(eng) Pamela Sargent - SA by Climb the Wind

Author:Climb the Wind [Wind, Climb the]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

The two Chinese men had learned to ride horses during their time among the Lakota, but had remained poor riders. Their uneasiness in the saddle and the necessity to haul what was left of their rocket-arrows in pony drags behind them made for a slow ride. Not, Lemuel told himself, that it mattered, since Touch-the-Clouds did not want them to ride too far, lest their weapons be needed again. They were to wait two days’ ride up the Platte for a message about the results of the talks with the Wasichu.

Virgil Warrick rode at Lemuel’s side. The black man had seemed relieved after being told that he could leave with Lemuel and the two brothers. Obviously Touch-the-Clouds did not want any negotiators to see that he had close comrades who were not Indians.

Virgil glanced back at the Chen brothers, then said, “I got a bad feeling about all this.”

“About what?” Lemuel asked.

“Everything. See, here’s how it is. I got to hope that things gets bad enough that more soldiers get sent south instead of west. That way, I’m safe. But if the South makes more trouble, it means more trouble for other darkies. Things could get a lot harder for them.”

Lemuel could not deny that. He had spoken to Colonel Green before riding out, to tell him that he and his men would soon be free. Green had chuckled at that. “Free,” he said, “we’ll be free, all right, free to get orders to go fighting Rebs or go after niggers acting up.” Green did not know very much of what was going on in the East, but the colonel had learned that some black men in the South had taken up arms, presumably to defend themselves. They would be convenient scapegoats for both the North and the South, hated in the North by men desperate for work who saw free Negroes as a threat, and in the South by those who wanted to return them to their former state as slaves. All that turmoil would serve the purposes of Touch-the-Clouds and his people, but it wouldn’t help the blacks.

Behind him, Lemuel heard one of the Chen brothers mutter a few words in his own language. He looked back. “Stop now,” the Chinese man said, kicking the sides of his horse with his heels. “We stop now.” Lemuel still could not tell whether Glorious Spirit or Victorious Spirit was the speaker.

“Why?” Lemuel asked.

“Backside much hurt.” The man mumbled something else and then dismounted awkwardly from his horse. Lemuel did not feel like arguing with a man valued so highly by Touch-the-Clouds. The mystery was why the two brothers had decided to throw in their lot with the Lakota.

Glorious Spirit and Victorious Spirit went through a series of stretches and bends, extending their arms and flexing their legs, then sat down near the pony drags. The horses nibbled at the grass. One of the Chen brothers opened his pack and took out a piece of dried meat.

“Ain’t noontime yet,” Virgil said to the Chinese man.

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