The Holy Road

by Michael Blake

  It could also be said that the extra steps it took to reach the lodge of Dances With Wolves were the only traces of that gap. The two white people, and then their children, were fully accepted, and after so many years no one thought of them as white.

  If anything, the uniqueness of the family was a point of pride, a pride that had not diminished over ten winters. Dances With Wolves had long ago taken the warrior's road, dedicating himself to the principles and skills demanded of Comanche manhood. There had been about him none of the self-centeredness that curses youth, and the idea of service beyond self was one he embraced smoothly and steadfastly. He was a great killer of buffalo and the meat he made always found the fires of the poor and aged and infirm before it reached his own.

  People raised eyebrows at the breadth of freedom he gave his wife, but none could deny that the match was made to last and that the couple's good citizenship was unassailable. If Dances With Wolves occasionally carried water, or helped in the striking of the lodge, or stayed with his children while his wife visited her friends, that was their business, not anyone else's.

  If the little girl, Always Walking, wanted to follow her father around the camp instead of staying home with her mother, that was all right. And if the oldest one, the boy Snake In Hands, wanted to help his mother tan a hide, that was all right too. Even if Dances With Wolves carried the infant girl, Stays Quiet, around in a sling, no one condemned it. Of course they might tease him, as they often did with little jibes like “You're a good mother to that child,” but there was no malice in it. People expected the Dances With Wolves family to be different and found no fault with their eccentricities. They would always be a little odd in their customs and there was nothing wrong with that.

  In truth, people would have overlooked far greater eccentricities in Dances With Wolves and his family for a reason that overrode every other. As a warrior Dances With Wolves was unexcelled, having demonstrated on many occasions a strength and dependability that put him on a level with Wind In His Hair.

  It was seen as fitting by all that three summers ago, under sponsorship of the great Wind In His Hair himself, Dances With Wolves had been inducted into the elite circle of Hard Shields.

  The new inductee's mettle was proven that season in a dawn attack by a large party of Utes who hit the village hoping for plunder and scalps. While the village took flight, Dances With Wolves, Wind In His Hair, and five other Hard Shields stood their ground, outnumbered two or three to one. To be a Hard Shield meant to fight to the last breath, and that morning the seven Comanches fought the enemy with extraordinary tenacity, repelling wave after wave of Ute charges, even after each of the defenders had been wounded. Not one of them withdrew, and once the main body of the village had safely removed itself from the fighting, many warriors came back to turn the tide, driving the Utes off.

  When the battle was over, six Ute warriors lay dead on the ground. One Comanche, a genial, heavy-set Hard Shield named Woman's Heart, lay among the dead, his brains half out of his head. The rest of the village and its people were unscathed.

  From that day on, people regarded Dances With Wolves as one of their most powerful protectors, and he lived up to the perception. He was always among the first to get a weapon in his hands and among the last to put it down. His loyalty to the band was unquestioned, and when the red-haired scalp arrived in camp, no one questioned his feelings because Dances With Wolves had been part of the raid in which it was taken. In fact, he was with Wind In His Hair when the woman had picked up the two-shooting rifle and fired it. He had seen Wind In His Hair leap through the smoke of the blast and club the woman to the floor. He had seen him bend over her body and slice the hair away from her head with a knife. Dances With Wolves returned as a warrior who was already part of the scalp's history.

  He had suffered the same privations as his friends on the deep drive into Mexico, where they had been chased relentlessly by huge numbers of Mexican soldiers. He had crossed the great muddy river at full flood and nearly been swept away. He had stumbled toward home with nothing in his belly, and he had seen his strong-hearted pony lie down on the trail and die. He had crept with his brothers to the isolated white man's house on the edge of Comanche country in hope of finding something, anything, to eat. He had been fired on and he had returned the fire. He had helped storm the house and he had helped kill all those inside. He had ridden off on a stolen horse and he had seen by morning that they were being pursued. He had, like the others, made a desperate run for his life, scrambling up the great caprock cliffs and onto the staked plains. And then, like his fellow warriors, he had walked those parched plains for almost a week before finally trudging into the village, deep in the night of a waning moon.

  For Dances With Wolves, the scalp in Wind In His Hair's lodge was but one memory counted among many from the long, disastrous raid into Mexico. He sat under it often, as he visited Wind In His Hair frequently. Everyone knew that the two were as brothers.

  Like all Comanches, Dances With Wolves was uneasy about the shrinking space between Indian and white, more so perhaps because he had more to lose. But, in itself, the scalp meant nothing to him. The person it terrified was his wife.

  Chapter V

  The love she had for Dances With Wolves was abiding. They suffered through divisions as any man and woman would, but most days she counted herself lucky to have found such a considerate and faithful husband. That in itself would have been plenty but Stands With A Fist also enjoyed a special status accorded her by his achievements.

  And he was a perfect rudder for her emotions, for Stands With A Fist was not a woman who walked the middle of the trail. She had always found herself to one side, blowing hot or cold, and she often wondered what might have become of her were it not for her husband's ability to love her through unpredictable swings of temperament.

  But even with all they held between them, Stands With A Fist knew that the one thing in this world she could not be without was her children. It was the children who had smoothed the rawness of her edges. Motherhood had entwined the disparate strings of her personality and forged her into a whole person, moving her through life with a freedom from doubt and fear she had not known before.

  It was difficult to believe that Snake In Hands was in his ninth winter. Was it possible he could have come out of her so long ago? And was it possible that a being who came into the world so helpless could now be a boy racing toward manhood? He was taller and stronger than any boy his age and was blessed with an ability to retain everything he learned. Information, of whatever sort, seemed to stick in the inquisitive boy's head forever.

  Their firstborn had been slow to show himself, and for a long time they had been unable to name him. His skeptical expressions hardly changed in the first year of his life, as if he knew his own vulnerability. As an infant people had marveled at his fine, fair hair and his white skin, and more than one made the practical suggestion that they call him White Boy. It was an amusing thought and for a time it circulated as a joke in the village. The parents took the ribbing good-naturedly, and when prodded to find a name they offered the same reply again and again, a reply the boy's godfather, Kicking Bird, was the first to make: "Let's see what happens."

  The child's physical development was astounding and when the moon of his birth was marked for the first time, he was already standing on a pair of thick, beautiful legs, legs that would soon be propelling him around camp and onto the fringes of the grassland. One summer morning he trundled back into the lodge holding a young garter snake in both tiny hands. His mother was not fond of snakes but her son was so happy that she could not bring herself to discourage him and soon he was gently cradling every harmless, legless serpent he could find.

  The only real falling-out he had ever experienced with his father took place when Dances With Wolves killed an obstinate rattlesnake outside the lodge entrance. His son had upbraided his father for days after, and from then on Dances With Wolves was forced to gingerly remove all dangerou
s snakes to a place of safety.

  The boy's affection for these special animals never lagged, and even now he would jump down from his pony whenever he saw something slithering through the grass. Intent as any hunter, he would creep after the wriggling object of desire and, at just the right moment, clamp a pair of fingers on its tail and lift it off the ground. If the snake was agreeable, he would take it with him, and it was not unusual to see the head or tail of his find poking out of a shirttail or trouser leg as he rode along.

  The second child, a girl, was born less than two years later, and the Comanches, who had gotten over the surprising whiteness of Snake In His Hands' skin, were jolted again when they found that not a single hair could be seen on the little girl's head. An infant without hair was as inconceivable as a sky without stars, and the strange being that dwelt among them was constantly discussed. Again the parents looked to Kicking Bird and again he gave the same reassuring advice.

  "Let's see what happens."

  The naming of the second child, as with the first, was put off and in the meantime a growth of light, extremely fine hair began to appear on her head. That and the passage of time put an end to many wild speculations.

  Though smaller and less sturdy than her brother, the new arrival grew just as rapidly, and in her own way just as strongly. She, too, was walking early. whatever she might have lacked in boyish strength she more than made up for with a singular sense of purpose that dominated every aspect of the little girl's personality.

  From the time they could carry her, the girl's legs were moving her fearlessly around the village and she was forever popping up in the homes of people she didn't know. These solo flights were taken without warning at odd hours, and it became routine to see Stands With A Fist going from lodge to lodge, her boy in tow, searching for her little girl.

  Although the wayward child was repeatedly lectured about the importance of obtaining permission for her daily jaunts, the admonitions did little to deter her, and on one mild winter day the worst fears of her parents were realized when it was discovered that she was missing. After the village had been searched twice, from end to end, all available men and boys went to their horses and fanned out across the prairie in all directions. She was found more than a mile from camp, striding resolutely across the open grassland.

  When the horsemen came alongside she refused to break stride, acknowledging them with an irritated glance before turning her right blue eyes forward again. And when one of the men laughingly inquired, "Where are you going?" the toddler replied curtly, “I'm walking.”

  She complained loudly when one of the warriors plucked her off the grass, and kept up her squawking all the way back to camp. After that she was known as Always Walking.

  Always Going would have suited her just as well, because being on the move was how she wanted to be. She loved helping her mother, and she was good at entertaining herself. She could spend all morning with a doll and a toy lodge. But if her father went outside to relieve himself she wanted to go along, and Dances With Wolves' generosity toward his children was such that he found it hard to deny them.

  Instead of diminishing, Always Walking's penchant for action swelled as she grew, along with a flinty obstinacy for getting her way. When her mother reminded her that a girl should be a girl and that she should pay more attention to her place, Always Walking would reply, “I am a Comanche, Mother. Comanches can be anyplace they want to be.”

  If the logic of her arguments was overruled, Always Walking stubbornly sulked, refusing to be herself until the next opportunity to exercise her will was realized. So deep was her determination, that by her eighth summer there was almost nowhere that her father and Snake In Hands went that she didn't go, too.

  Stands With A Fist's third child, a girl, was now nearing two summers and had yet to demonstrate anything beyond the reticence that marked her older brother's early years. She was neither meek nor bold, neither leader nor follower, seemingly content to take in the life swirling all about her. Perhaps she was awed by the individuality of her older brother and sister. Or perhaps she was slow in developing. Or it might have been that cautious observation was simply her nature. They called her Stays Quiet.

  The greatest satisfaction Stands With A Fist took as a mother was to see her children healthy, happy, and growing. She still slept with them, and feeling those three warm bodies that carried her blood breathing next to her was the ultimate pleasure, her hope and salvation rolled into one.

  Motherhood also represented her greatest fear, the same blinding fear she had experienced when Lieutenant Dunbar made his appearance so long ago. Her first life had been torn away from her when the Comanches seized her as a little girl. The thought that her life as a Comanche, too, might be taken away was a bad dream that dogged her day and night.

  After the disastrous raid into Mexico it was impossible to keep it in the back of her mind. Dances With Wolves had already fought the whites. Wind In His Hair had taken the white woman's scalp. She could not escape the conclusion that more contact was inevitable. What would happen if the whites discovered her? What would happen to her children?

  The possibilities made her mind buzz so chaotically that sometimes the rattle of it made her faint. Since the men had walked in from Texas in the middle of the night, each day had become a trial. When her children asked questions about the whites the best answer she could make was, "The whites are none of our business, that,s why we stay away from them. They have nothing to do with us.”

  In sleep she sometimes lost her children. Once she had a horrifying dream of soldiers riding through camp, killing everyone in sight. She ran onto the prairie, dragging the children behind, but still they were pursued. When she stopped and looked back all of the soldiers' eyes were red and they were breathing fire. With her own hand she cut the throats of her children, each of them hysterical with fear. Then she drove the same knife deep into her own heart and fell back. Face up on the ground, she realized she was not dead. Unable to open her eyes, she lay vibrating to the power of horses' hooves pounding the earth, listening to the screams of the soldiers and the explosions of their guns as they bore down upon her. She cried so hard that tears ran in streams down the length of her body.

  She was sobbing when she woke and frantically checked her sleeping children to make sure they were still alive. Drawing them close calmed her enough to stop her tears.

  But still she could not sleep.

  Chapter VI

  His reputation as a dreamer had endured since his long, hazy days with the pony herd, and while it suited him perfectly, it had divided people as to his worth. Many regarded him as lackadaisical and shiftless. Just as many tolerated his slow development and defended his unique skills with horses as indispensable in tribal life. But as he entered his twenty-first summer, Smiles A Lot was finding it more and more difficult to follow the poorly defined path he had taken. He daydreamed about taking his place as a warrior and sometimes imagined himself sitting in the Hard Shield circle. But the chance of his ever winning membership in the elite society was a remote possibility.

  Smiles A Lot would be the first to admit that he was far behind. Boys four and five years younger had already been on many dangerous raids, and a number of them had even won honors. He had been on only one major raid, the doomed incursion into Mexico, and the only honor he had won for that was his own survival. There was as much to be ashamed of as there was to take pride in, and every action he had taken seemed to have mixed results.

  It was true that he had single-handedly stolen twelve excellent horses from under the noses of heavily armed ranch guards. But it was also true that he had been confused about the precise rendezvous point because he had not listened carefully to Wind In His Hair's instructions. As a result he had waited in the wrong place with the horses while the main body of warriors, most of them on foot, had to fight their way out of a Mexican trap. The whole skirmish could have been avoided had he been in the right place at the right time, and Smiles
A Lot shuddered at the thought of what might have happened to his standing if the warriors had not escaped the Mexican net.

  Wind In His Hair had said it all when he gave the young man a public scolding.

  "What good would a hundred horses be if there were no warriors to ride them? You think more about horses than you do about people! You are useless to me!"

  To feel the wrath of Wind In His Hair beat down on him was humiliation enough, but to have his friend Dances With Wolves, the man who had sponsored him, witness the upbraiding was devastating. The man he had once called Loo-ten-tant, the man who had been so kind to him, was forced to stand by passively as he was tongue-lashed by the most respected warrior in the band. There was nothing Dances With Wolves could say or do for his young friend because Wind In His Hair was right. He had endangered everyone.

  Smiles A Lot thought about his failings constantly in the weeks it took them to get back to the village. How could he restore his standing? What could he do? Where could he begin? His eyes had welled and overflowed as he stood a half mile away holding the worn-out reserve horses, as his brothers in arms risked their lives in the attack on the white man's house where Wind In His Hair took the woman's scalp.

  Now, two moons later, Smiles A Lot hardly thought about the red-haired scalp or the looming threat of white people coming into the country. There were too many personal problems pressing him, problems that a part of him felt were unfair.

  Hadn't he been encouraged in his gift for managing horses? Hadn't he given his youth in service to the people and their animals? He was the one everyone else turned to when a mare was foaling, when a favored buffalo runner went lame, when there was trading to be done. Hadn't they depended on him to locate good pasture and the right breeding stock? Hadn't he enriched all of his people?