“Need you ask?” Cody replied as he carved into his roast beef. “We have traveled two thousand miles for this delightful lunch, and it was worth every mile.” He smiled at Mrs. Sturgis. “And, madam, may I say that this meal is the equal to any I have had in all the courts of Europe?”
Mrs. Sturgis laughed self-consciously. “I know you are just saying that,” she said. “But I am vain enough to appreciate such a comment.”
“But there is another reason, is there not?” Colonel Sturgis asked.
“Colonel, have you ever heard of something called Spirit Talking?” Cody asked.
“Yes, Spirit Talking. The Indians call it
“Do you think it is likely to cause another Indian War?” Cody asked.
Sturgis stroked his jaw for a moment as he looked back at Falcon and Cody.
“Why do you ask that? Have you heard something that I have not?” he asked.
“We can’t answer that until we know what you have heard,” Falcon said.
“I know that it has made the Indians a bit more assertive, if not aggressive,” Sturgis said.
“What do you know of Spirit Talking?” Cody asked.
“The best way to describe it would be to call it a religion,” Sturgis said. “Though it is an unholy religion at best. It was started by Mean to His Horses, who was with Crazy Horse during the battle of Little Big Horn. But he was such an unknown then that nobody had ever heard of him. Now, he has a movement following him, and the movement has cut across the nations; not just the Cheyenne, but all the Sioux nations, and even some Indian tribes beyond the Sioux.
“From what some of the Indians have told me, it is a way of talking to the souls of Indians that have already died. The dead know everything, including the future. And the dead have told them that all the white men will soon be leaving. When that happens, the buffalo will come back and the land will return to the Indians.”
“So I will ask again. Do you think this portends war?” Cody asked.
“General Miles thinks that, does he?” Sturgis asked.
“He thinks it is possible, and he thinks that Sitting Bull is behind it.”
“As to whether or not this could lead to war, I can’t answer,” Sturgis said. “As I said, it has made the Indians more assertive. But I believe I can answer as to whether or not Sitting Bull is behind it.”
“And what would that answer be?” Cody asked. “Do you think Sitting Bull is behind it?”
“Absolutely not,” Sturgis said, emphatically.
“Good,” Cody said. “Because I don’t believe he is, either.”
Since leaving the Cheyenne Reservation, Mean to His Horses had gathered almost four hundred followers, including the women and children who had come with the warriors. There were at least two hundred warriors with him, having joined him not only from his own tribe, but from other tribes: Lakota, Oglala, Brule, and even some Shoshone.
Black Rock, who had been a longtime friend of Mean to His Horses, was sitting with Mean to His Horses and others in council.
“We need more guns,” Black Rock said. “Too many of us have only bows and arrows.”
“We took two guns from the ranch of Kennedy,” Mean to His Horses said. “And we took three guns from the wagons.”
“We need many more guns.”
“We will get them,” Mean to His Horses promised.
“Where will we get them?”
“We will get them,” Mean to His Horses repeated, without further clarification.
Nearly one hundred miles away, Pony Face and Red Shield, two Crow hunters, were looking for elk in the open range near the Meeteetsee River. They were off the Crow reservation, but they had no cause for worry. They had a long record of peaceful coexistence with the white man.
Now one band of Crow, under Chief High Hawk, lived on a reservation set aside for them just outside the eastern entrance to Yellowstone Park. And though they had a specific part of the valley set aside for their use, it was understood that they could hunt anywhere in the Valley they wished. In addition, many of the Crow had made friends with farmers and ranchers in the area, often trading with them, sometimes stopping by to visit while on a hunt to take a meal with them, and to leave game for them.
Because of that friendly relationship, when Pony Face and Red Shield saw a couple of white men approaching them, they weren’t concerned. Perhaps they were part of the group of white men who were looking for gold. The hunters approached the white men to extend the sign of peace.
“We are Crow,” Pony Face said, holding his hand up, palm out to show that he was friendly. “We are friends.”
To the surprise of the two Crow hunters, the white men pointed their guns at them.
“We’ve had enough of you Injuns attacking our homes and killin’ our women and children,” one of the white men said.
“You speak of Cheyenne. We are not Cheyenne, we are Crow,” Red Shield said.
“You’re Injuns,” the white man replied.
