Shortgrass Song Read Online Free PDF Page A

believe there can be any more.”
    Buster looked Kicking Dog in the eyes. The little warrior may have been scary, but he sure was ignorant. “Tell him he ain’t even seen the half of ’em yet.”
    When he got the answer, Kicking Dog stalked away to his tepee.
    â€œI tell him that before,” Long Fingers said. “I go across the plains two years ago to see how farming works. I see plenty whites there.”
    â€œIs that where you learned to speak English?” Buster asked.
    â€œNo. I learn long time ago. The Arapaho trade with whites. Our people stay friendly. I learn the English to trade better with whites.”
    Arapaho! The word lifted a load of fear from Buster’s innards. But if that Kicking Dog was friendly, he would sure hate to see a hostile Indian. “Do you want your people to learn farmin’?” he asked.
    The chief frowned, shaking his head. “The whites say we should learn, but our people do not like that kind of work. It is our way to live on the buffalo, but the white hunters are killing too many, and the wagons going everywhere scare the buffalo away. If the buffalo all go away, maybe so we will have to make a ranch for cattle or horses. But our people do not want to do fanning. We do not like to dig up the ground. Maybe so you know about work with cattle?”
    Buster smiled at a man who touched his guitar as he tuned it. “No. But I’m goin’ to a ranch. Maybe I’ll learn about it.”
    â€œWhat ranch?”
    â€œClose to here. On Monument Creek.”
    â€œYou know Holcomb?” the chief asked.
    The familiar name rang in Buster’s ears like a bell of salvation. “Not yet, but I’m supposed to find him.”
    â€œYou will not learn about cattle there. Holcomb knows nothing about it. His cattle get away all the time. When we find them, we bring them back and Holcomb’s wife trades with us. Sugar, flour, coffee. After we eat, I will show you which way to go to find Holcomb. It is half a day if you pull your wagon.”
    Buster nodded. “Thank you.”
    â€œNow, my boys want to hear you make music with all these things. Come into my tepee and show us how the black people make music.”
    Buster got up with his guitar.
    â€œAre there tribes with the black people?” the chief asked.
    â€œYes.”
    â€œWhich tribe are you?”
    â€œAfrican Baptist.”
    â€œAfrican Baptist,” Long Fingers repeated. He paused at the entrance hole to his tepee and looked toward the east. “There are many tribes of people on the earth.”
    Buster found the ground inside the tepee covered with buffalo robes, rolled robes forming couches. Light streamed down from the smoke hole, illuminating a pile of ashes circled by rocks in the middle of the lodge. The hide tent was surprisingly cool and well ventilated, though the rank smell of the camp wafted here, too.
    He sat on a rolled hide and played, using the guitar first, then the banjo, then the mandolin. Between songs, he smoked a pipe with the warriors, though he was not fond of tobacco. He could hear giggling and the shuffling of feet outside, and knew the women and children were listening. When he started fiddling, Long Fingers put his hands over his ears and made him stop.
    â€œMake the fiddle sing outside,” the chief said. “It is too loud.”
    When Buster played “Old Brass Wagon” on the fiddle outside, Long Fingers called for his wife. The fiddler was amazed to see the chief and his wife square-dance together like white folks. The rest of the Indians laughed at the mockery, except for Kicking Dog, who considered white dancing scandalous.
    â€œWhere did you learn those dances?” Buster asked when he sat with the chief to eat a gruel made of corn from a tin plate.
    â€œThe whites at Cherry Creek do not have many women with them, so they like to dance with our women when we camp there, and they teach us their dances.