"Levi's letter told as how my boy Josiah made it to the trading post too," Hodge said. "Mr. Cooper even let him do some shootin' at the redskins."
Mr. Cooper? Since when did David Cooper get to be so high and mighty?
"I need some of that coffee," Raoul said. Hodge strained the grounds out of the coffee by pouring it through a kerchief into a tin cup and handed the cup to Raoul.
The black liquid scalded Raoul's lips and tongue, and didn't treat him any better when it bit into his whiskey-burned stomach.
"Anything to eat?"
With a bitter grunt, Levi Pope took a square biscuit out of a paper wrapper and held it out. "These worm cakes is pretty lively, but dip 'em in the coffee a couple of times and you'll boil the little buggers to death."
Raoul shut his eyes and waved the weevil-riddled hardtack away.
"What the hell is that bunch doing down by the river?"
Hodge Hode grinned. "They call it a 'pub-lic in-dig-nation' meeting." He drawled out the words, amused. "Say they won't go across the river into Michigan Territory. Say they want to go home."
"Any of our men talking that way?"