scraping them clean of excess flesh. The place where we worked was backed by a brush-covered cliff, so we could not easily be seen.
Our view took in a wide sweep of country, a country seen by few white men and not by many Indians except for the few who lived in the area. There were Indians in the mountains, we had heard, but whether they were real or imagined we did not know.
'Apache!' Keokotah commented. 'Many tribe! All bad!'
'All?'
He shrugged. His people were The People, and all others were mere interlopers. Some he tolerated, but for most he had no use at all. Pa had been a tolerant man and we boys had grown up feeling the same. We accepted all people as they were and trusted nobody until they had proved themselves trustworthy.
We worked hard at scraping the skins and then took some time to broil buffalo steaks and eat, while watching the plains before us. We knew what to look for. Movement is easily seen, but Indians would keep under cover until close, so we studied the places that offered cover. Many times we looked straight out over the plains, letting the corners of our eyes look for any movement.
And movement there was. A wolf, a coyote, and once a great, lumbering bear. It was at least a half mile off but we knew what it was by its movement.
We saw no Indians.
Keokotah slept then while I worked at the hides. Facing toward the plain, I could work and keep an eye on all that lay before me, careful not to let my movements fall into a pattern. Often one looks up at certain intervals, and an enemy approaching can time those intervals and remain still.
Now to find Itchakomi--somewhere out there, or perhaps even in the mountains themselves. I had given my word to Ni'kwana, and I would be faithful to the promise.
Once I had found her and made sure she was warned of Kapata and told of the illness of the Great Sun, we could be on about our business.
Off to the south there were twin peaks that towered into the sky, and to the north there were others. This was where the great Far Seeing Lands ended against the wall of the mountains. From here all streams ran to the Mississippi.
Sometimes I ceased from scraping and working on the hides and took time just to look out over the vast plains. My thoughts went back to Shooting Creek. Did it survive still? For surely the Seneca would come again, or the Tuscarora. Would our small island stand against them without Pa? And what of Brian and Noelle? They were across the sea now in England, he studying for the law and she growing wise in the ways of the city and of the people there. Ways I would never know, and a city I would never see.
But how many could see what I saw? How many would cross those plains, hunt the buffalo on its native grass, and penetrate the unknown mountains that lay behind me? This was my destiny, as I had known from the first. This land was mine.
Others would come. Oh, I knew they would come! There would be others like Pa, who could not rest for not knowing what lay about. They would seek out these lands until all was known, all was recorded.
The Indians? I shrugged. Many acres were needed to feed even one Indian, living as they did, but men would come who would grow grain where only grass grew. They would plant orchards and herd cattle and sheep, and they would provide for a still larger world, still more people. There were too many landless ones back in Europe, too many willing to risk all to better themselves, too many--
Something moved!
It was still far away. From where I sat I could see for miles, for all the while we had been moving we had been climbing, and all the land before me slanted away to the Arkansas River and from there to the Mississippi.
I saw it again, just a faint stir of movement down there that fitted no normal pattern. I longed for my father's telescope, retained from his seafaring days. I chose landmarks so that my eyes could focus upon the spot again, and I went on with my work.
After a while I looked again, bringing my eyes into focus on the chosen landmarks and seeking out from them.
I needed only a minute or two before I had them again. A small party--how many I could not tell, for they were indistinct with distance. If they continued as they were going their path would cross the one we had used.
There was a stir behind me. I turned. Keokotah shaded his eyes to look. 'What do you see?'
I showed him my landmarks and he picked the movement out of the landscape at once. Quicker than I had.
He stared for several minutes, looked away, and looked again.
'How many?' I asked.
'Ten ... I think. It is Itchakomi,' he added.
'Itchakomi? How could you know that?'
He shrugged. 'She has more than ten. Some are women. They travel slowly. They keep to low ground.'
I stood up and looked again. It needed a moment for me to find them. They were coming toward the mountains, and as we watched, Keokotah said, 'They come back. Something is wrong, I think.'
'Come back? What do you mean?'
'You see? They are far out. Why, unless they have start home? And why do they come back to mountains? Something is wrong.'
It was a bit more than I was willing to accept, yet it could be true. Why, at this point, would they be coming to the mountains? Unless--
'Maybe they haven't even been here yet,' I suggested.
He shrugged.
The rain clouds still lowered above us, but there had been no more rain. When we looked again we could see nothing. Our travelers, whoever they were, followed a riverbed, not a wise thing in this weather unless there was something they feared more.
Had they been cut off from the river by a war party? Or ... had Kapata found them?
Keokotah watched while I slept. We would move again at night, getting closer to the mountains. Or that had been our plan. If that was Itchakomi, it was up to us to intercept her.
When I awakened it was dusk. Keokotah had folded the hides. Gathering them and our weapons we went down off the lookout point and found the trail we had been traveling. The only tracks were those of a deer.
We stopped and I looked toward the mountains where I wished to be going. But if that was Itchakomi ...
'The Conejeros will come looking for us,' I said, 'and will find them.'
'It is so.'
'We will wait,' I said. 'If they walk by night--'
'They will.' He squatted on his heels. 'She is much trouble, this woman. It is better to look at mountains. To find rivers. We do not need this woman.'
'I gave my word.'
It was many days since I had drunk chicory. I felt the want for it now, yet to build a fire was dangerous. I mentioned it and he shrugged and began putting together a fire.
When water was boiling we added the shavings from the root. I used it with care. Perhaps there was no more to be found. Perhaps it did not grow here. Keokotah had come to like it, too, and he watched as I added it to the water and put twigs into the fire. Ours was a very small fire, hidden from sight, yet it was a risk. I could not smell the smoke but I could smell the chicory.
We often had it at home, added to our coffee to make the coffee go farther. Coffee was hard to come by at Shooting Creek, and we used a lot of it.
Pa told me that in London there were shops, where men gathered to drink coffee and tea and to talk. Much business was done there, but there were those who believed the drinking of coffee sinful. Sakim had told me there were riots in Bagdad against the drinking of coffee.
Ours tasted good. I took my time, enjoying every drop, aware that it might be long before I had more.
Yet I should have been watching out for it. Who knows where it might grow? Such seeds might be carried far
