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  He opened his eyes and then flailed to make sense of what he saw. He was no longer standing by the river. Instead, he lay on his back staring up at layers of multicolored blankets stretched over a cone-shaped structure formed by long, skinny poles. He was in a tipi. Dim light filtered through the faded blankets. How had the day turned from bright to evening so fast? An intense pain in his jaw overrode thought. His fingers probed his chin. Ow. Had he been in a fight? Did someone slug him in the chin? No. That didn’t make sense. He’d been by himself, standing on the river bank, waiting for Eich.

  And where was he now? He studied the busy patchwork overhead. Drying plants hung from the supporting poles. Then

  he recalled seeing the Indian fisherman. Had that man knocked him out? Kidnapped him? But why? It made no sense.

  And where was this tipi? He’d seen nothing like this around Prineville. Had he been taken away from town? His fingers told him that he lay on a pallet made of folded blankets atop a deer skin. Sweet-smelling flattened grass, still green and pliable to the touch, formed the tipi’s floor. Various packs and small baskets crowded the edges of the enclosed circle. He reached into the nearest basket, his fingers touching something supple and soft. He pulled it out to find a finely stitched deerskin glove.

  Murmuring soft voices outside the tipi caught his attention. For the first time, he was aware of smoke. He couldn’t see it but, the scent was all around him. Some of it was stale, wafting down from the blankets. But, sweet-smelling, fresh burning wood also scented the air. Thin tendrils of smoke drifted in through a small opening between the blankets. He raised his head, struggled to sit up, groaning when his chin encountered his shoulder.

  The blankets parted and Eich stepped inside, a wide smile splitting beard from moustache. “Ah, my boy. I see that you have decided to wake up.”

  “What happened? Where am I?”

  Eich, a sturdy but not gigantic man, stepped closer until he could stand erect beneath the tipi’s apex. “In answer to the last question, you are the guest of a small band of Wyam Indians. They are traveling through Prineville on their way to the Willamette Valley where they hope to find work in the hop fields.”

  “Hop fields,” Sage echoed.

  “Yes, it is their annual trek. Along the way, they hunt animals for making jerky and harvest edible plants for drying. It is how they prepare for winter.” He gestured at the tied bundles overhead. “Let me begin at the beginning. You recall that we were to meet in the cluster of river willows, near where someone shot Rayburn?”

  Sage nodded. That much he definitely recalled. “I got there early. Tried to find evidence of the killer. I didn’t find anything. I was waiting for you. Looking at the cliffs, watching the water, listening to the birds.”

  “Yes, exactly,” Eich said. “From the bridge, I saw you standing on the river bank. I was making my way toward you when a shot rang out and you dropped to the ground. I ran toward you. I found you face down, unconscious.”

  The ragpicker’s face reflected the anguish he must have felt. “All I could think of was that you, too, had been shot in the back. That I had failed Mae.” His voice trailed off and Sage understood how awful it would have been for him to tell Mae that her only child was dead.

  Sage wriggled on the blankets. “Funny, I don’t feel like a bullet hit me.”

  Eich laughed. “That’s because it didn’t. It appears that you knocked yourself out when you dove to the ground. I think your chin encountered a rock.”

  Another tentative touch of the chin made Sage wince and he said, “Yup. I fear you might be right. It feels like someone landed me a walloping uppercut. Great. Knocked myself out with a rock. I can hear Fong’s jokes already.”

  Then he remembered everything. “Speaking of Fong, I remember now. I was standing there practicing what Fong calls ‘ear’ awareness. Trying to hear all the different birds and other sounds. There was the water swishing, a breeze rustling willow leaves and a passel of birds singing their hearts out.”

  He looked at Eich.“Have you noticed how many birds live here? They must like the long prairie grasses. I’ve never heard so many different bird songs.”

  Eich nodded but said nothing. Sage squinted, trying to capture the memory. “Then the bird song stopped,” he said slowly. “That made me listen harder. I thought I heard the swish of legs moving through grass. So I held my breath, fanned out my ears. There was a metallic clink just like a revolver hammer being pulled back to turn the cylinder. I threw myself forward. That must be when I hit the rock.”

  “And so, the bullet missed you. But it looked like you fell because you’d been hit. The killer probably thinks he shot you.”

  “So how did I end up here?” Sage gestured at the tipi’s interior.

  In answer, Eich stood up, went to the opening and called, “Mr. Henry, would you kindly come sit with us?”

  There was no sound before a small man with a round, dark face entered the tipi. Sage recognized his form and clothes. It was the fisherman he’d seen at the river. Eich sat down on the flattened grass, as did the newcomer. Sage struggled upright on his pallet. Other than the throb in his chin, he felt fine.

  “Mr. Miner, I’d like you to meet Mr. George Henry. It is his hospitality you are receiving.

  Sage leaned over and shook the Indian’s offered hand. “Thank you very much, sir,” he said. The black eyes looked back at him, bright with warmth and curiosity. That look reminded Sage of Fong. With a pang, he realized he missed his friend and teacher.

  “Mr. Henry was fishing the river,” Eich said. “He heard the shot, then my shout and came to investigate.”

  Henry nodded. “Yes, I saw you. I wanted fresh fish for our supper. I heard a shot and saw Mr. Eich running. At the same time, I heard another man running away, into the bushes.” He looked at Eich who nodded that he should continue. “Once we saw you were not shot, we talked and thought it better to let that man think you were dead. That is why we carried you here instead of taking you into town.”

  Sage looked at the two men sitting comfortably side-by-side. “How long have I been out?” he asked.

  “Oh, about two hours, a little bit more,” Eich answered. “We were thinking to hide you away until dark. Then we’ll sneak into the hotel, through the back door. After that . . . ,” here Eich shrugged.

  “That’s probably the best plan,” Sage said. “Maybe when I come back to life, it will shock someone into revealing themselves. By now, he must be wondering why the town isn’t in an uproar over my murder. Good, I hope he’s feeling real nervous.”

  “We have at least an hour before dark,” Eich observed and turned toward their host. “Do you mind if we stay here, out of sight, until then?”

  “My wife, Donna, is frying up the fish. We will eat, drink and talk until darkness comes,” answered Henry.

  “Mr. Eich tells me that you are heading to the Valley to pick hops,” Sage said.

  “Yes, every year, we work for a German farmer near Salem.

  He has grown hops for many years. It is for the beer.”

  Sage thought of the beer he’d drunk in Silverton, a small Willamette Valley timber mill town near Salem.“Those are some very good hops,” he said. “Mr. Eich tells me that your group is of the Wyam tribe? Is that part of the Warm Spring’s reservation?” Sage knew little about the Central Oregon Indians. Just that there was a reservation west of Madras called the Warm Springs and another reservation, further east, called the Umatilla.

  For some reason, that question made his host grin broadly. Eich cleared his throat and said to Henry, “Correct me if I explain it wrong, sir.” Then he turned toward Sage. “First of all, there is no Warm Springs tribe. When the federal government created the reservations after the Civil War, they forced a number of tribes, some of them mortal enemies, all on to that one reservation.”

  Eich gestured toward their host. “Mr. Henry and his small band are what the government has historically labeled ‘renegades’.”

  Sage felt his eyebr
ows raise. The western penny dreadfuls had given him to understand that renegade Indians were murdering outlaws some thirty years or more ago. Like the Apaches in Arizona.

  Sage’s thoughts must have traveled across his face because Eich hastened to explain. “All that term means is that, back when they told the Indians they had to move onto reservations, some of them refused. The Wyams stayed on the traditional land along the river. In Mr. Henry’s case, that meant on the Columbia River at the Celilo Falls. Much later, the government allowed the Indians to actually claim their own land as homesteads. That was in the mid-1870s.”

  “We Wyams come from more than one tribe,” George Henry said, taking up the explanation. “We are people of many tribes living together at the falls. We refused to move onto the reservations. We call ourselves ‘people of the river.’ Once there were problems between the reservation Indians and us, but now, we meet together at the falls every year to celebrate the return of the salmon.”

  Henry continued speaking in the low, rich voice common to the other Indians Sage had previously encountered. “We fish for salmon in the spring and fall. In between, we travel to the Valley for the hop harvest. Along the way, we men hunt. Our women collect roots, nuts, berries. They gather half of what we eat during the winter. The women dry the meat, roots and berries.”

  “Are we still near town?” Sage asked.

  “Yes, at the west end of the bridge, across the river. We come here every year to sell deerskin belts, gloves and salmon jerky to townspeople and ranchers. That is one more way we prepare for the winter months. I came ahead to catch fish and my son came to hunt deer and has not returned. The rest of the band arrived just before the man shot at you. Tomorrow we will sell our goods. The next day we will leave.”

  “It’s lucky you were here. Mr. Eich would have had a hard time trying to hide me,” Sage said.

  Henry studied Sage with an intense gaze. “Do you know why someone tried to kill you?”

  Sage looked into dark eyes, bright with polite curiosity. Something told him this man was trustworthy. He glanced at Eich who inclined his head in assent. Sage took a deep breath and told the Indian about the murder of sheepherder Timothy O’Dea, the burning of hay barns and the dead Asa Rayburn.

  Sage’s story done, Henry pondered for a few minutes before saying, “The grazing problem is everywhere this side of the mountains. Many, many people are angry. If an Indian is willing to lease land, there is more than one sheep or cattle man who wants to use it. Sometimes they cheat. Not all of them are good men.”

  “Well, it is hard to tell the good from the bad sometimes. If a range war breaks out, many people will be hurt. And, some of them will be good people,” Sage said.

  “You know,” said Henry, “my wife heard something the other day that fits your story. Let me ask her to speak with us.” He left the tent. Seconds later, he could be heard saying something in a language containing popping sounds. A woman’s soft voice replied in kind.

  The opening parted and a small, round woman entered. She looked at them with merry, deep brown eyes. Sage liked her instantly. Henry said, “This is my wife, Donna. On the way down to Prineville we stopped at a sheep rancher’s house to sell gloves and other things. The ranch woman was in the house, finding money. The window was open. Many sheep ranchers were inside, talking.” Finished with this introduction, Henry looked toward his wife, nodding for her to speak.

  “They were very angry. Shouting,” she said in a soft but clear voice. “They were talking about their sheep getting killed. Many said they’d had enough and were going to make sure the cattle men knew that they could not hurt others and to expect punishment when they did. Then they talked about a plan.”

  Sage had little hope that this woman had overheard the details of the “plan.” Still he had to ask, “Could you hear what they were planning?”

  She shrugged, saying, “I heard the words ‘shoot’ and ‘burn’ but they spoke in low voices. One man kept asking them to wait. He talked about a meeting. The other men shouted him down.” This was not good news. Until now, the sheepmen had resisted retaliating. It sounded like the they had decided to move in that direction. Darn. Siringo wasn’t going to like it. He became aware that Donna’s soft voice wasn’t finished.

  “One man left sooner than the other men. He spoke to them as he was leaving out the door. I heard him say “I’ll meet you all here, eleven days from today.”

  What did that mean? Were they going to attack the cattlemen in eleven days? But, no. “When was this?” he asked hoping it wasn’t days ago.

  “Yesterday,” she replied.

  “Where? Where is the ranch where they are going to meet?” That question unsettled her because she looked at her husband who returned the look. She shook her head, “No,” she said. “This could cause trouble for my people. And, the rancher’s wife is a kind woman. Lonely. ”

  Sage nodded his understanding and turned toward George Henry who was gazing into the distance, one hand thoughtfully rubbing his chin. At last Henry said, “We try to stay away from white men’s fights. Too many times, we are the ones who suffer,” he said, smiling ruefully before adding, “But, we will be camping here and there around Prineville for about one week. We travel to the east and south selling to the ranchers, hunting and gathering. We will keep our eyes and ears open. If we learn more, I will find a way to let Mr. Eich know.”

  With that, Henry rose and left the tipi. His wife also rose to leave, “I will bring you coffee and food very soon,” she said before exiting.

  Sage and Eich exchanged a look. “You never know,” Sage said. “Maybe they’ll hear something we won’t.”

  TWENTY

  A band of clouds moved in from the west as night fell. He and Eich returned to town along residential streets and slipped between houses to reach the hotel’s back door. Sage waited in his darkened hotel room for 10:30 p.m. He used the back door again to reach the pest house’s rear yard where he’d been waiting for Lucinda for the last half hour. His day reviewed, his ears straining for the sound of her arrival, he pondered over something Eich had said.

  As they had made their roundabout way to the hotel, the ragpicker talked about Sage’s mother, Mae Clemens, as he never had before. “After the shot, as I was running to you, all I could think was, ‘What am I going to tell Mae’? It felt like that bullet had hit my heart.”

  The ragpicker, put a hand on Sage’s forearm, bringing him to a halt. Eich’s derby was tilted back, revealing an intense, earnest face. “Your mother, she’s one of a kind. Clear as a mountain stream but, also, as hard as the rocks over which it flows. She’s a strong woman. But, I’m not sure she could survive losing you,” he’d said.

  “Clear as a mountain stream, hard as the rocks it flows over.” That description suited another woman just as well, Sage thought.

  Then she was there. Her face a pale oval in the cloud-dimmed light. He stepped forward and threw his arms around her. His recent brush with death gave his arms a vigor that surprised even him. She froze, then hugged him in return before pushing him away and stepping back.

  “Just what do you think you’re doing?” The words were harsh, but amusement warmed them. She stepped closer. “What is that you have on your chin?” She reached up to touch the bruise and he quickly jerked away from the pain.

  “Ouch! Don’t touch. That’s a bruise and it hurts like hell.”

  “Did someone manage to plant a facer on Fong’s star pupil?” This time, he didn’t need to guess at her reaction. She was grinning.

  “No. Someone did not ‘plant a facer.’ I managed to hit a rock with my chin.”

  She chortled before cutting it off with a hand over her mouth. Her face turned somber as he went on to explain the events by the river.

  “Is someone shooting at you because you’re asking questions about the shepherd’s murder or because you’re asking questions about Rayburn’s murder?” she asked.

  “I wish I knew. Maybe both. The good news is that it means that h
e wasn’t shooting at you the other night. But, it also means that we have to be extra careful meeting here. Right now, whoever shot at me figures I’m dead, my body carried down river. Once I turn up, alive and kicking, he might come looking here. We’ll have to stop meeting.”

  He was surprised to see her smile and wished he could see her in the daylight. “Well now,” she said. “That happens to be the good news that I have. Tomorrow morning, I will be moving into the Poindexter Hotel. Dr. Rosenberg says since there have been no new outbreaks, the quarantine is over. Xenobia is going to go back into business and she’ll need my room.”

  “You’ll be staying in the hotel?” Sage asked, even as images flashed into his mind. Him creeping down the hallway, late at night. The two of them entwined on rumpled sheets. He shook himself free of those hopes. He had to because she wanted Siringo, not him. He could hear his mother’s chiding voice, “Well, Sage, what did you expect? The way you treated her.”

  Lucinda was studying him and her tone was a bit testy as she said, “I have no intention of cramping your style.”

  “No, no. I was thinking of something else,” he said, aware his words sounded distracted.

  “I hear the back door,” she said. And with that, she picked up her skirts and vanished around the privy, leaving him staring after her.

  “Huh. I didn’t hear a thing,” he muttered to himself as he turned toward the hotel, disappointment a heavy lead ball in his gut.

  But, by the time he was stealthily climbing the hotel’s back stairs, his mind was no longer on her. Instead, he was thinking ahead to the morning. John Miner’s unexpected resurrection was going to shock someone. He hoped to catch sight of that man’s surprised reaction.

  Hours later, a slamming door woke him from a restless sleep. Looking out his window, he saw bands of wispy clouds drifting west to east. South of town, two large hawks circled silently, either communing with each other or hunting a critter down below.