Cheyenne Captive (29 page)

Now through the early spring, the colonel’s lady worked Gray Dove a little harder since her husband had acquiesced about keeping the girl. It seemed to Gray Dove that all she did was polish stoves but she put up with the hard work patiently. When she got to the white’s city of Richmond, she would figure out another way to make money, for she was very clever.

Every Tuesday morning, she entertained the old colonel, sometimes even in the root cellar. He never got much better sexually and sometimes she had to grit her teeth to keep from scolding him in her sexual frustration. But she was smart enough to feign satisfaction and he always smiled shamefacedly and sometimes slipped her a little money. This she carefully saved toward the time she would start a new future in the place called Virginia.

She never left the fort with the Willards. It was that month the Cheyenne call
Matsiomishi
and the whites know as April that her father came riding into the fort to trade, having long assumed his whole family was dead. She had no interest in returning with him, of course, but there rode with him the most exciting, virile Cheyenne Dog Soldier of about sixteen years or so that she had ever seen.

He hardly noticed her, but when she saw him she fell deeply in love for the first time and dreamed of becoming his woman. He was of the Hevataniu band and it had been them the Pawnee Knife Lance soldiers under Bear’s Eyes were riding to attack that fateful day in the autumn when her family’s path had crossed the Pawnee’s. His father, War Bonnet, had been killed in that attack, she learned, but his half-grown son had fought bravely and the Cheyenne had succeeded in repulsing the Skidi and driven them in retreat back to their own country up on the Platte.

Even now, she remembered how the sun had gleamed on his fine, rippling muscles, his handsome high cheekbones. His back and face were scarred and she wondered about that, never knowing how it had come about. She only knew it was something terrible that was buried in his past among the whites.

She was so charmed by him, although he gave her no encouragement, that she thought of nothing else but returning to the Indian camp in hopes that the young Cheyenne Dog Soldier might take her as his woman. She didn’t even mind that her father beat her up and took her small cache of coins she had saved and bought whiskey with it.

The Willards were leaving for Richmond the next day. The colonel’s lady had gone off to tell her friends good-bye and left ironing and, of course, the endless stove polishing for Gray Dove to do.

The Indians were ready to ride out when Gray Dove made her final decision. She decided Virginia mattered not at all to her if she had a chance to become the Cheyenne’s woman and she ran back to the quarters to gather her few belongings.

The colonel came in as she gathered her things. “Where are you going?” he asked. “The stage doesn’t leave until tomorrow.”

“I’m going back with the Indians,” she answered coldly. “I’ve changed my mind.”

He grabbed her by the shoulders. “You can’t!” he stammered. “I—I don’t know what I would do without you. I love you, Gray Dove! You can’t leave me. I thought you loved me, too.”

“Love!” she laughed bitterly. “What you call love is like being mounted by a steer! A gelding! Do you hear! I am sick to my stomach every time you touch me! I can hardly wait to get away from you!” She brushed his bewildered hands away. “You stupid old fool! Do you think I could ever really care for you!”

He collapsed in sobs on the settee and Gray Dove smiled coldly, enjoying the fact that she had wounded him deeply. She gathered her things and looking around, decided to leave a message for Mrs. Willard, a message she could not mistake.

Running back in her room, she took the Black Book from the washstand and tore the pages out, scattering them in a frenzy. Next, she took the black stove polish and carefully poured it all over Mrs. Willard’s white blouses that were waiting to be ironed and then all over everything in the house until she used it up.

The colonel still sobbed, a broken man on the settee, as she gathered her things and left, not even bothering to say good-bye.

She ran to join the departing Indians.

That had been ten long years ago....

The thought of Iron Knife brought her back to the present and she realized she had been sitting here motionless for nearly an hour by the pegged-down buffalo hide, the scraper idle in her hand as she remembered the past. For ten years now, she had schemed to become the woman of Iron Knife although she occasionally crawled into the blankets with another warrior if he offered gifts. But her heart belonged to the big Dog Soldier. She had given up a chance at an easy life in the white civilization to stay near Iron Knife, never giving up hope that someday he would realize that she was the right woman for him.

The white bitch called Summer Sky came out of Pony Woman’s tepee just then and Gray Dove glared at her in fury. As long as that pale one was in this camp, Iron Knife could see no other.

She would have to get rid of the yellow-haired one,
she vowed.
There was no other answer.
Savagely, she scraped at the hide and smiled to herself. She had just decided how to rid the camp of Summer Sky forever!

Gray Dove laid her plans carefully and waited several days to take action. She figured it would take her maybe two days to ride into Fort Smith and maybe two days back. The war party might be gone a week or more which gave her plenty of time to do something about Summer before the men returned. Then she would feign ignorance when anyone wondered about the girl’s disappearance.

In the meantime, the Jesuit priest came to the camp as he made his rounds among the plains tribes in the name of his god. The Indians trusted the frail, saintly man who came and went on his mule and he had free access to all the camps.

She watched from afar as Summer called the old priest into her tepee. Gray Dove hoped she might be asking for help in escaping, but in her heart she was sure the white girl planned a wedding ceremony. The thought made Gray Dove grind her teeth in jealous fury.

So she made her plans, and late one chilly afternoon when no one was around she mounted her dun-colored pony and rode toward Fort Smith.

It was night as she reached the fort at the junction of the Arkansas and Poteau rivers on that rocky bluff the French traders called La Belle Point. The harvest moon shone on the small jumble of brick and stone buildings as she rode into the settlement.

Gray Dove wondered if there really was a big reward out for the missing girl. No matter, reward or no, she determined to hand the girl over to the soldiers and get her out of Iron Knife’s arms forever. She wanted this badly enough to risk the anger of the old Cheyenne chiefs. Besides, if she handled this right, no one would ever know where Summer went or who was responsible for her disappearance.

Light shone from the saloons as she rode down the main street. Raucous noise and piano music drifted to her ears. She realized it must be that weekly ceremony the whites called “Saturday night.”

Uncertainly, she paused in front of a saloon and dismounted, listening to the crash of chairs and glass from inside. A woman screamed and men roared challenges so Gray Dove realized a fight was in progress. She knew a soldier chief called a “colonel” was probably in charge of the fort, but she wasn’t sure where she would find this chief on a Saturday night.

As she stood there, trying to decide what to do next, a big man strode out the swinging doors of the saloon, rubbing his knuckles in satisfaction. “Shoulda finished killin’ the sonabitch!” he drawled as he came down to the hitching post for his horse and seemed to see Gray Dove for the first time.

In the light streaming from the saloon doors, she saw a big man in his middle forties. She could smell him even though she couldn’t see him clearly and she thought immediately of the old “Mountain Men.”

“A squaw!” he exclaimed, looking her over as he swayed on his feet. “A sure ’nuff dogeatin’ squaw. This must be my lucky night!”

She watched as he pulled out a Lucifer match from a small match tin and lit a cigar with unsteady hands. In the sudden glare of the flame she saw he had small, mean eyes and streaks of gray in his beard. He wore a western-type hat with two feathers in the brim and a rough, fur vest.

“Come here, missy, let me look you over.” His ignorant drawl was more a threat than an invitation. She thought from his accent that he was from someplace in the South like the Willards.

Touching the small knife hidden in her clothes for reassurance, she moved closer. “I need to see the colonel of this fort. Is he in the saloon?”

He looked at her a long moment as he smoked his cigar. “You speak pretty good English for an Injun,” he said. “Whata you want with the colonel?”

“Is he in there?” she persisted, annoyed now.

“Hell, no, he ain’t!” The man shook his shaggy head, leaned against the hitching post. “The colonel and some of the officers is off at some big meeting and left that snot-nosed Captain Baker in charge. That kid don’t know enuff to pour piss outa boot with directions writ on the heel!”

She moved closer. “You will take me to Captain Baker?”

“Tonight? Gawd Almighty, woman, I ain’t gonna risk botherin’ an officer this late at night! He’d skin me for sure. They don’t pay us scouts much but it ain’t worth losin’ for wakin’ up the captain!”

“You’re an army scout?” She put her hand on his beefy arm and deliberately brushed her big breasts against his rough shirt. “Maybe you could point out the captain to me in the morning?”

The man shrugged. “Why would I? I never do nothin’ extra ‘les there’s somethin’ in it for me.”

She wondered if the scout had any money on him as she brushed against him again. “We could go somewhere and talk.”

He took a deep draw on the smelly little cigar and she remembered that at the Nebraska fort she had heard the cigars called “stogies” because the drovers of the big, Connestogacovered wagons of the settlers favored them.

“Hell, honey.” He grinned at her. “I think I could find something better to do with you than talk.”

She winked and smiled agreeably. “I’d like some of the white man’s whiskey.”

He guffawed as he took her arm. “If you ain’t the uppitiest little bitch I’ve seen in a long time! You know they ain’t gonna serve an Injun gal whiskey.”

“For you, I think they would.” She smiled archly at him, knowing she appealed now to his pride.

He laughed as he gathered up the two horses’ reins and led her rather unsteadily around the corner to a smaller, grimier saloon.

It was
dismal,
she thought as they entered. Two men drank at the bar and over in a corner a private lay passed out across a table, his glass overturned before him. A card game was in progress among a tableful of cowboys under the dirty glow of an oil light. At another table, two men sat with white whores on their laps, kissing and fondling them. The women might once have been pretty and young but were neither anymore.

The rough man led her to a table and they sat down. One or two men looked at her with interest and then studied her big escort and looked away.

The bartender came over. “Now, you know I can’t serve no Injuns liquor,” he whined.

“Two whiskies!” the big man said as if he hadn’t heard him.

She watched the bartender man fumble with his apron a moment, looking at the big man. Then he went over and came back with two dirty glasses of cheap whiskey.

She sipped the raw liquor that burned her throat and watched the scout gulp his. Curiously, she watched the two white women and the way the men ran their hands over them as they kissed them.

Her escort laughed as he followed her gaze. “They’re playin’ something called ‘mouth fishin’,” he drawled. “Cowboys usually do it with squaws for fun but those two old bags ain’t choosy anymore.”

“I never heard of ‘mouth fishin.’” Gray Dove shrugged in annoyance, thinking he made fun of her. “It looks like kissing to me!”

Just then, one of the women laughed triumphantly and extracted a coin from her mouth. The money immediately got Gray Dove’s attention.

“See?” the man drawled as he leaned back in his chair. “The gal has to fish the coin outa the man’s mouth,
comprende?
He gets a little fun and she gets to keep the money.”

Gray Dove looked at him. “You speak Spanish. Are you from the Mexican country?”

“Hell, honey,” he boasted. “I been just about everywhere. You gotta speak the lingo if you go anywheres south or west of here.” He tipped his hat back and scratched his head absently.

She tried not to stare but she couldn’t keep from gaping at the pink, bald spot in his wiry, long hair just back of his forehead.

He glared at her and pulled the hat back down on his forehead self-consciously. “What’s the matter? Ain’t you ever seen what the Comanche can do to a man? They wasn’t even waitin’ ’til I was dead yet! I was lucky to come outa that alive! You ain’t Pawnee, are you?”

“No, Arapaho.” She tore her gaze away from his disfigurement, knowing he asked because the Pawnee considered a man scalped as a man to be treated as already dead. “Show me about ‘mouth fishin.’” She got up and settled herself on his lap, rubbing her big breasts against his chest.

He guffawed and pulled a strange little black leather money pouch from his fur vest and popped a coin in his mouth.

Wiggling on his lap, she put her arms around his neck. “I intend to leave here a rich woman!” She laughed.

His hands pawed her breasts. “Missy, you may not leave here at all tonight unless you go home with me.”

The two men at the bar ambled over to watch in idle curiosity. The card players paused and looked toward the couple.

Very slowly and deliberately, she put her tongue between his lips and probed deeply into his mouth. She felt him tense under her and one of his big hands went to her bare knee and stroked along her thigh. She teased him with her tongue, running it along his teeth. She found the coin and took it from his mouth, holding it up triumphantly for all to see.

“Gawd Almighty!” he exclaimed to the other men. “I never had so much fun losin’ money. Here, honey, let’s do that again!”

“Let’s see if you got enough money to keep this up!” she challenged. This time as she took the coin from his mouth, she could feel his fingers probing further up her thigh as she did with her tongue. She started to protest, then decided not to anger him. She wanted the money and she needed him to point out the captain for her the next day.

“Let’s go to my quarters, honey.” he muttered. “I got something better in mind.”

One of the cowboys who had been watching said, “Is this a private game or can anybody play?”

She felt the big scout tense threateningly and she whispered in his ear. “What does it hurt? Let me take the cowboy for his money. I’ll buy you some drinks.”

He looked at her a long moment and then grinned in agreement. “Missy, you’re a gal after my own heart! I never say ‘no’ to another drink or makin’ a little money.”

He stood up suddenly, dumping her unceremoniously on the floor. “Sure, Cowboy, you can have a chance at my little Injun gal. So can any of you. But let’s see some gold. None of them little silver coins now!”

Immediately, the card game broke up and the men came to the table to watch. Even the two who had been holding the white women on their laps dumped them off in the floor and came over.

Gray Dove took a lot of money from the men in the next hour or so. The scout took over handling the coins, inspecting them carefully to make sure no one slipped her anything to small.
This was easy
, she thought happily. All she had to do was take the coins from the men’s mouths while she rubbed her big breasts against their chests and they ran their hands up and down her thighs.

Finally, the scout complained. “I’m tired of watchin’ you guys put yore hands all over where I wanta put somethin’ else. Come on, honey, let’s go to my place!”

She pouted and pulled away when he tried to jerk her off a cowboy’s lap. “I want to make money.”

“Money mean that much to you?” He smiled cruelly. “I’ll show you how to really make money!” He turned to the crowd of men. “You guys want more’n just a sample, come over to my place in a few minutes, you can all have at her. Bring cash!”

Then he took her wrist and pulled her outside to the hitching rail.

Angrily, she shook his hand off. “What gives you the right to offer me to all those men?”

“Listen, you little dog-eatin’ squaw.” He jerked her around roughly to face him. His eyes were cold and mean. “You probably be givin’ it away out in the grass for years. I’m gonna show you how the white whores do it and take a little cut for helpin’ you. I’d like to live a little better’n I do now on an army scout’s pay.”

She sulked as she looked up at him. “I haven’t got my share of what I just took in the saloon yet.”

He threw back his head and laughed, turned loose of her arm, and reached info his vest for the money pouch. “If you don’t beat all! I never saw anyone so money hungry, except me, of course. I think we’re two of a kind, missy!” He counted out half the coins and put them in her hand.

They mounted up and rode over to his quarters. The room was small, dirty, and smelled bad.

“I don’t think I like this idea after all,” she complained, disliking the place. “Soldiers don’t have much money.”

“They do right now ’cause they just got paid.” He peeled his ve,st off and unbuttoned his shirt. “And what they got, we’ll git!”

She scowled. “Why should I cut you in when I do all the work?”

“Because I know how to get you more money! They’d try to cheat a squaw but they’d be afraid to cheat me.” He sat down on the edge of the rumpled bed and pulled off his boots. “Listen, honey, I got bigger ideas! I always wanted to own a saloon with fancy women upstairs. You could be one of my main girls. I could dress you up pretty and pass you off as a Spanish duchess or some such.”

Gray Dove snorted. “No man would believe that!”

“Sure they would. I’ll do something to your hair, put jewels on you like that Lola Montez out in Californy! Them dudes that’s startin’ to pour in here don’t know an Injun when they see one.”

She watched him stand, unbutton his pants, and pull them off. “Why should white men be coming here?”

“The gold strike west of here over in the Rockies! Ain’t you heard the rumors?”

She pulled her shift over her head. “White men can’t go there! That’s Cheyenne-Arapaho hunting grounds! They’ve got a treaty. Do you want to dig for gold?”

He sat down on the edge of the bed again, looking up at her. “Gawd Almighty, no! It’s too damned much work. I jest want to take it from the suckers who do find it. And as for the Injun huntin’ grounds, since when does that mean anything to whites? If there’s gold in that Colorado country, the army’ll just move the Injuns outa there! And they’ll need saloons and fancy women in those boom towns!”

She stood in front of him nude, and the light from the moon shining through the window silhouetted her lush body as she felt his eyes on her. “Am I a ‘fancy’ woman?”

“The fanciest!” he assured her as he reached for her.

She evaded his hands. “You are going to pay me for loving me tonight?”

“Hell, no, I don’t pay!” He jerked her to him roughly.