#17
He said turn them back, said he wouldn’t see them then. But maybe they didn’t listen. There, in the depth of his house, Keintpoos stood looking up the ladder to the roof opening, listening to the commotion outside. He heard the horses running back along the trail, heard them heave to a halt, heard footsteps race up the roof.
“They’re coming!” the look-out shouted down to him through the smoke-hole. “They wouldn’t hear me. They’re many.”
Keintpoos turned to John Schonchin who sat with the kiuks Euchoaks and some others next to the fire. In the dusk of the sleeping areas of the families, the women stopped what they were doing and fell silent, shushing the children.
“Hear that?” Keintpoos asked, and John Schonchin nodded yes.
“Who are they?” Keintpoos demanded of the messenger.
“Some of our women and their Klamath men, the ones who came before to see you. McKay. A red-whiskered man. Another in town clothes, black. He must be the one.” The messenger looked down the ladder, impatient for Keintpoos’ answer. “Frank Nurse’s come with them, too, I think, and Horn. McKay said they must see ‘Captain Jack.’ He used that name, not ‘Keintpoos.’”
“Soldiers?” John Schonchin asked.
“No brass buttons. Only these.”
“I told you to say I wouldn’t see them. I don’t wish to speak to them now. When I want to, I’ll send a messenger.”
“I said that, but the one in black shoved past us. We couldn’t stop him. He’s here. Now. I’ll tell him again.”
The lookout withdrew, and outside there was turmoil. Keintpoos could hear the raised voices, the high keening sound of women off at a distance. His own women picked it up, began chattering. He looked again at the men by the fire. The kiuks stared before him, but John Schonchin nodded his head. “You’re going to have to hear them,” he said.
“I’ll see one!” Keintpoos shouted to the watchman. “Tell them I’ll say when that one should come!”
The messenger looked back down the ladder, then withdrew, crying out in broken English to those outside, “Keintpoos see one only. One only come alone! You all others leave now. Go on b…!” He could not finish his words, though, because the black-clad figure had knocked him away and had slid without stopping, sprawling at the bottom of the ladder in a cloud of roof-dirt and of dust kicked up from the floor mats.
He cried out some Boston words as he got up. He dropped his parfleche at his feet to pull back his coat, show his white shirt, the belt and trousers. Keintpoos could see for himself there was no gun, unless in a pocket. But the man was coming forward as if he knew the thought. He was saying in his own tongue -- something. Scarfaced Charley took the words from him and made them into Modoc:
“‘I have no weapons,’ he says. ‘You must look. And I come in peace. I am Superintendent Meacham. Who of you is Captain Jack?’”
#18
This was the Meacham he had heard of. If Keintpoos couldn’t understand all the words, he could see how the man moved his hands, pick out the names. Toby had told him, and so had others who had been to the reservation to visit or gamble. This was the one who took away Lindsay Applegate -- a man you could at least talk to because he knew your way almost as you did. This was the one who came from the Boston tyees, you could tell by his dress. Like the men in the streets of Yreka sometimes, who had come by the stage from far places. Black pants, and a white shirt that ended in the pointed neckband. And a black ribbon tied there, again like the strangers. Not the strong clothing of the trail. Keintpoos felt at the torn kerchief around his own neck.
He felt, too, a triumph and an anger. Keintpoos had sent word that he would not go again to any Linkville or to the agency. This Salem tyee had heard him and had made no second demand. Instead, he had done as Keintpoos had said. He had come a distance, proof enough he understood Keintpoos was not to be called like some dog. Here was a cause for satisfaction. But also he came against Keintpoos’ wishes. Not here, to Lost River, but into the heart of his house, unbidden. This Meacham was a brave man, but foolish to push in here as if the place were his. Because he and the Boston tyees had said this and this was Klamath reservation land, because the cowardly Klamaths agreed to be on it, because Old Schonchin stayed with his band of Modocs along the Sprague River, those were not reasons to think that Keintpoos’ own home was lessened. He would be the one to decide who could come down his ladder.
Not one of his men made a move. After a glance, Euchoaks turned back to the fire as if this person were nothing. The shaman motioned with his head for Keintpoos to join him. But the man in black stood as he had before, his hand thrust out, unmoving.
“I have come to talk with you. I don’t know if you understand me.” He repeated: “I am Superintendent Meacham.”
Keintpoos brushed past him. He ignored the hand and returned to the fire, gave this ‘Superintendent’ a chance to leave. But the man didn’t know shame, and he followed, turning the gesture into a quest for heat. He put both hands before him over the flames, as if Keintpoos had invited him.
#19
Meacham tried to see his quarry in the dismal light, but it was hard to without looking directly at him. He had the impression of smooth, well-balanced features, a broad mouth pulled into a thin, clenched line, a jaw set in displeasure, a man his own age, maybe some younger. The eyes did not look at him but into some middle distance, a veil of resentment over them. He could read the checked anger in the set of the head, the shoulders. Meacham felt his own heart banging against his ribs, a dryness in his mouth that made it impossible to swallow. Had he paused to think, he would not be here, but impulse had swept all before it when the Modoc men had thrust their ponies forward to block the way. Suddenly, after weeks of waiting, after sitting half-frozen for days in a shambling line of suppliants, he was taken by such a lust to see this man that nothing -- least of all good sense -- could stop him. Pushed by all his promises and intentions, he had forced his way past everyone and had lurched and sprawled into this elusive presence, at the dark heart of this dark house.
For one of the few times in Meacham’s life, words failed him. There was nothing he could do but wait. He held his hand out again to the chief and tried to keep it steady, afraid to think what was in the dark behind him, what was coming from the future toward him. Finally, when it was clear that Jack would not reach his own hand out to him, Meacham fished the pouch of tobacco from the parfleche, opened it. He took his pipe from his pocket, wiped it clean with his kerchief, and filled it. Pulling a burning twig from the fire, he sucked the flame into the pipe and let the smoke rise in a puff into the dark air. Through it he could see the hardened eyes of Jack’s men, watching. He wiped the pipe again carefully then handed it toward Jack, nodding, then he looked encouragingly toward the young Indian who stood next to him. Meacham noticed for the first time the deforming scar that angled over the flesh of the fellow’s right cheek from his eye nearly to the corner of his mouth. He looked, too, toward the man, evidently a bit older than the chief, with thicker, less refined, features, who sat on the fire’s other side. Was it from him the guttural sounds came? Perhaps. Meacham was not even sure he heard them. Soon they stopped, but still there was no movement. Was this John Schonchin, the next in command, he wondered. And by him, with the buffalo-mane head of hair, this would be Euchoaks -- the shaman, the kiuks -- Curley-Headed Doctor. Well named! It was as if Meacham were not there, his pipe extended, the others caught in some tableau at a wax museum. These