Louisiana History Collection - Part 1

by Jennifer Blake

  She turned to Little Quail. “How long is it since the death of the old war chief in battle?”

  “Not long. His bones were picked clean and buried only a few days before the delegation left the village to go to Hawk-of-the-Night.”

  The woman’s voice was so quiet that Elise felt a quick remorse. Impulsively she said, “Forgive me. For a moment I forgot that this was also the time of your husband’s death. If I caused you pain by speaking of it, I am sorry.”

  “You must not be. He is gone and I am not sad.”

  It was true that she did not look the grieving widow, but the Indians did not believe in long periods of mourning. Three days were given over to intense outpourings of sorrow and then it was done. Life went on. “You miss him, I’m sure.”

  “Perhaps,” the woman said with a Gallic shrug learned during her days with the French.

  “You had no children.”

  “No. I made certain of it.”

  “You what?”

  Little Quail sent her a surprised glance at the sharpness of her tone. “I chewed the leaves that rid my body of the flesh of his flesh, for I did not wish to bring it to fruit. Would you not have done the same?”

  Thinking of Vincent Laffont, Elise said, “Possibly, if I could.”

  “Surely you could have done so!”

  “The leaves are not known among the French.”

  The woman stopped, “But you have so much knowledge. Surely this, being so important to women, is known to you.”

  “No.”

  “How strange. What do you do?”

  “There are ways, instruments, but it is dangerous. Usually we do nothing.”

  Little Quail shook her head in amazement. “But you have no child of your husband.”

  “He was incapable, I believe, or possibly I am.”

  “It may be he was, for I had no need to chew the leaves while with him.”

  It was a relief to hear her say it. Elise had sometimes wondered why she had never conceived in the early days. She had thought that perhaps her body itself had cast off her husband’s seed so greatly had she despised everything about him. Nature was not always so accommodating, however.

  “In truth,” Little Quail went on, “the death of my husband saved me trouble. I was near to putting him from my house.”

  Once more there was surprise in Elise’s eyes as she looked at her. “You could have done that?”

  “Most certainly. Oh, I know that the house belongs to the man among the French, but it is otherwise with us. Here the house, the cooking pots and vessels, the furs and leatherwork, the land we plant all belong to the women. A man owns his weapons, the clothing he wears, and perhaps a horse if he has used furs to trade for it.”

  “And you would have been allowed to put him out? There is no law that would compel you to let him return?”

  “None. I alone decide.”

  “But if you had had children, they would have gone with him?”

  “My children? Would I not have been their mother, she who carried them under her heart, bore them in pain, and cared for them in their helpless days? Does a fawn follow its father? Does the small opossum cling to its father’s tail? Does the bear cub recognize the one who sired it? No! Why should they have gone with him?”

  “He might have wished to know them, to help rear them.”

  “Children are watched and reared by all. There would have been no hindrance.”

  It was said that children of the Natchez were never struck and seldom spoken to in anger. They were welcome at every fire and in every hut and were taught with gentle words and demonstrations by whoever was near when a lesson was needed. As a result, they grew up confident, fearless, and certain within themselves. It would be interesting to see if it was true.

  In the bright light of day, Elise was able to see more clearly than she had the night before that the village was built in a straggling circle. In the center was the mound of the Great Sun with his house facing south and with the open plaza, a large, flat area of beaten earth, in front and below it. There was a ball game, using a sphere of leather-wrapped moss, in progress on this meeting ground of the village at the moment, with much shouting and yelling among the adolescent boys and girls who played.

  On the other side of the plaza, facing the mound of the Great Sun, was the temple mound. The temple itself was the most imposing building in the village, built of enormous logs in a large square, with an antechamber facing east to prevent the uninitiated from seeing inside. Outside the temple the eternal fire burned between posts that were carved at the top in the likenesses of eagles. The most curious feature, however, was the ridgepole of the temple, where the carved images of wild white swans in flight were attached.

  Directly behind the mound of the Great Sun lay yet another mound. This was, according to Little Quail, the old temple mound, abandoned in some forgotten year because the waterway that ran swiftly alongside the village, called St. Catherine Creek by the French, had encroached upon it. There was a fairly open space in front of it that had been the plaza in the old days, but it was now covered with huts. The huts also spread to the edge of the creek and on one side of the plaza and for some distance on the other.

  “Where do you live?” Elise asked Little Quail.

  “My hut is over there, with the Honored People.”

  The Honored People were those who had won advancement due to brave deeds or unselfish service. They were a special class ranked below the Sun and Nobles, but above the Commoners, or Stinkards.

  Elise looked at the indicated round building with a conical roof. It was small but comfortable. A number of others were set close around it, with a space of tree-shaded earth between it and the larger huts nearer the mound of the Great Sun.

  “And who lives there?” Elise asked, indicating the larger dwellings.

  “The Nobles in the nearer huts and the Suns living closest to the Great Sun. The Commoners live over there, farthest from him. Perhaps I should tell you that my husband was a Commoner, or more accurately, a Stinkard.”

  Her attention caught by Little Quail’s tone, Elise turned to look at her. “That makes a difference.”

  “Yes, of course. It is forbidden to marry one’s own class. If I had been chosen by a Noble, I would have had to obey my husband and wait on his pleasure more closely. By marrying into the class under me, I kept my privileges and possessions.”

  “I see. In either case, your children would have remained Honored People, following your station.”

  “You have it right, though if I had been so honored as to marry into the Sun class, my children would have been Nobles.”

  “But your possessions?”

  “They would still have been mine, always supposing that I was not so overwhelmed by my royal relatives that I was persuaded to give them up. If they were not needed, then most likely I would have given them to my daughter as a dowry.”

  “And in any case they would have descended to your children on your death?”

  “This is so. Your inheritance is different, I know, by way of the father. But how unreasonable it is! Every child knows its mother, but who can say without doubt who his father may be?”

  “Just so,” Elise said with a wry smile. “But among the men of the Natchez there are some, particularly the Great Sun, who have more than one wife. How can this be, if women are free to leave a marriage at will?”

  “Most often it is the Suns who have a second or third wife. It is the honor, the hope of advancement for the children, the family, you see, that makes a woman accept such a position. And then there are times when many men are killed in war so that there are more women than there are men of an age to be husbands. Besides, it is not always a cause for jealousy if a man takes another wife. It is done often because the first is pregnant and no longer wishes to please him in the bed furs. Sometimes a woman will suggest that he take another wife because she wants to avoid all possibility of pregnancy while nursing her baby. Though the leaves can be used, it will weaken he
r and perhaps cause her milk to cease flowing. And if, when her child is weaned, she is unable to live with the second wife, then she can leave, taking her child and the possessions she brought with her.”

  Elise nodded, mulling over the curious arrangement of the Natchez, and they walked on. They passed a large house set up on piles, the wood of which was polished to a satin gleam. There was a ladder lying on the ground beside it, and as they drew even a woman picked it up, set it against the door, and climbed up into the house. Glancing in, Elise saw her shaking out a coverlet that was unmistakably of French design. Behind the woman could also be seen piles of clothing, stacks of dishes, the legs of chairs, the solid bulk of marriage chests, and even what appeared to be the black snout of a cannon. The house was a storeroom for the booty that had been taken from Fort Rosalie and the houses of the French, and the slickly polished piles were to keep rats and mice from climbing up to damage the goods. Elise closed her eyes, turning quickly away.

  They stepped around a pair of young girls playing at something like pick-up-sticks in the middle of the path. From a nearby doorway, two slightly older sisters looked up from where they were taking turns grinding corn to call a greeting. A dark-eyed cherub, wearing only a cloak about his shoulders and moccasins on his tiny feet, toddled from around the hut and stood rocking on his feet in front of them. Proud in his plump, copper nakedness, crowing with glee, he grinned up at them. His eyes were black and his hair fine and straight. Elise, staring down at him, felt an odd pain under her heart. Little Quail bent to scoop the boy up, robbing her now against his smaller one. A white-haired woman rounded the hut with hurried steps, dragging a half-scraped deer hide. She laughed toothlessly, scolding without heat as she saw the boy in Little Quail’s arms. Greeting them, she began to talk, her wary gaze touching Elise now and then, but always returning to Little Quail.

  Elise looked away. She had the uncomfortable feeling, as the old woman let out a cackle of mirth, that she was the subject of conversation. It made her uncomfortable that she could not fully understand, though otherwise she found that she didn’t mind. She thought idly that she must begin to improve her Natchez if she wasn’t to feel left out.

  A flicker of movement caught her gaze and she looked toward the back of the hut. It was a dark column of flies that had attracted her attention, flies buzzing around the viscera of the deer the old woman had been cleaning. They had been disturbed by the approach of a warrior. His movements, stealthy, too hurried, made her watch him as she waited for Little Quail to finish talking. With his knife tip, the man raked an intestine from the pile of refuse, slitting it and spilling the contents on the ground. He took a pair of what appeared to be stout supple canes from under his arm and rubbed them in the entrails and their spilled contents. Satisfied, he glanced quickly around, turned, and walked away.

  He had not recognized her in her Indian clothing or had perhaps taken her for a French slave of no importance, but Elise had known him instantly. What he was doing, whether it was some Indian trick or merely an unsavory habit, she did not know, but she was certain that the warrior had been Path Bear.

  They walked on after a few minutes. Picking up their conversation, Little Quail said, “You spoke of the Great Sun and his wives. The poor man has been much too busy. Both his first wife and his second are now pregnant and will have nothing to do with him. It may be he will soon be looking for another.”

  “Perhaps his gaze will light on you?”

  Little Quail laughed softly, but did not deny the possibility.

  “If it did, would you wed him, despite the danger?

  “Danger?”

  “Of being strangled should he die before you.”

  “The Great Sun lives long, in most cases. He does not go to war and his house stands high, where it is cool and healthful.”

  “Still, I would think he would have trouble finding a wife. It would seem more likely that he would take a mistress like our own King Louis.”

  “A mistress! Never!” Little Quail exclaimed.

  “What would be wrong with that?”

  “It isn’t done.”

  “Oh, come, it’s well known that such things happen a great deal in the village.”

  “Well known by whom?”

  “We heard it constantly at the fort and I myself knew several men who enjoyed visits from Indian woman who also had husbands and children here.”

  A smug smile curved the mouth of the Indian woman. “Indian women. That’s different.”

  “What do you mean, different?”

  “There is nothing unusual in the activities outside marriage, or otherwise, of women. It is our privilege. But men are required to be faithful. An Indian man discovered in the arms of another woman can be put to death on the order of his wife.”

  “You don’t mean it.”

  “But I do.”

  “And — and not the other way around?”

  “Why should it be so merely because that is the way of it among the French? The women of the Natchez are not so bound. It is our right to take as many gallants as may please us regardless of the protests of our husbands.”

  “Surely they would divorce you for it.”

  “No, why? It would be to lose everything for the man while his wife would lose nothing. In any case, it is not possible. Divorce is a thing of women.”

  Elise stared at her with her mouth open, then gave her head a shake as if to clear her thoughts. “I don’t understand. If women are so powerful, then how does it happen that they are given to men visitors, such as the French? I know this happens because Reynaud mentioned it himself.”

  “This is a matter of courtesy, but it requires the woman’s approval. It is seldom withheld, for according to the wise men it brings new blood into the tribe, and anyway we females are curious about men who are strangers. Don’t you find it do yourself?”

  Thinking of Reynaud and the way she had reached out to touch his tattoos on that first night, Elise felt the color rise to her cheekbones. Her answer was barely audible. “I suppose.”

  There was the smell of woodsmoke and cooking food on the air. In nearly every hut at least one pot, if not two or three, bubbled near the fire. At some there were men gathered to eat, for except on feast days there were no regular mealtimes; each person ate as he grew hungry and found food prepared. A part of the delicious aroma on the air, however, came from the smoking racks. It was a good day for smoking meat, being dry, cool, and bright, and there were strips of deer, bear, opossum, and even the tail of an alligator hanging over the slow-burning fires.

  Adding to the smoke was a great fire inside a small hut. The door stood open for ventilation and inside could be seen what appeared to be large rocks being baked. Elise nodded in that direction, asking what the purpose might be.

  “The sweat hut,” Little Quail said, the words clipped.

  “Oh, a kind of steam bath,” Elise said, having some faint remembrance of hearing it spoken of by that name.

  “Water is poured on the hot rocks to make steam, yes. It is used to relieve extreme fatigue or as a purification ritual. It is being prepared now for Hawk-of-the-Night.”

  “I see.” She had not realized it would be turned into a ceremony, this running of the gauntlet. It made it seem worse somehow, more dangerous.

  “He will fast during the day, then spend several hours in the sweat hut this evening. Afterward, still fasting, he will wait out the night in the temple.”

  Elise swung to face the other woman, putting out a hand to stop her. “Won’t that make him weak?”

  “It will focus his mind fully on what will happen and how he must withstand it.”

  “Is there anything I can do to help?”

  “You have done enough.” The young woman turned her face away.

  “What is it?” Elise asked. “What have I done?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Little Quail, please!”

  The other woman swung back to meet her gaze, her dark brown eyes steady. “Very well. I
said before that Hawk-of-the-Night would not die, but I fear for him, I do fear for him. Path Bear wanted to be war chief, expected to be war chief, but the women influenced the wise men in the council of elders and they chose the brother of the Great Sun. Path Bear was sent instead to fetch the man who has always been his rival, has always been a better warrior, a better man, though he is but half Natchez. You gave Path Bear the excuse he needed to bring down the man who was chosen above him. He will do everything in his power to see that Hawk-of-the-Night does not recover from the gauntlet. At this time my people do not need cunning and bravado but a man of intelligence and daring and steadfast purpose. Without him, we may be doomed. If Hawk-of-the-Night dies, it will be upon your head, as the fate of the Natchez will be upon your head.”

  “I didn’t know it would come to this.”

  “You are not of the Natchez or you would have thought.”

  “No,” Elise said, a hard note in her voice, “I am not of the Natchez.”

  They stood staring at each other with the distrust, absent until now, of enemies. A chill breeze flapped Elise’s skirt, exposing one leg to the thigh; she scarcely noticed and did not feel the rise of gooseflesh on her naked skin due to the greater chill inside her. Around her the Indians went about their tasks, chopping wood, grinding tools, and sharpening weapons, calling to each other and the omnipresent dogs, yelling in play. Nothing had changed, and yet she was suddenly aware of being French and among foes, in a way she never had before.

  “Elise! Oh, Elise!”

  She swung around at the sound of her name. Running toward her, stumbling over her ragged skirts and with her hair straggling around her face, was Madame Doucet. The woman threw herself on Elise, clutching her arms and sobbing.

  Elise caught her, holding her with compassion. “What is it? Tell me.”

  “My little Charles! I knew, I knew it. It was he they killed. It was he they strangled, cruel monsters that they are; strangled in his youth, ah, mon Dieu, so young, so young. And for nothing. Nothing. I told you! I did tell you how it would be. I knew. Somehow I knew.”