“Mr. Grimes, how is it that you’re so friendly with the Pawnees—I mean, with Braid having caused you to lose your arm and all? I would think you’d be downright mad, or at least not friendly enough to bring them powder and lead.”

Mr. Grimes snorted, and Francis could see the mountain man’s back jerk as he began to laugh. “Honestly, Mr. Tucket, you do ask the mulish questions, don’t you? I’ll bet you spend the rest of your days looking gift horses in their mouths.”

“What do you mean?”

“You want me to answer that? Or would you rather figure it out for yourself?” the mountain man said. “It seems simple to me. If I hadn’t been ‘friendly with the Pawnees’ as you put it, you’d be back there with a rope around your neck, getting whipped.”

“I’m sorry,” Francis murmured. “It was a dumb thing to ask—”

“But since you asked,” Mr. Grimes cut in, “I think maybe I ought to answer it. You think I ought to be mad at Braid on account of my arm. Well, Braid can’t help the way he was made, no more than you or me. The Pawnees call themselves ‘The People.’ They live with the land. If you put it in our talk, that means they live by nature—the same nature that makes a she-bear gut you if you mess with her cubs. Braid costing me my arm is about the same as if a she-bear took it. I couldn’t get mad at a bear and I couldn’t get mad at Braid, and I couldn’t hate the whole Pawnee tribe because of a mistake.”

“You call losing an arm a mistake?” Francis asked.

“Yes, sir. I should have got Braid before he got my arm—not doing it was a mistake.”

“How can you talk about killing Braid when you don’t hate him, aren’t even mad at him?”

“Now be careful, Mr. Tucket. Asking a question is one thing—even when it’s a dumb question. But now you’re picking, and picking is what St. Louis city folk do …”

“No—I mean it. In the wagon train and at Braid’s village, I fought a lot. But I couldn’t really fight unless I got good and mad. Now you make it all sound so cool and calm—I just don’t understand, that’s all.”

Mr. Grimes laughed. “Let me put it another way. I live by trapping, mostly beaver. Sometimes I trap on Pawnee land, sometimes not. When I do trap on Pawnee land, it figures that I’d want to do it without getting my hair lifted, so I bring them something they need—powder and lead—and I don’t get mad. I get something—beaver pelts—and the Pawnees get something. We all stay happy. Well, maybe not happy—but alive.”