Adventure Magazine Cover, February 3, 1921 — page 47: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

The Road to El Dorado “We come to give you your lives. If it were only a matter of the Kiowas we might let you all die. But if you die then the Arapahoes and the Cheyennes, the Com- anches and the Apaches must die, and that will make the big chiel’s heart very sad. The Kiowas remember the Smali-pox Winter?” : The unexpected query left Walking Wolf dumb for a few moments. His compan- ion, less quick to school his countenance, betrayed great uneasiness. The question was put for rhetorical effect, for there was no Kiowa, no plains Indian of thirty years of age, who did not remember the terrible disaster which overwhelmed the plains tribes from 1837 to 1840. Walking Wolf was old enough to re- member the first epidemic of 1818, when the dread disease was brought to them by visiting Osage. But only twenty years had elapsed since small-pox broke out on the Upper Missouri, reducing the Mandans within a few weeks from sixteen hundred to thirty-one Indians, while the Arikaras and Minnetarees were reduced from four thousand to two thousand. In all, that epidemic had cost the plains Indians one- third of their number. No; there was no need to ask the Kiowas if they remembered the terrible scourge. “Why does the white man ask foolish questions?” Walking Wolf finally de- manded. “Because we will give you your lives so that the Arapahoes, who are friendly to the whites, may live.” This was proclaimed with a volume that carried to the listening Arapahoes. “We would have the Blue-Cloud people wake up from their bad dream and go back to their womenand children. Do you see this?” He held up the small bottle of liquid and shook it until it foamed. Walking Wolf stared at it intently, his small eyes fixed as if hypnotized. He bowed his head. Reason calmly explained: “This contains the small-pox spirit. If I open it the evil spirit is again loose on the plains. Does the old Wolf believe me, or shall I prove it?” And he seized the stopper. “Wait!” gasped Walking Wolf. He suspected a trick, but the horrors of *27 were painted indelibly on his savage mind. Small-pox was considered-to be a white man’s disease. That they should 4l have control of the disease was perfectly logical. ‘This the more so as the epidemics did not decrease-the number of whites. ‘Let me talk with my people,” he re- quested. “Be quick,” urged Reason. The two Kiowas wheeled their ponies and rode back to their friends, signaling that the truce continued. The Arapahoes, some of those nearest the party having overheard Reason’s threat, began stealing back along the ridge to join the Kiowas in council. California Joe stared admir- ingly at the back of his partner’s head, and exclaimed: ‘““Dawg-gone ye, Tommy! ye had any brains afore!” “My snake medicine,” modestly insisted Reason. “I could see we was done up if they kept to the fightin’. Th’ gal wor- ried me. Then th’ snake spoke up jest as clear as a bell an’ told me to mix some flour an’ water in a bottle an’ tell ’em it was small-pox. They’ll always have a sly notion we fooled ’em, but there ain’t one in th’ whole Kiowa nation, not even Do- hasan himself, that dares prove we're liars. That’s th’ beauty o’ this game. Here they come!’ Walking Wolf and his one compan- ion trotted toward them slowly, the open hand held high. Reason held up the hand holding the bottle. The aged medicine man shuddered as he gazed on it. Reining in a rod from the whites, he abruptly an- nounced: “The Kiowa ride back to their village at once. The Cloud Men (Arapahoes) send this talk to the white men—+that they have no trouble with them and will now go to hunt buffalo.” “Does the Wolf and his friends wish to smoke a calumet of peace before we part?” asked California Joe. Never lowed Walking Wolf winced and threw his open | right hand forward and outward with the palm to the front, the Kiowa sign for a decisive negative. Reason said: “Then let the Kiowas and the Arapahoes ride off. If they come near the train again the bottle will be broken and the evil sick- ness let loose.” may THE Indians whisked their ponies O5y about and raced back to their “4 friends. The white men, Joe now afoot, slowly returned to the wagons. .The wagon-crew were all grouped in front of GomiGchbooks (C@