Longarm hadn't been trying to doze off, but he saw he must have when he awoke with a start to see daylight in the entryway across from them and heard all sorts of commotion outside.
He eased Matty's drowsy head from his lap, and rolled over to holster his gun and stab the tipi cover with his knife. When he put an eye to the puncture he saw ponies swirling in a haze of dust in the center of the tipi ring. Minerva sat up on her pile of buffalo robes to ask what all the fuss was about.
Longarm replied, 'Ain't certain. They've run all their riding stock inside the ring for safekeeping and never mind the mess. Some kids from another band might be out to have some fun. On the other hand they might really be worried about something.'
A figure appeared in the entryway to call out in bad English that the man, not the women, was wanted at the Do-giagyaguat. So Longarm tossed the pocket knife near her, saying, 'Open some more cans and don't eat or drink anything else before I get back, hear?'
Matty sat up, rubbing her eyes, to ask what they were supposed to do if he never came back. Longarm didn't offer any suggestions as he rolled to his feet and ducked outside. It would have sounded hard to point out it wouldn't really be his problem.
He followed his Kiowa guide through the swirling confusion, noting he didn't seem to be under guard as the Indians worked to get set for something ominous.
He found old Necomi and the other Kiowa elders out front of that bi painted tipi, along with five younger Indians dressed much the same with different beadwork. When he heard everybody talking in English he caught on. The visitors had to be Kiowa-Apache, allied or adopted and hence half-ass Kiowa who spoke another lingo entirely. He knew Na-dene, spoken by the so-called Apache, Navajo, and such, was as tough for either a white man or Indian as Arabic or Turkish might be for your average cowhand. You could ask a Comanche or a Lakota what a buffalo was, and while one would say tatanka and the other called it kutsu, they agreed to call the critter something. But Na- dene speakers would ask you whether you meant a buffalo off a ways or in plain sight, grazing, running, or hell, shitting.
Kiowa could only powwow with their little brothers in English or Sign, and Sign being slower, the meeting that morning was being conducted in the hated tongue of the blue sleeves.
Necomi told the head Kiowa-Apache, a scar-faced runt called Eskiminzin, to tell the damned government rider his sad story. So the runty Kiowa-Apache did. He said his own band ranged west of the Wichitas, as close to the reservation line as they could manage without making the Great Father angry. He said they'd been raided more than once by riders who'd sure as hell looked like Kiowa Black Leggings.
Necomi sighed and told Longarm, 'Maybe you did not lie about the riders you fought with over by Cache Creek. But somebody is lying about being members of our lodge and we are very cross, very!'
Eskiminzin said, 'My Kiowa uncle is not as cross as the women we left back along Elk Creek, throwing dust in the air and calling us cowards because we let the Comanche Police bring our ponies back for us without killing any two-hearted Kiowa raiders! Listen to me, all of you, there must be blood for blood, and one of our pony guards was stabbed in the back by those Black Leggings!'
The outraged Necomi roared, 'No Black Legging rider owes any blood to anybody! We just told this other twittering magpie from the Great Father that our lodge has done nothing, nothing, to be blamed for all these silly fights! Hear me, when and if we do put on our paint and follow the warpath again, we will not be stopped by a few shots or less than a thousand enemies!'
Longarm didn't wait for the runty Eskiminzin to tell the older man he was full of shit. In a more soothing tone he asked about those Comanche Police. He pointed out, 'Elk Creek ain't all that close to the Comanche range southeast of Fort Sill, is it?'
The Kiowa-Apache grumbled, 'We never invited Quanah's white-eyed Comanche in blue sleeves to patrol along Elk Creek. They told us they had to patrol all the reservation lines because nobody else was willing to join them. Maybe we were not so cross the second time they rode by, right after those Black Leggings killed that boy and drove off two hundred of our best ponies!'
Longarm nodded soberly and said, 'Chores such as that were what Quanah and the B.I.A. had in mind when they commenced to organize such forces for this big reserve. I don't think any of your Kiowa brothers from the real Black Legings Lodge ran that stock off on you. I think Necomi here was right about some big fibbers pretending to be a bunch more feared and respected than your average band of horse thieves.'
Necomi gasped, 'Riders who were never initiated into our lodge in the leggings and paint of members? Who would do such a terrible thing? Who would dare? Tanapah, the great bright eye in the sky, would tell all the other spirits, and then where would they be? Everyone knows it is wrong to use another person's puha, or even to paint one's pony in the same way, without offering him a present and getting his permission!'
Eskiminzin nodded gravely and volunteered, 'This is true among my people too. I paid the first very rich Aravaipa ranchero for the use of this prosperous and powerful name. It would have been bad medicine if I had just stolen the name like a chicken!'
Longarm nodded and said, 'I understand about your old ways. Sort of. Maybe these raiders pretending to be honorable Kiowa have forgotten the old ways. Tell me about those Comanche Police recovering your run-off stock without having to gun any of the rascals.'
The Kiowa-Apache shrugged and said, 'None of us were there. The blue sleeves said that they only had to track the stolen ponies a day and a night. They said they found them in a draw at dawn. The men who'd run them off were not there. So the Comanche only had to round them up and herd them back to us. Their sergeant said he did not think the stinking Kiowa wanted to fight Comanche. So they ran away in the dark.'
Necomi gasped, 'That was a bad thing to say! Hear me! Any rabbit-killing Comanche who thinks even a Kiowa girlchild is afraid of him had better stop dreaming and wake up!'
Longarm shook his head and said, 'Don't get your bowels in such an uproar, Chief. There used to be some troublemakers called Romans on the far side of the Great Bitter Water. They liked to get the rest of us white folks to fighting amongst ourselves by spreading just such an easy mess of fibs. Then they'd move in and stick us with spears. They called their game divide and conquer.'
Eskiminzin asked innocently, 'You mean the way your Eagle Chief Carson got the Utes to fight our western cousins for him over in the Canyon de Chelly?'
Longarm laughed sheepishly and said, 'It worked, didn't it? What I'm saying about these mysterious raiders is that anyone can slip on a pair of black leggings. And they've been acting more like plain and simple outlaws than any warrior society I know of. I got a good look at three of them, dead, over by Cache Creek. So I'd be mighty surprised to discover they were a gang of Minnesota Swedes. But how do you boys feel about them being Mexican
