Chapter 17: Rifles and Treaties

Nantan had brought a Comanche brave over to help Winona just after the evening meal. He reminded Wind Rider of a lineman from the Oklahoma Sooners football team: Strong Bear was tall and broad-shouldered, and looked like he could take on any Nebraska running back that came through the line. Nantan introduced him as one of the new allies who wanted to stop following the elk and bison herds around the prairie.

Winona worked through the night with her new apprentice, her fingers blackened with gunpowder residue as she rifled barrel after barrel by firelight. The rhythmic scrape of the broach became a chant—each twist carving defiance into steel. By dawn, twelve barrels lay finished beside the forge, their spiral grooves catching the rising sun like tiny rivers of light. She called a halt at dawn, looking over at Strong Bear. The young man looked eager to continue.

Helmut staggered out of his tipi and brought a bowl of victuals over to the smithy. “Ahh,” he said, looking at the new arrival. “I see a volunteer smith, we have gained. Greetings, young man, I am Helmut the Gunsmith. There are three ladies who share my tipi, and I will thank you to not poach them away from me.”

Winona quickly intervened, “Helmut. There is no need to be unkind. Strong Bear has a young man who shares his tipi. And he is not inclined to visit any other tipis. He is satisfied with his farmer friend. You have nothing to be afraid of.” She spoke in Apache. “He is Comanche and does not speak our tongue, yet. But he is strong and is picking up Apache, quickly.”

“Oh. Sorry, I am. It’s just that he is so manly, I naturally thought that...” He went over and shook hands with the new man.

“No, Helmut.” she explained. “He told me during the night that his tribe didn’t really want him to be ... well, he wants to be an Apache smith now.”

Helmut smiled, “There were some men back in Bavaria, who...” He shook his head, but took Strong Bear over to the cook fire where his women were preparing some vegetables and antelope meat, and got the young man some nourishment. “Always room there is for a strong fellow at our smithy.”

He looked at the pile of rifle barrels that Winona had set aside. He looked down the empty gun barrels one after another. Some were the shorter, lighter barrels — the Winona rifles he called them — and some were the Girandoni type he’d made the previous day. All seemed to pass his inspection. “Goot! You and Strong Bear did well.”

Winona was tired. She patted Strong Bear on the shoulder and wandered over to find Wind Rider. That fellow was not up yet. She barely managed to strip out of her dirty clothes and fall into bed next to him. He mumbled, threw his arm over her and pulled her to him. “Is it morning yet? Have you been working all night?” She cuddled up to him and was asleep in the warmth of the rabbit fur that he’d gathered around himself.

Strong Bear helped Helmut and his womenfolk tidy up the forge and to get ready for yet another wagonload of Toledo steel and gunpowder. The Comanche lad had insisted on being called Strong Bear — “Not Strong Ox!” — though Helmut thought that Ox was a more fitting name for the young man. He was strong, but not quick to pick up the Apache lingo.

“Strong Bear,” Helmut began, “I need you to go down to the village and tell Tall Pine that the Toledo steel has arrived.” He handed Strong Bear a small ingot of the steel, carefully wrapped in deer hide.