by Judith Pella
“Oh, God, am I to die out here?”
But it was fitting, wasn’t it, to die here, alone, in this place that had been kind to her? She could ask for no better coffin than this spacious, grassy prairie.
The prairie.
Prairie …
“You are a grand horse, clothed with thunder….”
“Oh, Jacob, why didn’t you come to rescue me? … You must be dead….”
Deborah’s body relaxed. She could move no more. She was glad that in the end the wind and the rain had conquered her rather than Caleb Stoner. She’d never see his gloating face over her final defeat. He’d never even know for certain if she was alive or dead. He’d always wonder, never certain.
It would make up for his dead certainty when he found her standing over Leonard’s body with her husband’s Colt in her trembling hand.
“You murderous tramp! You have killed my son!”
“No! I saw someone … he might still be out there … I took the gun….”
But what was the use? No one believed her. Perhaps she had imagined it, after all. Maybe this was the dream, and what she had always thought to be the nightmare was the reality. The dream that so often haunted her sleep did seem so real. Only in it she held a derringer in her hand, not a Colt. But that look of disbelief on Leonard’s face could not have been more real.
“Put that gun down, Deborah.”
“Beg me, Leonard! Beg me to spare your life!”
“Don’t be foolish.”
“Get on your knees and beg for mercy.” She lifted the little gun, leveling it at his head. “You only have to beg for your life, Leonard. How many times have I had to plead for my self-respect, my very soul?”
“You unfaithful hussy! You deserved what you got.”
“Then die, Leonard! Die … die …” Whoever said vengeance wasn’t sweet?
And her hand no longer trembled as her finger squeezed the trigger. But did that horrifying explosion wake her from a tortuous dream, or did it merely usher in the true nightmare?
What truly happened the night Leonard Stoner was killed?
She was so certain she had seen someone. Maybe they were right. Maybe she was crazy, maybe she was a murderer.
Maybe … but she was supposed to have used the derringer, not the Colt. What did it matter? A Colt, a derringer … her husband was dead just the same.
And still she wasn’t free. Not yet. But soon … soon she would be. The beautiful prairie was waiting to receive her, to take her at last to where she could know peace. She had finished fighting. She was tired.
“God, I am sorry I could do no more than believe. I am sorry it wasn’t enough.”
All she wanted now was to rest, like at Griff’s cabin, only longer.
Longer …
Soon Deborah did not feel the sting of the wind or the icy fingers of rain against her face. She felt nothing at all. But she felt no peace, either. In her delirium she continued to struggle, writhing on the ground for some time until a troubled unconsciousness overcame her.
At least death, or oblivion, or whatever it was, had stopped the terrible rain. The next sensation Deborah felt was of looking up, through distorted vision at a blue sky. Then a shadow passed over her.
No, not a shadow but a face.
“Griff, is that you … ?”
But the voice that replied was not Griff’s, and the words it spoke were mumbled, foreign.
A few hazy moments passed, allowing no further consideration of what was happening. Deborah passed again—into oblivion, if not rest … into unconsciousness, if not peace.
Part 3
Broken Wing
23
The shaman, called Crooked Eye, had received a sturdy pony and a fine bull buffalo hide for his services. A substantial payment when the patient was a stranger. He had accepted the gifts even though he saw that the sickness was perhaps too serious even for his strong medicine. He looked at his wife, Gray Antelope Woman, who assisted him. She wore a solemn expression and shook her head slightly. She was concerned for the unborn infant, as was understandable since Gray Antelope had never borne a child of her own. Her heart went out to such a great loss, should the baby die with the mother.
She handed her husband the potent concoction of sweet grass mixed with ground juniper and dried, pulverized mushrooms and powdered bitterroot. Crooked Eye sprinkled the mixture over the fire in the lodge, and its pungent aroma permeated the air as it purified the shaman and his patient.
Then followed the ritual for driving the evil spirit from the lodge. Crooked Eye chanted a powerful invocation while shaking his sacred rattle, made by his father many summers ago from the mighty snake he slew after it had tried to attack Crooked Eye’s mother. This held strong medicine; the bad spirits would obey.
This ceremony completed, Gray Antelope Woman gave the patient a tea of healing herbs. The sick woman was, most of the time, in a fitful, troubled sleep. Sometimes she mumbled incoherently. Sometimes she opened her eyes, but she did not see. When the poor woman cried out, Gray Antelope Woman did not know if it was from fear or pain. Thus, the woman swallowed some of the tea but choked and sputtered some of it. She took enough for the tea to do its work. It would calm her, perhaps bring peace to her sleep. It might heal her also, for in it was a very potent herb. But Crooked Eye would not trust only the tea. He knew the woman’s illness went deep.
Crooked Eye glanced at his small audience in the lodge. Broken Wing, who had brought the woman to the shaman, his brother Stands-in-the-River, and his sister-in-law Stone Teeth Woman, were watching carefully, expecting the best effort for their payment, even if the patient was only a white woman.
Hovering over his patient, the shaman paid particular attention to her inflamed right shoulder. He bent low until his face was very close to the injury, and made motions as if he were sucking the offending disease from the arm. Then he raised up and with great flourish, brought his hand to his lips and instantly a small feather appeared in his hand. His audience nodded with approval. The feather, of course, was supposed to be the cause of the woman’s sickness, and with its removal from her body she would recover. But more chants were still sung, and Gray Antelope administered more tea and rubbed a poultice of the same herbal mixture over the wound.
Now only the passage of time would tell if the woman would return to this life or if she would travel the Hanging Road over the Milky Way to the place of the dead.
Gray Antelope shooed the visitors from the lodge so the patient might receive the best benefit from the shaman’s skill. Broken Wing lingered, and with sad eyes turned toward the pale, sick patient, all but swallowed up within a mound of Crooked Eye’s best hides.
“Don’t worry,” said Gray Antelope, “you will have your captive back.”
“I did not capture her; I found her,” Broken Wing replied with more than a little pride in his tone.
“Of course, of course,” said Gray Antelope patronizingly. “A gift from Heammawihio himself.” She only mocked him halfheartedly. Perhaps his tale was true.
“I was seeking a vision,” the young warrior said.
“And you found the white woman.”
“It is a good sign.”
“If she lives.”
Crooked Eye sidled up to the pair. “Do you doubt my skill, woman?” he asked with a raised brow.
“If she lives, it will only be because of your great skill, husband.”
Crooked Eye smiled. He had married a smart woman, even if she could not bear children.
Gray Antelope finished clearing the lodge. Crooked Eye left also, leaving his wife alone with the patient. She sat on the dirt floor next to the woman, studying her carefully. The tea was taking effect, for she seemed to be sleeping easier, not fighting as much against it, or against whatever evil spirits were haunting her. Beneath the dirt and grime of the trail, Gray Antelope thought there was a beautiful woman—at least by the standards the white man had for such things. Her skin was pale and her face was thin, but perhaps
with health and good food that might change. Her golden hair, too, would probably shine like the sun when all the filth was washed from it. She had only one other time seen hair as yellow—it had been hanging from the scalp belt of a warrior called Little Left Hand.
But this woman would keep her hair. Broken Wing was being very protective of his “find.” In fact, if anything happened to the white woman, it would be Crooked Eye’s hair that would be in more danger!
Nevertheless, Gray Antelope thought it might still be worth her while to try to buy the white woman from Broken Wing. She might then have the baby to raise as her own, especially if the woman herself died. However, the woman must not die yet, for the baby did not appear to be grown enough to survive on its own. Regardless, Broken Wing would not let her go cheaply.
Could it be true that Heammawihio, the Wise One Above, did indeed send the woman as a sign to Broken Wing? It was an unusual sign, but Broken Wing had spent his young years with a mountain man and had learned many of the ways of the whites, so perhaps such a sign was not as peculiar as it seemed.
The white woman stirred but did not awaken. She would remain asleep for some time.
“If the Wise One Above wills it, you will live,” murmured the Indian woman to the prostrate form. “If he does not and you die, maybe you will not mind so much if I raise your baby.”
Gray Antelope rubbed more poultice on her patient’s shoulder. It was obviously a bullet wound. Could other Indians have shot her, perhaps while raiding her people as they traveled across the plains to the land on the other side of the far mountains? But Crooked Eye said the wound was made with a pistol, a kind the Indians did not often use. Was she then shot by her own people? It was not like even the white men to shoot their own women, especially those with child. The woman said many words in her sleep, but Gray Antelope did not have the white man’s language so she could not understand. Perhaps she would let Broken Wing listen. He had learned some from the mountain man.
An hour later Gray Antelope emerged from the lodge. Although it had been light hours ago when she had entered the lodge, it was dark now. There was no moon tonight, but several fires burned about the camp, giving enough light for her to see the approaching figure in time to avoid colliding with it. She smiled to herself. It was Broken Wing. He must have been waiting outside the lodge the whole time, or was watching it closely from his own lodge across the way.
“Is she well?” he asked anxiously.
“Not yet.”
“But she will live?”
“I think so. She fights.”
“That is good. The Wise One Above is with her.”
“It is not for me to say.” Gray Antelope Woman cast a shrewd eye toward the young warrior. “The white one is very sick. It takes strong medicine to heal her.”
“That is why I brought her to Crooked Eye.”
“He did not know at first how much it would take to mend her.”
Broken Wing cocked an eyebrow at the older woman. He was young, but he was not a fool. “Was my gift too small?”
“For a sick white captive, no. But for one who is a sign from Heammawihio … ?” She pursed her lips together and nodded meaningfully, allowing him to draw his own conclusions. This was not difficult for him to do.
“I will give him another horse—a very good one that I captured wild myself.”
“Crooked Eye needs no more horses.”
“Ha! What Cheyenne has no need for horses?” He realized now that the woman was speaking for herself and not for her husband.
“I want the white woman’s baby,” Gray Antelope said flatly.
“The whites do not part easily from their children. In this way they are much like us. Take my horse, Gray Antelope Woman; it will serve you well.”
Gray Antelope sighed. She knew Broken Wing, for all his youth, was right. She knew also that she would not have had the heart to take the child from its mother, anyway. It had been a tempting idea, though. There was still the chance the woman would die, for many white women were too frail for the hard life on the plains. Then she recalled the look on the white woman’s face and thought otherwise. That woman would not die easily. Her outer shell might be delicate like a hummingbird’s, but inside, she had the marrow of a buffalo. At least that is what Gray Antelope thought. Time would tell.
24
Deborah wavered on the edge of consciousness for three more days. But even when she appeared to be awake, fever and delirium were never far from her. Not until the sixth day after her arrival in the Cheyenne camp north of the Cimarron River did she finally depart the netherlands of fever and exposure and near-starvation.
When she awoke at last, the play of eerie nighttime shadows reflecting from the fire in the lodge dulled the line between waking and sleeping. She was very warm, and her first conscious thought was that summer must have come to the prairie, that it had been months, not days, since that terrible rainstorm. But then she moved, and the fresh ache in her right shoulder affirmed that only a short time must have passed. But if it was winter, why was she so warm? Had some settler found her and taken her into his cabin? It was an odd cabin, with walls that seemed to tilt inward all around, coming to a peak at what should have been the ceiling.
The covers that contributed largely to her warmth were odd, too. They were heavy, a bit scratchy and with a gamey odor. But they were warm and gave her a peculiar sense of security.
“Where am I?” she asked, but in a drowsy tone as if she didn’t really care one way or another if she received an answer.
Several voices spoke at once, but she didn’t understand a word. She tried to peer through the semidarkness of the lodge; then someone tossed a log on the fire and the flame flared up, sending fingers of erratic light about the room. She caught her first glimpse of her companions.
Indians!
She knew she should be frightened, but she wasn’t. She felt too warm and secure to be afraid.
A woman knelt down beside Deborah, holding a hollowed-out gourd in her hands. She spoke, but Deborah could not understand. The woman touched Deborah’s lips with the gourd, apparently wanting her to drink. She looked at the contents of the cup—some white, creamy-looking substance. Then she looked at the woman.
She was several years older than Deborah, perhaps in her late thirties. Her dark skin was not lined except for fine crows’ feet about the corners of her eyes and lines framing her long, thin mouth. She had large black eyes that, as they reflected the flames of the fire, looked strikingly like burning coals. She spoke in a deep, resonant voice, both sad and vibrant. Deborah at once felt no fear in accepting the strange offering in the gourd.
Deborah drank deeply. It was a chalky liquid, rather tasteless, and though it wasn’t exactly unpleasant, she had the distinct impression it was medicine of some sort. When she finished drinking, she lay back, content to sleep again.
The Cheyenne lodge was illuminated with sunlight when Deborah next awoke. This time there were no voices, no movement of others, no comforting warm fire. She was alone.
She slipped out from under her heavy covers. Her shoulder still ached, but not as badly as she remembered. Her body was stiff but seemed willing to cooperate with her as she gingerly moved each limb, one at a time. Everything seemed to be in working order, and she felt her baby kicking. She tried to get up—not an easy endeavor considering she had been flat on her back for days and there was nothing nearby she could use for support. She lay down again, out of breath from her efforts. But now that she was fully awake, she was unwilling to remain inactive. She wanted to know where she was, who she was with, and if she was a prisoner or a patient. Rolling onto her side, she struggled to her knees, crawled like an ungainly porcupine to one of the tent supports and, grasping it, pulled herself to her feet.
She was no longer wearing her gray muslin dress, she realized—the same dress she had worn continuously, except when she removed it for washing, since that day Griff had rescued her from the gallows. Now she wore a plain brown shift, made of
some animal hide that hung straight and shapeless to about her mid-calf. It struck her as significant that the gray dress was gone, but she did not pause to ponder the implications of this. She was too anxious to answer other more pressing questions.
On rather shaky legs, Deborah walked to the lodge entrance and lifted the flap. The air was several degrees cooler outside, but the sun was bright and the sky was blue. No trace could be seen of the storm that had assailed her. There were many other lodges scattered along a narrow waterway. She could see several dozen from where she stood, all in the tepee shape she had read of and viewed pictures of, but had never actually seen. This was, truly, an Indian village. The busy residents, mostly women and children, with long, black hair and walnut brown skin, and wearing their buckskin garb, gave ample proof. Deborah watched the activity for five minutes, entranced. Children were playing—girls with dolls made of sticks and hides; boys with small bows, wrestling with one another or playing chase. Deborah noted one little girl riding a stick horse with her buckskin doll perched in front of her; both were having a grand time parading around the open ground between the tepees.
Women were engaged in cooking, sewing, and doing other activities completely alien to Deborah. One woman shooed a barking, frolicking dog away from an object that looked similar to a quilting frame except that it lay stretched out low on the ground and held a sleek hide. The scene that greeted Deborah was pleasant, inviting, and she found herself smiling in spite of her personal trouble and uncertainty.
Instinct told Deborah this place held no danger for her. Even when, one by one, several of the nearby villagers began to take note of her presence, stopping their labors to stare, Deborah did not feel threatened.
Before long one of the women looked up from where she was bent over a large animal hide. Deborah vaguely recognized her. That face had floated before her while she lay half-conscious, and she realized this woman had nursed her during her illness. Deborah remembered the warm, sad face, broad and unaffected and beautiful in its simplicity. She recalled, too, those eyes that had seemed to burn with intensity, though now, by the light of the sun, they were softer, yet no less intense. The woman rose and approached Deborah.
