Page 6 of Sure as Shooting

Chapter Three

“I know that all about me are my friends, and as a friend to all, I wish to talk.”

Huntley paused, as was traditional, and took a long pull off the pipe before passing it to the next Indian. He continued in the solemn, dramatic tones the Diggers were accustomed to. “I know that some of you don’t wish to be friends with white men and are trying to unite the different tribes to make war. I’m here to tell you. It is better for the Indians and white men to be friends. If Indians make war on the white men, every tribe will be exterminated. Not one will be left. I’ve just been where white men are more numerous than wasps and ants. If you arouse the anger of the Americans, every Indian will be killed before they are satisfied.”

This impromptu meeting had been called in front of Huntley’s Agua Fria trading post that morning with the arrival of José Juarez and his band. Huntley welcomed the opportunity to address the group that included about thirty Diggers from other tribes.

Sheriff Burney had easily been summoned, Agua Fria being so small that one instantly knew if someone expectorated on the other side of town. They’d been joined by several town luminaries, such as Boling from his hotel, the assayer Paul Terrell, Adam Johnston, special agent to the governor, and Philip Din of the tenpin alley and gambling establishment.

Huntley wanted to remind José Juarez of the events in San Francisco, the unmitigated might of the white man he’d witnessed with his own eyes, so he now intoned, “José Juarez here has just returned with me from the place where the white men are numerous. You’ll believe him when he tells you they are more powerful than the Indians.”

Respectfully, Huntley handed the pipe to Juarez, today clad only in a jacket and socks. They stood before the log where people conglomerated in front of his trading post, and Huntley waited for Juarez to issue a statement of agreement. He knew enough of Diggers’ character and intelligence to know Yankees were considered trespassers on their property, and he’d already lost four horses to them—no horse too valuable for an Indian to eat.

“What did Ashbury tell them?” Phil Din wanted to know.

Boling was the only other fellow present who could speak the Indian lingo. “That they’d better shake and call it done, or there’ll be hell to pay.”

The Americans nodded in satisfaction.

Juarez suddenly took a step forward and declared with alarming gusto and energy, “Our brother has told his Indian relatives only some of the truth! We did see many white people, but the ones we saw are not like the tribe that digs gold in our mountains. When the gold diggers go to the big city, they give their gold for strong water and games, and when they have no more gold, the city dwellers drive the gold diggers back to the mountains with clubs. They strike them down, as your white relative struck me when I was in the big city.”

What? Huntley’s jaw dropped, and his arms hung limply at his sides. He looked at the cunning chief’s face, and Juarez shot him a vindictive glance. It was plain the melee in San Francisco had not been forgotten.

Juarez continued, “The city whites will not go to war with us. They cannot bring their big ships and guns to us, so we have no cause to fear them.”

Many other Indians had joined them by now, and Huntley felt like tearing the pipe from the traitor’s paw. True enough—three-masted clippers couldn’t make the journey up the San Joaquin River, but what absurd logic! Huntley had heard many such examples of convoluted Indian logic in his time, but this one topped all. It would be bad manners to interrupt Juarez, though, and now that infuriating Dr. Whitney and his grumpy associate Bud had joined the American side of the audience.

Dr. Whitney stood with folded hands, unruffled and expressionless, tilting his torso this way and that to get a better glimpse of Juarez. Huntley barely took note of the disheveled Bud, probably clad in that ridiculous woven Spanish vest and those olive trousers that looked to have been stolen from a member of Frémont’s expedition. No, Huntley’s attention was fixed solely on the elegant doctor. He had not stopped thinking about him for a moment since the events of the day before.

He might have overreacted to the effects of the medical massage. It was probably true that medical gymnastics involved stroking the nipples, even tweaking them. What did he know about these newfangled techniques? Dr. Whitney had studied in Glasgow, Paris even. Europeans did things differently and were in the forefront of almost every new idea, ideas that were often considered absurd by Americans. So his cock stiffening when the doctor had fondled his nipple, well, that was just a normal physical reaction, maybe even the desired European result.

But when Whitney had grabbed handfuls of his ass and rotated so heartily he could feel Whitney’s hot breath on his asshole, vulnerable and open to the air, well, something emotional had surged in him. He knew Whitney could view his cock pressed against the sheet, taut and throbbing between his thighs. Maybe this was not a shameful sight for a doctor of European training. But when Whitney’s hand had dared to slip lower and actually tickle the underside of his erection, all reasoning went out the window. By that time Huntley was so randy he could have torn the door off a barn with one arm. But since he’d booted the doctor from his house, he’d felt increasingly more guilty about his own behavior. He had become hysterical.

He’d had to immediately run out and fuck one of his squaws just to relieve the arousal created by the doctor’s marvelous hands. But Indian women only lay there until he was done, so that was hardly any release. No one, not even his poor departed wife, had ever touched him the way the doctor had. No one had ever stimulated him in that manner. Perhaps it was akin to some opiate, to want to find out more about this, to keep coming back for dessert.

Juarez handed him the pipe. It was his turn for a rebuttal. Huntley quickly cleared his head and strutted about to regain command. “I have listened attentively to what my friend the chief has said. He has told you only some truth. He has told you of things he saw in his dreams while ‘strong water’ made him sleep. The white men we saw in the city are all of the same tribe as the gold diggers in our mountains. They are all brothers, all of one tribe. All can climb the mountains, and if war is made on the gold diggers, all white men will come and fight against you. Their numbers will be so great, every tribe will be destroyed that joins in a war against them.”

Huntley was just getting into a good rhythm when the pipe was yanked from his hand. This was unheard-of, yanking the pipe, interrupting a man in the middle of an eloquent speech! Juarez paraded in agitation, gesturing excitedly at his fellow tribesmen, as though unaware he wore no trousers and no shoes.

“Ashbury’s tongue is crooked! This trader is not a friend to the Indians. He is not our brother. He will help the gold diggers drive us from the country. We can now drive them from among us, and if the other whites come to help, we will go to the mountains. If they follow us, they won’t find us. We will kill them with arrows and rocks.”

Adam Johnston, the special agent, shook Huntley by the elbow. “What in the name of Sam Hill is he saying? I don’t like the looks of this.”

Huntley informed the men, “Sounds like he’s declaring war.”

Johnston cried, “What the hell did you tell them, Ashbury?”

Huntley protested, “Shut the hell up and let me listen, you tomfool blockhead!”

The hotelkeeper, Boling, tried telling the Americans, “Ashbury didn’t incite them—just warned them that any war would be futile.”

A Chowchilla Indian chief, King Joseph, as he was known, paced back and forth before them, clad in a dazzling sombrero and about twelve shirts. This fellow had always seemed a bit treacherous, now more so than ever, for he trilled, “My people are now ready to begin a war against the white gold diggers. If all the tribes join as one tribe, we will drive them all from the mountains. They will run from us, and the people who join us will be the first to secure the property of the gold diggers.”

Very astute of him, appealing to their collective greed. Everyone was listening avidly. Suddenly, directly behind Huntley, some doughhead bellowed out, “Down with the Indians!”

The report was so sudden and so close to his ear that Huntley pivoted about. Sure enough, it was that hateful buffoon from San Francisco, Bud, who had somehow snuck around the crowd to stand with the Americans of Agua Fria, thus making it seem as though his pronouncements were part of their creed.

Bud shrieked, “Goddamned Diggers, good for nothing! Only the lowest sort of being would steal horses for food!”