Blood of the Devil Page 14

  Nantan Lupan worked the Blue Coats and scouts hard for the next three days, from dawn until moonrise, making sure only the fittest mules and horses and scouts crossed the border, and that the mules carried enough for every man, but no more. Every Blue Coat and scout carried forty bullets on a belt or bandolier, a blanket, and his weapons. The mules carried pots, hard bread, coffee, and bacon, which most scouts refused to eat, and an extra one hundred sixty bullets for each scout.

  Five mule trains and their packers, fifty Blue Coats, and nearly two hundred scouts from the Chiricahua, White Mountain, Tonto, Mojave, and Yuma bands ran or rode into the land of the Nakai-yes at dawn on the fourth day. A young di-yen with us who had strong Power told us that we would have great success and our spirits wanted to play.

  We followed the Río San Bernardino south, covering about the same distance each day we had on the runs from Willcox. Our camping place the first night lay where a small creek coming from the east ran into the San Bernardino. We hunted as we ran and came into camp with more than enough deer and turkey to feed us all.

  The San Bernardino Valley was a patchwork of many colors. The trail followed the Río San Bernardino, which ran through mostly flat desert country where everything was bigger, sharper, and deadlier than in the deserts northeast across the border, until it emptied into the Río Bavispe. The creosote bushes were much bigger than those in the north, and their blooming made veils of little white flowers, good for the eyes and sweet to smell. Great patches of prickly pear cactus, ocotillo covered with red blossoms reaching for the sky, and mesquite with light green leaves standing out against those of the much darker, feathery creosotes filled the valley.

  We followed the Río Bavispe flowing through deep twisting canyons. The land along the river was filled with arroyos and canyons, forming hard-to-climb, rocky ridges and arroyo bottoms filled with soft, easy-to-break caliche over deep sand. Even the strongest mules struggled on the trail up the Río Bavispe.

  We passed many villages abandoned because of Apache raids. Dust-filled irrigation ditches crisscrossed fields where crops had once grown. The crops had gone to scattered seed competing with weeds. The villages where the Nakai-yes continued to live had dirty, black-eyed children wearing rags, and the livestock and dogs showed rib bones of hunger. The droopy, sad faces of the adults filled with fear when we ran past them.

  After four suns of running from San Bernardino Springs, we made camp against the mountains east of Bavispe. The Río Bavispe was filled with cool pools, their surfaces like mirrors. We bathed and swam in the still, deep water. Losing the dirt we had gathered, washing our hair, and feeling clean again made a fine reward for a hard day’s run. Al Sieber rode over to a cattle herd grazing near Bavispe. He drove back ten boney cows for us to butcher. The cattle didn’t look so good, but the smell of their meat grilling over our fires made our stomachs howl. We ate like wolves, the juice from the meat running down our chins and forearms. We rubbed the grease from our fingers and forearms on our legs and moccasins to keep them supple for the hard running still to come, and grilled all the meat left from our meal to feed the Blue Coats and mule packers when they finally came in at dark.

  The alcalde (mayor) of Bavispe rode a white pony over to our camp. He dismounted where Sieber talked to Mickey Free, stuck out his chin in defiance, and said in a trembling voice, “Señor, por favor, you owe my village for the cattle you took. We are poor and fight the Apaches a long time and have little. You don’t pay? You steal food from our mouths.”

  He grinned and nodded when Al Sieber gave him enough pesos to pay for the boney cattle. The alcalde, his voice not trembling anymore, invited everyone, including the scouts, to a baile (dance) in the village that night. I stayed in camp, but several went. They included Sieber, a few Indah Blue Coats, and some scouts, who together consumed a couple of jugs of strong mescal. The mescal followed like a ghost haunting them and pounding their heads when we left Bavispe, still running south in the shallow darkness and early morning mists off the Río.

  The village of Huachinera lay a day’s run south toward the source of the Río Bavispe. We made camp that night just east of Huachinera in a canyon at the foot of a high mountain. The next morning, we began the hard run up the trail toward the top of the mountain. The trail followed a steep ridge to the top. I was used to following ridge trails when I went to the camp of Elias with Beela-chezzi and Kitsizil Lichoo’. But unlike the others, this trail seemed to have an overpowering presence hovering over it like ghosts somehow left by the Chiricahuas, of all people, who flinched at even the word ghost.

  The trail climbed up into the morning light, following long straight stretches and then switchbacks. On the south side of the trail were drop-offs so high that big pine trees in the canyons looked like little black insects against the brown and red sand in the arroyos.

  High up on the ridge, a mule made a bad step and, struggling and heehawing to stay on the trail, went off the edge, pack and all, leaving his packer shaking his head in disgust. Wailing in fear and desperation, it kicked and twisted against the wind on the way to the bottom until it smashed into the rocks below and was crushed under its pack, which somehow stayed lashed upright on its back. It was so far to the bottom of the canyon no one bothered to go after it, and we lost several more on the climb to the top.

  After much hard running, we finally reached the top of the mountain. We rested there and could see far up the valley we had run the day before and trace the Río Bavispe almost all the way back to Bavispe. Three boney cows, their heads hanging down and barely moving, stood in the shade of the tall pines on top of the mountain. We guessed they had escaped from the herds taken from the Nakai-yes and driven by the Chiricahuas to their camps for slaughter, but they didn’t escape our knives. The meat was tough and not much on the bones, but the hearts, livers, and heads made us a good meal when we camped that night.

  Tzoe and a couple of others who had been with the Chiricahuas for a while knew the best places to camp. We went down from the mountaintop a short distance where a spring flowed back in the big pines. There we made our next camp.

  This was Chiricahua country, so we had to be more careful than a man reaching for pups in a dark wolf’s den. Oak made long lasting coals in fires built under the trees to disperse the smoke. By making the fires early and cooking for the night’s meal, only coals survived to make light and give heat for sleeping after sunset. Light from a small open flame in the Blue Mountains shows from far away. Scouts kept a lookout in every direction for Chiricahuas.

  Since leaving San Bernardino Springs, Sergeant Sweeny Jones came to our fire several times for an evening meal. We ate and told many stories of times fighting enemies. I came to know Sweeny Jones like I did Rufus Pike, and I liked them both. I counted Rufus, Sweeny Jones, and Dr. Blazer among my friends, even if they were Indah.

  Sweeny Jones told me of the great respect he had for Nantan Lupan and his scouts. The scouts had fought in the Tonto Basin War ten years earlier. In those days, the scouts came from Apaches, Yavapais, Walapais, and even the Paiutes, who despised Apaches. He said Nantan Lupan soon learned that Apaches were by far the most reliable and courageous of all the tribes he used. He came to depend on Apaches more than the others.

  That night as we sat under trees listening to the night birds, insects, tree peepers, and the occasional coyote bark, I asked Sweeny Jones if he knew Soldado Fiero. He nodded slowly, the shadows from the orange coals under a light layer of gray ash wandering across his lively face.

  He said, “Yes, wished I didn’t, but I do. Three years ago, when General Hatch tried to disarm and unhorse all the Mescaleros, a few of ’em sneaked off, and the general sent some Chiricahua scouts under Sergeant Soldado Fiero to bring ’em back. When them Chiricahuas came back, ol’ Fiero’s face was black and blue, and they didn’t have no prisoners. He looked like somebody had cold-cocked him on the side of his head with a hammer. He claimed that his head was a-hurtin’ bad and he needed some firewater to ease the pain, and the
Mescaleros they’s a chasin’ got clean away. He claimed he knowed where they went, but he couldn’t git permission to go after ’em again. General Hatch took his stripes away after he showed up drunk at a drill, said he could earn ’em back by showin’ his courage when they faced Victorio. He never got a chance to face Victorio. I ’spect he’s mighty lucky in that regard, since the Mexicans got to Victorio first. Now, Soldado Fiero hankers to come along on this here expedition, so he’n show his bravery an’ git his stripes back. Only thing, Chato is a cousin or half-brother to Soldado Fiero. I can’t figure which. Word around the night fires says Soldado ain’t above killin’ Tzoe and claimin’ the Chiricahuas did it, if it comes down to helpin’ Chato escape. You better stay away from him. He ain’t nothin’ but trouble, and he has a big thirst for firewater.”

  “Hmmph. I hear you, Sweeny Jones. I watch Soldado Fiero good around Apache camps.”

  CHAPTER 23

  CHIHUAHUA’S CAMP

  Al Sieber and the other scout leaders had a long powwow with Nantan Lupan. He agreed to change how we operated. We spent four days by the spring baking bread and making dried meat in the middle of the day so no one saw our fires. We also made up fruit and nut mixes, so we wouldn’t have to cook when we stopped.

  Fifty scouts went on ahead and looked for the Chiricahua camps while the rest followed with the pack mules. Tzoe, my new friends, John Rope and Tulan (Much Water), and Soldado Fiero and I were among the fifty chosen. If we found a camp, runners were to race back to tell the others to move up quick and help take the village. I stayed near the front of the line to watch Tzoe, who led us.

  We left the camp single file: first, ten scouts and then a mule; next, ten scouts and then a mule. We repeated the same pattern until we were lined out down the trail and crossing a canyon toward a mountain to the southeast. We soon found old tracks and a horse left behind in very poor shape. We butchered him and were able to use some of the meat and liver. After that, we were nearly always in sight of some animal, dead or dying, that had fallen off the steep trail. Others wandered free, lost from the herds the Chiricahuas pushed across the mountains. The Chiricahuas didn’t retrieve cloth streamers, hides, and many other things lost on the steep trails.

  We followed the tracks for three days. Two pack mules carrying a lot of supplies caught up with us. We sent a message that the others needed to come where we had camped while we went on to an old Chiricahua camp Tzoe knew in a canyon near the headwaters of the Río Bavispe. There under many tall pines we found tracks from a big dance. Much Water, who was of the Warm Springs band, said the tracks looked like those made in a war dance. From the dance center, the tracks led off in many different directions. I knew this trick. As a child, I had escaped Bosque Redondo with my parents when bands of Apaches ran off in different directions so the Blue Coats wouldn’t know who to follow or where the tracks might lead.

  The next day we ran along the side of the mountain until the middle of the afternoon, when we stopped to eat and rest. I sat at a place where it was easy to see through the trees to the top of a mountain across the valley. I took out the Shináá Cho and studied the dark green treetops and a few bare spots on the mountain across the valley. Tzoe and Much Water also searched the far mountain with their Blue Coat be’idest’íné.

  We saw the Chiricahua camp on top of a ridge across the valley at about the same time. There was a big, flat place near the camp where Chiricahua horses, lots of them, grazed. I scrambled back to tell the others, and they came to see for themselves. Looking at the camp with the Shináá Cho, I saw many Chiricahuas. I thought, Now, we’ll see if Soldado Fiero just makes a big wind about getting back his stripes or if he tries to kill Tzoe.

  Sieber studied the Chiricahuas before he called two of the strongest runners to find those far behind and tell them to hurry up, ride all night if need be, and come plenty quick. I was glad we had cooked up much bread and made trail food. We sat back in the darkness and cold air wrapped in our blankets and filled our bellies, watched the Chiricahua camp in the low glow from their fire coals, listened to the wolves and other night animals, and whispered to each other what we planned to do in the coming fight. Late in the night, we drifted off to sleep. The snorting of mules, the creak of harness and saddles, and the stomp of hooves woke me. Crawford and the rest had come. Gray light began to show on the far horizon. Crawford ordered the Blue Coats to tie their horses back down the trail out of sight of the Chiricahuas, and the scouts to eat and rest.

  Light came, filling the mountainsides with shadows and yellow pools of light. Birds began to call. Morning water sparkled in spider webs across the bushes. We saw much smoke from cooking fires in the Chiricahua camp. Sieber divided us into three groups. First, one group went straight down the trail leading into the camp. The great warrior Alchesay, now a sergeant, led it. Second, a group ran down the north side valley in order to come up behind the horse herd. I ran with a third group down the valley and around a low ridge with the second group, but then we left them and ran up a shallow stream and then up the trail the Chiricahuas used for watering the horses.

  Much Water, well in front of the rest of us, and true to his name, stopped at some bushes near the trail to make water. He saw two Chiricahuas riding down the trail and ran back to warn us. We disappeared into the brush along the side of the trail and waited to take them. Someone in the second group fired a shot. It echoed down the canyon, but the Chiricahuas riding toward us never seemed to hear it and kept coming.

  Scouts started firing at the two Chiricahua riders. They jumped off their mules, scrambled into the brush on the far side, and disappeared. We ran on up the trail, but stopped to drink at the last place there was any water in the stream before running up to where the horse herd grazed. Some of the scouts complained their knees hurt. They said they had to run slow, behind everyone else going up the trail. Tzoe told me later that those scouts always did that. They were afraid. He said he ought to make them run in front, but we didn’t have time to cure them of their fear. When we were far enough up the trail to see the place where the horses grazed, we saw three Chiricahuas herding some toward new grass, and behind them rode a boy and a girl each leading a horse.

  Up the trail, Much Water and John Rope crawled to the edge of the brush. They stayed out of sight, waiting for the boy and girl to ride by. When the young ones rode even with them, Much Water, a Warm Springs Apache who talked like them, said, “Hold! Come over here.”

  The boy and girl stopped. They looked toward the brush from where the voice came, and squinting and moving their heads this way and that tried, but didn’t see who called them. Much Water, command filling his voice, said, “Come here! Hurry up.”

  They dropped their lead ropes and rode over toward the voices in the brush. When they reached the edge of the brush, Much Water and John Rope charged out and snatched them off their ponies. Much Water took the boy, and John Rope took the girl. Much Water knew the girl’s father and swapped the boy for her. In those days, children taken in wartime belonged to those who took them. Kept, traded, or sold, but we didn’t consider them much in the way of loot.

  After we took the boy and girl, we scouts ran out of the brush and yelled for the three Chiricahuas on ponies to stop, but they wheeled and raced off into the pine trees on the other side of the trail. Our shots made branches fly off around them like some giant spirit whacking the trees with an ax as it chased them. We shot only one rider. It was hard to hit anything, shooting through those trees at a moving target, but Rufus had taught me well. I didn’t miss. The other two got away until John Rope saw the moccasins of one hiding under a bush and pulled him out. He was only a boy, and he wasn’t hurt. Several of the scouts ran up to John and asked for him, but John said, “No, I found the boy. He stays with me.”

  We ran up the trail to the horse herd and then into the camp. Nearly all the Chiricahua we saw the day before had run off. They had been slaughtering cattle. Meat and hides were drying everywhere on bushes, and a large store of cut-up mescal wa
s drying. That night Tzoe told me that the shot starting the attack was an accident. A sergeant, who had his rifle cocked and ready to fire, was climbing up a steep place, slipped, and pulled the trigger when he lunged forward to keep his balance. Tzoe said we had attacked the camp of the great chief, Chihuahua, and that the Chiricahuas had just come back with a big herd taken from a Nakai-yi rancho five days ride to the south. There was much booty in the camp. I found a couple of pesh-lickoyee (nickel-plated) Winchester rifles, several revolvers, and nearly a full case of ammunition. I kept it all, not sure how I’d get it back unless I could trade some of my booty with one of the mule packers and have him carry it back to San Bernardino. The nights had been very cold high in the mountains. I didn’t think more than the time it took to blink before taking a couple of good, warm Mexican blankets, and I found a pocket watch, which I didn’t know how to use, but also kept.

  A young gray mule watched me through the bushes. I put my booty in a pile so the other scouts knew it was mine, and went for the mule. It tried to run when I approached him. He wore a fine silver-trimmed saddle and a practically new bridle. The bridle reins caught in the brush when he wheeled to run and held him tight for me. I liked him. He had good, strong confirmation, and he watched me unafraid. I spoke to him in a calm voice. I held his jaw, breathed in his breath, and let him take in mine. He relaxed and let me lead him to my loot and load him up. I tied him to a juniper tree on the edge of the camp and returned.

  On the other side of the camp, three scouts from San Carlos led by Soldado Fiero approached an old woman whose face had more wrinkles than the Blue Mountains have ridges. She was on her knees cutting up meat. When the scouts came up, she laid aside her knife and stood up with the bloody palms of her hands out and said, “You from San Carlos. I know you Soldado Fiero. I quit the Blue Mountains. Go back with you. Don’t shoot me.” Soldado Fiero angrily kicked her meat and knife off into the bushes, stared at her a moment, and said, “Time for the Happy Land old woman.” He shot her in the chest, right in the heart. She fell backwards, dead before she hit the ground, a twisted smile of defiance on her face and her eyes still open, laughing at the stupid scout, even in death.