Ghost Dance (22 page)

There was a general suspicion that the white men had simply made another of their mistakes, or perhaps better, had done something stupid again, and might perhaps still be patiently reasoned with. There was, after all, the matter of the treaty, and treaties, now that the Indians were on reservations, seemed to be taken more seriously by the white people, more seriously at any rate than when the Indians had still held land the white people wanted.

Besides, how could the men come to collect the rations, even if men were to do this squaw's work, when there was the Ghost Dance to be danced?

No, it could simply not be done. The agent in the administration building and the colonel at Fort Yates perhaps simply did not understand these things.

The Ghost Dance was holy.

Moreover, why should there be fighting now, when the Messiah was going to come in the spring and the ground was going to roll over the white men anyway, and over their stone lodges and their railroads and cannon, leaving not even their bones to puzzle the trampling, returning buffalo?

It would be foolish to fight now.

War, in any case, particularly after smoking, was a serious matter, not to be lightly decided upon, particularly in the winter, and with the buffalo gone.

And so it had been decided to send some braves to see the agent, and in the meantime to dance the Ghost Dance, keep the ponies at hand and the weapons loaded.

If the food did not come soon, of course, then the Indians must leave the reservation. Indian wives and children, like white wives and children, required food. There were many white ranchers within a day or two's ride from the reservation, who raised thin herds of the white man's spotted buffalo, and these white man's buffalo would have to serve. No Hunkpapa family would starve while its man had an arrow for his bow or a bullet for his gun.

At Running Horse's cabin an Indian, one of the two braves who had accompanied Drum, was waiting for them.

Chance's hand went to the revolver in his belt.

"Come to the cabin of Old Bear," said the man, and turned, leading the way.

Not understanding, Chance followed Running Horse and the other Indian.

Suddenly Running Horse broke into a run, not waiting, and ran to the door of Old Bear's cabin. Chance, surprised, jogging behind, leaving the other Indian back.

At the door Running Horse did not knock but stood outside and called his name, to be given permission to enter. One does not beat on the side of a lodge.

There was a grunt from the inside and Running Horse, followed by Chance, and a few seconds later by the other Indian, entered the cabin.

Behind the fire, his back to the far wall, facing the door, in the position of the master of the lodge, sat Old Bear, his face utterly impassive.

He did not smoke.

Running Horse, visibly apprehensive, was sitting down, cross-legged, across the fire from Old Bear. He would not, of course, speak first. Chance, bewildered, sat down beside Running Horse. The other Indian sat down against the wall, by the door.

Looking about, Chance saw, in a corner of the cabin, among the goods and boxes, the sacks and robes and articles of Old Bear, a large, bulky shadow, an object wrapped in a blanket, and suddenly, with a start, he saw that it was the bent figure of a human being, motionless yet alive, the figure of a girl, kneeling on her heels, her arms folded under her, her head fallen forward, almost touching her knees.

No sound came from the concealed figure.

Outside he heard a voice. "I am Drum, the son of Kills-His-Horse."

"Enter my lodge," said Old Bear.

Drum scarcely looked at Chance, but seemed to be as puzzled as he himself was. Only Running Horse seemed visibly disturbed.

Drum's hair now hung loose and wet over the back of a buckskin shirt. It had been cleaned with sand and water. The paint had been washed from his face, and undoubtedly the rest of his body. He still carried a long welt across his forehead from the encounter with Chance hours before. The young Indian wore buckskin leggings and a breechclout, and had wrapped about his waist a blanket, which he drew about his shoulders when he sat down opposite Old Bear. He had been accompanied by the other brave, the one who had protested to Sitting Bull about the fight between Drum and Chance, and this brave sat down next to his fellow near the door.

Kicking Bear was nowhere in sight, and Chance gathered that he had not been summoned.

Whatever was to take place was not a matter for medicine men. He himself was there merely by virtue of having been with Running Horse when Running Horse was called to the cabin. No one had told him to go away. Perhaps that would not have been courteous. Perhaps he should go away. But he was here now. He gathered that what was to transpire was really between Old Bear and the two young Indians, Drum and Running Horse.

Chance wondered why Old Bear had not lit a pipe and passed it around.

Neither Drum nor Running Horse, both of whom must have been aware of the figure in the corner of the cabin, gave any sign of having seen it.

For a long time Old Bear said nothing, and then he looked at Drum, and said, "You, Drum, wanted the white man to kill me at the place of scaffolds, so you could take my daughter to your lodge."

Drum said nothing, but stared into the fire.

"You, Running Horse," said Old Bear, "have worn your hair short. You have become too much like the white man."

Running Horse dropped his head.

"But," said Old Bear, "you have danced the Sun Dance."

Running Horse looked up, gratefully.

"And you, Drum," said Old Bear, "though you are young and sometimes you are bad and you do not understand many things, you are yet strong and brave, and it is not your fault that in you is the memory of the eagle feather you have never seen and should not hope to wear."

Drum's eyes blazed at this.

"And," continued Old Bear, "you are the son of Kills-His-Horse, who was my friend."

Drum looked as though he might speak, but he did not do so, for Old Bear was not yet finished.

"There was a chief of the Hunkpapa," said Old Bear, "who once had many horses and had taken many coup and fought at the river with Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse against the warrior Long Hair, and this chief became old and the days of the eagle feather passed like the sight of his eyes and he then lived on the beef of the white man, his enemy, and had one daughter to cook in his lodge and care for him, and this daughter, though she was not beautiful nor skillful, was dear to him, and he did not wish to let her go from his lodge."

Old Bear was quiet for a time, staring down at the fire, and then he began to speak again.

"But it seemed that two young men wanted to bring horses for this woman, though she was neither comely to look upon nor could she work skins and do the beadwork of her people, and that there was bad blood between these two young men, though they were both of the Hunkpapa. One was willing even to see the old chief die to have the daughter come to his lodge, and would kill the brother of the other, to shame him."

"So," continued Old Bear, "the old man thought about these things and one day, in a place of peace, when he had prayed to the Mystery, he understood that he was old, and that his daughter was young, and that there should not be bad blood between the Hunkpapa, and that she must leave his lodge."

"I will bring you many horses," said Drum.

"But," said Old Bear, continuing, "although the old man's heart was good his head was not wise and he had waited too long."

Drum looked puzzled.

"And the old man is no longer young and the lance is heavy for his arm and it is hard to draw the bowstring."

No one spoke for a time. At last Drum asked, "Is it the words of a father of the Hunkpapa that his daughter may now leave his lodge?"

"She may do what she wishes," said Old Bear.

"I will bring many horses," said Drum.

Old Bear looked at Running Horse, sadly.

Running Horse hung his head. "I have only one horse," he said.

"I do not need horses," said Old Bear.

"Your daughter is worth horses," said Drum, "and I will give them."

"I want my daughter to go to the lodge she wishes," said Old Bear.

Drum laughed aloud and struck his knee with the palm of his hand. "The daughter," said he, "has promised to come to the lodge of Drum, who is the son of Kills-His-Horse."

Running Horse reacted as if struck.

"Is it truly the wish of Drum the son of Kills-His-Horse to take my daughter to his lodge?" asked Old Bear.

"It is my wish," said Drum.

"And what is the wish of Running Horse?" asked Old Bear.

Running Horse looked down for a time, and then looked up, meeting the old man's eyes. "My wish is the wish of her father," he said, "that she go to the lodge she wants."

"In the morning," said Drum triumphantly, "I will bring horses."

Old Bear looked steadily at Drum and then, stiffly, rose to his feet. He went to the corner of the cabin and took the girl by an arm, pulling her into the light of the fire. When she stood before them, Old Bear tore away the blanket.

"I will bring no horses for this woman," said Drum.

Winona did not raise her eyes.

Her hair was loose and filled with dirt, and her face was stained with dirt and tears. The left side of her face was discolored where Totter had struck her. Her blue cotton dress was half torn from her body, and she held it to her by her left hand. Her right hand was clutched into a small fist, clenched beside her exposed, bruised right thigh.

Old Bear seized the fist and with his two hands lifted it and pried open the fingers, revealing inside the pair of yellow chevrons torn from Totter's sleeve.

"I am an old man," he said.

Drum took the chevrons.

"I am your eyes," he said, "and I am your arm."

"I, too," said Running Horse.

"In the morning," said Drum, looking at Running Horse, "we will meet to make medicine."

"Yes," said Running Horse.

Winona, who had not spoken, now lifted her head, and looked at Drum.

He regarded her with contempt. "You will not now come to my lodge," he said. "I do not want you now."

Old Bear put the blanket about her shoulders and she drew it close about her, once more lowering her head.

Drum turned and left the cabin, and was followed by his two braves.

"You may stay in my lodge," said Old Bear to the girl, "as before."

"It would shame you," she said.

"No," said Old Bear. "I would not be shamed."

"I will go away," said the girl.

"Stay with me," said the old man.

Winona suddenly cried out and lunged toward the door, and Old Bear tried to restrain her but she pulled away and fled into the winter night, leaving only the blanket in the hands of Old Bear.

Old Bear dropped the blanket to the floor and sat down behind his fire, in the place of the master of the lodge. "Leave me," he said.

Chance and Running Horse left the cabin.

Outside Chance turned to Running Horse. "What are you going to do?" he asked.

Running Horse looked at him, his expression unreadable. "I am going back to my cabin," he said.

Chance shrugged, and accompanied the young Indian back to his cabin.

 

* * *

 

Winona, cold, huddled by the slow-flowing, chill waters of the Grand River, south of the camp of Sitting Bull.

Alone with no one before whom to be shamed she had wept, and poured dirt over her head, and with a sharp stone she had cut her long black hair, rubbing and sawing the strands, until it hung no further than the back of her neck, and then with the stone she had struck herself, again and again, in the thighs and arms, bruising herself, hurting herself.

Now she was quiet and cold, and sat huddled by the waters, watching them move their slow winter way between the frozen mud of the banks.

She cried out, startled, as she heard a twig snap near her, and looked up.

Running Horse, a broken twig in his hands, stood near her. About his shoulders he wore a blanket, which he had brought from his cabin. He threw the two pieces of the twig he had snapped into the water.

"Go away!" cried Winona.

But Running Horse did not move, but stood looking at her.

"Short hair!" she cried viciously, wanting to hurt him. "Short hair! Short hair!"

He looked on her, yet without showing pity, on her bruised and now bleeding body, the dirt with which she had covered herself, the jagged remnants of her once long, beautiful hair.

"Go away!" cried the girl.

But Running Horse would not leave.

She sprang to her feet in rage, seizing up the sharp stone with which she had cut her hair, and her body.

She took the stone and slashed at Running Horse's face and the stone gashed him on the left cheek leaving a wide wound and a sudden mark of blood, like a streak of paint. He did not move.

She dropped the stone, and with her hand almost touched his face. "I am sorry," she said.

The girl turned away and dropped to her knees, rocking and sobbing, her head to the ground.

"Go away," she wept. "Go away."

Running Horse sat down, cross-legged, on the ground near her.

"I am Running Horse of the Hunkpapa," he said. "I have a good horse. I can shoot with a rifle. I can hunt meat."

"Go away," said the girl.

"I have some white man's money," said Running Horse. "My brother is Medicine Gun, who knows the medicine of the white man. I saved my brother from men who would kill him. I fought with Drum and he did not kill me."

"Leave me," begged Winona.

"I am brave," said Running Horse. "I am strong. Even the spotted sickness of the white man could not kill me. I have a steel knife. I have a white man's pipe given to me by my brother. I have blankets and corn and beef and a fire in my lodge which needs tending."

Winona raised her head and turned slowly to face Running Horse, her eyes glazed with tears, her body miserable with pain.

"What are you saying to me?" she asked.

Running Horse dropped his head.

Suddenly without warning she hissed at him. "You are a fool and a short hair. I am only a white man's woman."