Page 287

The Way West (1955)

noise and movement of the meeting, the night fell gentle, dimming the sunset, drifting into groves and gullies to wait its time to claim the land. And then the moon swelled up, the red fires whirling in it, and whitened in its climb. In the still silver of it, Summers could see things plain-the faces of the smoking men, the clean lines of tree trunks rising, the Indian lodges pointing up, the caught moon-glimmer of a blade of grass.
The men smoked quiet, Indian and white alike, speaking only stray words that Summers put into one tongue or the other, for the solemn talking was over and the solemn smoking. Evans sat with him, and Patch and Gorham and Carpenter and Daugherty, and White Hawk and half a dozen of his men. Yes, the hunting was good, for sheep and deer and elk, and the fish were big and many. White Hawk would see that the Shoshones did not steal from their friends. He had posted soldiers to watch. How many miles to Fort Hall? How many sleeps to the British house, White Hawk?
No air stirred, not a breath. The fire they had built grayed with ash, just the heart of it alive. And no noise sounded except the tiny hum of mosquito wings and the lazy words they spoke. The children were abed, and the women waited their men, and the dogs were quiet, and the wolves and coyotes not yet tuning up. It was as if the earth and sky listened while the question turned in Summers.
Why did he ask instead of act? He didn't believe in the sin the preacher did. Men and women were made different for a purpose, like hes and shes of any breed, and mostly he had done what he wanted and got up