Sacajawea

by Anna Lee Waldo

  “The people of these drawings and the huge grinding stones have not been seen for many seasons. Where did they go? Who were they?” asked Chief No Retreat.

  The men shook their heads and huddled closer together. It was not a usual experience for them to wonder about others who had lived on their land. Nor did they care to know. The Agaidükas were wary about anything unknown, because too much curiosity might unleash unwanted powers from the tribal medicine man. The medicine man could hide a black stone in some tepee and cause much misery in camp. Interpreting dreams and visions, foretelling success or defeat in hunts and warfare was the duty of the medicine man. He gave much thought to explanations for unusual events, such as an eclipse of the sun or moon. He tried to keep his information on a mundane, familiar level. He predicted the movement of enemy camps, changes in weather, and cured most disease with the knowledge that given time a body heals itself, if it gets plenty of plant material and good meat to eat.

  They ate fish and roots because they fared badly in wars with the Blackfeet, who lived in buffalo country. Sometimes the People joined forces with the Flatheads, finding strength in numbers, and invaded the buffalo country for meat and skins. Occasionally their bone-pointed arrows sank into antelope, deer, mountain sheep, or goat. They planned only two annual buffalo hunts, spring and winter. There was great feasting when the hunters brought home fresh meat. After their forays, they retired again to their meager life in the mountains.

  Now Chief No Retreat moved from the customary squatting position and sat cross-legged. “We could build long sticks and beat the wild grain ourselves as those ancient people might have. We could collect it in large, soft hides. It would fill our empty bellies in the Moon of the Howling Winds.”

  Again the men huddled close. This was a new thought. Several women, who had gathered in a circle behind the men, placed hands over their mouths in astonishment as they heard the words of their chief.

  Finally an old man spoke. “If the grass had wanted us to keep its seeds in such larger quantities, it would have grown closer together,” he said.

  Chief No Retreat’s son Spotted Bear had come up to the circle in time to hear the old man, and he answered him.

  “Grandfather, the buffalo does not run to us. We must chase it. Perhaps if we harvest the seeds we come upon, out emptiness in the winter will not be so sharp. Perhaps our women can learn to give the men something new to taste.” He looked intently at the women standing behind the circle of men.

  “Ai, ai, perhaps so,” answered a few, including his mother, Fragrant Herbs.

  Early the next morning, Chief No Retreat tied his spears in a bundle and put his newly made arrowheads into a skin bag. He left his tepee, shrugging a wordless greeting to Fragrant Herbs, who was adding pine pitch to make her fire hotter, and looked around his quiet village, then up to the tall trees, and to the hills. He breathed deeply. “The air smells as if the Season for Gathering Nuts is almost over. We should strike thetepees within three suns and move toward buffalo country and more safety for the winter.”

  Fragrant Herbs stirred the fire to a fresh blaze. “I had hoped we could stay here long enough to gather the grass seeds,” she said without looking up. “Our son’s thought was good.”

  “Oh, woman, sometimes men and boys have thoughts that do not fit a hunter of meat. The People need the buffalo hunts to keep them together. Plucking tiny grass seeds will do nothing but stick in our teeth.”

  “I was thinking,” Fragrant Herbs said, looking at the face of her man, “that if our food supply could be increased a little, our people would not grow so weak during the winter. Then there would be no end to our abilities to repel the Blackfeet or even the Sioux that come for our horses early in spring. Instead of being weak like our Ute cousins, our braves will retrieve the horses and bring distinction to themselves.”

  “A woman is not made for thinking so much,” shrugged Chief No Retreat.

  Fragrant Herbs had no sooner uttered her words than she became aware of a disturbing thought. With the assurance of food all year, what would be the impact upon the People? They knew the balance between life and death. An unending supply of food would disturb this balance. There would be more old ones to help with the lodge work. Then they would have more time to tend to the babies, or for cooking or sewing or sitting in the sun doing nothing but visiting. Fragrant Herbs thought a shift in the balance toward a life of ease and laughter would be something good. “Perhaps we could have more feasts, with dancing and games. The winter cold would be more bearable. We could laugh at the howling winds if there were no belly growlings.”

  Chief No Retreat looked closer into the face of his woman. “Oh, most loved woman, your words run deep, deep.” Confused that a woman could have such thoughts, he ducked back into the skin tepee and rumpled the matted heads of his children, waking them to the brightness of the sunshine, before he ducked out the flap back to the side of his squaw. He watched her broad smile. She was a delicate woman with long black hair combed into two smooth braids. She was also a womanwith strong character and outspoken opinion. So he was not surprised when she asked, “Why is too much ease a bad thing?” But it was a new thought to him and he was not prepared to answer right away.

  Flustered, he stared at the fire a moment. “If enough grass seed can be collected to ease the hurt of winter’s hunger, that cannot be bad for the People. It will make them laugh at the blizzards. That is good. But so much seed is needed. You cannot collect enough. It will be like trying to store water in a torn buffalo bladder— never enough to go around. You know how it is with meat. The more we have, the more is eaten. The People would grow soft and fat and lazy.” Even as he spoke he wondered what had really made the people of the circle of stones disappear. Their life had been altered by some force unknown to him. Perhaps the people of the stone circle made life too easy for themselves and in their softness were slaughtered by their enemies. Perhaps they were forced to move on by their greed for more food. He thought of his own father and his father before him doing what was expected to keep the People together. To visualize fathers farther back in time was difficult. Who were the ancient ones of the stone circle? Did their blood run with his blood? At this moment he changed a little, he was humbled. And when his woman gave him a flat, hard biscuit made from freshly pounded grass seed, he wondered if living and keeping a tribe together was as simple a thing as he had thought. Once or twice in the past he had suspected that his people would not of themselves survive, but there was some mysterious force, something from the Great Spirit that allied itself with them to conquer their fear of the weather, or starvation and sickness, and even the great mystery of death.

  “How do you like it?” asked his woman, handing him another biscuit made from the grass-seed flour, water, and bear grease.

  “It is crisp and good to the taste and deserves a gift in return.” He pulled something from inside the waist-string of his trousers, hoping to distract her profound thoughts with something gay. “A smooth blue stone. I have been keeping it for some special time, for this day. I took it from a Blackfoot after he and a companionskulked around our best ponies at sundown during the Month of No Rain. His companion will be getting back to his camp about now—if he went all the distance on foot as I last saw him.”

  “My Chief, the color is like the spring sky, cool and fresh! Pound a small hole here so that I can put a thin thong through and wear it around my neck.”

  “A woman requires things of beauty as a man requires food,” mumbled the chief, not daring to look at his woman’s radiant face. He was not afraid of the emotion deep inside his belly; he wished only to keep it under control in front of his children. “Uuuugh.” He cleared his throat and watched the four youngsters emerge from the tepee ready for their first meal of the day.

  Fragrant Herbs hid her feelings only in the presence of strangers. “Each sunrise my feeling for you grows. This feeling is greater now than when you first came to my mother’s tepee.”

  “Is it not stran
ge,” asked the chief, “that the birds and animals decorate their bucks, while we decorate our squaws?”

  “Would you have me decorate you with quills and shells and bright flowers in your hair?” Her eyes snapped.

  “Would you have the men laugh behind my back and the women giggle behind their hands?”

  “I feel like a young girl in love, beautiful,” she smiled.

  Chief No Retreat coughed and turned to see his boys scuffle over a smooth stick. Grass Child spotted the whiteness of it. ‘That is mine,” she cried shrilly. “I have gathered yellow grass to make a tunic and wide sash for the stick. It is to be my papoose.”

  Rain Girl ran between the boys. “Give the baby her stick-papoose. You can make another with a cutting stone. Give it to her so she won’t scream.”

  Fragrant Herbs quickly pushed tightly woven willow bowls into the hands of each child. “Eat, and enjoy the fall air,” she said gently. “Perhaps your father will take the boys hunting before we strike camp. Rain Girl and Grass Child, try to finish your sewing before we break camp in three suns.”

  Rain Girl took a bowl of meat broth to Old Grand-mother inside the tepee. “We want to sew today,” she said. “In three days we leave.”

  Old Grandmother’s eyes were as bright as wet black stones. Her hair was sparse and matted in the back, with a few black wisps showing over her forehead. Her brown face was like a shriveled, dried plum. She had taught both her granddaughters to sew, to tan hides, and to make pemmican. While she taught with her hands, she sang songs for happiness, songs for sadness, and songs of praise to the Great Spirit. Her songs used a range of only five notes, but they were from the depth of her soul’s memory. They were songs from the memory of her own grandmother. Near the end of each winter, she retold the legend of the origin of the Shoshoni to her grandchildren.

  “Once,” Old Grandmother would say, “a great flood covered the land. A water bird swam about the surface with tufts of grass in its bill. The Great Spirit breathed life into the tufts, which became people, white as the fresh-fallen snow. After several children were born to them, the women ate some chokecherries given them by Coyote the Trickster. When the fruit made their mouth draw up, they induced their family to try it. The more they ate, the darker their flesh became, until it was a nice rich brown.”4

  Today a friend, Willow Bud, about twelve summers like Rain Girl, came to listen to Old Grandmother’s stories as she worked on a pair of moccasins for her father.

  “Teach me to sew on quills, Old Grandmother. I wish to surprise my father so he will have moccasins to wear when we move to winter camp. See the long tops I made for them and the tiny fringe drag at the heels?” Willow Bud held the high-top moccasins up proudly.

  Old Grandmother sat on her bed of buffalo hides and crooned to herself as she picked out red-and yellow-dyed porcupine quills from a small leather pouch. Her hands shook as she arranged them in a design on the earth.

  “Turkey tracks,” squealed Willow Bud with delight as she recognized the design.

  “Old Grandmother, tell us a story while we sew,” begged Grass Child.

  “Oh, ai,” cried Rain Girl.

  Old Grandmother’s hands shook in her lap like bone rattles. She sat very still, staring at her hands. Her eyes took on a fresh luster, and she began softly, “I have told you of the Great Mystery of birth, and now I tell you another mystery is death. It comes to all those that live.” She stopped, closed her eyes, and scratched at a fly on the back of her neck with a long, yellowed fingernail. “It is soon time for me to go to the Great Spirit. The journey is not long,” she announced in a whisper, her eyes remaining closed as if to see the trail to the place where there was no hunger, no pain, no sadness, only sunshine, clear streams with many fish, and grassy meadows with much game.

  “No, no!” exclaimed all three girls.

  “We need you,” said Willow Bud.

  “Our mother needs you,” said Rain Girl.

  “I can never learn all the things I must know to be a woman without you,” said Grass Child, tears welling.

  “You are foolish. You think of yourselves,” scolded Old Grandmother. Her voice was raspy and stayed in her throat. “I am lonely for the people I used to know. Those who have already taken the long journey to the Land of Everfeasting. I have the stiffness in my joints and can hardly walk. My hands spill the soup before it reaches my mouth.”

  “But we love you,” sobbed Grass Child.

  “Ai, I love you, too, but this is my time now. Do not grieve. Look ahead.”

  “What is there ahead?” said Rain Girl, her head bowed as a tear slid from her cheek to the soft tanned skin on her lap.

  Old Grandmother bent unsteadily and clasped her thin fingers around Rain Girl’s hand. “I have had a feeling. A strange omen has been pushing at my thoughts. My granddaughter, you will never feel the joy of being an old grandmother. Aiieee! That is sadness.”

  Rain Girl looked into the pinched face of Old Grandmother. She smiled and remembered that Old Grandmother had always told of omens. She could even smell the weather.

  “Do not be sad about that, Old Grandmother. It isperhaps because my children will not marry. I am betrothed to Heavy Runner, son of Red Buck, remember?”

  Old Grandmother shrugged and pulled a robe over her thin knees. “I do not know more.”

  Grass Child moved closer to Old Grandmother, forgetting about her sewing. “What about Willow Bud? Have you had a feeling about her?”

  “Ai,” smiled Old Grandmother. “She will make a good wife and mother, and her sewing will improve each season.” She shuddered and opened her mouth. Her bottom teeth were gone, so that nothing held back the saliva. She wiped her mouth with the back of a shaking hand. “You will go on a long journey into an unknown land. Soon.”

  Willow Bud laughed. “I know; we are going to winter camp. That’s a long journey and is coming soon.”

  “What do you know of me?” asked Grass Child, eager to have something strange and mysterious revealed to her, also.

  Old Grandmother was resting, her eyes shut tight. The girls waited. Soon her eyes glittered, and the restlessness of the girls told her they were waiting for an answer.

  “Ai, for a long while I have wanted to tell you. Your mother has forbidden it.”

  Grass Girl peeked out the doorway. “She is gone.”

  “Now is the time. All of you listen so that you may know I told you true what I feel.”

  Shivers ran down Grass Child’s back. She strained her ears not to miss a word. “Tell me. What is it?” she asked.

  “You, Grass Child, are a chosen one. You will have many names. You will be a leader. Something like a chief to bring full bellies and happy faces to the People.” Old Grandmother’s face became flushed, and her eyes snapped. “You will be known in legends many old men from now, and loved by other nations. You will die young, yet you will live to a very old age.” Her voice became a whisper. “Lately I have had this strange notion that the beginning of this is near, like Willow Bud’s journey.” Old Grandmother coughed and wheezed and lay herself back on the robes.

  Rain Girl burst into fits of laughter. “Oh, this little papoose a chief? A squaw, a chief?”

  “Rain Girl,” Old Grandmother said from her couch, “hush. I have more.” The girls sat in silence, waiting. “I have had more than one dream of Willow Bud as a slim young woman weeping and running nearly out of her moccasins to embrace Grass Child. And Grass Child does not at first recognize her. There are many men, braves, standing around with their pale eyes big with disbelief. It is a strange dream. I do not understand it.” She shook her head and covered her eyes with her trembling fingers.

  Willow Bud sat waiting for more revelations. Then Grass Child broke the silence by scrambling around, untangling herself from sinew and tunic so she could put her hand into Old Grandmother’s. She bent her head and whispered near the sallow, wrinkled face, “I shall not forget this day.” The child placed the knotted hands of Old Grandmother over her hea
rt, signifying love between them.

  The following morning the sun was still strong, but the wind had a chill that warned of colder times. Fragrant Herbs was busy packing clothing and the little food that was left so that when the time came for striking the tepee her work would not take too long. Willow Bud came to see if Rain Girl and Grass Child could take their baskets to the edge of camp and gather some of the fall asters to make flower chains.

  The girls ran in the dry grass and began picking long-stemmed purple asters. Soon they were thirsty and hurried over to the water hole. Then Grass Child saw a windfall across the game trail leading from the water hole. Its freshly upturned roots were still covered with moss and earth. The branches, upon which it had fallen, lay torn and broken on the rocks.

  “It’s a tamarack,” said Rain Girl, “we can go right through. The needles are soft.”

  They were careful not to walk on the slivered branches as they pushed aside the boughs in front of them and climbed along the huge rough trunk in follow-the-leader fashion.

  Grass Child straightened—she heard a hiss and thesound of scrambling. She searched through the boughs, holding one to keep her balance. On the other side of the tree she saw a little black bear cub hitching himself up another tamarack, scattering bark and black deer moss with every push of his short legs. She started to laugh and point to him, when directly in front of her the mother bear rose on hind legs and let out a fierce roar as she pawed the air, long claws gleaming in the sun. Another cub came up beside the mother.

  The girls froze, too frightened to move, then Rain Girl whispered, “Don’t move too quickly. She’ll chase us.”

  “I’m not going to stay,” Willow Bud replied. Feeling the solid trunk of the tamarack through her moccasins, she slunk slowly back into the protective branches. Rain Girl followed her example, letting boughs fall slowly into place between them and the mother bear. Grass Child moved cautiously.