Free Comanche by J. T. Edson Page A

arrow, even if one could achieve the desired result quickly enough to be of use, Long Walker did not waste time trying. Instead he drew the tomahawk from his belt. Like the bowie knife, it had been a present from Ysabel and made in James Black’s Arkansas forge. There was no better steel in the United States than that made by the Arkansas craftsman and it held an edge almost as sharp as a razor. Swinging the tomahawk around, Long Walker sent its blade crashing on to the back of the buck’s neck. Steel bit home to sever the buck’s spinal column. Instantly it went down, flopping to the ground as if boned, and almost landed on top of Loncey. Only by making a very hurried roll over did the boy avoid having the blood-spouting buck collapse on to him. A hoof, kicking spasmodically, struck him on the rump and brought a yelp of pain from his lips.
    Slowly Loncey rose to his feet and turned a sheepish face to meet his grandfather’s eyes. The boy knew that he had made a foolish, rash mistake even before Long Walker addressed him.
    ‘Always look first before you go near any animal,’ the chief warned. ‘If it lies with its legs sprawled out, ears drooping, mouth open and face to the ground, it is either dead, or too badly hurt to be dangerous. If you had stopped and looked, you would have seen that the buck had its ears erect, legs doubled underneath it and head held up. That meant it was still sufficiently alive to be dangerous.’
    ‘I did not think, tawk ,’ Loncey admitted.
    ‘Then think next time. If that had been a grizzly bear or a cougar, you would be dead.’
    ‘Yes, tawk .’
    ‘Always treat any wounded animal as being dangerous. Don’t go towards its head if you can come up on it from behind. If it lies, like the buck, on a slope, go to it from above so that it must charge uphill at you. And when you go in close, be prepared to defend yourself, even if you feel sure that the animal is dead.’
    Loncey nodded soberly, filing away the words for future reference. Having made his point, Long Walker did not belabour it. While Loncey might have made a foolish mistake, the chief doubted it he would ever repeat it. So he praised the boy’s conduct throughout the majority of the hunt and nodded to where the Green River knife lay after being dropped during his wild evasive action.
    ‘Take up you knife, boy,’ Long Walker ordered. ‘I’ll show you how to butcher the buck now we’ve killed it.’
    ‘That is woman’s work,’ Loncey objected, full of male superiority now he had been on his first major hunt.
    ‘And when there are no women with you?’ smiled the chief. Taking the point, Loncey picked up his knife and waited for instructions. He had watched the butchering of buffalo after the big organised village hunts; but, as the work had been done by the women, paid little attention to the details. From the manner in which Long Walker handled the work, Loncey decided skinning and butchering could be a task worthy of a man learning.
    There were even advantages to doing one’s own butchering, Loncey admitted to himself. Having worked up a healthy edge to his appetite, he found himself in a position to do something about it. What was more, all the tasty tit-bits went his way instead of having to be shared among several more equally eager children.
    Using his new knife, he deftly opened a vein and drank the buck’s warm blood as it flowed. Then he assisted his grandfather to skin the animal, watching where to make the incisions so as to remove the hide in one piece. While butchering, he ate well, sampling the raw liver soaked in the juices from the gall bladder, raw kidney and its tallow and part of the paunch. Later he and his grandfather sat down to a favourite delicacy of their people, raw brains mixed with the marrow from leg bones using a section cut from the buck’s rib cage to act as a dish.
    By the time the butchering ended, Loncey felt he could not eat another mouthful. Leaving the buck’s heart in the