Cherokee Sister

by Debbie Dadey

  Cherokee Sister

  Copyright © 2014, 2000 by Debbie Dadey

  All rights reserved.

  Published by StarWalk Kids Media

  Except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and articles, no part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the publisher. Contact:

  StarWalk Kids Media

  15 Cutter Mill Road, Suite 242

  Great Neck, NY 11021

  www.StarWalkKids.com

  Print version originally published by Delacorte Press.

  ISBN 978-1-63083-330-5

  Cherokee Sister

  Contents

  1 The Beginning

  2 Leaf’s House

  3 Wild Indian

  4 Trouble Brewing

  5 The Baby

  6 Dark Land

  7 My Chance

  8 Just Like Me

  9 Soldiers

  10 Half-Breed

  11 Morning Fire

  12 Rain

  13 Village on Wheels

  14 White Man’s World

  15 The End

  Author’s Note

  1

  The Beginning

  Honeysuckle always reminds me of Leaf and Elisi and long-ago days when the world was different. I was just a scrawny twelve-year-old girl in 1838, but I learned how life can change in an instant and never be the same again. That was the autumn my best friend, Leaf, lost just about everything.

  It started on one of those hot, sticky days when I wanted to jump naked into the water and stay there all afternoon. Mama and I had churned butter, collected eggs, weeded the garden, baked bread, and snapped beans the whole morning. When Mama finally took a nap, I grabbed my chance and ran. Most folks would probably think I was ornery taking off like that with Mama getting ready to have a baby and all. Mama had trouble carrying babies and Papa had told me to be sure to help her. I planned on being back before Mama even woke up.

  Hopefully, in a few weeks I’d have a baby sister. Or if Papa had his way, a baby brother, so there’d be someone to help him in the fields. I think Mama wanted a boy, too. I would have helped in the fields, but Mama said that was men’s work. She said there was plenty to keep me busy around the cabin.

  Mostly we just wanted a healthy baby. I said a quick prayer that we wouldn’t have to add another little cross to the four already in the family graveyard out beyond the barn and the outhouse.

  I ran all the way through the woods, close to the river, and headed for my favorite spot. My friend Leaf Sweetwater and I tried to meet there every day after our morning chores were done. Sometimes she couldn’t make it and sometimes I couldn’t. But that day Leaf was there, waiting for me on the huge piece of granite we considered our special, private place.

  “Tsi-lu-gi, Frog-girl,” Leaf said, smiling. Tsi-lu-gi meant hello in Cherokee. It was one of the few words I knew in her language. Frog-girl was one of the many silly names she had for me. Leaf called me that because the first time we sat at our secret place, a frog had jumped right in my lap and scared me. Leaf hardly ever called me by my real name, Allie.

  I tried to think of a funny name for her, but I wasn’t as clever as Leaf. “Tsi-lu-gi, Rock-girl,” I said, proud of myself for coming up with something.

  “If we were both snow girls, we wouldn’t be so hot,” Leaf said, making a funny face as if she were frozen.

  “If we didn’t have to work so much, we could spend all our time in the shade,” I said, laughing and brushing sweat from my forehead. “Mama worked me hard all morning. I’m tuckered out.” Leaf scooted a basket of leaves and roots out of my way and I plopped down next to her.

  “I have looked for medicine plants since sunup,” she told me. “Now I am ready to rest.” She slipped off her moccasins and laid them beside her basket.

  “Me too!” Quickly I unlaced my heavy brown shoes. Off they came, along with my long woolen socks. I laughed and wiggled my sweaty toes. “Ahh! Freedom!” Ever since I turned twelve a few months ago, Mama made me wear shoes, even in the summer. Even when it was so hot I thought my toes would fall off. She said a lady shouldn’t be seen without her shoes. I tried to tell her I wasn’t a lady. I was just a farm girl, and most farm children didn’t wear shoes until the first frost. But Mama insisted and I wore shoes. Leaf probably wore her moccasins just so I wouldn’t feel bad. I knew she’d rather be barefoot. Elisi, her grandmother, never cared if Leaf didn’t wear shoes. Elisi often went barefoot too.

  Our granite rock was a real treasure. It was taller than me, but not as tall as my papa. One side looked like Mama’s belly, filled with a baby, only twenty times bigger. The rock curved over a big hump at the top and the other side was slanted and flat. The slanted side made a perfect resting place, hidden from the path. Leaf and I left our pile of shoes and leaves on the belly and stretched out on the flat side of our secret place. I pulled up my long skirt so my legs could soak up the coolness of the stone. Leaf’s brown legs were already bare. We lay on the rock with our heads together. Above us red, orange, and yellow leaves swayed in the slight breeze. A mockingbird sang from a tree branch.

  This was my favorite place, hidden away from our tiny cabin and all the work that went along with it. Here I could breathe the sweet honeysuckle and have a place to stretch. Mama wasn’t around to scold me for being lazy. On our rock I could dream about never chopping another weed in our garden. I could imagine what it would be like to taste fresh butter and never have to pump the churn myself. I sighed with contentment.

  Leaf’s eyes sparkled as she leaned toward me. “Elisi finished the dress she’s making for me. It has hundreds of tiny blue beads,” she said. “It’s taken her all season to make it.”

  Blue was Leaf’s favorite color because she loved the sky and birds so much. “You’re lucky to have a grandmother like Elisi,” I said. “I haven’t seen either of my grandmothers since we moved from South Carolina. It’s been so long, I don’t even remember what they looked like.”

  “If your grandmothers were here, you’d have a different dress for every day of the week,” Leaf told me.

  We giggled. I didn’t mind that I had only one old dress. After all, Mama had only two dresses. One she kept for Sunday services and one for everyday. But it was fun to pretend that I had more clothes than I could possibly need. “I’d have a white dress for Sunday,” I said, twisting a strand of long brown hair around my finger.

  “And you’d have a yellow one with a white apron for Monday,” Leaf said.

  I smiled and closed my eyes. “I’ll take a green one for—”

  “Did you see that?” Leaf asked suddenly.

  “What?” I followed her finger pointing up to the sky. A big bird hung over an opening in the trees. It hovered there for a moment, almost as if it were looking at us. Then it flew away.

  “An eagle!” Leaf called. “Something important is going to happen. The eagle was telling us.”

  I sat up. Leaf believed that things in the woods gave her signs or warnings. I didn’t much cotton to any of it. What would happen would happen, and a bird couldn’t know anything about it. Sometimes Leaf would get angry at me if I disagreed with her, though. So I held my tongue about the eagle. “My stomach is telling me it’s hungry.” I changed the subject and stood up. “Let’s go down the path for some blackberries. Then we can jump into the river to cool off.”

  “No,” Leaf said firmly. “Just wait. Maybe the eagle will come back.”

  I sighed and lay back down. Sometimes Leaf could be so stubborn. The day got hotter. Sweat trickled off my face. Nearby a brown squirrel skittered up the peeling bark of a birch tree. In the distance a woodpecker knocked out a beat. After about five minutes I scratched my arm and said, “Come on. It’s
not coming back.”

  Leaf held up her hand and whispered, “Listen.”

  I listened but heard nothing. The mockingbird didn’t sing and the woodpecker was still. The sky was bare, without a sign of the eagle. “I don’t hear anything,” I told Leaf.

  She hushed me. “Sometimes nothing means something.”

  I listened again. Then I figured it out. The silence of the woods was telling us people were near. Quietly I peered over the rock.

  Riders emerged on the path not more than a stone’s throw from our boulder. A heavy man rode a bay horse and a tall man sat on a black mule. Both had rifles jutting from their saddles. I’d seen the big man on my last trip to town. He wore a sweaty gray shirt, and his horse plodded along under his bulk. I felt sorry for the horse.

  The big man spat tobacco juice against a tree and cursed to the other man. “I tell you, Myers, we oughta hunt down every damn Indian and string ’em all up. Those red demons think they’re fit to live among us and marry decent white folks. There’s no way one of them will marry my sister.”

  I ducked and looked at Leaf, a full-blooded Cherokee. She lay perfectly still, but her face was red with anger. When Leaf was angry, she sometimes acted without thinking. I put my hand over her mouth and held it tight. If that fat man saw Leaf he might decide to do a little Indian hunting. I had never been so afraid. I wished we hadn’t come to our rock that day. Even though it was hot, gooseflesh sprang up all over my arms and my sweat turned cold. I hated for Leaf to hear the men’s awful words. But Leaf acted as if she hadn’t heard. She didn’t even seem to notice my hand over her mouth. She kept looking at the sky.

  If the men saw us, who knew what they would do? At least we were hidden on this side of the boulder. But our shoes! They were on the other side of the rock. What if the men saw Leaf’s moccasins? What if they decided to find their owner?

  I held my breath. My heart beat so strongly I thought the men might hear it.

  “Don’t worry, Brownie,” Myers bellowed, “the army’s gonna take care of the whole mess of ’em soon enough.” Even on his little mule, he was much taller than Brownie.

  “If it was up to me, I’d shoot ’em all right now,” Brownie said with delight.

  “Blasted heathens shoulda been gone years ago,” Myers agreed. “It’s the law.”

  Finally their voices faded away. Peeking over the rock, I saw the dust left by their animals. I scrambled over and grabbed both pairs of shoes, clutching them to my chest.

  Leaf kept looking at the sky. “I don’t think the eagle will come back today,” she whispered. “Maybe we’d better go to my house.”

  I wanted to tell her I was sorry the men had said those awful things. I wanted to ask if she knew anything about the army. But I didn’t get the chance. Leaf snatched her basket and ran. I followed her. I should have gone home, but I felt funny leaving Leaf alone with those crazy white men loose in the forest. She’d be safer if we bumped into them together. And besides, Mama would still be sleeping. She wouldn’t even miss me.

  2

  Leaf’s House

  By the time we got to Leaf’s house my insides were about to burst. “Did you have to run the whole way?” I panted and dropped the moccasins and shoes in a pile beside the well before sitting down.

  “Here, this will make you feel better.” Leaf lowered the bucket into the well and pulled out fresh water. She offered me a drink from a blue metal dipper. “Have some ama.”

  “A-ma,” I said slowly. Leaf and her older brother, Cobb, were always trying to teach me new Cherokee words. I was eager to learn but pitifully poor at remembering them later. I sipped the water and tried hard to put the Cherokee word in my brain. “Ahhh, that tastes so good! I could take a bath in this.”

  “All right!” Leaf smiled and dumped the rest of the cold water on my head.

  “Ohhhh! What’d you do that for?” I sputtered and jumped to my feet.

  Leaf giggled. “You said you wanted to take a bath, Fish-girl.”

  I grabbed the bucket away from her and wiped the water from my face. “You know I didn’t mean it.” I searched for a word to call her. “Have some water yourself, Water-bucket-girl.” I was all set to give Leaf a soaking when I kicked her moccasin with my foot and my good spirits disappeared. I was so grateful the men hadn’t seen the moccasins. I couldn’t easily forget the men’s hateful words. My stomach still churned with fear for Leaf.

  “Do you think those men meant it when they said they wanted to kill Indians?” I hated to say it out loud, but I was plenty worried about Leaf.

  “Town folk always talk that way,” Leaf said as she took the bucket and hung it on its peg. “I’ve heard them when they’re riding by on the trail.”

  I had heard people grumble about Indians too, when I went to town with Pa. But they never scared me like those men. This talk was meaner. With Leaf beside me, it had seemed so real. “Do you know what the army is up to?” I asked.

  “No. Probably just some more white people hating Cherokees,” she said. “There’s nothing new about that. Come on in, let’s get something to eat.”

  Leaf lived in a two-story log building set in a dusty clearing. A big, wide porch ran along the whole front of the house, which was both Leaf’s home and a trading post. The top floor contained three little bedrooms, one each for Leaf, her grandmother, and Leaf’s older brother, Cobb. Leaf’s parents and grandfather had died long before from the measles. Leaf was lucky her grandmother was so good at business. I had never known anyone who had a bigger house or nicer things than Leaf.

  The big trading post room took up most of the first floor. There was also a tiny storeroom, and a good-sized keeping room, where Leaf’s family took their meals. I never got used to how big Leaf’s house was. We had only two rooms: the keeping room or main room, where I slept, and Mama and Papa’s small bedroom. Our house might not be as fancy as Leaf’s, but it was warm and safe.

  Leaf’s grandmother ran the trading post with her grandson, Cobb. There wasn’t another store within a day’s ride, so lots of people used it. If they didn’t go to Sweetwater’s they’d have to go the whole way into town—a day’s ride one way—just to get supplies.

  Leaf’s grandfather had built the business through hard work when Leaf’s grandmother was even younger than my mama. When her husband died, Elisi took over the store. She worked just as hard as her husband. People trusted and liked her. She always had kind words for those she traded with. Of course, some white folks would rather ride extra to go to town than trade at an Indian store, but there were enough Indians and white people who didn’t mind dealing with Indians to give the Sweetwaters plenty of trading.

  I knew Leaf was proud of her brother, too. Cobb was a head taller than any of the other men around, even though he was younger. Something about the way he stood made you feel his strength, his calmness. Leaf’s grandmother made me feel the same way. She had a peacefulness that went straight down to her toes. Sometimes I felt that stillness in Leaf, too. Maybe it came from being Cherokee, or maybe it was something special about Leaf’s family. I didn’t really know.

  On our way into the store, we walked past two Cherokee men standing right outside the open wooden door. They wore turbans over their long hair, and loose tunics and leggings. One of the men was reading the Cherokee paper, The Phoenix. Leaf had read to me from the paper before. She was excited that some of the Cherokee chiefs had gone to Washington, D.C., to see the president. She had shown me the story, but I couldn’t read the Cherokee words. Mama would be embarrassed to tell it, but I could hardly read any English words, let alone Cherokee ones. I didn’t know why Leaf was so excited, anyway. Washington, D.C., sounded so far away it was hard to imagine. I was lucky to get to town twice a year and that was a day away from our farm. Getting to Washington would take weeks.

  I smiled at the Cherokees. I knew one of the men, Rattler. I’d seen him several times when I’d visited Leaf. He was long and thin, like a snake. He used to tease me about my heavy shoes. But today
he scowled at me.

  “It seems strange to see the men here today. It’s not even Saturday,” I whispered to Leaf. “Shouldn’t they be hunting or working their farms?”

  Leaf shrugged. “Too many men have been hanging around the store lately. They talk badly and are so angry. It makes me think something is going to happen. Like the eagle tried to tell us.”

  “I don’t like the way those men looked at me,” I told Leaf. “You’d think I was some varmint.”

  Leaf giggled. “You are—an Allie varmint,” she teased.

  “Then that makes you a Leafy varmint,” I shot back, and glanced around the trading post. It always amazed me how many things fit inside the store. Everything from piece goods for making dresses to saddles and farm tools lined the walls. Every inch bulged with something to sell: coffee, tea, salt, spices, eggs, salted meat and fish, raisins, cheese, and even precious cane sugar. It all looked good to me. Seemed as if everything we ate had to be hog or something Mama made out of the corn Papa grew, like hominy. My mouth watered to think of all the wonderful things Leaf could eat whenever she wanted.

  My favorite part of the whole store had to be the big jars loaded with taffy, fudge, and pralines. I loved lifting the wooden lids and sniffing the smooth white taffy. The sweet smell made my mouth water. Taffy and pralines smelled even better than honeysuckle.

  “Allie, tsi-lu-gi,” Leaf’s grandmother called, and closed the spigot on the vinegar barrel. “You have grown prettier since I saw you last. And wetter!”

  I smiled and hugged Elisi. She had powdery, sweet-smelling skin and a calmness in her dark eyes. Even at her old age, Elisi was beautiful. Her silver braids wound in a crown on top of her head. Tiny laugh lines surrounded her eyes, while her long red skirt and white apron hung gracefully on her slim hips. I loved that she let me call her Elisi, the Cherokee word for grandmother. She seemed more like my real grandmother than my own faraway ones. She was always happy to see me and always ready to hug me. I couldn’t remember the last time Mama or Papa had hugged me.