Читать книгу Shaman's Dream: The Modoc War - Lu Boone's Mattson - Страница 35

“I talk for myself,” she said, shrugging away from Toby. Meacham threw some brush on the fire, and in its flare got his first real look at her. So this was Queen Mary. What with her claims to privilege as the chief’s sister and her easy style with the miners, her reputation ran ahead of her. They said she had been sold several times to whites, but sooner or later every one of them had been glad to return her. Not five feet tall, he would guess, but every inch the image of Jack. The same features: his broad face, straight nose. But the eyes were more defiant. So was her whole person as she elbowed Toby away and squared off to face him. She didn’t have to take anything from a white man.

Of course she could speak English. He should have known she would have picked up enough around Yreka and the camps. Many of the women, he knew, could hold their own in a conversation, better than the men. She might have a somewhat specialized vocabulary, but what she had would probably do.

“I’m sure you can,” said Meacham. “I’m not going to hurt you. Come over here by the fire. It’s too cold a night to be out without a wrap. Knapp, hand me that blanket.”

She sized him up with a look of disgust but evidently decided she could handle him, for she stepped within the warmth of the fire.

“You ready for lice?” Knapp asked as he handed Meacham’s blanket to him.

“Never mind about that,” Meacham said.

Indeed, the cold had teeth to it by now. It had stopped snowing, but the wind kept on cutting through the dark, swirling sparks up out of the fire. He sat down next to her to seem more friendly, aware that Knapp disapproved. Meacham didn’t know if he could do it or not, but he needed to persuade her that he had meant what he said in the house, that he was there as their friend, not their master.

She let him talk, staring off into the night while she listened to him, rocking slowly and deliberately back and forth as he made his appeal. Nothing had changed, he said, just because the soldiers had come. They would merely be an escort, to see the Modocs safely through Linkville and up to Rocky Point. No harm would come to them; he would pledge her his word on that. The place they were going would be better than this. No settlers to deal with. No worry about struggling to make it through the winter while the food supply dwindled and disappeared. No shortage of blankets or firewood when the cold settled in for weeks at a stretch.

What he had said to her brother and the others was true. He regretted frightening them, but there had been a mistake. The soldiers had got drunk. And she knew how drunk men could be. They were supposed to come tomorrow, to escort the Modocs safely through the town and its settlers. He got Knapp to say it, too, and gradually their words calmed her, especially his, until eventually she looked toward Toby as if asking whether she dared to believe this man.

“Trust him,” Toby said. “Just get word now to Keintpoos. You can find him.”