5

Hoss settled the last of the bodies into place and then hesitated, taking a step back. As he looked out over the burial ground, he felt sure he’d messed things up somehow. He didn’t really know how they were supposed to be arranged. He’d never been to an Indian burial ground before. In fact, he’d always made sure to steer clear of them. Burial grounds were supposed to be sacred places. White men weren’t welcome anywhere near them. Yet here Hoss was, a white man in an Indian burial ground because there weren’t any grown Indians around to do what had to be done.

It was too bad he didn’t know what else he should do. There had to be some sort of special rituals to be performed or words to say at a time like this. He supposed he could at least say a few words of his own. Taking off his hat, Hoss dropped to one knee and cast his gaze over the newly placed bodies. It was unsettling to see them all out there like that, all those folks who just days before had probably been looking forward to their tribesmen returning from the hunt…maybe laughing and carrying on about how to celebrate. Now they had nothing left to look forward to at all.

Hoss felt the prickling feel of ice at the back of his neck and decided he’d better get moving. The sun was sinking fast now, leaving blood-red trails in the sky and casting long shadows that almost seemed like living things reaching out for him—like these folks aimed to have him join them.

Clearing his throat, he tried to push such thoughts from his mind. “I reckon that’s about all I can do for now,” he said after a moment. “I’m sorry if it ain’t enough, or if I didn’t do things quite the way you might expect. But more than that, I’m sorry for what happened to you. It weren’t right. It weren’t right at all. Those men that done this, well…I guess I’d like to track ’em down myself. Bring back your womenfolk. Give that baby back his ma.” He glanced down at the hat in his hands, feeling a sudden, intense connection with that baby.

“It’s strange,” he went on then, looking at the bodies once more. “It was an Indian arrow that took my ma from me, when I was no older than that baby back there. Now it’s a white man who took that baby’s ma. I know some folks might think that’s some sort of justice. Like it brings a balance, somehow. But…I don’t see that at all. What I see is a baby who needs his ma, and if I could get her back to him, I would. I hope you know that. I wish them boys back there could know it, too.”

Returning his thoughts to the boys made Hoss think harder about his family, and, particularly, Little Joe. “You can be proud of them boys,” he said. “They’re doin’ a whole lot more than boys their age should ever have to do. They’re all fired up about takin’ care of the rest of the tribe until their fathers get back from huntin’. Only…I wonder if maybe…well, if you can hear me at all, then maybe you can somehow get those boys to see we ain’t like those men who attacked you. We’d even help out a whole lot more if they’d let us…if they’d trust us enough to let us. They don’t have to be pokin’ at us, or makin’ Little Joe suffer like that.”

Sighing, Hoss took a deep breath. “But I don’t reckon there’s anything you can do about any of that. And I’m sorry if I disturbed you at all by askin’. It ain’t your fault, and I suppose I got no right to ask for help from folks who sure didn’t deserve to die like you did. What you do deserve is to find some peace. I guess what I’m sayin’ is, I hope you find yourselves in a better place.”

Hoss closed his eyes and bowed his head in a moment of silent reflection before rising back to his feet.

And then he turned…

…coming face-to-face with a Shoshoni warrior.

XxXxX

Though Ben did what he could to focus his efforts on helping Paul, he kept a watchful eye on Joe, nonetheless. Seeing Joe sit up and lean against that tree had filled him with immense relief.

“I won’t lie to you, Ben,” Paul had warned him early on. “Even without getting a close look, I can tell that wound has become significantly worse than what it started out to be. If we don’t get to him soon, he stands a chance of losing that arm…and that’s if he’s lucky.”

Of course, Paul’s warnings had meant nothing to the boys who were intent on seeing to the needs of their own people before any thought would be given to Joe. With Ben’s and Adam’s help, Paul had already treated five people, all of whom had suffered excruciating and certainly life-threatening wounds. The tribe’s medicine man was in especially bad shape. Ben had been sitting with him for over an hour now, fighting to keep a rising fever from finally claiming his life, despite knowing in his heart his efforts were futile. This man was going to die.

Frustrated, Ben rose to his feet and stretched the taut muscles in his back before gazing out the entrance of the small structure that had been set aside for the tribe’s nat-soo-gant, their own healer—a man past any hope of healing himself. Adam and Paul were in another structure to the right side of this one, working with an old woman who also stood very little chance of surviving.

The situation was tragic, yes, and Ben’s heart went out to the entire tribe. But his responsibility must lie first with his own family. And Joe had been ignored long enough.

Now, as daylight began to give way to dusk, his gaze landed once again on Little Joe. Even amidst the rising shadows Ben could see him fumbling with what remained of the arrow’s shaft—as though he was determined to remove it himself.

“That does it,” Ben said softly to himself before hastily grabbing up the supplies he would need: a bladder of water, a small soapstone bowl that held what he had been assured was a healing paste, a handful of leaves to be used as bandages, a string of leather to hold them in place…and, finally, a small, sharp knife.

XxXxX

“I can do it myself!” Joe had argued years ago when he’d been a small boy determined to show he could be as much a man as Adam or his pa. He’d wrapped the string around the loose tooth just as Adam had shown him. And then, taking a deep breath, he’d pulled his shoulders back and yanked as hard as he could.

“Ya’ got to be quick about it, Joe,” Hoss had cautioned. “Ya’ can’t dawdle. All that’ll do is make it hurt a whole lot longer.”

Now, all these years later, Joe tried to bring the memory back into clarity. “It’s just another loose tooth,” he told himself. “Just a tooth.”

But the arrow embedded in his arm was a far cry from a loose tooth. Yanking as hard as he could accomplished nothing except to make his vision go dark and bring about a fresh surge of bleeding. At least Joe had managed to avoid crying out—or he thought he had, anyway. His teeth were clamped down tight, and all he heard was the raging river that pounded through his head until his heart could slow its frenzied beating.

He had no idea how much time passed while the river calmed, the darkness faded and his breathing slowed to something as close to normal as he could manage, but the world was finally starting to come back into focus when he heard a gentle ‘thud’ beside him.

Curious and even a bit grateful for the distraction, Joe turned his gaze from the red and purple hues he hoped had more to do with the setting sun than his pain-shrouded vision. What he saw then made him stop breathing altogether. There was an arrow protruding from the ground barely a foot from his left thigh. It was still quivering.

XxXxX

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