She remembered squatting over a tiny, delicate plant, feeling its leaves while Medicine Woman tried to explain to her how to prepare it and what it would do. They sat for a long time watching a black beetle, shimmering with iridescent fireworks as he patiently rolled his ball of dung ahead of him, lost in some mission of his own.
“The dung beetle can show you where the buffalo herd is.”
“How, Kaku, Grandmother?”
Medicine Woman tapped the beetle’s horns lightly with her fingernail.
“His horns point toward them.”
“Why?”
“Some say it’s because they have strong medicine. But I think, perhaps, being so close to the ground they can feel the vibrations of the buffalos before we can. What do you think?” She smiled at Cynthia in that mischievous way she had, all her wrinkles moving and deepening on her face.
Cynthia never went anywhere now without studying everything around her.
“Watch the animals, see what they eat,” Medicine Woman had told her. “They know what cures.” It was as though she had never really seen the world before. And the more Medicine Woman and Takes Down taught her, the more wonderful it all became. Now there was an emptiness in her life. She shivered as she pulled the rabbit fur robe from the bag and wrapped it around her. She found Something Good’s doll and clutched it with her free hand, the other holding the robe closed at her chest.
“Come on, Star Name. Let’s go find Something Good.” She had to move, to do something besides sit and mourn and think of the injustice she had done Wanderer.
The two of them threaded their way through the groups gathered around fires, stumbling now and then over piles of loose gear and ropes. There was rarely litter in Pahayuca’s camp, but tonight everyone was too despondent to care. They were mourning Medicine Woman and Wanderer, but quietly, not officially yet. They knew that if anyone could survive the wave, Night could. They would wait before they grieved in earnest.
“Something Good, I found your doll.” Cynthia held the sodden toy out to her.
“It makes my heart glad to see it, little one. Put it over there with my saddle.” She sat with Blocks The Sun and Tosa Amah, Silver Rain, Pahayuca’s other wives. Something Good was roasting a paste of pounded hackberries mixed with fat for Pahayuca’s three youngest children. She pointed the stick at Dusty, who scraped the paste off with her fingers and took a small bite out of it. She smiled bashfully at them, the only smile in the group. Pahayuca’s chunky seven-year-old son, Haista Amawau, Little Apple, and his daughter, Kesua, Hard To Get Along With, had already eaten theirs. Their mouths were rimmed with a shiny ring of grease. The roasted hackberry paste was as good as candy, and the girls watched hungrily while Something Good molded more of it around the stick.
“The next batch will be for you, sisters.”
“Something Good, will Medicine Woman and Wanderer come back?” Cynthia almost believed that if she asked enough people the question one of them would answer yes, and it would be so.
“I don’t know, little one. Wanderer and Medicine Woman have strong spirits watching over them. And Night is the best horse I have ever seen. We have to trust their medicine.” The grief in their eyes pained her and she patted the robe next to her. “Sit here and I’ll tell you how Ahtamu, the grasshopper, got his beautifully painted robes. He used to be gray, you know.” Everyone except Cynthia did know, but it didn’t matter. They all moved in closer to hear the story, even Blocks The Sun and Silver Rain.
Around them the camp with its flickering fires was eerily still. There was rarely a night when the drums weren’t pounding and voices chanting a song for dancers, or the men weren’t boasting about their coups or shouting around a handful of dice. Sometimes a young man would be serenading his love with his flute, and the dogs would howl mournfully in accompaniment.
But tonight there was only Gets To Be An Old Man, lying on his back out on the prairie, alternately quavering and yodeling his medicine chants. From one of the sawed-off bluffs ringing the horizon a coyote took up the song, as though in response. The full moon had risen over the same bluff, silhouetting the coyote in stark relief.
Later that night the two girls lay rolled together in a single robe, their heads drawn in like twin turtles to escape the singing mosquitoes. The insects and the ringing in her ears blended with her memory of the water’s thunder and Night’s desperate shriek. The coyote began howling again, and she silently asked it what had happened to her friends. Coyote would know. Coyotes could tell the future, Sunrise said. If only she could understand what he was saying.
Finally she threw back the robe, grateful that a rising wind had blown away the mosquitoes. She rolled over, reached out, and put an arm around her friend’s slim, smooth waist. Laying her cheek against Star Name’s shoulder blade, she let the steady rise and fall of the child’s breathing put her to sleep.
She was still asleep when Eagle woke up at dawn. He saddled his pinto, gathered extra supplies and two packhorses, and rode off toward the rising sun. He went grimly in search of his friend, determined to find him alive or to bring back his, bones in the empty buckskin sack he carried with him.
CHAPTER 11
Cynthia coughed and choked on the dust blowing in her face in billows. It settled everywhere, the cloud following them as they rode. And they were near the front of the procession. She wondered what it must be like for those following behind. The column stretched for more than a mile, winding through the hills. The dry, hot wind had seared her sinuses and tear ducts until her eyes and nose burned. Her lips felt like sawdust, and the skin on her hands and legs was cracked like alligator hide, with dry flakes peeling off. An umbrella. What she wouldn’t have given for an umbrella between her and the sun. She was riding the old mule as usual, and her bare thighs were sore from his mangy back.
At first it had been exciting to move. Like a parade or a gypsy camp or a circus. Upstream and his friends galloped, yelling, from the sides of the column. They beat game from the bushes—birds and rabbits and mice—-and shot at it with their toy bows and arrows. The older boys raced their ponies, charging and whooping as they pretended to swoop down on sleeping enemies. The travois poles, heavy with piles of robes and bundles and with round willow-withe cages of tiny children, clattered over the stony ground. The dogs fought constantly, and the betting was always heavy on the outcome of their brawls.
As they rode, three or four abreast, the women gossiped. Their babies swung in the long, fringed cradle boards that hung from their saddle horns. The two planks that formed the V-shaped back of each cradle board extended above the baby’s head and were sharpened into points. Even if the board fell the points would bury themselves in the ground and the baby’s head would be protected.
Cynthia envied the four-and five-year-olds as they sat effortlessly atop their fat, tranquil ponies. Their short, chubby legs stuck straight out from their horses’ sides. At the head of the women rode Blocks The Sun, Pahayuca’s first wife. She always occupied the coveted lead position, out of most of the dust and able to pick the best camping place when they arrived.
No one would have disputed the position with her, even if she hadn’t been Pahayuca’s favorite wife. She weighed three hundred pounds and had been known to crack a man’s ribs in an affectionate hug. No horse could hold her, so she traveled on a specially made travois. She rode backwards on it now, waving her arms and leading the gossip. She was solemn today, but usually her eyes were merry, when they could be spotted among the folds of her face.
Pahayuca liked to complain that he had to ask Takes Down, the band’s best lodge-cover maker, to sew Blocks The Sun’s dresses. But she was the one who waited on his guests and carried his shield and lance when they moved camp. And she always set up a lodge next to her own for visitors.
The warriors rode apart, some behind, some to the sides, and some ahead, their bows and lances ready to defend their families. A man never carried anything that would interfere with his weapons. There was a constant jingle and cla
tter of bells and kettles and metal bridle ornaments. Feathers and streamers fluttered in the wind, and the long fringe on the clothes and tack bounced to the rhythm of the ponies’ gait. The People were happiest when they were mounted and moving, and they designed their clothes and gear to look best when in motion. Some of the war ponies had brightly painted buffalo robes draped across their withers, in barbaric imitation of the early Spanish conquistadors. It gave the procession a courtly dignity. But it had become so familiar to Cynthia that now she thought more about the discomfort than the romance of it all.
“Why do the People move so often?”
Bemused, Takes Down looked at her. “We have to move.”
“But tosi-tivo, white people, don’t move every few days the way we do.” Cynthia blurted it out before she thought, but Takes Down didn’t seem to make the connection between her blue-eyed daughter and white people.
“White people don’t know how to live. Sunrise tells me they stab Mother Earth with sharp metal sticks and destroy her. They cut down all the trees, not just the ones they need for their lodges. And they let their horses eat ail the grass, then grow different grass for them and feed them only the seeds. And the horses can’t run as well. The People could never live like that.”
“But the People wouldn’t have to dig in Mother Earth’s breast. Why can’t we stay in one place and hunt?”
“There’s no reason to stay in one place.”
“I liked the last place we camped. I wanted to stay there longer. It was a pretty place.”
“But, Naduah, the next place will be pretty too. Pahayuca picks pretty places. There are many of them. We can enjoy them all. And then come back later and enjoy them again. And the animals don’t stay in one place, especially when they’re being hunted. We have to move on when they leave.
“Besides, if you could smell the big winter camp after the spring thaw, you wouldn’t ask why we move. So many people and animals leave piles of dung. Also, if we stay in one place it is easy for our enemies to find us.”
And that was the other, unspoken reason that Cynthia wanted to stay longer where they were. She still had a faint hope that her family would find her and rescue her or ransom her. But by now it was probably more from a sense of duty than from a desire to leave her foster people. She thought of her brother, John, and wondered where he was.
“Will we see other bands of the People sometime?” Did she dare mention John? “I would like to see my brother.”
“Your brother is with Old Owl’s band. We will see them. We will spend the winter with them.”
The winter? It was only June. She wondered how John and Upstream would get along. They were alike in many ways. Maybe the two of them and she and Star Name could run away together. She tried to imagine the reception they’d get at Parker’s Fort. Then she gave it up and nodded on the mule, drifting off into a nap. Behind the caravan, at the very end of the line, rode Buffalo Piss, setting up stone markers pointing out their direction of travel.
Cynthia sat under the cottonwood and whittled at the L-shaped shinny stick, very much like the one she had brandished at Takes Down and Star Name and Medicine Woman the first morning in their lodge. Now she knew what it was, and was making one of her own. She shaved off long, curling slivers and smoothed it, sighting down it to see where it needed trimming. Star Name sat beside her, sulking because she hadn’t been allowed to play shinny with the older girls and women. But it wasn’t in her nature to sulk long.
“Look out. Something Good!” She jumped up screaming and waving her arms. But Something Good had already sidestepped the blow that would have crippled her if it had connected with her knees. Most of the people in camp were lined up along the hundred-yard field. They cheered for their favorite team and bet heavily. The noise was deafening as the twenty players screamed at each other, their sticks flailing in the sun.
They were each trying to knock the flattened deerskin ball toward the other team’s goal post. The ball was about the size of a small cannon shot. It was stuffed with hair, and dust colored. Cynthia couldn’t sit still either and stood shouting next to Star Name.
“Look at Takes Down. Run, Pia, run! Hit the ball.” She threw her hands over her eyes. “I can’t look, Star Name. Someone’s going to be killed.”
“No one from this band has ever been killed playing shinny.” Star Name spoke matter-of-factly, her eyes never leaving the action. “But a woman was killed last year. Our team was playing against Old Owl’s band when it happened. I saw it.”
“Look at Takes Down run. Star Name. I never would have believed she could move so fast.”
“She’s good, but she’s not as good as my mother.” Actually, the two were about equal, but Black Bird did shed her shy manner as soon as she walked out onto the playing field. She raced and screamed and looked like she would kill anyone who came between her and that lump of buckskin. Behind them sat Cynthia’s mangy new friend, scratching her teeming flea colony and panting in the scanty shade. The dog had spotted a soft touch and gradually insinuated herself into the child’s life. Now she followed her everywhere.
“What shall we name her?” Cynthia knew that names were important, although she wasn’t sure if they were important for dogs.
“I don’t know. Why don’t you call her Dog?” Star Name didn’t seem to think it was a vital decision.
“Dog?”
“Sure. That way everyone will know her name without even being introduced. And if we think of a better name we can call her that.” So Dog it was.
Takes Down had been right. Pahayuca had found another wonderful place to camp. The seventy lodges of the Wasp band stood scattered among an open grove of cottonwoods along a clear, deep stream. It ran through a valley about a mile and a half wide, with high, ragged hills on each side. The grass that hadn’t been trampled stood waist high, and the horses were grazing contentedly, picking out the most succulent blades. The playing field took up a large part of the level valley bottom that wasn’t included in the camp and its pasture.
She allowed her attention to stray for a moment and saw movement at the far end of the valley. Rangers? Her heart skipped. They were really coming for her this time. Should she yell? Should she sneak toward them so they wouldn’t attack her friends? She sidled away from Star Name and stared into the shimmering air, trying to sort out the images. Four horses picked their way down the twisting trail and started slowly across the valley floor. As they approached she recognized the proud, ebony pony, his long plume of a tail flowing out behind him.
“Star Name. Nabone, look!” Cynthia’s voice rang out over the noise of the game. The game ended instantly and became a footrace as the players dropped their sticks and ran toward the riders.
Sitting straight and loose and solemn, Eagle rode first. Behind him came his packhorses, one with an improvised travois and litter. On it rode Medicine Woman. She was hollow-eyed and looked as though her face had been rubbed with ashes from the morning fire. Wanderer brought up the rear. Pahayuca galloped from camp on the big bay that had once been a Mexican rancher’s pride, and rode alongside Wanderer. Wrapping his bear’s arms around him, he embraced Wanderer from atop his horse. Wanderer laughed as he gasped for breath.
“Ara, my uncle, spare me your gratitude. It’ll kill me.”
“Wanderer, my son, we feared that you and my sister were dead.”
“I said I would get her for you. You had no need to worry.”
Medicine Woman began shivering with the chill that meant another attack of high fever. The malaria had weakened her, leaving her helpless with delirium when the flood hit. Wanderer had managed to save only her most precious things. Hanging from his saddle was the medicine bag that brought people from all over the Comancheria to see her. Silver Rain and Something Good led her pony toward the village. They took her not to Pahayuca’s noisy, crowded set of lodges, but to her son’s. So it was that Medicine Woman came to live with Sunrise and Takes Down, and Cynthia became a granddaughter again.
Cynthia�
��s temples throbbed in time to the drum that had been beating for hours, along with her headache. The heat and odor and fumes in the tent were stifling. But worst of all was what’s-his-name’s voice. What was his name? She’d always tried to avoid him. He was an irascible old geezer, seduced only by Star Name’s honeyed way. She could make him grin a toothless grimace until he looked like a living death’s-head. His cheeks collapsed into his empty mouth and the skin around his eyes gathered into tiny pleats.
Now he was naked as usual, except for the greasy, filthy breechclout that always seemed about to fall off his thin shanks. It bagged around his flat buttocks and gaped at his stringy thighs, exposing the worn medicine pouch that rode nestled in his hairless groin. There wasn’t much more than willpower holding the breechclout up, and it made Cynthia nervous to see him jumping around so. If his breechclout fell down she would laugh, in spite of everything. And she knew that would make everyone angry with her.
His voice sounded like sandpaper and had gotten worse as he became hoarser with each passing hour. His chanting was marvelous only for its monotony, rather like a machine badly in need of oil. Poor Medicine Woman. This couldn’t be helping her.
Gets To Be An Old Man. That’s who he was. She remembered Star Name’s imitation of him as she acted out his name, sucking her cheeks in and scolding like a jay. Gets To Be An Old Man must be the camp quack, and now he was tormenting poor Medicine Woman. Why didn’t she heal herself if she was the powerful medicine woman everyone claimed her to be? Maybe her medicine only worked for others, or when she was strong and well. The tension and anxiety in the camp added to her own fears for Medicine Woman. She bowed her head and whispered a prayer, asking the God she knew to spare a good woman.
Takes Down came in with another armload of green cedar branches and threw them on the fire. The needles sent up a shower of sparks that crackled like thousands of tiny firecrackers. Fresh” billows of pungent smoke spewed toward the top of the lodge. Gets To Be An Old Man blew on Medicine Woman, and fanned her with five eagle feathers. His assistant, a sour-looking boy, drummed on until it seemed as though his beating and the drone of the old man would never cease. She could have left the lodge, but she was afraid something terrible might happen while she was gone.
Robson, Lucia St. Clair Page 14
