The Family Jensen (15 page)

Dark, luminous eyes dominated the lovely face. They had a slightly odd cast that made them look a little different from the eyes of other Indian women he had seen. She was armed with the bow in her hands, a quiver of arrows slung on her back, and a pair of sheathed knives, one on each hip. She wasn’t pointing the arrow directly at him anymore, but the wariness in her eyes and the tenseness in her stance told Matt that she could raise the bow and let fly in the blink of an eye.

He could swing his Winchester up and fire faster than she could loose an arrow, but instead he said, “I don’t have any interest in hurting you, ma’am. I saw those men chasing you and shooting at you, and I stepped in to stop them.”

“Why?” She put the question to him sharply. “Why would you risk your life to help a stranger?”

“Well…you’re a woman, for onething. But I reckon I’d have taken a hand even if you were a man. I never did like six-to-one odds. They don’t hardly seem fair.”

“Fair?” she repeated. “You helped me because my plight offended your sense of fairness?”

“You could put it like that,” he said with a shrug.
If you want to be all high-falutin about it,
he added to himself.

“Who are you?” she asked after a moment.

“Name’s Matt Jensen.”

“Jensen…”

The name seemed to mean something to her. She might have heard of him, Matt thought, but more likely she recognized the name because of Smoke, who was much better known on the frontier.

“What are you doing in this valley, Matt Jensen?” she went on.

“Just riding,” he said. “I’ve been up in Montana Territory and thought I’d drift south for a while, before the colder weather moves in. Is there a settlement in these parts? It probably wouldn’t hurt if I picked up some supplies.”

“Buffalo Flat is about ten miles south of here,” the young woman said. “You should be careful, though. Reece Bannerman doesn’t like strangers riding across his range.”

Matt grunted. “Bannerman, eh? As in the Circle B?”

She nodded. “Yes. That’s his ranch.”

“We’re on his range now?”

“He runs his cattle on this land,” she said, the sharpness back in her voice. “That does not mean he owns it.”

“I see,” Matt said, although he didn’t, not fully. Since the woman had lowered the bow and arrow farther and seemed more relaxed, he ventured another question. “I’ve told you my name, but you haven’t told me yours. What do they call you?”

After hesitating a moment, she said, “Starwind.”

He nodded. “Starwind. It suits you.” He studied the beadwork and markings on her buckskins. “You’re a Crow?”

“That’s right. My father’s village is near here.” She frowned at him. “You’ve said nothing about my clothes.”

Matt shrugged. “I reckon folks have a right to dress however they want.”

“Or the fact that I fight like a man.”

“Well, that came in mighty handy when you ventilated one of those fellas with an arrow.”

“Two of them,” she corrected.

“I thought I heard somebody else yell in those trees,” Matt said with a smile. “If you hadn’t turned around and come back to help me, there’s a good chance they would’ve kept me pinned down in those rocks until a ricochet got me. So I owe you just as much as you owe me.”

“We are square, as the white man says.”

Matt nodded. “Yep. We’re square. I’m curious, though…why were those varmints chasing you? Do they work for this fella Bannerman?”

“I don’t know,” Starwind replied with a shake of her head. “I was searching for…something…when they saw me and began shooting at me. If my pony was not so swift, they would have killed or captured me.”

“What were you looking for?” Matt asked, still indulging his curiosity.

She didn’t answer. Instead, she finally unnocked the arrow and slid it back into the quiver slung over her shoulder.

“Will you come with me to the village of my people, Matt Jensen?” she asked.

Matt didn’t have any place he had to be. He knew the Crow were usually friendly toward whites and thought he could count on their hospitality. And he was still mighty curious. It seemed to him that the beautiful young woman called Starwind was being deliberately mysterious.

“Sure, I can do that,” he told her. “I appreciate the invitation.”

“Follow me, then.” She turned her head and whistled, and the paint pony she had been riding earlier came out of the trees. She vaulted lithely onto its back. The buckskin trousers made it easy for her to ride astride.

And the way they hugged the curves of her hips wasn’t half-bad, either, he thought.

Matt let her lead the way. Starwind headed west, her course winding through the lush valley between the rugged, heavily timbered mountains. They crossed the first creek, then another stream half a mile farther on. Turning south they followed the second creek. A few minutes later, Matt spotted a tendril of gray smoke twisting upward into the blue sky.

“My father’s village,” Starwind said, nodding toward the smoke coming from a cooking fire.

When they reached the village, Matt saw that the lodges were scattered along a plain beside the creek, with woods nearby for firewood. It was a good-sized village, housing probably a couple hundred people, he estimated as he and Starwind approached. Dogs came running out to greet them, barking loudly. The commotion drew plenty of attention. Men, women, and children emerged from the lodges. Warriors holding rifles or bows stepped forward, forming a protective line in case there was trouble. Matt wondered a little why they were so defensive.

An air of tension definitely hung over the entire village. Some of the women and children looked frightened. The warriors glared at Matt, and he was glad that Starwind was at his side. If she hadn’t been there to indicate by her presence that he was a friend, he might have been risking his life by riding into that village, he realized.

Something had happened that had everybody spooked.

Matt spotted someone striding forward, behind the line of warriors. The man was easy to see, because he stood head and shoulders above the others. The line parted to let him through. Matt’s jaw tightened as he got his first good look at the tall, broad-shouldered Indian.

The man’s face was scarred and misshapen, and yet it bore a powerful dignity that slightly lessened the impact of his ugliness. His dark hair was heavily streaked with gray, but that was the only real indication of his age. The lines left by the years didn’t show on his ravaged face, and his body seemed as powerful and vital as that of a younger man. He had to be the chief of the band. The way he carried himself, he could be nothing less.

“Starwind!” he said. “I feared that you had disappeared, too.” The man looked at Matt and scowled. “Who is this?”

Starwind slid down from the back of her pony. The chief towered over her. “He says his name is Matt Jensen.”

“Jensen!” The massive Indian seemed as impressed by the name as Starwind had been. He peered at Matt and asked, “You share the same blood as the one called Smoke Jensen?”

“Not exactly,” Matt said. “He’s my adopted brother. Or I reckon I should say he adopted me, since he saved my life, took me in, and pretty much raised me into a man. I took his name when I went out on my own, in tribute to him.”

“Not blood, but blood brothers, then.”

Matt nodded. “That’s the way I feel about it.”

The Indian clenched a ham-like fist and held it to his chest. “I am Crazy Bear. Years ago, Smoke Jensen did a great kindness for my family, and I have never forgotten him. Come. You are welcome here.”

Matt relaxed, as did the warriors who were lined up behind Chief Crazy Bear. The crowd began to break up. Matt dismounted, and as he did so, Starwind reached for his reins.

“I will see to it that your horse is cared for,” she said.

“Thanks. His name is Spirit.”

Crazy Bear ushered Matt toward one of the lodges. “You will be my guest,” he said. “Has Smoke spoken of his time here?”

“Not that I recall,” Matt said. “It might have been after he and I went our separate ways.”

“He called himself Buck West then. I learned his true name later.”

Matt nodded. “Yeah, that was after we split up, after his first wife was killed. I heard about it from him later on, but I wasn’t around when it happened. I’d like to think things might’ve been different if I had been.”

An older woman waited in front of the lodge that was Crazy Bear’s destination. She had gray in her hair, too, but she was still very attractive. Something had upset her. Matt saw pain and worry in her dark eyes.

“I thought there might be news of Moon Fawn,” she said.

Crazy Bear shook his head. “No, but our daughter has come home. This man was with her. His name is Matt Jensen, blood brother to Smoke.”

The woman came closer, and Matt realized that she wasn’t an Indian. He had taken her for one at first, because of her coloring and her buckskin dress. Her features had a distinctly European look, and he knew that was what he had noticed about Starwind without really understanding it. The young woman was a mixture of the two cultures.

“My name is Mala,” she said.

Matt took his hat off and nodded politely to her. “I’m pleased to meet you, ma’am. I just wish it was under better circumstances.”

She stiffened. “What do you know of the circumstances?”

“Nothing, really, only that your daughter was being chased by gunmen because they caught her looking for someone else who has disappeared, someone named Moon Fawn.” He had put that together quickly in his head from things that Starwind, Crazy Bear, and Mala had said.

Mala drew in a breath sharply. “Starwind was in danger?”

“I stepped in to help her,” Matt explained, “and then she helped me when those hardcases turned around and came after me. I guess you could say we got each other out of trouble.”

Crazy Bear looked past Matt and rumbled, “Starwind! Where did you go?”

The young woman walked up, having cared for her pony and Matt’s sorrel. Her chin held a defiant tilt as she said, “I went to look for my niece. Someone has to find her before it’s too late.”

“We have searched from one end of the valley to the other.”

“Not Bannerman’s line camps or the headquarters of his ranch,” Starwind shot back at him.

Crazy Bear frowned. “The truce between us is too easy to break. If we go near the line camps or Bannerman’s house, there will be trouble.”

“Why should we worry about trouble with Bannerman and his men when Moon Fawn is missing?”

Mala snapped, “You think I care about Bannerman when my granddaughter is gone? But your father is right…the peace is a fragile one. And Bannerman has no reason to be interested in Moon Fawn.”

“He runs his cattle on land that has always been our hunting ground! He cannot be trusted!”

Crazy Bear said, “I do not trust him. But one little Indian girl means nothing to him.”

Mala moved between Crazy Bear and Starwind. She said to Matt, “My apologies, Mr. Jensen. All this means nothing to you. The most important thing right now is that we owe you our gratitude for the help you gave our daughter. Please, accept our hospitality. We can feed you well and give you a good place to spend the night before you ride on to wherever it is you’re going.”

“I appreciate that, ma’am,” Matt told her, “and I’ll sure accept your kind invitation…but only on one condition.”

“What condition is that?” Crazy Bear asked, not sounding too happy about Matt’s response.

“That you tell me everything you can about what’s going on here. You see, I’d like to help you get your granddaughter back safe and sound if I can.”

For a long moment, Crazy Bear didn’t say anything, and his craggy face became impassive and unreadable.

Then he jerked his head in an abrupt nod and said, “It is to be expected that the blood brother of Smoke Jensen would make such an offer. Come into my lodge, Matt Jensen. We will smoke a pipe, and my wife will prepare a meal.”

With the formality that he knew was expected at such a moment, Matt said, “I accept your hospitality, Crazy Bear.”

A few minutes later, they were seated cross-legged inside the tepee on bearskin rugs near the fire pit. Crazy Bear prepared a pipe, packing it full of tobacco, then lighting it with a twig from the fire. After he had puffed it into life, he offered the pipe to Matt, who took it with a solemn expression on his face and puffed several times. Meanwhile, Crazy Bear’s wife Mala began preparing a meal on the other side of the tepee.

Starwind hadn’t followed them into the lodge. Matt glanced toward the entrance, where the hide flap that usually covered it was thrown back.

“If you look for my daughter, do not expect her,” Crazy Bear said. “She will not help my wife with the meal. She says that is woman’s work.”

“No offense, Crazy Bear, but I figured Starwind was a woman, and a mighty pretty one, at that.”

Crazy Bear grunted. “She says she should have been born a warrior. She has no interest in woman’s ways. She would rather ride and fight.”

“I saw her skill at both those things with my own eyes, earlier today,” Matt said. “Did you teach her how to use a bow?”

“Someone had to.” Despite his massive size, Crazy Bear sounded as if he had meet an irresistible force in his daughter’s determination.

They passed the pipe back and forth again, then Matt said, “Tell me about the girl who’s missing.”

“My granddaughter, Moon Fawn.”

“Not Starwind’s daughter?”

Crazy Bear shook his head. “My daughter has no husband, no children. Moon Fawn is the child of my son Little Bear and his wife Robin.”

Mala turned her head and added, “My son is also known as Sandor, Mr. Jensen. He has gypsy blood in his veins.”

“And his wife is a white woman,” Crazy Bear went on. He sighed. “There is much madness in my family.”

Matt smiled. “It doesn’t sound like your children are mad, just that they know what they want. This is a good thing, isn’t it?”

“That’s what I try to tell him,” Mala said. “But tradition is important to him.”

“I understand that, too,” Matt said. “What about Moon Fawn?”

“My son and his wife have traveled east to the city called St. Louis. They left Moon Fawn here with us while they are gone. Little Bear wants to establish a school for Indians, and he thinks he can persuade some of the wealthy people in St. Louis to pay for it.”

“Sounds like an admirable goal,” Matt said with a nod. “How old is the little girl?”

Mala answered the question, and her voice broke slightly as she did so. “She has seen…seven summers.”

Matt felt a chill go along his spine. For some reason, he’d thought they were talking about a somewhat older girl. Moon Fawn was just a little kid, and on the frontier, a lot of dangerous things could happen to a child out on her own.

“Was she alone when she disappeared?”

Crazy Bear nodded. “Moon Fawn has always looked up to her father’s younger sister. She wants to be like Starwind, who thinks nothing of taking a pony and riding through the valley by herself. Two days ago, Moon Fawn slipped away, took a pony, and went riding. She never returned.”

“Good Lord,” Matt murmured. “Did you find the pony?”

“It came back to the village that evening…alone.”

Mala said, “There was no sign of Moon Fawn or Gregor.”

“Who’s Gregor?” Matt asked. “I thought you said she was alone.”

“Her…her doll.” Mala’s voice choked with emotion. “She named it. She always carried it with her.”

“I’m sure you went looking for her.”

“Of course,” Crazy Bear said. “Everyone in the village helped. We searched that night, and we searched again yesterday. No one found her. Today I went to Buffalo Flat, to ask for help from those in the settlement. When I got back, Starwind was gone, too, and no one knew where.”

“She was east of here, and a little north.”

Crazy Bear’s face darkened. “On the land that Bannerman claims is his.”

“You don’t get along with Bannerman?”

“When he first came to the valley and brought his cattle, my people and I tried to be his friends. The Crow have fought the white men in the past, but the time for war is long since finished. It is a time for peace now.” Crazy Bear made a sweeping gesture with an arm as big around as a sapling. “The valley is big. Plenty of room for all. But Bannerman takes more and more. Now he wants our hunting ground. This cannot be.”

Matt felt a pang of sympathy for the Crow chief. Crazy Bear’s story was one that had been repeated all over the West, and the situation was one that would probably continue to be repeated. Legally, the land didn’t belong to the Indians anymore. As the country expanded and civilization marched across the frontier, they were being pushed back into smaller and smaller corners. Matt felt sorry for them, but he didn’t see any way to stop what was happening.

“This fella Bannerman…would he stoop so low as to kidnap your granddaughter to make you go along with what he wants?”

“Of course he would,” Starwind said as she appeared in the lodge’s entrance and ducked low to come inside. “I told Moon Fawn never to ride alone on the other side of Badger Creek. There are too many of Bannerman’s men over there. That’s where I was today when those gunmen jumped me. I was nosing around one of their line camps.”

“You know I have forbidden it!” Crazy Bear said.

“I also know that Moon Fawn might not be missing if she hadn’t wanted so much to be like me,” Starwind shot back, and Matt heard the pain in her voice. He realized that she blamed herself, at least in part, for her niece’s disappearance. “I will find her, Father, if it is the last thing I do.”

Mala said, “If it is the last thing you do, then I will have lost a daughter as well as a granddaughter.”

Matt felt uncomfortable being in the middle of all the anger and tension between family members. He let the silence go on for a moment, then said, “Hold on. Even if Bannerman has Moon Fawn, surely he wouldn’t do anything to hurt her. She’s just a little girl. He’s probably just letting you stew a little, Crazy Bear, if the two of you have clashed in the past.”

“I do not trust him,” Crazy Bear said.

“I don’t blame you. But here’s an idea…why don’t you let me search for her?”

“You cannot know this valley any better than my people and I do.”

“No…but I can ride over to the Circle B and see if Bannerman’s hiring. If I can get a job with him, then I can look around without him knowing what I’m doing. He or one of his men might let something slip around me that would lead me to Moon Fawn.”

“This is a good idea,” Starwind said, adding, “I will come with you.”

“You must not have been listening,” Matt told her. “The idea is that Bannerman won’t know I’ve got any connection to you folks.”

“But I want to help!”

Mala said, “I think you have done enough, Starwind.”

The young woman’s face tightened. Anger darkened her features, and tears shined in her eyes. She came quickly to her feet and left the lodge before she let herself cry in front of her parents and their visitor.

Crazy Bear looked intently at Matt and asked, “How do we know we can trust you, Matt Jensen?”

“I’m blood brother to Smoke,” he replied with a shrug. “If that means as much to you as it does to me, then you know you can trust me.”

“Very well. If you can help find Moon Fawn and return her safely to us, you will be as much a friend to the Crow as Smoke Jensen is.” Crazy Bear glanced through the entrance flap. “But the day grows short. Stay here tonight. You can ride to Bannerman’s ranch tomorrow.”

Matt nodded. “All right.” Something had occurred to him. “I may have to go to Buffalo Flat first. That’s the name of the settlement near here, right?”

“Yes. What do you need there?”

“If the men who were after Starwind today work for Bannerman, they got a look at me when I was trading shots with them. I don’t reckon they ever saw my face very well, but they might recognize my horse and my clothes. I think I need to go to Buffalo Flat and get a new mount and some new duds.”

Crazy Bear thought about it and then nodded slowly. “You are a smart man, Matt Jensen.”

“I try,” Matt said with a grin.

“I hope you are smart enough to find my granddaughter…and bring her home.”

Matt ate supper with Crazy Bear and Mala, a savory stew that tasted good, so he didn’t ask any questions about what was in it. After the meal, he checked on Spirit and found the sorrel was being well taken care of. Then Crazy Bear took him to a tepee that would be his to use for the night. A fire burned low in the center of the lodge, casting flickering shadows on the hide walls as Matt took off his hat, unbuckled his gunbelt and coiled it. He sat down on the bear robe that served as his bed to take off his boots.

The flap over the entrance was shoved aside suddenly, and Starwind stood there, glaring at him. She stepped farther into the tepee, let the flap fall closed behind her, reached down to the bottom of her buckskin shirt, and lifted it up and over her head, peeling the garment off her body so that she was nude from the waist up.

Matt took a deep breath. With an effort, he lifted his gaze from her firm, round, dark-tipped breasts so he was looking into her eyes instead. “What are you trying to do, girl?” he asked. “Get me killed? Anybody finds you here like that with me, I don’t care how peaceable a man your father is, he’ll have my hair.”

With her jaw set angrily, Starwind lifted the shirt and held it in front of her, which was a little bit of a relief, anyway.

“I am a woman!” she said.

“Well, yeah, I kind of got that idea,” Matt said.

“My father told you that I refuse to do woman’s work and that I ride and fight like a man, and these things are true. But that does not mean I am like some women who…who refuse to have anything to do with a man!”

“I didn’t really think it did,” Matt told her. “To tell you the truth, I didn’t even think about that.”

“Someday I will have a husband and children, but not now.”

“Good, because I’m not proposin’ to you. And I sure as hell didn’t make any sort of deal with Crazy Bear to buy you.”

“Oh!”

In her anger, she flung the shirt at him, smacking his face. He caught it before it could drop into the fire and stood up to toss it back to her. He tried not to notice how breathing hard made her chest heave. “I think you should put that back on and leave,” he told her.

“Take me with you when you search for Moon Fawn.”

“I told you, I can’t. Having you along would ruin the whole plan.”

“You saw what I can do. You know I can take care of myself.”

“I also know I can’t fool Bannerman into thinking I don’t know your folks if I have their daughter tagging along with me.”

She continued to glare at him, but after a moment, her sleek, bare shoulders rose and fell slightly. “I suppose you are right.”

“I know I am. Now, uh…”

She lowered the hand that held the shirt in front of her and stepped closer to him. “You would kiss me, Matt Jensen?”

“I would if I wanted to be tortured and burned at the stake,” he said. “Now, dadgum it, Starwind—”

During the ruckus that afternoon, he had seen how fast she could move when she wanted to, but she still surprised him. She dropped the shirt at her feet and had her arms around his neck before he could stop her. She had inherited some of her father’s height, which meant she didn’t have to stretch much in order for her mouth to reach his. Involuntarily, his arms went around her bare torso.

They stood like that, their lips working together, before Starwind pulled back and whispered, “I told you I am a woman.”

“I, uh, never doubted it,” Matt said.

Before he could kiss her again or say anything else, she slipped out of his arms. Moving as swiftly and gracefully as a deer, she picked up the shirt, pulled it over her head, and went to the entrance. She threw the flap back but paused to look over her shoulder at him. Her face wore a triumphant smile and her eyes sparkled as she said, “Now you will never forget it.” Her expression grew solemn as she added, “Find my niece.”

“I will,” Matt promised.

Then Starwind was gone.