When Scull finally came over to where he sat, Famous Shoes pointed at the mountains.
'Kicking Wolf has taken your horse into the Sierra,' he said. 'Three Birds is still with him, but Three Birds does not want to go into the Sierra very much.' 'I doubt that he does, but how can you tell that from a track?' Scull asked.
'I can't tell it from the tracks,' Famous Shoes said. 'I can tell it because I know Three Birds and he is not crazy. Only a crazy man would ride into the country of Ahumado.' 'That qualifies me for the asylum, then, I guess,' Scull said. 'I went there once and got shot for my trouble and now I'm going again.' 'Some of the mexicanos think Ahumado has lived forever,' Famous Shoes said.
'Well, they're a superstitious people,' Scull said. 'I expect they have too many gods to worry about. The good thing about the Christian religion, if you subscribe to it, is that you only have to worry about the wrath of one God.' Famous Shoes didn't respond. Often he could only understand a small fraction of what Scull was talking about, and that fraction was of little interest. What he had just said made him seem a fool. No intelligent man would walk the earth long without realizing that there were many gods to fear.
There was a god in the sun and in the floor, a god in the ice and in the lightning, not to mention the many gods who took their nature from animals: the bear god, the lizard god, and so on. The old ones believed that when eagles screamed they were calling out the name of the eagle god.
He thought that Scull would do well not to criticize Ahumado's gods, either--even if the Black Vaquero hadn't lived forever, he had certainly lived a long time. Men did not live to a great age in dangerous country without cleverness in placating the various gods they had to deal with.
'We are in Ahumado's country now,' Famous Shoes said. 'He may show up tomorrow. I don't know.' 'Well, Kicking Wolf's ahead of us with my horse,' Scull said. 'If he does show up he'll have to take care of Kicking Wolf first.' 'Ahumado is always behind you,' Famous Shoes said. 'That is his way. These mountains are his home. He knows trails that even the rabbit and the cougar have forgotten. If we go into his country he will be behind us.' Inish Scull thought the matter over for a moment.
The mountains were blue in the distance, dotted with shadows. The way into them was narrow and craggy, he remembered that from his first assault. He picked up a small stick and began to draw figures in the dirt, geometric figures. He drew squares and rectangles, with now and then a triangle.
Famous Shoes watched him draw the figures. He wondered if they were symbols having to do with the angry Christian God. In Austin Scull sometimes preached sermons--he preached from the platform of the gallows that stood behind the jail. Many people gathered to hear Scull preach-- white people, Indians, mexicanos. Many of them could not understand Scull's ^ws, but they listened anyway. Scull would roar and stomp when he preached; he behaved like a powerful medicine man.
The listeners were afraid to leave while he was preaching, for fear he would put a bad spell on them.
'I think you ought to find this man Three Birds and take him home,' Scull said, when he had finished drawing the little shapes in the dirt. 'He ain't crazy and you ain't either. What's left to do had best be done by crazy folks, which means myself and Mr. Kicking Wolf.
'If I was perfectly sane I'd be on a cotton plantation in Alabama, letting my wife's ugly relatives support me in high style,' he added.
Famous Shoes thought he knew why Kicking Wolf was taking the Buffalo Horse to Ahumado, but it was a subtle thing, and he did not want to discuss it with the white man. It was not wise to talk to white men about certain things, and one of them was power: the power a warrior needed to gain respect for himself. He himself, as a young man, had been sickly; it was only since he had begun to walk all the time that his health had been good. Earlier in his life he had done many foolish things in order to convince himself that he was not worthless. Once in the Sierra Madre, in Chihuahua, he had even crawled into the den of a grizzly bear. The bear had not yet awakened from its winter sleep, but spring was coming and the bear was restless. At any time the bear might have awakened and killed Famous Shoes. But he had stayed in the den of the restless bear for three days, and when he came out the power of the bear was with him as he walked.
Without risk there was no power, not for a grown man.
That was why Kicking Wolf was taking the Buffalo Horse to Ahumado--if he went into Ahumado's stronghold and survived he could sing his power all the way home; he could sing it to Buffalo Hump and sit with him as an equal-- for he would have challenged the Black Vaquero and lived, something no Comanche had ever done.
There was nothing crazy in such behaviour. There was only courage in it, the courage of a great warrior who goes where his pride leads him. When he was younger Buffalo Hump had often done such things, going alone into the country of his worst enemies and killing their best warriors. From such daring actions he gained power--great power. Now Kicking Wolf wanted great power too.
'You brought me where I asked you to bring me and you taught me to track,' Scull said. 'If I were you I'd turn back now. Kicking Wolf and me, we're involved in a test, but it's our test. You don't need to come with me. If you meet my rangers on your way home, just give them the news.' Famous Shoes did not quite understand the last remark.
'What is the news?' he asked.
'The news is that I'm off to the Sierra Perdida, if anyone cares to know,' Scull said.
Then he walked away, following the tracks of his big horse, toward the blue mountains ahead.
They had removed the young caballero's clothes and were tying him to the skinning post outside the big cave when Tudwal came loping into camp with news he thought Ahumado would want to hear.
Ahumado sat on a blanket outside the cave, watching old Goyeto sharpening his skinning knives. The blades of the old man's knives were thin as razors. He only used them when Ahumado wanted him to take the skin off a man. The young caballero had let a cougar slip into the horses and kill a foal. Though Ahumado never rode, himself--he preferred to walk--he was annoyed with the young man for letting a fine colt get eaten by the cougar.
Ahumado also preferred sun to shade. Even on the hottest days he seldom went into the big cave, or any of the caves that dotted the Yellow Cliffs. He put his blanket where the sun would shine on it all day, and, all day, he sat on it. He never covered himself from the sun--he let it make him blacker and blacker.
Tudwal dismounted well back from the skinning post and waited respectfully for Ahumado to summon him and hear his news. Sometimes Ahumado summoned him quickly, but at other times the wait was long. When the old man was meting out punishment, as he was about to do, it was unwise to interrupt him, no matter how urgent
