Benny was the hurt man.
Jim interrogated me--for all that his questions were softspoken and quiet--while the Owens brothers did their best to save Benny.
"No sign of anyone else?" he asked me, after I told him how Adam and I had found the boat--and how Adam had run back to camp to get help and left me to do what I could.
"No." I pulled the blanket they'd given me more securely around myself.
Benny woke up briefly when they started wrapping his foot with vet wrap. It sounded like it hurt.
Jim sighed. "Benny's sister, Faith, was with him out fishing. They were supposed to be home for dinner. Julie, Benny's wife, she called Fred tonight when Benny didn't answer his phone. We were docking, but the Jamisons are good folk. We put the boat back in the water and started looking. What tribe did you say you were?"
I hadn't, in spite of the fact that they had introduced themselves that way. All of them were from the Yakama (with three a's, though the town was spelled Yakima) Nation. The Owens brothers were Yakama. Jim Alvin was Wish-ram and Yakama, as was Calvin Seeker. I didn't think of myself that way. I was a walker and a mechanic, both of which served more often than not to make me separate from other people. I was Adam's mate, which connected me to him and to the pack.
I was also cold and tired. It took me too long to remember.
"Blackfoot," I said, then corrected myself. "Blackfeet."
"You don't know which?" asked Calvin, speaking for the first time--though he'd been watching me since they came ashore. I'd almost forgotten I was naked until I saw his face just before I'd been tossed a woolen blanket. I supposed polite disinterest was too much to ask from everyone. Three out of four wasn't bad.
"I never knew my father--my mother is white. He told my mother he was from Browning, Montana," I told them. The wool was doing a good job of warming the skin it covered.
Naked wrapped in a blanket among strangers didn't use to bother me. Maybe if Calvin would have quit staring at the various pieces of me that the blanket didn't cover, it still wouldn't have bothered me. As it was, I did my best to keep Jim between Calvin and me.
"So you were raised white," said Calvin in disapproving tones.
I should have told them I was Hispanic and any Indians in my bloodlines were South American and unknown. Half of my customers thought I was Hispanic. Telling them I was Hispanic felt like it would have been less of a lie than telling them I was Indian. As if I were claiming ties that weren't there.
"Browning, Montana, makes him Blackfeet," Jim told me kindly. "Piegan. The Blood and the Siksika are Blackfoot."
I knew that. It just hadn't tripped off my tongue.
"What were you doing out here? It's an odd place to be running around at this time of night." Jim didn't say naked. He didn't have to. "Boy," he said abruptly to Calvin. "Don't you make your mother ashamed of her son."
The young man's mouth tightened, but he looked away from me. A few years ago his regard wouldn't have bothered me the way it did now. But things had happened since that made me uncomfortable standing nearly naked with four strangers--five if I counted Benny, which I didn't.
"I just got married," I told him, reminding my too-jittery self that Adam would be on his way back by now. If something happened, and I had no reason to think it would--especially as they had handed over a blanket to cover me without a word--Adam would be here before anything too bad happened. I wouldn't be caught in the trap of assuming all men were bad--but I wouldn't have been human if I weren't wary. "We were swimming."
"Good thing for Benny," said Jim. "We've been by here twice. It would have been morning before we could have seen that boat under the trees. And morning would have been too late for him."
Fred (I could tell because he wore a red flannel shirt, and Hank wore a gray one) left Benny to his brother and came over.
Evidently he'd been listening because he said, "I called 911, Jim, and they had already gotten a call from her husband. There is an ambulance on its way. I told the operator that we could get Benny up to the road. It'll be a rough trip. The road's only a half mile or so as the crow flies, but this is horrible country for a fast trek in the dark. But they'd have to make the trip twice that we need to make once."
"What about taking him on the boat?" asked Calvin.
Fred shook his head. "We might get him to the hospital faster that way--but the ambulance will have medical personnel on board. He'll get faster medical care, and time matters. If he stays in shock, we could lose him--but when he warms up, that foot is going to bleed like a fountain."
"Whatever you and Hank think best," said Jim, which seemed to make the decision for everyone.
5
THE ONLY BRUSH OR TREES IN THIS PART OF THE gorge that weren't cultivated--very little of the ground on either side of the river was cultivated--were right on the river. For the most part our footing was cheatgrass-covered basalt, not horrible hiking if I'd had shoes.
It would have been better if I could have shifted into coyote, but I didn't know these men--and I don't make it a habit of telling everyone what I am. Too many bad things happened to people who admitted too openly what they were without a powerful group behind them--and sometimes even with a powerful group behind them. I'd survived a long time by keeping my head down and blending in; I wasn't going to change that just to make my bare feet feel better.
The Owens brothers and Calvin took turns carrying Benny. Jim led the way and carried a couple of flares to flag down the ambulance with. We all, except for whoever was carrying Benny, carried flashlights, which did a fair bit to destroy my night vision. I brought up the rear--though they had all suggested I stay down by the river.
I could have done that, but what if they ran into Adam? Under normal circumstances, they'd be perfectly safe. But Adam had had to make two fast changes tonight and experienced a number of stressors. He'd been forced to leave me naked and vulnerable. Benny had been so afraid--in addition to all the blood and pain.