Fireblossom (33 page)

Kills Hungry Bear shrugged. "Many chiefs are not. Some have been blinded by the white people's promises. Some are jealous of Crazy Horse. I am afraid that he might be killed by his own people as easily as yours." Pausing just long enough to turn his upper body toward Fox and fix him with a level stare, he said, "I am weary of this talk about other people and of problems that cause us pain because we have no power to solve them. Instead, let us talk about
you,
Fox-With-Blue-Eyes."

Fox felt as if the wind had been knocked out of him. He tried to smile casually but succeeded only in avoiding his friend's penetrating eyes. "What do you want to know?"

"Ah, I see that my sense was true! Ever since you and Fireblossom came to our village, I have felt a shadow hovering over you, even when you are laughing and acting like the friend I used to know. There is something wrong."

Even as panic swept over him, Fox felt an answering swell of relief in his heart. Still, the words wouldn't come. His secret was the kind that made him a traitor to everyone; neither white nor Lakota could forgive him.

When Fox didn't reply, Kills Hungry Bear said gently, "Perhaps I will understand better if you tell me how you came to the town you call Deadwood?"

Fox sighed harshly, then shook his head. "I won't lie to you, my friend, and I cannot tell you the truth."

"I am happy to hear that you respect me enough not to deceive me. And it's respect for yourself." He sat in silence and pondered the situation for a few moments before adding, "My father told me the same thing before I went to sleep, every night that he was in our tipi. He said, 'A Lakota may lie once, but after that no one will believe him.' I used to think that my father thought of this wisdom alone, but I later discovered that all good Lakota fathers repeated that to their sons!" Kills Hungry Bear chuckled softly at the memory.

Lulled by the atmosphere of affectionate conviviality, Fox declared, "Amazing!
My father said that to
me
about a thousand times during my boyhood, but instead of 'Lakota' he just said 'man.' " He laughed, remembering.

Kills Hungry Bear patted Fox's sun-warmed back. "I suppose that they were wise men, our fathers, to recognize the importance of that lesson." Now he fixed his eyes again on Fox's face and continued, "Do you know that other Lakota saying,
Wowicake he iyotan wowa sake?"

Slowly, with the sound of his heart pounding in his ears, Fox translated, "Truth is power." He lay back in the lush grass bordering the stream. "I know the truth
is
power, but somehow it seems that my case must be different. You said a moment ago that respect for myself is one reason I won't lie to you, but I have the kind of secret that has tormented me so much that I'm not sure I do respect myself anymore."

"The secret is keeping you like a prisoner," Kills Hungry Bear decided. "The truth will destroy it and then you'll be free."

Fox opened one blue eye and arched the brow above it. "I wish it were that simple."

"It can be, my friend." He gave him a maddeningly serene smile. "Wait. I'll get my pipe and we'll smoke. Then you should have some answers."

Fox closed his eyes again. He lay in silence, listening to the sounds of Kills Hungry Bear preparing the pipe and making sparks to ignite the dry tobacco. As the fragrant smoke wafted down to him, he propped himself up reluctantly and reiterated, "It's not going to be this simple." His tone was stubborn. "You people think that the pipe can solve any problem, but if all I needed was tobacco I'd've fixed this mess I'm in long ago!"

Kills Hungry Bear held out the pipe. "You know that you are speaking nonsense. Tobacco won't provide the solutions, Fox-With-Blue-Eyes. Everything that you need to know is already inside your heart. You need only trust yourself and let the Great Spirit guide you."

Fox's chest hurt; he felt raw inside, but as he took the pipe tears of hope sprang to his eyes.

Watching with satisfaction as his friend began to smoke, Kills Hungry Bear couldn't resist murmuring, "Listen to the voice within. If a man is to do something more than human, he must have more than human power...."

* * *

It wasn't simple, but Fox struggled onward. Kills Hungry Bear counseled his friend to pray for a dream that would lead him to freedom. Perhaps it would be necessary to pray and fast for several days. Although Fox responded to that suggestion with a skeptical glance, it appealed to a part of him—the part, nurtured over the years by Annie Sunday, that viewed suffering as a way to atone for his sins. The adult man preferred to regard the coming hours as an opportunity to wrestle with the events that had caused him so much guilt, a chance to discover a way to make peace with himself. Couldn't there be a logical solution? For all his admiration for the Lakota culture, there were some beliefs that he just couldn't swallow. The notion that dreams took one into the "real world," for instance, seemed as farfetched as the idea that the three-quarter moon that hung in the sky that night had assumed that shape "because someone took a bite out of it!" as one of the Lakota men had cheerfully remarked.

Tonight, sitting alone under this three-quarter moon on the other side of Bear Butte, Fox found his thoughts careening down a familiar blind alley.
I don't belong in either world. I've been too well educated in the white world to adapt to the Lakotas, and I've been too enlightened by the Indians to respect my own race.
He rubbed his temples. This was ground he'd covered countless times, and each attempt to conquer the maze only increased his frustration. Perhaps it was time to try Kills Hungry Bear's method.

What did he have to lose?

At the edge of the stream, Fox stripped off his clothes, folded them, and waded out into the nearly still water, glimmering silver and black in the starlight.

I'm scared,
he thought, and the realization gave him some relief
. Scared of what? Myself? Maybe. The truth? Time to get some real courage. Spirit courage, not that posturing and recklessness stupid men call courage.

Fox took a deep breath and sank into the water, acutely conscious of each sensation as the liquid, cool and pure as night, rippled outward from his body. He stretched out on his back, fighting the urge to tense up, gradually relaxing. At length the upper part of his body floated above the surface of the water. Toes, knees, hipbones, penis, sculpted belly and chest, chin, nose, and forehead all floated. Fox saw himself becoming lighter and lighter until even unlikely places, like his ankles, shins, elbows, throat, and temples, floated. His thick hair swirled gently behind his head, caressing his nape and shoulders when he tilted his neck back a bit.

The more he relaxed, the more magical he felt. He lay thus, floating on the stream, floating into himself, for an immeasurable portion of time. He told himself to stop fighting. Eventually the urge and even the thought of struggling left him. When at last he opened his eyes, he looked up through a frame of lacy black cottonwood leaves to view the sky. The profusion of white stars, sizzling across the heavens, was wondrous. It was as if he beheld a miracle, performed tonight for the first time. A tear trickled down Fox's cheek and melted into the cool water.

It came to him then. He could almost see the hand reaching down toward him. All he had to do was accept it. He thought
of
Annie Sunday, who was always so certain about life and God. Sometimes, as a young adult, her unwavering certainty about what was right annoyed him, but he had to admit that her ideas made sense and her own life seemed to bear out her wisdom.

God will never desert you,
she would say
, even when you believe you don't need help from anyone. But come the day your back's against the wall, grace will intervene. You just have to humble yourself
.
When you get there, you'll know it, and then you'll really be a man.

Funny... Kills Hungry Bear had said almost the same thing. Perhaps Annie Sunday and Crazy Horse reached the same destination when they prayed....

A wave of sheer, joyous peace rolled soothingly through Fox's body. Closing his eyes, he slowly lifted one hand to the starry sky. He continued to float. In a clear internal voice he prayed,
Direct me toward the answers that will bring me peace. Please lift me with Your strength.

As
if pulled by an unseen hand, Fox came out of the water. With a calm sense of purpose, he dressed and began the long walk back to the village.

* * *

"You are changed," Kills Hungry Bear said approvingly. "It is good." Then, holding back the flap opening the tipi where he was staying, he pronounced the traditional Lakota welcome:
"Hohane,
Fox-With-Blue-Eyes."

Entering, Fox saw that Kills Hungry Bear's woman and dog slept together on one side of the tipi. The fire looked fresh; it appeared that Kills Hungry Bear had not slept, preferring instead to wait in case his friend returned to the village in search of him.

"I am glad to find you awake," Fox said.

"I could not close my eyes at such a time. Come. Let us sit and smoke. Then I have something to give you that I made tonight." He led the way to the back of the tipi, took the host's seat, and gestured to Fox to sit on his right, facing east. "I hope that you will tell me then what has happened. I can see in your eyes that the story of your adventure will be important."

Fox's grin flashed in the amber light of the tipi. He was eager to share everything with Kills Hungry Bear, but his sense of peace gave him patience. They smoked together for a long time; neither felt sleepy. Then Kills Hungry Bear laid the pipe aside and reached behind his bed for one of the soft buckskin bags that held his possessions. From it he plucked a narrow necklace.

Holding it out to Fox, he said proudly, "I wanted to give you a present that I made for you, in honor of our brotherhood and the journey you have taken this night under the moon." The necklace was just long enough to encircle Fox's neck, and it consisted of tiny blue beads with a thin, sharp tooth marking the halfway point. "I searched and traded here in the village until I gathered enough beads of this color. This seems close to the color of your eyes. And
this"—
Kills Hungry Bear pointed to the tooth in the center—"is the tooth of a fox! I have been saving it for a long time, thinking of you whenever I took it out of the little pouch where I keep special things."

Fox was very moved. He looked into the dark eyes of his friend and said in a tone weighted with meaning, "I will wear this gift always. I am very grateful." He held the beads in his hand for a minute, admiring the care and thought that had gone into Kills Hungry Bear's present. He saw that the beads and the polished tooth had been strung on a narrow strand of buffalo sinew. There were inches of plain sinew at each end and he lifted those and tied them together at the back of his neck. "A perfect fit."

"Yes!" Kills Hungry Bear searched in his bag and produced a mirror, acquired long ago in trading with white men.

Fox stared at his reflection. The tooth nestled in the hollow of his throat and the blue beads did indeed echo and accentuate the color of his eyes. It was more than an attractive gift; it was symbolic and would enable him to carry a mark of his Lakota experience with him into the white world. "I am very fortunate to count you as a friend, Kills Hungry Bear."

"I hope that you will share your story with me, but only a part of it. Some things cannot be explained. Those feelings belong to you alone." He lit the pipe again and drew on it as they both reclined against the pillows behind them.

"The Great Spirit has taken the shadow from my heart," Fox said. As he spoke the words, he felt lighter still. "I knew the things that you said to me at dawn. I remember hearing the same wisdom from my own mother. What came to me tonight to lift the weight from me was the understanding that I must find my own meaning of right and wrong. I must listen to the voice in my own soul, follow it, and not waver." He accepted the pipe, smoked for a moment, then added, "This has been difficult for me because of my ties to my own race's culture and the bonds I also have to the Lakota people."

"Ah." Kills Hungry Bear nodded as comprehension dawned. "You have felt caught between these separate loyalties?"

"More than you know." Fox's eyes began to burn. "Caught to the point of feeling unbearable pain and guilt no matter which way I turned. Tonight, though, when I opened myself and asked God for guidance, I saw that I do not have to choose. I can do what I feel is right in my own heart."

"I believe this, too," Kills Hungry Bear replied seriously. "It is not you who is wrong because your loyalties are confused, it is fate! You love your race, but some of the things other whites do make you angry. How hard this must be for you, my friend!"

"I've tortured myself long enough trying to make sense out of a world I didn't make. I cannot subscribe completely to either side, so I must carve out my own road." He paused. "I realize, too, that it is fruitless to brood over the past. I followed my conscience, unable to see what lay ahead, and because of the actions of others I have spent untold hours regretting my own part in the matter."

"You have found wisdom tonight. Did you see something when this dream came to you?"

Fox knew that Indian men treasured the visions that accompanied their dream-journeys. "Yes... I saw stars. Powerful stars."

Delighted, Kills Hungry Bear exclaimed, "This is an important day, my friend! I think that you should have a new Lakota name to mark the dream that has changed you. When you came among us before, we named you like we are named as children—for the way you looked. But when Lakota boys make the dreams that carry them into manhood, they take new names."

"Crazy Horse was Curly as a boy, wasn't he?"

He nodded emphatically. "I think you shall have a new name, too. You shall be Star Dreamer."

Fox felt a jolt of pleasure. "I like that very much. I would be proud to have such a name." Then he felt the old, familiar pang of his torment deep within him as he remembered a certain day in late June. He knew now that it was time to reveal his guilty secret, to unburden himself.