Centennial (23 page)

He prized the companionship of all people, and was as much at home with children as he was with older warriors. He loved the intimacy of married life and retained close contacts with his three fathers, three mothers and various other relatives. Like most of Our People he was essentially gentle, avoided warfare when he could, but acknowledged that a man’s final worth depended on his capacity to count coup. He had not yet killed a man and intuitively drew back from considering in what circumstances he might one day have to do so; he preferred not to think of this. He would face the necessity when it arrived but would not hasten the day. He suffered an inner fear that he might prove cowardly at the moment of trial.

He had a deep sense of identity with living things. Having once seen a fish jump in the river, arching its back in a lovely curve, he often watched the water, hoping to see this phenomenon again. He enjoyed excursions to find lodge poles for tipis and knew well the kinds of trees that yielded such poles. He understood the bison, and he could track elk and deer. He knew where the beaver hid and how eagles could be trapped for their feathers. When his course required him to pass close to Rattlesnake Buttes he knew how to guard against the poison snakes and yet find a place to watch the prairie dogs at play. He liked the wolves and felt that they added definition to the other wild things of the prairie; sometimes he felt a deep identification with the wolf and had often speculated on the desirability of changing his name to Sun Wolf, after a great beast he had seen one day snapping at the sun.

It was this man, still seething with anger at having been deprived of his pinto, who sought spiritual cleansing for the task to which he was about to commit himself. To do what he intended, and alone, would require the control of every faculty he had, and this could be ensured only by offering himself to the sun. After pondering for some days what he must do, he appeared before his wife and announced, “When the Sun Dance is held, I shall offer myself.”

Blue Leaf shuddered. Lame Beaver saw this and frowned. “We must both make the sacrifice,” he insisted, without deigning to explain what his ultimate purpose was in committing himself to the sun. He did try to console her, but she withdrew. She appreciated the fact that when a man dedicated himself to the sun, events happened and no one could foresee their consequences.

The Sun Dance, as observed by Our People at that time, was a celebration covering eight days, and it was of such spiritual significance that other villages, oftentimes from far away, were invited to participate. Flat-Pipe was paraded to lend authority, and numerous intricate rituals were observed. On the fourth day stakes were driven into the ground, delimiting a ceremonial area, and on the fifth a sacred place was identified within this area.

It was marked by fourteen willow sticks painted red and protected by a low palisade of cottonwood branches. At the center Flat-Pipe was installed, flanked by two massive bison skulls, on each of which rested a very sharp wooden skewer plus a length of thong. Small boys, imagining the day when they would claim manhood, studied these skulls and shivered. Two young braves, noted for courage, moved forward, consecrated themselves to the sun, and stepped within the palisade, lifting the heavy skulls, the skewers and the thongs. Presenting these to a group of old men skilled in conducting this part of the ceremony, they waited impassively as the elders tested the sharp points of the skewers.

Now the older men went to the first brave, felt for his back muscle and jabbed a skewer under it. Pushing hard, they forced the wood beneath the taut muscle and out the other side, bringing with it a gush of blood. Testing the skewer for firmness, they secured one end of the thong to it, lashing the other end to the skull, which they placed in the young man’s hands. Betraying no evidence of pain, he lifted the skull toward the sun, then threw it to the ground, waiting at attention while the old men repeated the ritual on his companion.

The young warriors now leaped forward. The thongs tightened against the skewers. The bison heads dragged heavily in the sand, almost tearing the skewers through the back muscles, and the braves danced and danced and danced.

Lame Beaver, who had not volunteered for this lesser offering, watched. Women chanted and old men urged the younger on, and for some hours the latter dragged the skulls in a kind of trance, the pain long since numbed by the self-hypnosis. Finally the horn of one skull caught in sagebrush; the thongs tightened and the skewer ripped through the back muscle of that dancer. He collapsed.

On the sixth day it was time for Lame Beaver to offer himself, and he sought out Cottonwood Knee, leading him to the spot where Blue Leaf stood awaiting this terrible moment. Taking his young friend’s hand, Lame Beaver placed it in the hand of his wife and said in a loud voice, “Take her. Get her with child. This is my first sacrifice.” Then he stepped back and watched as Cottonwood Knee led Blue Leaf to a tipi set aside for this highest of ritual purposes. Lame Beaver had sacrificed even his wife, and this proved his eligibility for the ordeal which awaited.

He now confronted his three fathers, holding out to them a pair of sharp skewers and two very long thongs. His oldest father stepped forward, grasped Lame Beaver by the soft flesh of his chest and probed with his fingers until he located his son’s left pectoral muscle. Drawing it taut, he reached for a skewer, and after offering it ceremoniously to the sun, jabbed it under the muscle until both ends protruded. The second father did the same with the right pectoral muscle, staring into his son’s eyes as the young man accepted the great pain without flinching.

The fathers then lashed the thongs to the skewers and signaled to the watching crowd. A lithe young man leaped forward, grasped the free ends of the thongs and climbed to the top of a pole standing in the middle of the ceremonial area. There he passed the throngs over a deep notch cut into the top of the pole, allowing the ends to fall free. Before he reached the ground, eight strong men had grasped each thong and had started hauling Lame Beaver into the air until he dangled seven feet above the ground, his whole weight suspended from the skewers passing through his breast.

Up to this point Lame Beaver had not uttered a sound, not even when the skewers pierced him, but now when the thongs were lashed and he hung alone, he could feel the dead weight of his body and mumbled, “This will tear me apart.” But the muscles held. During the first period, while the sun climbed toward the midday point, he felt each stage of pain and at times thought he must cry out to have them halt the ceremony, but when the sun shone on him at noon, he experienced a benign sensation, as if it were banishing the pain because of his bravery, and for the last four hours he existed in a trance, powerful, capable of facing any enemy. In an exaltation of spirit, the memory of which would abide with him the rest of his life, he endured the closing hour and watched with positive sorrow as the sun vanished, releasing him from his ordeal.

His fathers lowered him to the ground and loosened the thongs. Tenderly they drew out the skewers and then rubbed salt and ashes into the gaping wounds, the first to cleanse them, the second to create tattooed cicatrices which would forever mark Lame Beaver as an exceptional member of Our People.

On the seventh day Lame Beaver rested in a special tipi. He had a soaring fever and limbs so pain-racked that he could barely move them, but old men who had suffered the same torture in their youth knew how to tend him, so that on the last day he was prepared for the final ordeal. The various young men who had dragged bison skulls with their backs and he who had made the great sacrifice assembled in a circle around the altar where Flat-Pipe rested and began a solemn dance. To the beat of drums and the chanting of voices they moved, always facing the sun.

They danced this way for eight hours, encouraged by their kinsmen. Aching with thirst, they kept on until their legs seemed about to explode. Visions of white bison assailed them, and haunting memories. Some staggered and others collapsed, and all the while watchers cajoled them to continue, to remain strong, until at last the sun went down.

That night Lame Beaver returned to his own tipi, where Blue Leaf waited. “Now I am ready to go,” he said, and she fed him and bathed his wounds and gave him consolation for the sacrifices he had made, and before dawn he was walking alone, quietly, making no noise and leaving no trail, for his solitary confrontation with the Pawnee.

With unbelievable vigor he walked and ran all the way to the confluence of the two Plattes, but found no Pawnee. He continued eastward, well into the heart of enemy country, but they were gone. When he penetrated their permanent villages, these, too, were deserted.

He went to the south toward Kansas and far along the Big Blue River, but they were not hunting there, and then he caught a smell of bison far to the west. He did not actually smell them, of course. They were much too distant for that, but he knew from many signs that they were there, well south of the Platte toward Apache country.

Gambling on his intuition, he made a sweep toward the Arkansas River and came in sight of a Pawnee hunting camp. He remained hidden for three days, exercising the most cruel discipline, for he was alone and without a horse. He required everything to be in his favor if he were to have even a slight chance of success. His spirits were kept alive by his discovery that these Pawnee had several hundred horses.

On the fourth day of scouting he concluded that this night would provide the best possible combination of circumstances, and if a lone warrior were ever to have any chance, this was it. The Pawnee hunters had been riding far to the west—very far for the Pawnee, who customarily kept to the east—and they would come home tired. The camp had been slaughtering for three days, and that, too, was hard work. Tonight he would strike.

Having made that decision, he fell sound asleep and did not awaken till midnight. The stars showed that he had much time till dawn, and he spent it moving into the one position that would enable him to cut out a score of horses and get off to a galloping start toward the Platte. The guard would be at the opposite end of the improvised corral and Lame Beaver would have a brief advantage.

Breathing deeply and recalling his devotion to the sun, he touched his breasts and said, “I am of Our People. Man-Above, help me.”

He slipped around to the far end of the corral and saw with disgust that the lone guard was not where he had been each previous night but right where he could do the most harm. It would be necessary to kill him; there could be no other solution. But as Lame Beaver was about to move forward to cut the guard’s throat, a coyote called, three low notes ending in a higher one. The guard looked in the direction from which the sound had come, and then turned and threw a stone. He threw another, and the coyote called again. Throwing stones rapidly, the Pawnee ran after the pesky beast, and in that moment Lame Beaver dashed into the corral, caught a handsome red horse by the mane, threw himself on its back and hallooed a score of horses northward.

It took some time for the Pawnee to discover what he had done, but when they did, they launched an immediate pursuit.

Pawnee riders, the best of the tribe, chased him all that morning. The sun rose and dew vanished from the low grass. Some of Lame Beaver’s horses scattered, but others kept galloping with him. Still the Pawnee scouts hammered across the plains, sending up clouds of dust and ignoring the strays that broke away from Lame Beaver’s little herd.

They would have overtaken him except for one thing: the ordeal he had undergone at the Sun Dance was so much more harrowing than a chase across the plains that when his Pawnee pursuers had to stop at a small stream to catch a drink of water, he galloped on, unaware of thirst. Neither dust nor fatigue nor anxiety deterred him; from midafternoon, as he galloped toward the Platte, he seemed to be growing stronger rather than weaker. He realized that at the river he would face a crisis: how could he urge his riderless horses into the water and out the other side?

He was saved by the fact that Red Nose and some braves were searching the riverbanks for beaver. When they saw Lame Beaver speeding across the plains, they were able to guess what was happening. Goading their horses into the water, they sped to his rescue, surrounding him in a protective arc and gathering in the horses.

When the exhausted Pawnee reined up, some distance away, it was obvious that their tired mounts would be no match for the fresh ones ridden by Our People, and they prudently retired, but not before one of their braves made a last heroic effort. Urging his foam-flecked horse, he drove right at Red Nose, touching him with his lance and soaring one of the most gallant coups ever witnessed by Our People. Two warriors tried to knock him down as he passed, but he escaped, and as he rode back to the Pawnee, Our People cheered his bravery.

That night Lame Beaver was acclaimed at Rattlesnake Buttes, for he had brought back not only his own big red stallion, but eighteen other horses as well. One he gave to Red Nose and one to his friend Cottonwood Knee and one fine pinto mare to his wife, Blue Leaf. The others he turned over to the council, almost with contempt, to do with as they wished.

When this was done he washed, ate a long meal of bison liver and hump steak, and told his wife, “Now we have horses.” From that time on, the warriors who camped around Rattlesnake Buttes rode, and only the women walked ... except Blue Leaf, who had her own prancing pinto. But Lame Beaver was not awarded a coup, for it could not be ascertained if he had actually touched a Pawnee. Whenever prying ones asked him to explain how he had captured, single-handed, nineteen horses, he said, “They were a gift of the sun.”

In the years when Our People came to occupy the land between the two Plattes, they were surrounded by enemies and life was difficult. But they could depend on one ally, the finest tribe of Indians on the plains, the Cheyenne. They were taller than Our People—in fact, the tallest Indians in America—and braver. They were better horsemen and always more willing to engage in battle. They were sage men and their customs were different: they scorned Our People’s practice of eating dogs and abhorred their custom of willingly offering up their women to other men; it was more difficult to count coup among them, too, for they allowed only three of their warriors to count coup on a single enemy, whereas Our People allowed four; and they viewed with special detestation the custom of the Pawnee whereby each year they sacrificed a virgin Indian girl, captured from another tribe if possible, or taken from their own if necessary.

Lame Beaver’s father once told him—that is, his real father—“The two things Our People can depend upon are the rising of the sun and the loyalty of the Cheyenne.” Once they had been bitter enemies, and it was no small thing for the Cheyenne to declare war on Our People who, though they were not flamboyant and did not make a ritual of war, could still be terribly stubborn, and men like Lame Beaver were not uncommon. His grandfather had fought the Cheyenne many times, until one day leading chiefs of the two tribes convened, the Cheyenne bright with paint and eagle feathers, and they had reasoned: “It is stupid for us to destroy ourselves. We share many things,” and they smoked the pipe, and for a century after that—indeed, for as long as Indians roamed the plains—no Cheyenne ever fought with Our People, and no Cheyenne in distress ever sought aid from Our People without receiving it. Longer than almost any other treaty existing anywhere, any time, the treaty between these two tribes was honored.

This was the more remarkable in that neither tribe could speak the other’s language. In fact, each of the Indian tribes with whom Our People came into contact could speak only its own language. Thus Our People could not speak to their enemies the Dakota, nor the Ute, nor the Comanche nor the Pawnee; they could not even speak to their trusted allies.

There was, of course, a sign language which did not depend upon spoken words, but rather on generalized ideas, and all Indians on the plains were conversant with it. Two men from tribes a thousand miles apart could meet at some riverbank and talk intelligently in signs, and in this way communication passed rapidly from one part of the country to the other.

Our People were imprisoned within the most difficult of the Indian languages, so difficult indeed that no other tribe except one related branch, the Gros Ventres, ever learned to speak it. It stood by itself, a language spoken by only 3300 people in the world: that was the total number of Our People. The enemy tribes were not much larger: the Ute had 3600; the Comanche, 3500; the Pawnee, about 6000. The great Cheyenne, who would be famous in history, had only 3500. The Dakota, known also as the Sioux, had many branches, and they totaled perhaps 11,000.

In the year 1776 the Cheyenne chiefs sent a messenger to Our People, their allies, and he said in sign language, “Comanche in the region between the Platte and the Arkansas are raiding and killing. We are going to make war against them and seek your help.”

There could be only one reply to such a request, and Our People said, “We will send our warriors with you.” Therefore, in the late summer of that year an army of Cheyenne supported by Our People rode south to teach the Comanche a lesson, but they had traveled only a short distance when scouts reported that the Comanche were aware of their coming and had sought help from their allies, the Apache. This was dread news indeed, for the Comanche by themselves were formidable and cruel, but when allied with the Apache, they would be well-nigh unbeatable.

There was no talk of retreat. The Cheyenne chiefs said, “If we allow them to invade our land, they will ransack our villages and take our women. They must be taught a lesson, Comanche and Apache alike.” Discipline tightened, and men moved with caution, for to be captured by this dreadful enemy meant more than death.

It was then that the warriors, at night, began to talk about Never-Death: “I fought against him once. He’s a Comanche with a deep scar down his left cheek. When he comes to your part of the battlefield, move away. He is invincible.”

Many reports attested to this. Once when the Pawnee were trying to steal horses, they launched a running battle to distract the Comanche, thus allowing a surprise group to sweep in against the horses, and this would have succeeded had not Never-Death, riding his big black horse, detected the ruse and countered it single-handed. He rode right at the Pawnee, one man against eleven, but his big medicine made their arrows fall harmless. This so terrified the Pawnee raiders that they turned and fled, with Never-Death following them, and when the leading Pawnee saw this, they realized that a miracle of some kind had occurred, and they, too, fled. All the tribes that roamed the plains carried tales of how this ultra-brave Comanche on the black horse possessed a medicine which could not be penetrated by arrows.

Therefore, as the allies approached the Arkansas River, they became more cautious, searching out the best location for their attack, and finally their scouts reported that by crossing the Arkansas and striking the Comanche from the south, they might drive a wedge between the great horsemen and their Apache allies. Then the chiefs consulted. For the Cheyenne there was Broken Hand and Howling Wolf and Gray Beads and Bison Wallow, and for the discussion they dressed in ceremonial gear with headbands resplendent with eagle feathers. For Our People it was Straight Arrow and Jumping Snake and Gray Wolf. Using sign language and drawing many designs in the sand along the riverbank, they devised a clever plan, requiring subtle timing and much deception. They doubted that the enemy would be able to react quickly; they expected to invade the camp itself and create much havoc among the Comanche before the Apache could rally to their assistance. It was a plan that would have done credit to any of the European generals who were engaged in battle in that late summer of 1776, or to any American generals so occupied.

But always the council had to take into account Never-Death, and after much discussion of this imponderable, Gray Wolf had a suggestion. “Have you among your young Cheyenne three men of great bravery?” They did, of course, and he continued: “We will assign three of our young men who have conducted themselves well, my son Lame Beaver, Red Nose and Cottonwood Knee, and the six shall have only one responsibility. To fight Never-Death and keep him from striking terror in our braves.”

“Will that be enough?” Bison Wallow asked skeptically.

“It will keep his terror in one place,” Gray Wolf reasoned, and the plan was adopted.

Gray Wolf sought out the three young braves of his tribe and briefed them on his plan, while Bison Wallow instructed his Cheyenne. Finally the eight men convened as a unit and Bison Wallow gave the six warriors their instructions in sign language. “No matter what happens in the fight, you are to hold back until Never-Death makes his appearance. Big black horse, scar down left cheek, usually dresses for battle in black. We must take him by surprise. You must surround him and engage him ... only him.”

Gray Wolf then added his advice, also in sign language: “It is useless to shoot arrows at him. It is useless to try to pierce him with lances. Club him to death. That hasn’t been tried yet.”

So the six young warriors cast aside their weapons and armed themselves with clubs, Lame Beaver producing a fine, well-balanced one with knobs, made from a heavy wood. When he swung it in the air, it had a lively
swoooosh
and seemed as if it could deliver a lethal blow. He was satisfied.

Now the grand design was put into operation. The first step required crossing the Arkansas, at this point a deep, dark river. The two tribes rode their horses into the swift water, using a tactic they had learned from the Pawnee: stay on the horse till only his head is above water, then slip off and go the rest of the way holding onto his tail. Once on the other side, the principal chiefs led the main body of warriors eastward along the riverbank until they neared the Comanche camp. A smaller group cut south to intercept the Apache if they should be moving in that area, while Lame Beaver and his special force rode apart, each inwardly terrified by the prospect of encountering Never-Death.

Scouts rode back to inform the allies that prospects were good. The Comanche camp had not moved. The Apache had not yet come into position. “And Never-Death?” the chiefs asked. “He has not been seen,” the scouts replied.

So the great battle was joined, and with the initial signal every fine stratagem the chiefs had devised evaporated, because in Indian warfare it was each man his own general, each unit its own command. The Cheyenne started for the Comanche village, but en route they came upon a Comanche riding a slow horse, and everyone tried to count coup on him, and by the time he was dead with eleven arrows through him, the village had been forgotten, because another Comanche was sighted running in the opposite direction.

Things were no better for the southern allies. The Apache had been warned that they must move quickly to support the village, and they would have, except that at the last minute they spotted a small band of Cheyenne who had gotten lost chasing a Comanche, and the whole Apache tribe diverted to annihilate that small band.

Only Lame Beaver, Red Nose and Cottonwood Knee held to the original plan; their three Cheyenne companions spotted an Apache separated from the main body, and chased him for a distance, killing him at last. Breathless, they returned to Our People, whom they accused in sign language of lacking valor. Lame Beaver laughed and replied, “Anyone who fights an Apache is truly valorous, but we are waiting for Never-Death,” and the Cheyenne said “We’re waiting for him too,” but in the meantime they sighted another Apache, and off they went. This time they failed to catch him and returned quite winded but delighted with the battle, and Lame Beaver wondered how much help they would be if they did meet up with Never-Death. He knew they would be valiant ... but exhausted.

The battle now degenerated into a confused melee, with the invaders retaining a slight advantage, but Never-Death had not yet made an appearance. Then came a small body of Comanche led by a large dark man riding a black horse. This was Never-Death, and his arrival so inspirited his allies that they launched a counterthrust against the Cheyenne, gambling that if they could terrorize these warriors, Our People would flee automatically.

But on this day Never-Death was not to have his accustomed effect, for as he was preparing to spread terror among the Cheyenne, Lame Beaver and his five companions rode speedily at him, and a violent scuffle ensued, highlighted by wild battle cries from the exhausted Cheyenne, who anticipated a fine brawl. Never-Death was as powerful as he had been depicted, but did not panic the six warriors. Our People drove steadily against him, but the wild Cheyenne, reveling in battle, sped in and out of the fight until Never-Death’s followers unleashed a flood of arrows at them, killing one.

Never-Death supposed that this would discourage the others, and he made a dash for the main battle, but again Lame Beaver intercepted him, while the two remaining Cheyenne, ignoring arrows, slashed at him with their clubs. Never-Death now commanded his troop to evade the pestilential attackers by a wide running sweep, and this would have succeeded except that Lame Beaver spurred his own horse to a gallop, smashed into the heart of Never-Death’s group, clubbed him over the head, then dived at him, knocking him from his horse and sprawling him on the ground.

As the two warriors fell, Lame Beaver discovered for himself that Never-Death really was different from other men. His body seemed not human but to be made of iron, and when he struck the earth, with Lame Beaver atop him, he rattled. He was a terrifying creature, and Lame Beaver expected Never-Death to destroy him in some magic way.

Lame Beaver had lost his club and felt powerless to hurt this terrible Comanche, but as Never-Death collected his strength and prepared to kill Lame Beaver, the latter remembered the caution of Gray Wolf: “Only the rocks live forever,” and he determined that he would fight this Comanche to the death. Doubling his two hands into one powerful fist, he cocked his elbows and brought that fist against the face of Never-Death. The Comanche, stunned by this unexpected blow, fell back, and Lame Beaver struck him again and again. He heard bones breaking in the Comanche’s head, and after one final blow he saw that head lying at an impossible angle to the body. He would have fainted, except that his two Cheyenne companions rode up shouting and laughing and proclaiming victory. Kneeling in the dust, he pointed at his fallen adversary and said in sign language, “Powerful medicine. No more.” The Cheyenne cheered.

Next morning the defeated Comanche and Apache chiefs sought pow-wow with the Cheyenne, who insisted that Our People participate too. The losers proposed that all prisoners be released, and this was done. They said that they would overlook the destruction of the two camps, and the Cheyenne council members nodded. They said they were offering the Cheyenne twenty horses in exchange for the iron shirt which their great chieftain had worn for so long and which two Cheyenne had stripped from his dead body.

The shirt was produced for all to marvel at, a cuirass made centuries ago in Spain of iron and silver, exhumed from the grave of a Spanish explorer who had died in these alien lands in 1542, and long the treasure of the Comanche. Deep Water, a Comanche chief, said in sign language, “For your warriors this would be nothing. For us it is the great medicine of our tribe.”