No Song to Sing

Tommy and I came to save my son from the heathens. I had it in mind I was going to kill every one of the bastards. We waited until almost dark, then crawled up close to their small camp. We found six gray-haired Apaches sitting cross-legged staring at a dog they were roasting. It was my son’s dog. One wore my son’s hat. A ceremonial jug painted gold and blue was going around the circle, each man taking a few long slugs and passing it on. Not a word was being spoken. Their eyes never left the dog.

Jem was kneeling a dozen feet beyond the fire with his hands tied behind his back. It was the first hard frost of winter, and we could see him shivering with the cold. Blood ran down the side of his face and one eye was swollen shut. The other was wide with rage as a boy and girl, both about his age and wrapped in thin, store-bought blankets, listlessly poked him with sticks.

The ones at the fire began to pray or sing, or chant— I didn’t know what they were doing. It was a low-pitched mumble to my ears. It made me sad just listening.

“It’s a death-song,” Tommy whispered, which didn’t make sense, but then, I find things rarely do these days. This was not a hunting party, nor a war party. The Apache doesn’t bring old men or children on either one. I figured they must be off the rez at San Carlos and headed for Mexico. They probably hadn’t wanted Jem; they wanted his dog. He must have fought them for it, and they took him along.

“What the hell?” I whispered to Tommy.

Tommy is half Lakota, and I’d known him since we rode together with twenty others into Wounded Knee Creek, a village of Lakota men, women, and children. We were there to take their weapons away. Tommy was to be our interpreter. Some sixteen-year-old buck-private fired off a shot, and then most of the rest of us did the same. Ten minutes later, hundreds lay dead. Tommy could never go back to his people, so I took him with me.

This time we were facing six worn down old men and two children, all half starving. If it wasn’t for what they’d done to Jem, I might have felt sorry for them.

We watched for a while longer until I figured we’d waited long enough. I slid the hammer back on my rifle and rushed forward, ready to shoot the first son-of-a-bitch that moved. None moved. The singing stopped, but nothing else changed.

“Pa!”

I looked over and saw the Apache boy holding a white-bone knife to Jem’s throat. The girl crawled quickly behind her older brother. She, like the boy, stared at me with seething hatred.

Tommy came out into the open now, his rifle cradled across his chest. He raised one hand and spoke softly to the boy who let loose with an angry jabber.

Tommy looked at me. “He’s saying we already killed ‘em.”

“Why’s he saying that?”

“Because we have.”

“I ain’t in the mood for riddles, Tommy.”

“There're no riddles here. They came here to die,” Tommy said.

“Well, good. I’ll see if I can’t just help them along.”

Jem, at that moment, brought his head forward and then back again hard, a reverse headbutt that sent the kid rolling onto his ass and I had a clear shot, but Tommy was already forcing the knife from the boy’s hand.

None of the six men had moved. They still sat with their heads lowered. I took the jug from the one holding it in his lap and was surprised to find it nearly full.

“Don’t mind if I do,” I said. I took three long swallows. It was no fine French spirit, but it tasted better than I’d expected. Like Juniper berries, maybe. I drank again, then handed the jug to Tommy. “Not bad,” I told him.

Jem came over wearing one of the children’s blankets. We gazed down at the six sitting with their chins resting on their chests, looking as if they were in church. Shadows danced across their solemn faces.

Tommy took a deep swig from the jug and handed it back to me.

I passed it to Jem. “I guess you earned it,” I said. Jem took a small sip, then a bigger one. He was about to take a third when I took the jug from his hands. “Not so fast, pard. We got a long ride home.”

Tommy moved to the campfire. He gently nudged a man on the shoulder, and the old man fell backwards to lie with his eyes open, staring up at nothing.

It took me a moment to catch my breath. Tommy nudged another with his rifle and this one knocked over the next and the next like falling mahjong tiles. They had the same vacant, open-eyed death stare. The roasting dog popped and spat and the small fire blazed. It was then we saw the yellow, puss-filled spots on their faces.
I tore the blanket from Jem’s shoulders and threw it over the dog on the fire. We backed away. I grabbed the Injun boy by his shoulders and took a look at his face. He too had the spots.

“What is it?” Jem asked.

“We call it Rotting face,” Tommy whispered.

“Smallpox,” I said.

Tommy pulled the jug out of my hand and smelled what was inside, then turned to look me hard in the eyes. “But that’s not what killed ‘em,” he said. He threw the jug to the ground where it splintered into a thousand pieces, and walked off into the distance where he began to sing his own song.

Jem and me watched him go, then sat down where we were. I felt the dizziness coming on. Jem said, “Papa?” but I had no answer for him, and no song neither.

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