He slowly lowered his weapon.She didn’t move a muscle.
His eyes were growing accustomed to the darkness inside the cabin.He was surprised by the orderliness and comfort of the place.He’d seen plenty of mining claims, and the men who worked them generally had little interest in the civilized upkeep of their living quarters.Prospecting was a rough life, and all their energy was directed at one thing: drawing gold or silver from the ground and streams.
Smith’s cabin was different.The place was…well, homelike.A big bed, raised off the ground.Bearskin covered it, and elk skins had been tacked up on the walls to keep the winter winds out.Baskets hung from the beams, alongside dried meat and herbs.There was a potbellied stove and a rustic table fashioned from split pine and cottonwood.Two stumps served as chairs.There was no fire going, but inside the cabin, the smell of stew hung in the air.
A man and woman had made this place together.Caleb could feel it in the careful order of things, in the hung herbs, in the patched hides, in the quiet usefulness of every object.It was not just shelter.It was a life.
She lived here with Smith.
Caleb understood why the fire was out.Being here alone, she didn’t want the smell of it to draw attention.
Never mind that she was a woman, she was a native.It wasn’t even two years since the Lakota and Cheyenne wiped out that fool Custer near the Little Big Horn River.It didn’t matter to most of the white folks pushing west that Indians had been living on the land they wanted.To them, they were all savage and barbaric and deserved to be wiped out.
Ugly words from Caleb’s childhood echoed in his mind.The words of the missionary.For those who are spared, it went,kill the Indian in them and save the man.He bristled at the memory of the man who said it.
Caleb forced back the recollection and focused on the woman pointing the gun at his chest.She had to be cautious.Unless she was married and protected by her white husband, men could abuse and even murder her, and no law would provide justice.
The thought sat hard in him.He knew too much about men who believed power gave them permission.
“I mean you no harm,” he repeated in Cheyenne.
“What are you doing here?What do you want?”she responded in English.She spoke the language with the ease of someone who had been using it for years.
Caleb didn’t blame her for not trusting him.A few words in Cheyenne weren’t enough.“Looking for Smith, the miner who owns this claim.”
“Why?”
He had no problem answering her question if it would put the woman’s mind at ease.She still hadn’t moved at all.She was standing, feet braced, finger on the trigger.
“He came to Elkhorn two days ago.He left there with my friend, Doc Burnett.The doctor has not returned, and people suspect foul play.”
“Smith is guilty of no foul play.”
“I believe you are correct in that, ma’am.But I need to find him.”
“Slowly, put your gun in the holster, Marlowe.”
Caleb pouched his iron and felt the woman immediately relax.She had no way of knowing, but there had been many times in the past where men thought themselves in a position of power just because his pistols were holstered.On more than a few occasions, those men had paid dearly for their error.He could still cut her down if he had to.
He had no wish to.
“I know of you, Marlowe.”
Caleb was surprised.
“My people knew and respected the one they call Old Jake.I saw him once when I was very young.He came and traded in my village.People say you are like a son to him.”
“I rode with him for a long time.”
She lowered the shotgun but didn’t decock the hammers.She still hadn’t decided to completely trust him.Knowing of a man only goes so far.
“What are you to Smith?”he asked.
“I am his wife.My name is Imala.”
He was not taken aback by her answer.Many men out here, including Jacob Bell, were known to take a native wife.It was curious, though, that the judge didn’t seem to know about her.Unlike other miners and settlers who had an Indian wife, Smith apparently wasn’t one to parade her around like some peculiar possession.
The way Imala dressed, however, told Caleb she was not one to abandon her ways.Maybe that was why Smith kept her out of Elkhorn.
