The Family Jensen (20 page)

Matt’s sorrel came when he whistled for it, and Smoke’s and Preacher’s horses followed. The three men mounted up and rode away from the cabin where they had been besieged, leaving the dead men who had worked for Reece Bannerman behind them. The rest of Bannerman’s crew of gun-wolves could retrieve the bodies later, if they were of a mind to, or leave them there for the scavengers. The three men they had tried to murder didn’t much care either way.

Preacher had the most unerring instincts of the three, so he took the lead. Despite the darkness and the fact that it had been a long time since he’d been in the valley, but he headed straight for Crazy Bear’s village.

They splashed across both shallow creeks that ran through the valley. A short time later, Preacher said, “We’re gettin’ close now. If the Crows been havin’ as much trouble as Crazy Bear claimed, they’re liable to be pretty jumpy. We better keep our eyes open. We don’t want to get shot full o’ arrows so’s we look like pincushions, just ’cause they mistook us for some o’ Bannerman’s bunch.”

They rode slowly and warily through the darkness. Because he was alert, Smoke was able to control the impulse to reach for his guns when a dozen or more shadowy figures suddenly appeared all around them. Ahead of him, Preacher reined in and said, “Whoa there, Horse.”

Smoke and Matt followed suit and halted their mounts as well. Smoke’s keen eyes made out the bows and arrows in the hands of the men surrounding them, and he felt relief that they had found the Crow, or maybe it was vice versa and the Crow had found them. Either way, the task facing him and his two companions was to convince the warriors they were friends.

“We come in peace,” Preacher said in the Crow tongue. “We are friends of Crazy Bear and the Crow people.”

One of the warriors lowered his bow slightly, but the others didn’t budge. The man stepped forward and asked, “Who are you who claim to be our friends?”

“Preacher,” the old mountain man replied. “And Smoke and Matt Jensen.”

For a moment, the Indian didn’t react. Then he spoke sharply and the other warriors pointed their arrows at the ground. “Preacher,” the man said in English, his voice breaking a little. “Smoke. Matt. Thank God.”

“Sandy?” Smoke asked. “Is that you?”

The last time Smoke had seen Crazy Bear’s son, Sandy had been wearing white man’s clothes. Now he was in buckskins and had a feather in his hair. It looked like the clash with Bannerman had caused the young man to turn back to his father’s ways.

Smoke, Matt, and Preacher dismounted. Sandy threw his arms around Smoke and hugged him, slapping him on the back, then shook hands with Matt and Preacher.

“We’re not far from the village,” he said. “Ever since the trouble started, my father has made sure there are guards out night and day, and warriors who are ready to move in a hurry if there’s any trouble threatening. One of our sentries came to the village and said three white men on horseback were headed our way, so we were ready to defend ourselves.”

Preacher nodded and said, “Thought it mighta been somethin’ like that, son. That’s why we were takin’ it sorta careful-like.”

“We’ll escort you to the village. Crazy Bear will be glad to see you.”

“How is your pa?”

Sandy hesitated, then said, “He’s been shot.”

“Shot!” Preacher thundered. “What in tarnation happened?”

“How bad is he hurt?” Smoke asked.

“He claims he’ll be all right,” Sandy said, “and as strong as he is, he probably will be. He was wounded in the side, but it’s just a deep graze. He lost a lot of blood, and he’s weak. Plus it’s a real struggle to keep him lying down so he can rest.”

“When did it happen?”

“This afternoon. He was out watching the creek and saw some of Bannerman’s punchers pushing cattle across, onto our land. He should have gone for help and not tried to stop them by himself, but…” Sandy’s voice trailed off. He didn’t have to explain. All three of the white men knew Crazy Bear. He didn’t have any more back off in him than they did.

“Maybe you should take him to town and let a doctor look at him,” Matt suggested.

Sandy shook his head. “Crazy Bear wouldn’t go along with that. Anyway, my mother says she can take care of him as well as any doctor could. Between the Crow ways of healing and the things she knows from being a gypsy, she claims she can cure just about anything.”

“She’s probably right.” Smoke said with a chuckle. “How are Robin and that little girl of yours?”

“They’re fine, thank goodness.”

“Does Moon Fawn still carry around that doll of hers? What was its name? Gregor?”

“She’s never without it,” Sandy said. “Now, we’d better get moving.”

Smoke, Matt, and Preacher led their horses instead of riding. Some of the warriors remained behind on guard. The others accompanied Sandy and the three white men to the village.

The smells of wood smoke and bear grease were familiar, as were the dogs that greeted the group with barks and wagging tails. Sandy asked some of the men to take care of the horses, then took the visitors directly to the large tepee that belonged to Crazy Bear and Mala.

“Our friends are here,” Sandy announced as he pushed aside the hide flap over the entrance and stepped into the tepee. Preacher, Smoke, and Matt followed him into the lodge.

“Preacher!” Mala cried. She was sitting next to Crazy Bear, who lay stretched out on a pile of bearskin robes. She got quickly to her feet and hugged the old mountain man. “You’re still alive.”

“O’ course I’m still alive,” he said gruffly. “Accordin’ to these disrespectful young’uns I’m travelin’ with, I’m just too cantankerous to die.”

Crazy Bear started to sit up. “Old friend,” he rumbled.

Mala turned toward him and knelt to put a hand on his shoulder. “I want you to lie there and rest,” she admonished. “Preacher can come over here and talk to you.”

Crazy Bear wanted to argue, but he sighed and went along with what his wife told him. Preacher hunkered on his heels beside Crazy Bear and gripped the chief’s hand. “Old friend,” he said.

Crazy Bear waved for Smoke and Matt to come closer. They gathered around him. Crazy Bear had a thick pad of moss bound to his side where he’d been shot. It worked as well or better than anything for stopping the bleeding and drawing poison out of a wound.

“I did not know if you would come, or even if you were still alive,” Crazy Bear said. His normal voice, which was reminiscent of an avalanche, was noticeably weaker than usual. He looked over at Smoke and Matt. “Now that all three of you are here, I know things will be all right.”

“Durned right they will,” Preacher said.

“We ran into a little trouble along the way,” Smoke said. “We went around Buffalo Flat because we wanted to get here as quickly as we could, and when we were cutting across Bannerman’s northern range, some of his hired killers jumped us.”

Sandy said, “You must have gotten away from them. You don’t appear to be wounded. Just…covered with soot?”

Smoke grinned. “Yeah, we had to fort up for a while in one of Bannerman’s line shacks, and Matt and I wound up climbing out through the chimney.” He waved a hand. “It’s a long story. But we’re all right—”

“And about a dozen o’ Bannerman’s gun-totin’ rannies ain’t,” Preacher finished.

“Good,” Crazy Bear said. “But he has more killers working for him.”

“Many more,” Sandy put in. “I’ve heard rumors that he may have as many as sixty gunmen on that ranch.”

“That’s only twenty-to-one odds for the three of us,” Matt said with a grin. “We can handle that.”

“My people will fight with you,” Crazy Bear said. “Bannerman wants war. If he tries to force the Crow off our land, he will get it.”

Matt thumbed his hat back on his blond hair and looked serious again as he said, “I don’t reckon that was really a truce that started last year after Moon Fawn was kidnapped. Bannerman was just letting things cool off a little. Biding his time, I guess you could say.”

“And using that time to recruit more gunfighters,” Smoke said. “I’m startin’ to wonder if he had something to do with that little girl being captured, after all.”

“Of course he did,” Sandy said. “I think he hired those men specifically to kidnap Moon Fawn and didn’t tell the rest of his crew about it because he didn’t want anything connecting him to them in case something went wrong and”—his voice caught, but he forced himself to go on—“Moon Fawn wound up dead.”

“You could be right,” Matt said. “But what in blazes was he after? What was that mysterious something the kidnappers wanted to find?”

“That’s easy,” Sandy said. “Bannerman was after the proof that our people really do own those hunting grounds. He can’t push his cattle across the creek because that range legally belongs to the Crow.”

Crazy Bear lifted his head to frown at his son. “What are you saying, Little Bear?”

Sandy smiled. “I’m saying that the law is on our side, because I filed on the entire upper section of the valley on this side of the creek eight years ago in the name of Sandor Little Bear.”

Smoke and Matt chuckled while the others in the tepee looked at Sandy in thunderstruck surprise. Finally, Crazy Bear asked, “How could you do this thing?”

“I sent the papers to the Department of the Interior in Washington while I was on one of my trips back to St. Louis,” Sandy explained. “I knew Congress had just modified the original Homestead Act so people could acquire larger tracts of land, so I put in my claim and it was first. The next time I went to St. Louis, the deed to this part of the valley was waiting for me.”

“No!” Crazy Bear pushed himself up on an elbow, ignoring Mala’s efforts to keep him lying down. “I mean, how could you betray your people that way?”

Sandy drew back, a look on his face like his father had just struck him. “Betray my people?” he repeated. “Why do you think I’ve betrayed the Crow?”

“You use a white man’s trick to claim the land we have hunted for many moons is now yours!” Crazy Bear’s voice shook with angry accusation. “You would steal the land of your own people! You are worse than a white man!”

“Crazy Bear, stop it,” Mala urged. “Lie down. You’re going to make your wound worse.”

“No worse than the wound my son has just dealt me,” Crazy Bear growled. But he stretched out on the robes again and glared at Sandy.

“Listen to me,” the young man said. “I’m not stealing anything. I’m protecting the land for the Crow. This was the only way to do it. You have to understand…Times have changed. Things are different now.”

“We will protect our land the same way we have always protected it,” Crazy Bear said. “With arrows and knives and tomahawks…and with our blood!”

“It doesn’t work that way anymore,” Sandy argued. “This way we have some legal standing.”

Smoke spoke up, asking, “Was it the deed that Bannerman was after?”

“Of course,” Sandy replied with a nod. “He thought he could trade Moon Fawn’s life for it.”

“How did he know about it in the first place?” Matt asked.

“I’m not sure, but I suspect that he tried to file on the land, too, and found that someone had beaten him to it.” Sandy shrugged. “A man with Bannerman’s wealth and influence wouldn’t have much trouble finding some minor bureaucrat who would tell him what he wanted to know. I figure that’s how he found out I own the land.”

Crazy Bear made a disgusted noise deep in his throat and looked away, as if he couldn’t stand the sight of his son.

Smoke rubbed his jaw in thought. “If you’ve filed a claim on the land, then it isn’t open range anymore,” he said to Sandy. “You could take Bannerman to court if he ran his cattle on it.”

“Yes, but could I win?” Sandy made a gesture that took in his buckskins. “An Indian trying to convince a jury to favor him over a rich, powerful white cattleman?” He shook his head. “I hate to say it, Smoke, but that’s pretty unlikely.”

“Then why doesn’t Bannerman just take you to court and get it over with?” Matt asked.

Smoke answered the question. “Because he doesn’t want to take the chance that Sandy
might
win, even if it’s a slim one. But if he could get his hands on that deed and destroy it, then it would be simple for him to bribe some clerk back in Washington to…misplace, I guess you’d say…the copy that’s on file back there.”

“And if I were dead, it would clear the way for him completely,” Sandy said.

Smoke nodded. “Yeah, that, too.”

Preacher looked impatient as he burst out, “You young fellas yap as much as them danged dogs! The question is, what in blazes are we gonna
do
about this?”

“The first thing we’re going to do is move Bannerman’s cattle back across the creeks,” Smoke said. “The longer we let them stay over here, the worse it’ll look in court.”

“Then you
do
think we should take the matter to court?” Matt asked.

Smoke nodded. “I do. If we can establish Sandy’s legal ownership of the land, Bannerman might back off. He wouldn’t just be going against Crazy Bear’s people, he’d be going against the United States government, too.”

Preacher made a disgusted noise and shook his head. “What in tarnation’s happened to you, boy? Was a time you’d’ve just rode over to the Circle B and shot it out with Bannerman and his bunch, and to hell with the law and the gov’ment! You don’t set the law on a hydrophobic skunk. You just kill it!”

“There’s a good chance it’s gonna come to that,” Smoke said with a nod. “But Sandy’s right, Preacher. Whether we like it or not, times have changed. If we get it on record that we’re defending Sandy’s rightful claim to the land, then the law won’t be as likely to charge us with murder once the killin’ starts.”

Preacher continued to glare, but after a moment he shrugged and said, “All right. I’ll go along with them crazy notions for now. But if that don’t work, I’m settlin’ things with old-fashioned law. Powdersmoke law!”

After the three visitors had been fed bowls of an excellent stew full of chunks of venison and wild onions, Crazy Bear asked Preacher to stay in his tepee, and the old mountain man agreed. Smoke and Matt were taken to lodges they could use as long as they were staying in the Crow village.

Matt was tired from the strain of the afternoon-long siege in the hot cabin. He was looking forward to stretching out on the thick bearskin robe and getting some sleep. He had taken off his hat, gunbelt, and boots and was unbuttoning his shirt when the entrance flap on the tepee was pushed back and a buckskin-clad figure ducked inside.

“Well,” Matt said as a smile slowly curved his lips. He unfastened the last button and peeled off the garment. “I seem to remember another time when you burst in unannounced like that. You were the one who took off your shirt that time, though.”

Starwind looked intently at him, her breasts rising and falling as she breathed hard. After a few seconds she said, “Then it is true. You have come back to help us, Matt Jensen.”

Matt grew more solemn as he nodded. “That’s right. Preacher and Smoke and I are all here to do what we can to keep Bannerman from forcing your people off their land. It won’t happen if we have anything to say about it.”

“People have been wounded, including my father.”

Matt nodded again. “We talked to Crazy Bear, and to your brother Sandy.” He paused. “Did you know he’d filed papers with the government claiming this whole part of the valley?”

Starwind nodded. “He told me…and I told him he was mad! No white man’s court is ever going to say an Indian owns land another white man wants.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure,” Matt said. “Anyway, Sandy is only half Crow, just like you.”

“You truly think the fact that my mother is a gypsy will help? According to her, in many places her people are looked down on and scorned, just like the Indians.”

“Well, that may be true,” Matt admitted. “But the law is the law. Not only that—and I’m not boasting here—Smoke and I both know some folks who might be able to help us. The governor of Colorado has already called on the territorial governor up here in Wyoming to launch an investigation. Smoke’s been in touch with his lawyers in Denver, and he can call in favors from some of those railroad barons if he needs to. He’s given them a hand in times past.”

Starwind shook her head. “All this talk of politicians and lawyers…it means nothing where Bannerman’ shired killers are concerned.”

“Smoke and Preacher and I will deal with them if we have to,” Matt said softly.

“Three men against fifty or sixty? What can they do?”

“Depends on who the three men are, I reckon.”

Her dark eyes studied him as another moment of silence went by. Then she said, “You mean to do this, don’t you? To risk your lives for my father and his people?”

“We’ve already done that. We had a run-in with Bannerman’s gunnies this afternoon. We’ve already taken cards in this game, Starwind. There’s no choice now but to play it out to the end.”

“Even if it costs you your lives.” The words weren’t a question, but a statement. She stepped closer to him, rested the fingertips of one hand against his bare chest. “Matt…”

He put his arms around her and drew her to him. Their mouths met as their bodies strained against each other.

Outside, firelight flickered on the tepee, obscuring the shadows that moved inside it.

The next morning, Smoke, Matt, and Preacher rode across a broad meadow covered with lush green grass so tall that in places it brushed the bellies of their horses. About half a mile ahead of them twisted a line of trees that marked the course of the creek.

Between them and the creek were close to a hundred cattle. Though Smoke wasn’t close enough to see the brands, he would have bet money each of those cows wore the Circle B.

“We’ll split up and start the gather,” Smoke said. As the owner of his own ranch, he had more experience at that sort of thing than either of the other two.

Preacher grumbled. “I never set out to be no dang cowpuncher,” he said. “It ain’t a fittin’ job for a real man.”

“That’s right,” Matt agreed with a grin. “Working cattle ties you down in one place too much. I’d rather drift on whenever the notion hits me.”

“That’s fine for a couple of irresponsible hombres like you two,” Smoke said. “But where would the world be if everybody felt like that?”

“It’d be a damn sight less complicated, I can tell you that,” Preacher insisted.

Smoke chuckled. “Keep your eyes open. Bannerman would be a fool not to have any riders up in these parts.”

The three men spread out as they approached the cattle. The herd was scattered over a half-mile. Smoke, Matt, and Preacher began pushing them together, gathering the animals so that they could be driven back across the creek in a more compact group. Despite the protests voiced by Preacher and Matt, each of them had done enough similar work they were able to cover their section and get the cattle moving without too much trouble.

The cattle began to bawl. They didn’t like being bothered when they could be standing around enjoying the rich graze. The men hooted and hollered and swung their hats in the air and the cows began trudging in the direction the men wanted them to go. It was noisy work, and Smoke knew he might not be able to hear hoofbeats of approaching horses. For that reason he kept his eyes moving all the time, searching the landscape around them for any sign of Bannerman’s men.

He saw the four riders coming when they were still several hundred yards away on the other side of the creek. The cattle were all converging, and Smoke could see Preacher in the middle. He turned his horse and galloped toward the old mountain man.

As Smoke rode up and fell in alongside Preacher, he saw Matt coming from the other direction and figured that the younger man had spotted their impending company, too.

“I see ’em,” Preacher said before Smoke could say anything. “More o’ Bannerman’s gun-wolves, you reckon?”

“Maybe not all of them,” Smoke said. “A couple could be regular punchers. But I’m bettin’ the other two are gunhands. We can’t ignore the cowboys, either. They’re probably plenty tough, and if they ride for the brand, they’ll likely fight to defend it.”

Matt rode up on Preacher’s other side. “Looks like trouble coming,” he said.

“I’m ready for it.” Preacher leaned to the side and spat on the ground. “Hell, it’s been more’n twelve hours since anybody shot at me.”

Smoke grinned. Sally wouldn’t like it, but he felt pretty much the same way.

The cattle stopped when they reached the creek, clumping up along the bank and bawling. Smoke, Matt, and Preacher rode around the herd to the north and reined in at the edge of the stream. The four men on the other side of the creek rode toward them and halted on the opposite bank.

“What the hell do you think you’re doin’?” one of them yelled. “Those are Circle B cows! You ain’t got no right to move ’em!”

“You’re right about them being Circle B cows,” Smoke replied. He didn’t raise his voice, but his deep, powerful tones carried across the creek without any trouble. “And they don’t have any right to be over here on Crow land.”

“Crow land! What in blazes are you talkin’ about? This is open range. And even if it wasn’t, it sure don’t belong to no damn redskins!”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” Smoke said. “You’re gonna have to push these cattle back across to the other side of Badger Creek. The upper section of the valley, from Turtle Rock north and west of Badger Creek, belongs to Sandor Little Bear, son of the Crow chief Crazy Bear, and is being held in trust for the entire band of Crow led by Crazy Bear.”

The spokesman for the four riders stared at Smoke for a couple seconds, then exploded, “You’re outta your damn mind! Injuns can’t own land!”

“You’re wrong about that,” Smoke said. “Just because most of them don’t doesn’t mean they can’t.”

During the tense conversation, Smoke had been studying the men on the other side of the creek. Just as he had guessed, two of them had the hardbitten look of hired gunslingers, while the other two men seemed to be common cowboys. As Smoke had said to Preacher, those cowboys couldn’t be ignored. They were armed, just like the two gunmen, and they looked eager to fight.

The four men glared across the creek in angry silence for a moment, then the spokesman sneered and said, “So the redskins have hired themselves some gunnies.”

Smoke shook his head. “We’re not working for the Crow. They’re our friends. We’re just trying to help them do what’s right.”

“I’ll tell you what’s right,” the gunman blustered. “You get the hell away from them cows and leave ’em be, that’s what’s right!”

Smoke’s voice was dangerously mild as he said, “You can move them, or we’ll finish the job we started. Up to you.”

“What the hell kind of man takes up for a bunch of filthy Injuns?” the gunman demanded.

“Name’s Smoke Jensen,” Smoke said quietly. “That’s Matt Jensen, and the old-timer is Preacher.”

“You mighta heard tell of us,” the old mountain man put in with a savage grin.

The two cowhands suddenly glanced at each other, and their eagerness to fight ran out of them like water from a cup. One of them said, “Maybe we better go back to the ranch and tell Mr. Bannerman about this, Ketchum.”