by Win Blevins
“Many generations ago, White Buffalo Cow Woman came and gave the people a new way to live, by the buffalo and the sacred canupa. That is one of many ways for two-legged creatures to live. Ways change,” said Horn Chips, “but life is, and Skan is.
“Big changes come sometimes,” he said. “Skan circles, life circles. Not every seven generations, but seven times seven or a hundred times seven, changes come that are too great to foresee, far too great to understand.”
He looked at them somberly. “I believe this one of the teachings of the Inyan: When the old ways are dead,” he said, “it means that a new way is upon us. We cannot discern it yet, but it is at hand.”
Horn Chips lifted the sacred canupa that lay across his lap. He pointed the stem representing Mother Earth to the sky. He touched the bowl representing the buffalo and the entire universe to the spirit place in the top of his head. He held the canupa straight before him. Carefully, delicately, he separated the bowl from the stem and held them far apart, one in each hand. Then he looked his two friends directly in the eyes, and they all understood.
Crazy Horse’s heart chilled. A way of living, the sacred way of the buffalo, separated from the earth, and made powerless. Fecundity turned to death.
“I think we will not see the new way,” Horn Chips said. “I think it will not become visible for seven generations. In that time the hoop of the people will seem to be broken, and the flowering tree will seem to be withered. But after seven generations some will see with the single eye that is the heart, and the new way will appear.”
He looked directly at Crazy Horse. “The old way is beautiful. We turn backward to it and in taking leave we offer it our love. Then we turn forward and walk forth blindly, offering our love. Yes, blindly.”
Horn Chips was quiet for a long time. “No one man must walk forward,” he said gently. He looked straight at Crazy Horse. “But the people must.”
After a while the visitors rose to take their leave. Horn Chips and Crazy Horse agreed that they would prepare the sweat lodge tomorrow, and the leader would go onto the mountain to ask one last time for guidance.
But he already knew what he would do. They all knew.
On the mountain he prayed for the prosperity of the people on the new road. He asked the four directions and the grandfathers and all the powers to make the new way a good, red road. He asked for courage for the people to follow it now, in blindness. For three days he prayed incessantly for this succoring.
On the fourth day he prayed for help for himself. In the constant running these last months, keeping away from the soldiers, worrying about food, coping with messengers from the soldiers and from the agency Indians, in all these responsibilities, he felt himself becoming someone alien. So he was slipping into the grip of a profound melancholy.
He asked for strength to carry the robe of leadership as far as it must be carried. He asked for courage to walk into the darkness that loomed ahead for the people. He asked for the will to complete the tasks of the next few months.
“Then, O Grandfathers,” he prayed, “I ask the freedom to wrap the robe of chieftainship around another man’s shoulders. Remember, I, His Crazy Horse, sought always only to become a warrior. In my youth vision I saw myself riding into battle. Later I was uneasy even with the responsibilities of the shirt. Now I feel unsuited to lead my people. They came to me, I did not seek them, and I have never felt right as their leader. I beg now to be permitted to return to my own way. I want to listen less to the cries of the hungry and more to the beat of the drum of life. I want to turn my mind from time to timelessness.”
He hesitated. He had spoken of this next to no one, not even his spiritual counselor, Horn Chips. It was too difficult to voice.
“I ask this because I have lost my oldest friend, one closer to me than my hunka Buffalo Hump, more intimate even than the mother I suckled as a child.” Tears were running down his face now. “I have lost Hawk.”
Father Sun was going down on the last day, a remote, clouded half-disk among pink and purple clouds. Crazy Horse faced it in the west, naked and shivering.
“I cannot find Hawk in my heart, Grandfathers,” he said softly. “I cannot find Hawk in my heart,” he murmured again. “I do not even know the day she left me,” he said. “It was when I was deciding to go to the agency.” The next words were agony. “Inside my heart are the hardness and deadness of stone.”
He lifted his arms to Father Sun. “Return her to me. Without her I cannot live as a man. Without her I cannot die as a man. Return her to me. Let me feel her again alive inside me.”
He stood that way a long time, waiting for the sense of an answer. He sat up all night, wrapped in a buffalo robe, listening for a reply that might come from the beat of the drum.
He heard nothing but the pulse itself, endless and mute.
UNTYING THE HORSES’ TAILS
Lt. William Philo Clark was struggling not to feel small, which was new to him—he was not short on ego. He watched the pipe make the circle of men in the council lodge and reflected on the names, names he’d heard incessantly since the beginning of the Sioux campaign a year and a half ago—Crazy Horse, Little Big Man, He Dog, Little Hawk, Big Road. And these were merely the men in the front circle.
Trying not to seem rudely curious, he studied the Indians’ appearance. He considered himself an astute student of Indians and knew well that all the decorations had meaning, that they were signs of coups or visions, or status in warrior societies or chieftainship. All this was like insignia on a military uniform, known completely to every man in the outfit but to outsiders mere baubles. He could accept that, though the decorations were strange. Some men dangled human hair from their lances. Others fringed buckskin shirts with scalps.
By will he kept his stomach from turning. He would no more have hung a scalp from his sword than he would have worn a necklace of slain enemies’ ears or a sash of enemy intestine. Even the thought of touching a scalp, a cap of human skin, shriveled, with dry, dead hairs hanging from it—it made him smile sardonically. Sometimes it made him feel like cringing.
The pipe made its circle. Yes, these men were intimidating. Lieutenant Clark was young and inexperienced beside them. He had only a few weapons: He was privy to some of the purposes of the army, which they had no idea of. And he was ruthless, willing to do what was necessary.
He had to give them credit, though—they were true warriors. In the space of eight days they had whipped his present commander, General Crook, at the Rosebud, and then the army’s best-known Indian fighter at the Little Bighorn. When he himself was with the cavalry under Crook that engaged them at Slim Buttes, his outfit had made no impact on them. In fact, these Indians had stayed out in their country, two steps ahead of General Crook and General Miles, for a year and a half. They had inflicted a terrible defeat on the army at Fort Phil Kearny a decade ago and one on Grattan’s men a decade before that. All the army’s “victories” had come against these men’s women and children.
Yet none of that impressed him particularly. It was his job to understand them—he had studied their sign language, their spoken language, their habits, their customs, had cultivated influence among the friendlies. What made him feel a tad uncertain of himself was what he saw in their faces today. These were worn faces, lined by caring, facing up to hard decisions, making desperate flights in the dark and the snow with women and children. Faces that looked down on sons and daughters while they died. Faces that had known elation and exhilaration and hardship and tragedy and …
He pondered it sometimes. They had done all their fighting not for some abstract ideal like conquering territory but for the simple need to protect their families. They had not gone into a foreign land, as he and the men under him had done, to take something from others. They had defended home, hearth, family, and tribe. They had tried to get enough food and something to keep the cold away.
Well, all this was not his concern. He was aide to General Crook, he was ordered here to get these Ind
ians settled onto a reservation with a minimum of trouble, and his job was to acquit himself well in the eyes of his superiors.
He did not know for sure why these hostiles had come here to surrender today. Was it the chasing of Miles and Crook? Was it the reassurances of their relatives sent to persuade them, first Spotted Tail and then Red Cloud? Was it an overwhelming realization that change had come and was irrevocable? The lieutenant didn’t know. Surely they had faced terrible realities and made terrible decisions. They came here today with the simplicity and sere tragedy of these realities and these decisions written eloquently on their faces, for those willing to read.
It almost made him feel callow. He looked into these eyes and saw texture, grain, shadow, depth he felt lacking in himself. He thought maybe they understood life and he did not. At least they had experienced it and he had not.
It also made him feel guilty. He remembered what General Crook had said when a reporter asked him what was the hardest thing about fighting Indians. Replied Three Stars, “Knowing you’re wrong.”
Lieutenant Clark—White Hat, as the Indians called him—reminded himself that he represented the armed forces of the government of the United States and, as his enlisted men said, he could be a right son of a bitch.
So now he would do his job and do it well. He would listen carefully to the Indians, and that included knowing enough of the Lakota language to prompt an interpreter sometimes to a better, fuller translation. It meant understanding the ceremonial gestures, such as the handling of the sacred pipe. And remembering the courtesies. So he would now wait for the slender man behind the center fire to speak the crucial words of this meeting. He had heard often that Crazy Horse never spoke in council. He didn’t know whether this was meant literally—it was hard to believe the headman never uttered a single word—or whether Crazy Horse would say a few words on an occasion of great moment, like this one.
As the pipe circled, Clark tried to study Crazy Horse without appearing rude or showing astonishment at his appearance. The great leader of the Oglala was anything but imposing. To begin with, he scarcely looked Indian at all. His skin was light, his hair sandy and down to his hips in braids. His figure was boyish. On his torso he wore nothing, below it only a simple leather breechcloth, undecorated leggings, and plain moccasins.
He was not quite naked of adornment. On his head perched the full skin of a red-tailed hawk. White hail spotted his chest, and blue lightning streaked down one cheek. This paint, though, indicated only dreams, not accomplishments.
Clark had spent a week with the half-breed Billy Garnett studying drawings of Lakota men painted to show their achievements. For Crazy Horse it had been a waste of time.
Strangely, Clark felt a surge of attraction to the man. He wanted not only to know him but to be close to him physically, to touch him, like an object of…
He cut off his thoughts. The pipe had returned to Crazy Horse. The headman cleaned the bowl and emptied the ashes into the fire. Then he looked Clark fully in the face for the first time. He had a mesmeric gaze, and the lieutenant felt his chest tighten.
In a soft voice Crazy Horse said, “My people untie the tails of their horses.”
And that was all. The translator, as Clark had requested, rendered the chief’s statement literally. A warrior tied the tails of his horses up when he went to war. So Crazy Horse was saying that these Lakota would fight no more. Evidently, that was all he intended to say.
“Thank you,” said Clark. After he said it, he wondered if “thank you” would look good—sufficiently triumphal—in the record.
The translator, Billy Garnett, added that Crazy Horse was acceding to everything essential. He would surrender. He would instruct the people to turn over their guns and their horses to the army. They would agree to give up their roaming ways and live on an agency. They did all this in return for a promise of peace, food and other necessities to be given to the people immediately, and eventually an agency in their own country.
Barely more than a boy, Garnett had a simple face and simple speech. In a world of the clandestine, Clark trusted him.
Now the warrior next to Crazy Horse spoke up. Clark had been told this was He Dog, a shirt wearer and a lifelong friend of the Strange Man. Clark caught the idea before Billy rendered it into English. “To show their sincerity, the chiefs will shake hands with you. Instead of the right, which does much mischief, they will shake with the left hand, which is the one closest to the heart.”
Lieutenant Clark nodded. Crazy Horse came first, grasped Clark’s right hand firmly with his left one, and sat down. One by one He Dog, Big Road, Little Big Man, and Little Hawk did the same.
Clark was actually moved. He looked into the chiefs’ faces and believed them. They wanted to stop fighting the soldiers. That’s what they would do—it was simple.
He Dog spoke up again. “Crazy Horse wants to give you a headdress.” Damned straight, thought Clark—this is a surrender. “But he owns no headdress.” Yes, that was the Strange Man’s medicine, Clark had heard. It prevented him from acquiring splendid clothing, signs of his accomplishments, or even fine horses. “So,” He Dog went on, “I will give you mine.”
The shirt wearer reached behind his back and brought out a painted rawhide case and opened it. Slowly, gingerly, he drew forth an eagle-feather bonnet, one that draped all the way to the ground. It was a magnificent artifact, thought Clark, lovingly cared for. Very few men would ever strike enough coups to earn the right to wear one of these bonnets.
He Dog handed his headdress to the young officer with a gentle smile.
“Crazy Horse,” He Dog continued, “wants to make you some other small gifts.” Garnett added that since the Strange Man owned no fine things, these items also belonged to He Dog.
The first was a long medicine pipe, painted and adorned with eagle feathers, a ceremonial pipe. Clark accepted it soberly, the stem that represented Mother Earth, the bowl that represented the universe, and the lovely quilled pipe bag. Billy Garnett spoke the officer’s thanks.
The second was a war shirt, beautifully beaded on the shoulders and arms and fringed with scalps. Garnett did not need to tell Clark how much fighting and how much war medicine the scalps represented.
The third was a small beaded bag of the sort that Lakota men often wore around their necks.
In spite of himself, Clark was enthralled. He stood up and took off his uniform coat. Then he thought to look at Garnett for confirmation that this was a good idea. Garnett gave a tiny nod. Clark put on He Dog’s war shirt. He looked at the gleaming beads on his shoulders, arms, and breasts. Hesitantly, he touched the scalp hair. He felt a primitive thrill.
Now he hung the beaded bag from his neck. He wondered what he would put inside. Something small but of singular importance to his own life, he thought. His father’s ring, perhaps.
He lifted the warbonnet onto his head. He Dog himself rose and helped to arrange the eagle feathers, the ones standing above the head and those trailing all the way down the back and legs. Clark felt self-conscious. He felt proud. He looked into the eyes of the chiefs surrendering to him and felt their generosity, the tribute they were offering, the honor they were giving him. He thought, Watch out, you idiot, or your eyes will moisten.
He wondered whether Washington and the high command had any idea what these people were really like. He knew it didn’t matter.
Remembering his orders, Clark sat. There was still a considerable distance to go. There was the signing of a paper of unconditional surrender, and other necessities.
Clark instructed Garnett to tell Crazy Horse that he was invited to Washington to see the Great White Father.
Now Little Big Man put words in. “Crazy Horse says that he would be honored to speak with the One You Use for Father. He will make that journey when he knows where our people’s agency will be.”
So the chiefs were not abject in surrender. Clark liked that.
“He says that the headwaters of Beaver Creek, on the west side o
f the Black Hills, would be a good place,” Little Big Man went on. “It has good grass for the horses, and some game.”
So Crazy Horse didn’t intend to go to Washington, D.C., to meet with Rutherford B. Hayes until he was given an agency where he wanted it. Clark smiled. Surely the chief didn’t know that a photograph of himself with Crazy Horse, the conqueror of Custer, would be political capital for the new President. Certainly he didn’t know that Hayes, elected amid sharp dispute, needed all the political credit he could get. Clark smiled to himself. It was funny that Hayes didn’t have his people’s confidence in the way that this simple tribal chieftain did.
“Or Goose Creek, by the Shining Mountains.” The Bighorns, Garnett translated. “That is a good place,” said Little Big Man. “If His Crazy Horse cannot have Goose Creek, he will accept Beaver Creek.”
Clark felt the steel in the words. Surrendering but not defeated, these chiefs. They wanted an agency in their own country, so that surrender would change their lives less. They wanted it as far from Red Cloud and Spotted Tail as possible, because of old rivalries.
What’s more, they were hinting that giving up their horses and guns would only be temporary. They wanted their agency in a country good for hunting. They were even hinting that they knew the Great White Father wouldn’t feed them, as promised.
It was all subtle, indirect, and done without a hint of offense. Clark knew it wasn’t unreasonable. Everyone knew that the agents and freighters stole rations until the Indians got only the crumbs and the worms.
Handling them would require all his skills. But he had no authority to make any such promises. He had to suppress an ironic smile. He could make a recommendation—he would do that. Colonel Mackenzie, the commanding officer at Fort Robinson, might support that recommendation to his superior, General Crook, or might oppose or suppress it. General Crook might make a recommendation to Gen. Philip Sheridan, Military Commander of the Missouri. Sheridan in turn would have something to say to his superiors, who ultimately would confer with the president of the United States.
