Venom

new home.” He turned to the Worths. “That is, if you two don’t mind?”

Emala took Samuel’s big arm in hers. “Mr. King, we were talkin’ about you last night and Samuel, he said you don’t know how we feel about you, and now I see he’s right. You surely don’t.”

“Feel how?”

It was Samuel who answered. “Do you know what it’s like to be a slave?” He didn’t wait for Nate to answer. “Of course you don’t. You’re white. But I was born a slave. Emala and me, both. We were told how to behave and where to live and what work we were to do. Our masters—that’s what they called themselves and that’s what we were to call them—our masters lorded it over us. We hardly had any say. I hated it. I hated it so much I had a powerful ache deep in me that wouldn’t go away.”

Nate listened with interest. He had known the Worths for a few months now, and this was the first time Samuel had gone into detail about their old life.

“I hated bein’ made to do work I didn’t want to do. I hated bein’ made to live in a shack barely big enough for two people let alone four. I hated that I had to do what our masters said or I’d be whipped.”

“How terrible,” Winona interjected.

“You don’t know the half of it, Mrs. King,” Samuel said sadly. “But my point is this. I wanted out. I wanted a new life. I wanted to be a free man, to do as I please when I please. I wanted it with all I am. But I never became a runner. I wasn’t sure we could survive.”

“You’ve done fine if you ask me,” Nate said.

“We’ve done fine thanks to you. You befriended us. You helped us against the slave hunters. You brought us across the prairie to the mountains. You said we could come live in your valley if we wanted and have a place of our own.”

“You saved us,” Emala said.

Nate didn’t quite know what to say to that, so he said nothing.

“We owe you,” Samuel said. “We owe you more than we can ever repay. So you want to wait a day to start our cabin? We don’t mind. Hell, wait a month if you have to.”

“What have I told you about swearin’?” Emala said.

“Not now, woman.”

Nate said, “You don’t owe me anything. I did the same for you as I’d do for anyone.”

“That’s another thing,” Samuel said. “You look at us, you don’t see the color of our skin.”

“You don’t know how rare that is,” Emala said. “You don’t know how special that makes you.”

“I’m just me,” Nate said.

“A fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy,” Shakespeare quoted. “He hath borne me on his back a thousand times.”

“Enough about me,” Nate said. “We have a problem and it has to be dealt with. Tomorrow we hunt snakes.”

Chapter Four

Nate sent word to his son and the Nansusequas. By eight in the morning everyone in the valley was gathered at Nate and Winona’s cabin. There were Zach and his wife, Louisa, Shakespeare and Blue Water Woman. There were the Nansusequas: Wakumassee, the father; Tihikanima, the mother; Degamawaku, their son; and their two girls, Tenikawaku and Mikikwaku.

The Worths were there as well. Samuel had offered to help, and Emala had said that of course they would but secretly she was more than a little afraid. She didn’t like snakes. She didn’t like snakes even a little bit. Now she and Samuel stood to one side as the rest talked and laughed, and the one thing she noticed, the one thing that struck her most, were all the guns. She had never seen so many guns on so few people in all her born days. All of them had rifles. Even the girls. Evelyn had what they called a custom-made Hawken. Teni and little Miki had rifles given to them by Nate and Winona. All the men wore at least two pistols. As did Winona, Evelyn and Blue Water Woman. Zach usually wore two, but for this occasion he had four wedged under his wide leather belt. Emala marveled that he didn’t clank when he walked. Zach and his father and McNair also had big knives and tomahawks. Waku and Dega had knives. There were so many firearms and blades that at one point Emala turned to Samuel and said, “Land of Goshen. Look at all the weapons. They could start their own army.”

“Don’t you dare say anything to them,” Samuel cautioned. “They are our friends and I won’t have you carpin’.”

“Who’s carpin’, for goodness sake?” Emala rebutted. “All I’m doin’ is tellin’ you they have a heap of guns and whatnot.”

“I aim to have my own heap before too long.”

“What?”

“We each have rifles the Kings gave us. And I have a pistol. But that’s all we have. As soon as we can, I am getting a rifle for Randa and Chickory and two pistols for each of you.”

This was news to Emala. “We didn’t need guns on the plantation.”

Samuel gave her his look. “Are you addlepated, woman? They wouldn’t let us have guns. They didn’t want us risin’ up against them.” It was a subject dear to him. “When folks take it into their heads to lord it over other folks, the first thing they do is take away their weapons. You can’t lord it over wolves. You can only lord it over sheep.”

“I suppose that’s true,” Emala conceded. “But we aren’t bein’ lorded over anymore. What do we need with so many guns?”

“I want guns,” Chickory said.

“Hush, boy,” Emala said. “You’re only fourteen. You are too young to be totin’ an armory like that Zach King does.”

“I want guns, too,” Randa said.

Emala scrunched up her mouth as she had a habit of doing when she was displeased. “Listen to this. My whole family has gone gun crazy.”

“It’s not crazy,” Samuel said. “It’s practical. Out here ain’t like back at the plantation. We are in the wilderness now. The real wilderness. Not woods that have been tamed, like back there. Out here there are things that will kill us as soon as they smell us. Bears and those big cats and wolves.”

“You’re exaggeratin’. And we had bears and stuff back there, too.”

“Black bears that were so scared of people they’d run off. Out here they ain’t scared. And it’s not just black bears. There are grizzlies. There are hostiles, too. Indians who won’t care we’re black and—what is it Nate calls it?” Samuel had to think. “Countin’ coup. That’s it. Indians like those Blackfoots. They’d kill us and rip off our hair.”

“I haven’t done the Blackfeet any harm,” Emala said. “Why would they want to harm me?”

“Because you ain’t one of them.”

“That’s hardly cause.”

“Tell that to the whites who hate us because we’re black. That ain’t hardly cause, but they hate us anyway.”

“Well,” Emala said. It was the only thing she could think of to say, and that bothered her. Usually she could think of a lot more.

Nate came over. “Are you folks ready to hunt?”

“We are ready, Mr. King,” Samuel said.

“Hopes the snakes are ready,” Emala said.

“Excuse me?”

“Pay her no mind, Mr. King. She’s in one of her moods. We’ve just been talkin’ about how dangerous it is hereabouts and how we need weapons, and she thinks it’s silly.”

Nate smiled at Emala. “Your husband is right. This isn’t like back East. You never know what you’re going to run into. You can walk out the door one morning to fetch water from the lake and meet up with a griz. Or you can go for a ride with your daughter and come across a war party. You must always be prepared for the worst but hope