The chiefs growled like angry wolves. Geronimo continued:
"That was not what Chief Gray Wolf promised, but where is he? Where are Captain Crawford and Lieutenant Gatewood? Where are any white men we may trust? They brought us here and over us set strangers like Lieutenant Davis, who knows nothing about Apaches and cares less."
"I told Mickey Free to tell the fat white chief, Lieutenant Davis, that I had killed men before he was born!" old Nana snarled. "He cannot tell me what to do!"
Chihuahua said angrily, "He and others do tell us! We must not do this, we must not do that! But we must scratch the ground with those foolish plows they gave us, and try to grow corn when it is much easier to steal it! I promised to keep peace with white men! I never promised not to fight with and raid Papagoes and Navajos!"
"None of us promised anything except that we would live on the reservation and bother no white men," Geronimo said. "It is true that we live in the White Mountains rather than on the flats of the Gila, but how do we live? It is still better to be free and at war in Mexico than to be at peace and live like the stupid sheep which Navajo herders chase."
"Right!" Nana agreed. "It is better to die in battle than to live as a slave! Before we go, I think that I will pick a fight with the fat white chief."
"Have men, not boys, beside you if you do," Geronimo advised. "Lieutenant Davis is a warrior. How many are we?"
Naiche said, "In all, we are thirty-five men, eight boys who know how to shoot, and a hundred and one women and children. We might have had as many more as we cared to take with us if we had been able to provide arms for them. As it is, three of the boys who can shoot must carry bows and arrows since we were unable to get enough rifles."
"It is as well," Geronimo said. "The smaller the party, the faster we may travel. We know that the Apache scouts and the white soldiers will stop us if they can. And I feel that Lieutenant Davis is suspicious."