touched her birth father's lifeless folded hands, bidding a diffident good-bye.

Cady was waiting in the lobby, as promised. He jumped to his feet and put on his coat as soon as he saw her coming. "It's snowing out," he announced, nodding toward the expanse of glass near the door. "I'm for finding a hot meal and a room somewhere. How about you?"

"A room?" She scowled. Her thoughts were still down the hall with her father-in-law, but...
a room?

"Well, rooms. A motel."

"Motels are as scarce as hen's teeth out here. Haven't you noticed?"

He shrugged. "We could drive to Rapid City."

She plunged an arm into her jacket sleeve as she peered out the window at the blustery, gray, waning afternoon. "It's not that bad out, is it?"

"It soon will be." He shrugged, half coaxing, half apologizing. "Look, I'm a journalist. My job is to notice when things are out of... alignment. I just thought maybe..."

Her stare turned hard, icy. She shook her head slowly.

"I did say
rooms
in the plural, so I wasn't..."

Her head was still turning back and forth.

"You're not even tempted to take one night off and spend it in a real bed?"

"No," she said lightly, but the look in her eyes had not changed. "Not even tempted. But if you are, I can probably find another ride." She smiled tightly. "Somehow."

"No need. I'm your driver." He drew on his gloves. "I just thought it was worth a shot."

"I suppose if you have shots to waste. But I made a vow." She headed out the door, casting a quick glance over her shoulder to see if he was coming. "Back in Little Eagle, remember? And long before that. Look, this is just a flurry."

It was blizzarding by the time they reached the Redwater Creek camp after stopping several times for directions and to clean off Harvey's windshield wiper blades. Cady did a little grumbling, but he finally admitted that he admired her resolve. And her commitment.

"Mom!" Anna came running as soon as Clara got out of the pickup. "Mom, what's wrong? How's Lala?"

"He's doing, in his words, as well as can be expected. And we had a heck of a time finding this place." She pulled her hood up and started tying it under her chin as she surveyed the camp. The riders must have just gotten here, she thought. A few were tending their horses in the corral, but many of them were still mounted. "Where's Dad?"

"He went out to find Toby."

Clara peered down the dirt road they'd just traveled. She couldn't see much for the swirling snow. "Out... where?"

"It was snowing pretty good by the time we got here, and when we made the circle and counted heads, Toby Two Bear was missing."

Clara's eyes widened. "Not out there in this!"

"Don't worry." Anna latched on to her mother's arm. "Dad's gonna find him."

D
ancing helixes of snow teased Ben's sense of direction. The west wind was a fickle bitch, blowing into his left ear, then spinning around to the right side. He wore his face mask with his sheepskin helmet, but the Dakota wind would still have her way with him. He'd be lucky to get through with a few spots of frostbite.

"Toby! Toby Two Bear!"

Hollering was nearly wasted effort in this wind, but the visibility was deteriorating rapidly, even though it was still light. Gray-white light. He'd had tracks to follow at first, but those had disappeared. For his own safety he was following a fence line. His gelding snorted, then whinnied, wanting out of this part of the Wounded Knee expedition altogether. So did Ben, but fear for the boy overrode his reluctance and shouted down his doubts. It wasn't that far back that he'd run out of signs. Blowing snow had drifted over the tracks now. But there was a good chance Toby was clinging to the fence line, too, just beyond the next knoll.

The gelding snorted again, and an answering whinny drifted back in a whorl of snow. Ben's hopes climbed, then took a nosedive when the signal cut through the gale a second time. It was an equine challenge, not a distress signal. The caller appeared on the hill, first as an intangible ruddy shape, obscured by swirling white streamers. The phantom figure plunged from the hillcrest into a drift, sending up a snow splash. Profuse mane and tail rippled with the zigzag motion of the seemingly effortless descent. It was a feral stud, untamed, unruly, untroubled by the weather. A magnificent red roan mustang, undoubtedly looking for a fight.

"Shit."

Ben took up the slack in his reins and jerked on the half-hitch that secured the cowboy's requisite coiled hard-twist to his saddle. A territorial stud had no use for males, even if they were gelded. The rope was all Ben had with which to chase the mustang away, and he managed to whack him a good one on the first charge.

"Hee-yah! G'wan! Git!"

The gelding laid his ears back and stood his ground as the roan circled, prancing imperiously. Ben waved the hard-twist again, but the roan started bobbing and weaving like a boxer, lunging close, then bounding away.

"I ain't in no mood for games, you crazy sonuvabitch! Git!"

The roan circled again, taunting. He circled yet again, challenging. Easily dodging Ben's menacing coil of hard rope, the stud turned tail and gave a sassy snort, dancing just out of reach like a kid pressing to be chased.

"Yeah, you think you're hot shit, right? You been stealin' mares out here?"

The roan whinnied.

"Okay, we're impressed. Now beat it!"

The stud's nicker sounded too much like derision for Ben to resist taking after him with a whoop and a quick snap of the hard-twist. The roan pointed his nose into the wind and sprinted a few yards, then stopped short and circled again. Teasing. Testing.

Beckoning?

Now, there was a ridiculous idea.

Foolish enough to make him laugh out loud. "Hey, Red, you seen an Indian kid on a pony hereabouts?"

The roan pranced up a short slope, then turned and waited, mane and tail fluttering like pennants in the snow-strewing wind.

The pony. Ben hadn't paid much attention, having a personal disdain for ponies as mounts. Toby kept calling it
this guy,
but that shaggy little pony... just might have been a mare.