The Christmas MEGAPACK ®. Nina Kiriki Hoffman
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the fires and straddled their ponies and are comin’ this way,” Ellison added. “They’re painted—I could see that in the firelight.”
“How many?” Willard asked.
“Looked like maybe a score,” Jones replied.
“Never knew ’em to jump a camp this time of the night,” Cooper put in.
“Act naturally,” Willard ordered, “but be ready for quick action. He glanced around and saw Johnny Bight sitting beside the wagon on a fallen log. He thought it best not to try to seize and tie Johnny in the wagon yet. Indian spies might be watching.
Brush cracked on both sides of the ravine. Willard bent over the fire and put the coffee pot in a new place, as if nothing unusual was happening. The others were tense, weapons near at hand.
“They’re all around us,” Cooper whispered.
“Hit for a dark spot if shootin’ starts,” Willard replied. “Never knew ’em to shoot without doin’ a lot of yellin’ first. That’s to scare their enemies and whip up their own courage.”
It was silent for a moment, not even the brush cracking, and then came a hail from the side of the ravine:
“Chief of Yellowleg Men, I want to talk to you.”
Willard glanced around to see his three men in position and Johnny Bight still sitting beside the wagon.
“Who wants to talk to the chief of the Yellowlegs?” Willard called.
“Young Swallow.”
“Let Young Swallow come to the fire and greet his friend.”
* * * *
There was a short wait, then the brush began cracking again and a painted Indian strode through a streak of moonlight and stalked toward the fire. He wore a headdress to which no doubt he was not entitled. He stood a short distance in front of Willard and the others, his body drawn up and his arms folded across his breast.
“What does my friend want?” Sergeant Willard asked.
“You here are as many as the fingers of one hand, and one of you is sick in the head,” Young Swallow orated. “We know these things. And we are as many as the fingers of four hands, and we have new guns and bullets we got from a trader. If we were to fight, the scalps of the Yellowlegs would soon be in our lodges.”
“Why should friends make war?” Willard asked.
“Do as we say, and there will be no war.”
“What does Young Swallow want me to do?”
“We want the horses you have, for Yellowlegs always have good ponies. We want those animals you call mules, for they pull great loads. We want all your guns and blankets and bullets. Give us these things, and we will ride away and not cause you trouble. If you do not give them to us, we will kill you all.”
“If you attack us, Young Swallow, the Great Father will send many soldiers and hunt you down.”
“We will be gone over the hills before the soldiers are ready to come after us,” the Indian replied, with scorn. “They are always slow starting.”
“Young Swallow must understand that these horses and mules do not belong to us, but to the Great Father. We only use these things when we work. And it is against the laws to give guns and bullets to Indians.”
“Enough of talk!” Young Swallow broke in. “My men are in the brush all around you. If I but lift my arm, all of you will die.”
“Our medicine is strong,” Willard barked at him. “Think for a long time, Young Swallow, before you attack us. The life will be blasted from your bodies.”
“Our medicine is strong also! It tells us to take what we want.”
“Our medicine is strange as well as strong,” Willard told him. Without turning his head, he raised his voice and called: “Johnny Bight! Light your tree—now!”
The Indian did not understand the meaning of the words, and they meant nothing more to him than an unintelligible incantation of a medicine man.
Willard went on talking:
“Our god is angry because you have come here painted for war and demanded things you should not have. So we will make our powerful medicine, and you will be destroyed if you do not get on your ponies and ride away. Our medicine is strange medicine, such as you never saw before.”
The sergeant was orating to kill time, and from the corner of his eye he glanced toward the huge boulder before which Johnny Bight had set his tree. And he saw a match flicker, a tiny spurt of flame, saw the match carried from one taper to another.
As Willard talked on, the light grew in volume and was reflected by the flat surface of the huge boulder. It gleamed on red and green ornaments which caught the high lights and sent color to stain the rock also. And on the top of the tree the star Johnny Bight had fastened there and draped with tinsel gleamed and flashed like a thing alive.
“Look!” Sergeant Gus Willard shouted, waving his arm in the direction of the tree. “Our medicine! Our God speaks! Did Young Swallow and his men ever see medicine like that? It will begin working in a moment. The young Cheyennes will be dead men!”
* * * *
An expression of terror came into Young Swallow’s face. From the brush came a chorus of exclamations, a quick jabbering of hysterical language, and the brush began cracking.
Over by the fire, Johnny Bight began shouting in a squeaky, uncertain voice with a note of hysteria in it. He began dancing up and down in front of the illuminated tree.
Young Swallow shouted to his men, turned and fled. The troopers heard them crashing through the brush as they yelled at one another. A moment later came the muffled sounds of hoofbeats as the Indians began a rapid retreat.
“Catch a little rest,” Sergeant Willard told the others. “We’ll start for Fort Wallace at dawn.”
THE SANTA TRAP, by Robin Aurelian
It was Subtraction Eve, and the children went through the house looking at everything they cherished, wondering which things Santa would sneak in and steal that night. Janie’s birthday was the week before Subtraction. She hated the fact that her birthday was so close to the holiday. She only got to play with her presents for a week before most of them disappeared forever. Sometimes she thought her parents gave her crummy gifts on purpose—why spend money on something she would lose before she even got a chance to break it? Mike’s birthday was in the spring and he always got much neater things.
“This time I’m going to hide the truck behind the toilet,” Mike said, cradling his yellow Tonka truck in his arms.
“Don’t be stupid. It doesn’t matter where you put it. The more you don’t want him to find it, the more he can find it. He’s got some kind of sniffer to find the stuff you like the best,” said Janie.
“He didn’t find Monkey Man last year,” Mike said.
“You didn’t like Monkey Man last year. You didn’t like Monkey Man until he was the only toy left.” Janie looked at her doll, Brewster. Worn and battered Brewster, with the hair half off his head, his clothes all torn and stained. Janie had her own way of dealing with Brewster and Santa. She had had Brewster for four years now. She roughed him up right before Subtraction, made him ugly and dirty, looked at him and thought bad thoughts. She spent all of Subtraction Eve thinking about anything other than Brewster; if she thought of Brewster she thought about him as her most hated toy. So far, Brewster had been there each Subtraction morning, and she could get back to taking good care of him.
She wasn’t sure her method would work this year. Even though Santa was only supposed to take the good things, the new things and the neat things to give to other kids who didn’t have enough money to get their own neat new things, Janie had heard of Santa taking someone’s best loved teddy bear even