Samuel moved to the door ahead of us, opening it for Big Joe and me to pass out on to the wooden walkway. Big Joe stepped on the dirt first. He stopped walking as I went to the wagon. Samuel followed me while Big Joe stood still on the edge of the street.

The big man looked up the street and then, he looked down to where the north trail crossed West Halifax. I could see him thinking about which way he'd go, but I couldn't let him go.

"Big Joe, what can I do for you? If you hadn't come along when you did," I said, not knowing the consequences that the two polecats had in mind.

"Ain't ate since yesterday," I suppose you could feed me if you've a mind to?"

I looked over my shoulder at Big Joe, before I looked at the front of the leather shop

"Things would have gone differently if you hadn't come along," I said.

Big Joe looked at me with no sign of emotion on his face.

"Happy to help, Phillip. Not much different than what I did as a buffalo soldier. We rounded up our share of outlaws. They's everywhere here abouts. Glad to be useful to someone."

"Where's your horse? You didn't walk while you were soldiering."

Big Joe shuffled his feet before looking east. He looked at me before speaking.

"Dropped dead on me aways back that away," he said, looking eastward again. "Good horse too. Gave him to me when I mustered out. Probably knew he wouldn't last much longer. Picked a fine time to drop dead. I only left soldiering a few weeks back. I got pay. Wasn't aiming on spending it all on a new horse."

I looked at the team of horses pulling my wagon. I looked at Big Joe.

"You come on now. Get on board and I got a place around the corner serves good food."

Big Joe walked to the middle of the street before stopping this time. He once again looked east, and then, he looked west before he spoke.

"My kind isn't exactly welcome in most eateries. I went behind a couple, knocked on the back door. I showed them my money when I asked to buy some food. They all told me to get on out of here. Don't want to be no bother to anyone, Phillip. Especially good folks like you."

"Big Joe, climb on up here now," I said, after I climbed up. "Place I got in mind don't look at anything but your appetite. They're too busy fixing vittles. We'll get the eaten done first, and then we'll see what else I can do for you."

Big Joe climbed aboard and the wagon shifted a mite when he did. I looked out ahead of the horses, thinking I didn't need four horses to pull my wagon. I was going to give Joe his pick, but I was ready to eat and we drove around to Mamacita's.

As I told him, no one looked at us twice, and the huevos rancheros went well with the gallon of coffee we packed away. I could see Big Joe wasn't all that comfortable, but he ate what they sat in front of him.

There wasn't a lot of talking, but there was a lot of eating being done.

"Mighty nice of you, Phillip," he said, once we were back outside. "I was aiming on finding my people. Haven't had no luck yet. Not many of my kind around," he said.

"Can't say I've seen many black men out this way. You come on with us. We got a place a day's ride from here. It's kind of peaceful there. You can stay with us until you decide to move on. Where are your things? Surely you have more than that shot gun you left in the wagon," I said.

"Horse dropped dead on me. Pulled him off the trail. Put my goods in the rocks a dozen yards further on. Figured they'd be safe until I got me a horse. I appreciate you wanting to help, Phillip, but you don't owes me nothing. I was just doing what I been doing while I was a buffalo soldier. We keep order. Shoot a lot of folks need shooting."

"I got more horses than I need. You'll have your pick. We'll go see to your goods first, and you can come with us, or go on as you please. We can use another good hand. My partner is building himself a horse ranch in a valley near where we're living now," I said as I jiggled the reins and clicked my tongue for the horses to get underway.

"I mustered out of the buffalo soldiers a week or two ago," Joe told me as we turned east on Halifax.

The two bodies were right where we left them and no one was around. I let the horses walk through Denver to the trail leading out of town as Big Joe told me his story.

"I was aiming on finding my people. Seeing the west without having a company of men keeping me company. I ain't got far. My horse dropped dead four, five miles back that away," Big Joe said. "Only reason I was walking along here and saw those varmints birddogging you."

Big Joe was another indication of how random life was, and how easily Samuel and I might have been killed for our own good. If Big Joe hadn't decided to leave the cavalry, if his horse hadn't picked Denver as the place for his demise, it would be us lying in front of the leather goods store, and not two claim jumpers.

A serious man like Big Joe would make a fine friend, but that would be his call. I was going to do what I could for the man and ask him to join our little survey team. I hadn't seen any of his people west of Kansas. I did see the buffalo soldiers pass me once. The officers were all white and in the lead, but the buffalo soldiers looked like a formidable company who followed them.

What I wanted was to get out of Denver and not come back. What I wanted was to leave the meanness and all the highway men behind us and return to Paradise Valley and stay there.

What I wanted was to find out what I could do for Big Joe, because I owed him in a way I owed few men. He'd put himself into the middle of a bad situation for two men he didn't even know. It told me all that I needed to know about Big Joe.

"Who walks around with a double barrel shotgun under his buffalo robe?" I asked, without expecting an answer.

It sounded funny when I said the words.

Big Joe took to talking about my observation.

"Most expensive thing I own besides that horse, Phillip. I left all my goods among the rocks near where Jehoshaphat breathed his last. Figure on them still being there when I am able to find a way to go back I worried if I left the shotgun, someone might find my goods, and I paid good money for that shotgun."

"Jehoshaphat?" I said.

"Fourth king of Judah in the Hebrew bible."

I shook my head when I heard this. A black man bigger than all outdoors has some knowledge about the Hebrew bible? I was certain Big Joe was not Jewish. I knew there were Jews. I had no idea they had their own bible.

Maw kept her Christian Bible on a table next to where her and Paw slept, but her father was The Prophet.

Samuel climbed up on the sacks behind the seat as we moved. He didn't mind giving his seat to Big Joe. He recognized we owed the man in the big buffalo robe.

"How? What?" I said, not knowing what to ask him about how he knew what he knew.

"My Auntie Esther told me you'll never go wrong knowing your bible. She wasn't really my auntie. My mother and father were sold off while I was a baby. Auntie Esther raised me. There were a lot of aunties raising babies not their own back on the plantation," he said.

"Aunty Esther worked in the big house. Took care of Missy Millie. When she wasn't busy, she set me down with a book belonged to Master Crawford. He owned us before we was freed. I read all kinds of books on account of because Aunty told me you'll never go wrong you know history and your bible. Wasn't supposed to be able to read. Aunty taught me, and then, all of a sudden, we was free."

I wouldn't have known otherwise. I knew about Indians, but I knew nothing about slaves. They picked cotton on southern plantations. Lincoln freed the slaves during the Civil War.

Big Joe's story ended as he looked out ahead of the wagon.

I passed a half dozen wagons the size of mine as we moved to the other side of the city and took the trail to where I saw Big Joe's horse lying dead a dozen feet off the trail.

Big Joe got down and he stood next to his horse for a minute or two. I stood back as he remembered when his horse took him where he needed to go.

Both Samuel and I helped him carry his goods back to the wagon without a word being spoken. His goods were a saddle, two saddle bags, a bundle of soldiers clothing, the shotgun, and his buffalo robe. He took off the buffalo robe, putting the shotgun on top before I closed the tailgate.

He went to stand by his horse for a minute, and he came back to the wagon and climbed up on the seat beside me.

We would need to ride back through town to get to the trail north. I wanted Big Joe to go with us. He seemed lonely. He was alone. The only friend he had died on him. I felt like going to get his goods and giving him a horse wasn't enough.

I liked him, but he had a life and a will of his own. I would do what I said, and the rest would be up to Big Joe.

"I can separate out one of my horses, and you can take your pick. We can do it here, and you can be on your way, Big Joe. You'll have my gratitude for what you done for us, or … You can climb back up on the wagon seat and come with us. We'll camp on the way home later on, and I'll single out your pick of the horses there and not waste time doing it now. I don't mind telling you, I hope you'll stay with us. We can use a man like you."

"Yes, Big Joe, come with us. You'll love Paradise Valley. You can meet John, he's our other partner. He worked in the south. I bet you two know some of the same places," Samuel said in what was a speech for him.

"What will you do now, Big Joe? I'm at your service."

"I got mustering out pay when I left the fort. Wasn't figuring on spending it on another horse. A man don't so much get to decide what to do as he is guided to do what he does."

I was almost sure I knew what he was saying. He was the first black man I had been close to, except for Simon, who worked for Paw, but Simon run away from his master, and the only work he could find was with Paw, because no one worked with Paw. He was an Indian. Simon and I were literally nodding acquaintances. He had nothing to say to me.

"You won't be spending your money on a horse. You pick the one you want. This wagon don't need all those horses to pull it. You look them over and pick the one you want. We'll stop a ways up the road and camp for the night. I'll unhitch them to drink and graze. If you want to stick with us that long," I said. "I can single one out now if you'd like."

"Got nowhere in particular to go. I was figuring on finding my people but haven't seen no one like me out this far. I figured we was about everywhere, but not so much in the west. I rode with a hundred men looked just like me, but not so much since I mustered out."

"Tell me what you need beside a horse. I owe you, Big Joe. Can't save your life, but I can show you my appreciation for what you did for Sammy Boy and me. You could have just as easily gone on your way and left us to those bandits."

"No I couldn't. My aunty told me, you see a man needs help, you help him. You do it because you are a good man, Joseph, and that's what good men do."

"Ya," Samuel said, leaning forward on the sacks of goods where he sat behind the seat. "That's how I met Pop. He stopped a man from beating me. Been with him ever since."

Big Joe looked at Samuel, and then he looked at me.

"You don't owe me for doing what I was trained to do. I been rounding up polecats like those since I joined up. I saw them birddogging you. Figured I might need to shoot them before it was finished. As you can see, I got nowhere to go and no way to get there. You don't need to give me one of your horses, but I would like to ride along. With the two of you."

"If you've got nowhere, you found somewhere. As long as you'll have us. We can travel together for a while, and you'll have one of these horses. They're well cared for, and they can all do a good day's work."

I wanted to get moving. We'd be late getting back home, and John would be worried we ran into trouble. I'm sure he won't believe the tale we had to tell him this time, but Big Joe would be living proof of the story we told.

I don't know why I felt so good. Maybe I was just happy to be alive.

As we rode, and we had to go back through Denver to get to the main trail north, I told Big Joe what I did, and how I needed people to help me. I'd be able to offer him a place to stay and employment if he liked, and with John needing to build on his horse ranch, he would need help getting that done.

Big Joe listened. The horses walked, and we rolled slowly west.

The one thing I noticed about Big Joe, once he got out of the buffalo robe, he was as tall as ever, but he lost weight without the robe making him look twice the size he was.

I laughed at the change.

Without the robe, I could see where he ripped off the military doodads. He looked like he weighed four hundred pounds in the buffalo robe, but he was a modest sized man, but tall and lean in the way a soldier should be, but muscular through his upper body.

He went silent for a time. I knew he had a story to tell. I wanted to hear it, but I would let him tell it in his own time.

Samuel leaned forward on the sacks of goods. He looked out ahead of the wagon.

Big Joe seemed more relaxed once we collected his goods. I had a dozen questions, but there would be time to ask them. If he stuck with us, I'd get them all answered.

As we went back through Denver Big Joe began talking.

"When I saw those two varmints, they were standing across the street watching your wagon coming this away. As a buffalo soldier, we spent a bit of time getting varmints off the trails. Out here cavalry is about the only law there is in a lot of places. We was often set out to round up rustlers, holdup men, and assorted bad men. I stepped back in the shadows. I saw them step back in the shadows so you wouldn't see them, and they started walking along beside the wagon. I started walking. I was waiting for them to make their move. I could have yelled at them to get on about their business, but I figured in a strange town, and being a black man, I might as well keep my mouth shut and my eyes open. They did what they did and I did what I did. Life is full of twists and turns, and here we are."

The last thing I expect when I left for Denver, finding a black philosopher along the way. I liked how Big Joe thought. I liked the man he'd made of himself. Good men may be hard to find, but I was lucky enough to find my share, especially when I needed one.

"I'm a surveyor, Big Joe. I work for the 1st National Bank. I hire on men and we do surveys for the bank. They are buying land out west, and I survey it. If you haven't got anywhere in particular to go, if you want to go with us, I can pay you fair, and we live pretty good. Sammy Boy there is a good hunter, and we always have fresh meat for supper, and a fair amount of dried for when we're out and don't have the time to hunt."

"Didn't figure I'd get no work out here. Mostly white folks out here. Mostly white folks don't cotton to my kind. Nice thing about buffalo soldiering, there was a hundred men just like me. Officers were white. Most didn't have much to do with us once they gave us orders."

"Where's your family, Big Joe?" Samuel wanted to know.

"Georgia," Big Joe said.

"You don't plan to go back to see them?"

"They'd be scattered in the wind by now. We was freed by Mr. Lincoln, and that was nice of him. Being free was a lot like being a slave. Owner of the plantation, Mr. Crawford came to us once we was free, and he told us, "I'll feed you if you pick my cotton. About the best I can do with times being so tough." Big Joe said, before he went silent a spell.

"Being free was a lot like being a slave. We picked his cotton, and he fed us. Maybe he fed us a little better once we was free. Seemed like we had more to eat for a spell. One of the boys who took off for parts unknown came back. We was friends, and he says, "Buffalo Soldiers are hiring folks like us in town. You get a horse, a gun, and they feed you and pay you too. I'm signing up. They said I should go tell other men. What do you think, Big Joe?"

"I guess I can give you the same deal. I will feed you. You got your own shotgun, but you'll get all you can eat. Sammy Boy here hunts for us. He helps with surveying some days. John, our partner is back at the camp. He's buying a horse ranch. Needs to build a cabin and get some horses soon. We take things as they come at us. We mostly live simple."

"I done some building," Big Joe said. "Storm took down part of the plantation house one time, and some of us were asked to rebuild the part trees fell on. I'm a fair hand at cutting wood. I know how we rebuilt the master's house. I could build a cabin okay."

Big Joe didn't have much more to say. We'd all said our piece and the horses were walking along in no particular hurry. I had to go back down Halifax to reach the main trail.

There was no one on the street when the incident happened, there would be no one to point at us and say, "There they come now."

As we approached the assay office, there was a white wagon pulled up next to the leather shop. There were two men there. One man in a white coat was checking the two men we'd left up against the front of the leather shop.

One man stepped away and he came to stand on the edge of the wooden walkway. He was a big man with a star on his chest. Pushing his hat back on his head, he looked up the street past us, as we rode down the street, and then he turned to look down the street.

Big Joe stared straight ahead, never turning to look at the scene as we passed. I remembered what he said about not being a good idea for a black man to be anywhere near dead white men. I could see he just wanted to move on out of there.

As we passed, the sheriff didn't even look at the wagon. We were just one more wagon passing through these parts. He showed no interest in us.

The sheriff was a big man, and he had the oddest big iron on his hip. The butt of the gun was hanging at a forty-five degree angle. With the handle pointed out, by turning his right hand at the proper angle, he could draw easy enough. The gun would practically fall into his hand once he turned his hand the right way, but in a pinch, if he was in close quarters, he could reach it with his left hand and draw the gun that way.

I found that fascinating. He was a man who had obviously been in close quarter fighting, and he made sure he could reach his six shooter with either hand. I could see where that might come in handy. He turned to go back to the bodies as we passed the assay office.

I had been everywhere and I never saw anyone wear his gun in that fashion.

We left the sheriff, the other man, and the two bodies behind, turning north on to the trail that would lead us home.

"Why'd you leave the buffalo soldiers, Big Joe?" Samuel asked.

We rode a while as Big Joe thought about it.

"Shame, I suppose. Even when I was a slave, I never felt shame before. Didn't think much about being a slave. I always been one. It's what I knew. Nothing like buffalo soldiering."

"Shame?" I said. "I can't see you have anything to be ashamed of. You're a good man."

We rode a spell and Big Joe didn't explain himself.

"What we're doing. You know what the officers call Indians out here?"

"Nothing good, I'm sure," I said.

"I heard our captain say to his lieutenant, "They're Plains Niggers." Big Joe said. "Plains Niggers. That's when I knew what they thought of us. Took me ten years. I'm a slow learner I guess. Ten years. Don't want to be nowhere people think that way. I know when I ain't wanted, and I mustered out a ways back. Time don't have much meaning out here."

"We'd ridden down a family of Indians and we killed them. They did nothing to us. Didn't know where they were going, why they were out there, but we were told to kill them. All of them. No reason for it. It made me sick to see what we did to people no better or worse than us, and we killed them and left them to the wolves and coyotes. Their people would wait for them. They'd never know what happened to them. We just killed them all."

Big Joe seemed to get smaller as he went silent again. Thinking about it did him no good.

Most men wouldn't have told anyone that they'd done a thing like that. Especially, soldiers wouldn't tell on themselves. It was war. War is hell. Like they took the southwest away from the Mexicans who lived there forever. They were taking the plains from the Indians now. Although they'd been taken the land since the first Europeans came to stay. There was no thought of leaving room for the people who were here when they arrived.

"I waited until a week later. I hadn't signed back up. Most buffalo soldiers keep signing back up. It's the best life any of us had, but after what we did, and I did no killing of those folks, but I needed to get out of there. I don't mind killing people who need killing, it's nothing to me, but not a family. They weren't doing anything to deserve what we did to them. I made up my mind that I killed my last Indian. I no longer belonged with the buffalo soldiers."

"We'd killed other Indians. It was our job. We killed lots of Indians, but never just to slaughter innocent folks going about their business. Most Indians put up one hell of a fight. They don't know tactics, regrouping, falling back to secure our position with as few casualties as possible."

Indians know one tactic. They come at us and keep coming until we ride away or until most of them are dead. Indians can not compete against a well trained military force. They know it, and yet they keep coming at us. Oh, I ain't saying they don't avoid us. If they see us, they go the other way. They may not know military tactics, but they know when not engaging in a battle with a superior force is the smartest move. When they have to fight, I've never seen tougher men. They have a courage you can't miss. They come at you and they keep on coming. It's how they got Custer."

"Custer?" I asked. "Custer is dead?"

"Just before the Centennial. Five, six months ago when we got the word his entire command had been wiped out at a place they call the Little Big Horn."

"What's a Centennial?" Samuel asked.

"We declared our independence on July 4, 1776. Last July fourth a hundred years since doing it," Big Joe said. "That was the centennial. There were parades and such."

"Who was Custer?" Samuel asked.

"The boy general," I said. "He was made a general about the time he was in his twenties. They called him the boy general. Suppose to be a hell of a soldier," I said. "Custer is dead."

"I didn't know all that," Big Joe said. "You know about Custer."

"Hard not to hear of Custer while taking wagon trains across," I said.

"You take wagon trains west? We see them all the time," Big Joe said. "I always imagined where they might be going. You just get in a wagon and go where you want. It's amazing. I never been anywhere until I joined the buffalo soldiers."

"I took a few for the bank I work for. I'm originally from out in the territory. Not much I don't know about this section of the country," I said, having been everywhere at least once.

"It was after Custer died that orders came down to kill any Indians not on a reservation. I suppose they kill them on reservations. It's just not as well known," Big Joe said.

A lot of things weren't well known.

Had the people known what was being done to the people who had been on this land for thousands of years, I don't think it would have changed a thing. Europeans took what they had a mind to take.

White people wanted the land. They weren't concerned with what it took to take it. Once the Civil War ended, they simply shifted the soldiers to the west. Anyone who wanted to stay in the military were signing up to do whatever they were ordered to do.

"We were always chasing Indians. It was the Indians who named us. Buffalo soldiers because we had hair like the hair on the buffalo. We do and Indians respected us."

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"Home Fires Burn"

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"Majors & Miners"

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