“Seems they figger they got the right to ask us to pay for the beaver we’re taking from their criks,” Cooper explained what he had been told in the stillness of that council lodge. “They took our stock to pay for that beaver they say we’re stealing.”
“I don’t figger they’re asking for all that much,” Bass said.
For a moment Silas glowered at Titus, then finally asked, “What y’ think, Billy?”
“You tell me, Silas. Think we ought’n give ’em any of our beaver?”
Cooper looked at Tuttle. “If’n we don’t—these thievin’ bastards said they’d stretch us out over a fire an’ let their womens do their worst to us.”
“That … that ain’t ’sactly what they said, Silas,” Bass corrected.
“Oh?” Cooper demanded, smiling the best he could for the sake of the Crow men, his marblelike eyes nonetheless glaring holes in Bass.
“From what I saw ’em sign to you,” Titus explained, “they give us a choice.”
Pursing his lips in seething anger, Silas crossed his arms and said, “So now y’ figger y’ read sign language good enough to know what the hell these ol’ bucks said to me? S’pose y’ tell us all ’bout it, y’ boneheaded nigger.”
Not only were the eyes of the trappers on him now, but the black-cherry eyes of every one of the Crow elders and counselors were as well, clearly sensing the tension among the white men.
“From what I make of it,” Scratch started tentatively, then swallowed hard, “looks to be we got us one of two ways to go at this. We can give ’em something in trade for the beaver we been taking out’n the streams in their country, or …”
“Or?” Tuttle squeaked.
“Or they throw us right on out the way they found us—maybe lucky to get our mule and horse back.”
Hooks twisted to look at Cooper. “That true what Scratch said? We give ’em something to trade or they turn us out?”
Cooper nodded, his brow furrowed, anger smoldering at Bass, every bit as plain as sun on his face.
“But they’ll let us go?” Tuttle said. “Just let us ride on out—if’n we give ’em some plunder?”
“That’s the way I read the sign, boys,” Silas replied.
Then Bass declared, “Looks to me like we gotta figger out just how good it might turn out to be—us trapping here in Crow country.”
“What you think of us hanging back in this country, Silas?” Billy asked.
For a moment Cooper was silent; then with a smile he turned to Bass. “Let’s ask Scratch what he thinks we ought’n do.”
“I say we give ’em presents,” Titus was quick to answer. “Never know when it might turn out good to have us friends like these up here close to Blackfoot country, don’t you think?”
“Never thought of that,” Tuttle mused.
“What it cost us?” Hooks asked.
“Hardly nothing. A couple of horses and a blanket here, maybe a few beads or tin cup there,” Titus responded.
“That all they asking, Silas?” Hooks inquired, long ago conditioned to believe in Cooper, still doubtful of what Bass was telling them.
“By damn, Billy—if Scratch ain’t picked up enough sign to know fat cow from poor bull!” Cooper exclaimed with grudging admiration. “S’pose y’ go ahead on and tell us what else these ol’ bucks said ’bout keeping all our plunder for theyselves.”
With a jerk Tuttle twisted near fully around at that. “They gonna rob us of ever’thing?”
Cooper winked faintly, saying, “Y’ wanna tell ’em, Scratch? Or y’ want me to?”
“I s’pose if you’re asking me to tell Billy and Bud the bad news,” Bass began, then sighed. “These here Crow say we can walk on outta here just the way we walked in … ’cept we have to leave Hannah and the horse with the rest they took from us.”
“Or?” Cooper prodded, looking all the more smug.
“Or the Crow say we can pay ’em for their beaver—which means we can keep ever’thing what’s ours, and …”
Exasperated, Tuttle whined, “And?”
“And,” Bass paused, winking at Cooper, “we been invited to stay on till spring.”
The River Crow moved four times that winter, migrating each time to another traditional camping spot in another sheltered valley where wood and water were available, where the wind by and large kept large patches of the autumn-dried meadow grasses blown clear of snow. Every few weeks when the firewood became scarce and the last of the grass was cropped down, when the game grew harder to scare up and the campsites began to reek with human offal and that stench of an abundance of gut-piles, Big Hair’s River Crow set off behind one warrior band or another chosen by the elders to have the honor of selecting the valley where their brown and blackened lodges would next be raised.
Not only were they a handsome people, but the Crow turned out to be less haughty and arrogant than Titus had taken them to be at first. Whereas the Ute had welcomed the white men immediately, Big Hair’s band were a little slower to accept their winter visitors. But once they had warmed up to the trappers, the Crow turned out to be warm and generous hosts. As time went on, in fact, Titus discovered them not only to have a keen sense of humor—but they enjoyed playing practical jokes on one another … and on their guests.
“Silas!” Billy Hooks was bellowing as he came tearing out of the lodge where he had been taken by a clan elder, near naked.
To the four white men, it seemed like nothing new—just what had been the Crow’s practice all winter long: one man or another would present a wife or daughter to one of the trappers for a few nights, usually no longer than a phase or the moon. This day the trappers had been seated in the afternoon sun around a fire with more than a dozen warriors, smoking, talking in sign, practicing either their pidgin English or their stunted knowledge of Crow, when a clan elder came up to lead Billy off to a nearby lodge. While Billy frequently turned and winked, rubbing his crotch a time or two in lewd anticipation, the others watched.
And when the lodge door went down and all grew quiet, the men at the fire went back to their easy chatter and midwinter socializing. Suddenly Hooks burst from the lodge completely naked but for the buckskin shirt he desperately fought to clutch around his midsection as he stumbled and fell on the slick ground, clawed his way to his feet again, and raced for the fire, screeching.
“Dammit, Silas!”
As Cooper and Tuttle shot to their feet, Bass instead glanced at some of the brown faces gathered at that fire ring. Strange, he thought, that the dark eyes showed no surprise at this turn of events, no alarm.
“Don’t y’ want that squaw they give y’?” Silas demanded as the sputtering Billy approached, shuddering like an aspen leaf in autumn. Gazing over Hooks’s shoulder, Cooper and the others watched the woman emerge from the lodge, a blanket wrapped around what was clearly an otherwise naked body.
“H-her?” Billy squeaked, sliding to a stop on the slushy snow right in front of the giant trapper.
“For balls’ sake, Billy! She’s a looker,” Tuttle agreed, nodding.
“Damn now, Billy,” Cooper said, grasping Hooks’s shoulder with one big hand, “if’n y’ don’t want the slut—I’ll rut with her for a few days my own self.”
As the others appraised the squaw, Bass was again glancing in turn at the faces of the Crow men. By now the eyes were crinkling, and sly grins were beginning to crack the masks of indifference. A few even held hands over their mouths to stifle laughter, and for the first time Titus noticed the women gathering here and there in knots between the lodges, having halted their work at hides or child care to whisper and watch.