The old warrior touched his chest. “I be Wilupup Hemeen.”
“Winter Wolf?” Fargo translated.
“We take you our village. Sit in council. Could be you live. Could be you not live.”
Fargo had to submit to being hauled to his feet and swung onto the Ovaro. Winter Wolf took the reins and climbed on his Appaloosa. The other warriors followed.
“Mind if we talk?”
“Talk when at village.”
Fargo sighed. He’d met a few Nez Perce in his travels. He hoped he would run across one of them when they got there. “There was a time when the Nez Perce treated whites as brothers.”
Winter Wolf glanced back. “You not listen.”
“I don’t want your people to make a mistake,” Fargo said. “Harm me and the bluecoats will come. There will be war between the Nez Perce and the white man.” He was exaggerating. It was unlikely the United States government would go to that extreme over the death of one man.
“We maybe take warpath anyway,” Winter Wolf said. “All whites like you. They not listen. We tell stay away. But more whites come. And more and more and more.”
“After gold. Yes, I know all about it. But I’m not in your land for that reason.”
“All whites hungry for yellow rock,” Winter Wolf said gruffly. “They try take our land. We not let them.”
“I don’t blame you. I would fight the whites, too, if I was a Nez Perce. But only the whites who were after gold.”
To his surprise, Winter Wolf chuckled. “You think I dumb but I not dumb.”
“I never said any such thing.”
“How I know you not after gold? How I know you not speak with two tongues?”
“I could be lying, yes,” Fargo admitted. “You have to take my word that I’m not.”
Winter Wolf chuckled again. “Take word of a white man? You, how you say, funny.”
The old warrior fell silent. Fargo tried to draw him out but Winter Wolf had apparently said all he was going to. They rode along until about sunset when they came to a small clearing near a stream. The warriors climbed down and two of the younger ones none too gently pulled him from the saddle.
“We’re camping for the night?” Fargo asked. He tried to sound as if it didn’t mean anything to him, when in fact the prospect of escape was being handed to him on a double-edged platter.
“We reach village in three sleeps,” Winter Wolf disclosed.
Fargo was thrown onto his side next to the fire a warrior was kindling. Rising on an elbow, he saw two of the younger ones go off into the trees with their bows to hunt. That whittled the odds but he wasn’t about to do anything in broad daylight. Patience was called for.
The hunters returned with a doe, which was promptly butchered. The Nez Perce roasted their meat but they weren’t finicky about how well done it was. Fargo’s mouth watered and his belly growled but no one offered a piece to him. Finally he said, “My belly is empty. I sure could use some of that venison.”
His mouth dripping, Winter Wolf said, “Good for you not eat. Maybe you listen better.”
“Is this what you call Nez Perce hospitality?”
“It what I call smart,” Winter Wolf said, and laughed.
Fargo sank onto his side and closed his eyes. He wanted them to think he was resigned to his fate. He listened to them talk, catching snatches of words here and there, enough to glean that the Nez Perce were on the brink of open hostilities with the whites. There had been clashes between gold seekers and warriors, and blood was spilled.
A young warrior made a comment to the effect that the gold hunters weren’t the only ones the Nez Perce had to be concerned about. Some whites wanted to till the soil and build wooden lodges, as the warrior called cabins. The Nez Perce weren’t going to allow that, either.
Fargo immediately thought of the wagon train. Sooner or later the Nez Perce were bound to come across it. Then again, the tribe laid claim to a large territory encompassing thousands of square miles, and they couldn’t be everywhere at once. It was entirely possible Winston’s bunch would have their cabins built before the Nez Perce discovered them. Either way, the outcome wasn’t in doubt. The farmers would be wiped out.
A sliver of moon had been up several hours when Winter Wolf and his companions turned in. But first Winter Wolf came over and checked that Fargo’s wrists were still tied. He also bound Fargo’s ankles.
Fargo had a few anxious moments as Winter Wolf looped the rope around his boots. But the old warrior didn’t think to slip a hand inside them to check for hidden weapons. Fargo’s Arkansas stayed snug in its sheath. “I’m sorry we can’t be friends,” he remarked.
Winter Wolf had stood and turned but he stopped. “You white. I red. White and red fight. White and red kill.”
“It doesn’t have to be that way.”
Sadness crept into the old warrior’s features. “It not how I want. It how things be.” He went to the other side of the fire and lay down to sleep.
Fargo made himself comfortable. It would be a while before all five drifted off. He was mildly surprised they didn’t have someone stand guard, but then they were deep in their own territory, and he was tied.
Fargo had no desire to harm them. He wasn’t their enemy. He wasn’t an Indian hater, as so many whites were. But he couldn’t go to their village, either. Hotter heads might prevail, in which case he could well find himself staked out over an anthill or skinned alive.
By midnight, heavy breathing and the lack of movement told Fargo the warriors were asleep. Slowly bending his legs back and up as high as they would go, he slid his boots toward his hands. When one of the younger warriors stirred, he stopped. He would only get this one chance. He mustn’t make a mistake. Lives depended on him.
In the distance a wolf howled. One of the horses pricked its ears but thankfully didn’t whinny or stomp.
Fargo tugged at his pant leg. The rope was so tight, he couldn’t work his pants free. The irony brought a grim smile. It was his own rope, or a piece of it. He tugged harder, then pried at the knot with his fingernails. But Winter Wolf had done a good job. It took Fargo a quarter of an hour before the knot began to come undone. Another five minutes and he had it. He was so annoyed it took so long, he went to throw the rope but caught himself.
The warriors still slept.
Hiking his pant leg, Fargo slipped his fingers inside his boot and palmed the Arkansas toothpick. Carefully sliding it out, he reserved his grip and sliced at the rope binding his wrists. The knife made all the difference. In seconds the severed rope lay on the ground.
Quietly unfurling into a crouch, Fargo moved toward the young warrior who had helped himself to the Colt. The warrior had been holding it when he fell asleep but now it lay next to his limp fingers.
Easing forward, Fargo reclaimed the six-shooter and holstered it. He could kill them. He could kill all of them as easy as could be. Five swift shots and they would no longer pose a threat to anyone. But Fargo didn’t shoot. He killed only when he had to.
All Fargo needed now was his Henry. It was beside Winter Wolf. The old warrior had taken a fancy to the shiny brass receiver; all afternoon he had fondled the smooth metal. Fargo imagined how upset he would be when he woke up and found it gone, and grinned.
Rearmed, Fargo crept toward the horses. The Ovaro raised its head, waiting. Fortunately, the Nez Perce hadn’t bothered to strip the saddle and saddle blanket. They had opened his saddlebags but left the saddlebags tied on. Right neighborly of them, Fargo thought.
The Appaloosas were curious about what he was up to and were watching him much as they would a mountain lion—with distinct unease. Fargo whispered to them, saying a few Nez Perce words, but stopped when one of the warriors mumbled in his sleep and rolled over.