Wild Roses: A Tale of the Rockies

by Howard R. Driggs

With luxuriant grass in plenty and the purest of water, with berries in abundance, with trout enough to feed many multitudes, and with elk, deer, and other big game all around them, there was no need for man or beast to go hungry. There was little excuse, indeed, for the cattle-stealing and other mischief they had begun.

This part of the program, however, fathered in the spirit of revenge by Nixon, grew and thrived on the spirit of dare-deviltry in the Indians. It was native sport for them to steal out into the valley and lift the fat steer or heifer from right under the ranchers’ noses, drive the beast into the brush and kill it, then slip back with the meat, unobserved, much less caught. How they would chuckle over their exploits at night around the wigwam fires as they told with much bragging about their daring fun.

Nixon fattened on the success his thick-headed smartness was bringing him. The Indians were growing to look upon Ankanamp as a “heap big chief.” Old Copperhead had some cause to be a little jealous of the white man’s waxing popularity; but he was too crafty to let such a feeling show, if he had it. Bud was a good tool to work out the Redskin’s revenge against the whites. If the tool got too sharp, it would not be hard to do away with it some dark night.

Just now, however, the old chief nursed no such thoughts. Instead, he was fostering a scheme to make his white ally a full-fledged member of the tribe by making him a squaw man. This suggestion had come, no doubt, to the watchful old chief from seeing Bud flirt with the young squaws. These dusky damsels received his sallies at first very shyly; but by degrees some of the bolder ones began to respond and chatter back in “Injun talk” when he joked with them. Bud was a socially inclined fellow. He mixed readily, and he was always girl-struck. It made little difference what the color or looks, so long as it was a girl. That he was white naturally made the young squaws more responsive to Ankanamp. He had his choice among them, but his favors were soon turned to Laughing Eyes, one of the brightest of the band, and a sister of Flying Arrow.

Of course with Bud the Indian love business was but lightly thought of. It was just a temptation thrown his way; and he didn’t resist temptation. He yielded to everything that promised satisfaction for the time being, caring no whit for the consequences. Never mind the morrow; the night is here; and night is for sport—even among the Indians.

The wigwam fires were blazing merrily. Around them the squaws, young and old, were bustling about, carrying wood, cutting meat, mixing dough, and getting pots and pans ready to cook the feast for their hungry bucks, who had just come whooping into camp with their spoils, and had thrown themselves upon the blankets about the littered tepees to rest.

An air of unusual jollity accompanied the meal getting. They were to celebrate with a dance that night. The squaws chattered like magpies as they hurried up the meal. The papooses, catching the spirit, made themselves more numerous and mischievous than ever, for which privilege they frequently were sharply slapped. Even the dogs caught a whiff of the fun. One ragged cur, infected with the impish spirit, dared to snatch a choice bit of beef—an unpardonable crime for a dog, for which he was fetched a savage thump by an old squaw. The yelp of pain he gave woke the echoes; the dog dropped meat and tail and struck off for the woods, followed by a bunch of howling papooses, who pelted him with sticks and stones.

Then the feast was spread Indian fashion, about the various lodges, served to the bucks first, who speared into the kettle with their hunting knives for pieces of meat. “Flapjacks” and coffee well sugared made up the rest of the feast. This was the common fare. Old Copperhead and the White Chief were given a somewhat choicer diet. They sat apart near their tepees. The best cuts of meat were served to them; and they had mountain trout. A dish of wild raspberries, too, was brought to Ankanamp by Laughing Eyes. He winked at her and smiled.

This was enough—a rich reward for her struggle through the thorny brush and up the shelving rocks to get the dainty fruit. Her heart laughed to feel that her White Chief was pleased.

This had been her reward, too, when a few days before she had laid before him a beautifully beaded pair of moccasins and a fringed and beaded buckskin shirt which she and his foster mother, Old Towano’s squaw, had made. Bud was really proud of that gift.