The Canyon of Bones by Richard S. Wheeler Read Free Book Online Page A

looking, he creeps out, snatches the baby, and runs away with it into the forest. This is very difficult. Many of the Wolf Society die; the Blackfeet catch him and take their baby back and kill the Absaroka boy.”

    â€œThis is remarkable. How often does this happen?” Mercer asked.
    â€œNot often. An Absaroka boy must have a vision, then pledge that he will take a Blackfoot baby, and then do it. After that, there’s a ceremony on a big moon night. All the men in the society count coups. Then the baby is left for the wolves to eat. But if a coyote eats it, that’s bad luck. Watch out for coyotes. They’re bad luck.”
    Mercer stared, slightly at a loss, and then wrote. The sun had set. A sweet cool evening breeze, scented with pine, drifted down from the slopes.
    She was in fine fettle, and hurried on. The next one might be worth two or three drinks. “Now I’ll answer another question. The Absaroka have the Wife-Trading Night.”
    â€œYou do? Then it’s true. I heard about this in St. Louis.”
    â€œIt’s true. It’s the longest day of the year, when Sun doesn’t go to bed but lingers on, and rises early. That’s the night when everyone is happy. Wives are honored. It is the Night of the Wives. That’s another Absaroka name for it.”
    â€œTell me, what happens?”
    â€œOh, I shouldn’t talk about it. It is sacred, very sacred.”
    â€œPlease tell me. I’ll not mention it or say where I heard it.”
    â€œYou sure? We don’t talk much. It’s great honor. Every wife, she wants to try it.”
    He scribbled furiously, and then the lead snapped. He dug in his pockets, extracted a tiny folding knife, and whittled a new point on his pencil.
    â€œNow I’m ready, Missus Skye. You were saying?”
    â€œAh, yes, the longest day, the light lingers, and husbands make big deals with friends, and give them their wives for the night, and because it’s light everyone knows, everyone knows who goes to which lodge, eh? Sometimes when a wife is plain,
the husband, he gives his friend a gift too? An elk skin, maybe. Then the plain wife gets to enjoy the honors too.”
    â€œAh … I see.”
    Mercer looked like he was about to choke.
    â€œYou all right?” she asked.
    â€œFine, fine. Tell me more. Does this happen just once each year, on what we call Midsummer’s Eve?”
    â€œHell no,” she said. “It happens all the time.”
    Mercer was turning an odd red color. “Remarkable. I shall want every detail.”
    But then the drumming began. She glanced at the meadow, and sure enough, a crowd was collecting at a bonfire, even as old men gathered into a drumming circle and began their plaintive songs to the demanding beat of the drums.
    â€œI must go look,” he said. “We’ll continue this little talk tomorrow, Missus Skye.”
    She smiled. She was in a smiling mood. If there was anything the People loved, it was a good joke.
    She drifted to her lodge, ready to confess what she had done and celebrate with him, but Skye was gone.

eight
    S kye drifted from the lodge after darkness cloaked the valley. The drummers had begun, their heartbeat drumming throbbed through the camp. A crowd had collected around them to listen to songs of triumph, great events, war, and power.
    He was in no mood for that and wished the tribes had some other and quieter way to spend a summer’s eve. He had no relish for the company of the explorer, Mercer, either. In fact, he was using the darkness to dodge the man. He had nothing against the energetic Briton who had welcomed him cordially, and yet he did not want further commerce with the man. Somehow, Mercer was an intruder, and few of the Absaroka or Shoshone people grasped that he was noting everything there was to know about them.
    It was one of those moments he often experienced, when he felt caught between the European world of his youth and