Chapter 8

I was up front with Jed when we came up on a churned up trail. Jed grinned. “Buff’ler. It’s a small herd by the looks of the tracks, mebbe two hunnert. We need to take a few fellers and get the train some fresh meat. Didn’t you tell me you had some big rifles?”

“I got four in 45/70. Isn’t it kind of late for them to be moving North?”

Jed grinned. “Buffalo don’t know how to tell time. You think they look up one day and say, ‘Shit! Look at that! We better get out asses movin’ or another herd will beat us to the best grass!’

They don’t. They may have liked it where they were, or just didn’t get in a hurry coming up. It don’t matter none, what matters is they’re here now and we got a good chance to get fresh meat.”

We talked it over with the train and decided we’d not move the next day, stopping a day early to get fresh meat. We picked three men who were above average shots and gave them the rifles, Jed keeping the last. About ten of us went along with our Winchesters and Henrys, just in case, along with a large contingent of our women, butcher knives sharpened and at the ready. Cindty had a lot of experience so most deferred to her skill, listening when she explained a technique.

We got ahead of the herd and set up on a small wooded hill. Jed advised them to look for young cows because they were the most tender.

They came ambling up the small valley, grazing along. After about half had passed Jed fired, the signal for the others. Each one scored a clean kill and I managed to knock down another.

The women waited until the rest of the animals had thundered past before going down the hill. They were just getting started when one of the Finnish screamed something in her native language but we all knew what she said. Indians!

They sat on the opposite knoll, lookin’ mighty pissed. Then six of them rode towards us. We made it a point to get out in front of our women, and I grinned to see each holding a shotgun as I rode past, and waited.

There were two braves in their prime, two oldsters, and two in their early teens. I noted there wasn’t a rifle among them, just bows. Jed talked to them for a while before turning to me with a grin on his face.

“Short Horse here says he wants our kill. They were about to fire when we opened up and they never had a chance. From what they were willin’ to tell me, they got into a scrap with another tribe and lost, big. They had to leave their lands and just now found a place to light. He says he needs that meat for the coming winter.”

I grinned. “Well, tell him he can’t have these. We’ll give him one for tonight and then help him hunt tomorrow, maybe get more than the four we got here.”

Jed palavered for a while before turning back. “Short Horse says that will be an acceptable payment for him allowing us to cross his lands. Indians are big on saving face and this will work for him.”

We ended up giving him two after our women found out the situation. Their women appeared and gave ours a lesson in skinning a buffalo. By the time they carted them off on travois there was nothing on the ground but scent. They took everything.

Jed and I rode with them for a ways and even though I had no experience with Indian camps it was easy to see this was a sorry lot. They fell on the buffalo like they were starving, which they were, barely waving them over a fire before gorging. We arranged to meet on the same hill tomorrow at dawn.

I asked Jed on the way back for his thoughts. “It looks bad for them. This is the time they should have been gathering roots, grain, and nuts and drying meats and it don’t look like they had much opportunity for that. From what I saw the few tipis they have are going to be really crowded, and crowding leads to disease. As few as they are, it will be a starving time for them before spring. Most of the old people and kids will die off. If another tribe comes along they may take most of their comely women but anyone else will be out of luck.”

That didn’t sit good with me but it wasn’t my business. We put up extra guards that night. To a bunch of starving Indians we were just too tempting of a target. Long about three I heard Luc snort and a thump as something hit the side of the wagon. I just grinned and rolled over. The next morning I noticed one of the youngsters with his arm in a splint and pretty good horseshoe shaped bruise on his ass, just stickin’ out of his breechcloth.

The group got ahead of the herd and set up on both sides of a draw. Besides the big guns there was about a half dozen on each side with regular rifles. When Jed fired we all opened up and when the smoke cleared there were forty-three buffalo on the ground. Some were big bulls but it didn’t slow them down none when it came to butchering.

I claimed four for the train and made a deal with one of their women. I traded a bolt of wool cloth for as many of the tongues as she could get. Cindy had fried one for me the night before and grinned as I went on about how good it was.

“It’s tongue.”

I had a bite halfway to my mouth and stopped. “Really?”

“Really,” said Jed as he grinned. “It’s considered a delicacy.”

“I believe it,” I said, as I took another bite.

The women of the train wanted to make up a care package but Jed warned them not to. “Indians are a proud bunch and won’t take anything unless they got something of equal value to give you in return. I might know a way around that.”

He looked at me. “I note you were looking at their horse herd. There must be better’n than two hundred and some them look damn good. I don’t know how they managed to keep that many but the next tribe down the road will take them as soon as they see them. You still want to run a horse ranch?”

I didn’t know anything about cattle, but horses were in my blood. I told the women not to worry about giving them anything, I’d do a little trading and foot the whole bill.

We met Short Horse and his counsel the next day. After gifts of tobacco and coffee, we got down to brass tacks. In the end I got eight really good looking mares and a bay stallion that looked pure Arabian. They got fifty pounds of flour, ten pounds of coffee, twenty pounds of sugar, ten pounds of salt, and six bolts of sturdy wool cloth, along with the needles, thread, and thimbles they would need to make them into clothes. I threw in about ten pounds of popcorn, popping some for the women and letting know if they saved some for seed they’d have a steady suppy. It improved their survival chances quite a bit. Short Horse started out demanded liquor and guns, but that came to nothing mighty fast.

Jed had given Mack instructions and they left at dawn, keeping the wagons pointing West. We should catch up to them before they made camp.