Heartsong (24 page)

Charging Elk suddenly looked around the market with a clarity that made his heart jump. He almost exclaimed in Lakota as he remembered that this was the same town that he had come to with the Wild West show. That was so long ago that he had come to think of it as another town. He suddenly saw the parade from the train station
to the arena. He had been proud then, proud of being a Lakota, proud of being in the show, proud of his appearance. He had been eager to put on a show for these new
wasichus
that they would talk about long after he was gone.

Charging Elk watched the little man—Ren-ay—argue with an old woman in a black scarf over a pile of small silver fish. She pointed a crooked finger at the fish man and said something in a quavery voice. Ren-ay threw up his hands and laughed, then scooped a mess of anchovies into the measuring bowl. The old woman regarded the scale with a suspicious eye but she seemed to be getting what she wanted.

Charging Elk watched the exchange, but he seemed to see nothing. The enormity of his changed situation had hit him in the chest as hard as a horse's kick. He had put on a show, all right, a shameful display. He had taken many falls from horses in his young lifetime but never in the arena, unless he was “shot” and had to tumble off the horse. And he had never been so helplessly sick that he almost crossed into the real world. Now, instead of being with his Lakota mates, wherever they were, he was standing in a market with the smell of fish in his nostrils.

Charging Elk had thought of running away during the night before. It would have been easy to sneak out of the dark flat—the man and his wife were in their own room on the other side of the stairs—but where would he go? He had had his taste of freedom after escaping from the sickhouse and he hadn't liked it. He had been cold and weak and hungry and still sick. If the
akecita
hadn't taken him to the iron house, he probably would have died. But then, death would have been a good thing, something he had wished for; on the other hand, how would his
nagi
have found its way home? That was always the question that prevented him from accepting death or seeking it.

Charging Elk glanced up at the now blue sky, then at the little
fish man's back, and he didn't feel like a prisoner, not as he did in the iron house. As far as he knew there was no lock on the door to his room. He had listened carefully the night before when the little man had escorted him up to his room after the night meal, but he heard only a soft click as the door closed—no key turning, no final clank of a bolt. But why was he with these people? He seemed to be with them the way he was with Strikes Plenty out at the Stronghold, or with his parents before they surrendered at Fort Robinson. He seemed to be free, yet he was with them, as though he and they had become relatives.

Even as he thought this, he knew the woman did not like him. He could see it in her eyes—the way she watched him—and he could hear it in her voice. He had sensed it immediately upon stepping into the
akecita
chief's big room with Brown Suit, the way she had turned her eyes away when he glanced in her direction, the rigidness of her mouth. And why should she like him or not like him? What was he to her? What did surprise him was the way the little man held on to him, the way he chattered in his tongue, even though he must have known that Charging Elk did not understand anything. Ren-ay seemed to like him very much. But why? He was no longer an important man, a man who made the audiences stare with their mouths open, their eyes wide.

“Monsieur?”

Charging Elk had had his eyes fixed on a golden horse's head above a shop across the street. Below it, a man with hair only around the sides of his head and wearing a white bloody apron was cutting chunks of dark red meat for his customers. The meat had made Charging Elk's stomach rumble. He couldn't remember the last time he had had real meat.

“Monsieur?”

He turned and saw the young woman with the short leg. She was standing on the other side of a stack of wooden boxes that separated
the two stalls. She had her hand extended toward him. He saw a cloth tobacco pouch and a small pack of cigarette papers in her palm. She raised her palm slightly and nodded. He moved toward her and realized that he had been standing in one position so long his legs had grown stiff from the cold. But now a streak of sunlight had reached the woman's stall and her face was bathed in the sharp glow. He took the pouch and papers from her, tapped out some tobacco on one of the papers, and handed the makings back to her.

“Merci, madame,”
he said, without thinking. Broncho Billy had taught the Indians that
merci
meant gratitude, just as “thank you” did in the American tongue. Charging Elk was surprised at how easily the words had come to him.
“Tabac,”
he said.
“Merci beaucoup, madame.”

The young woman struck a wooden match and held it to his cigarette. Then she said something that he didn't understand.
“Merely madame,”
he said, and he surprised himself again by allowing his eyes to take in the woman's face. She smiled at him and he smiled back. Her face bore the marks of the affliction that Indians called the white scabs or white man's disease. Many of the people of Charging Elk's parents' generation bore similar marks. Many others had died of the white scabs, including most of his relatives. He had not known any of his grandparents and only an uncle and two cousins on his mother's side. His uncle had married a Hunkpapa woman after the fight on the Greasy Grass and lived with her people at Standing Rock. He had not seen his uncle and cousins since he was eleven winters. Now twelve more winters had passed and he thought of them only briefly, as though his past were too far away to think of.

“Il n'y a pas de quoi,”
said the young woman. In spite of the pockmarks on her face, when she smiled, she was quite attractive to Charging Elk. “Marie-Claire,” she said, but he didn't know that the
words made up her name. She did not point to herself, as the others had. She said it again and he smiled slightly. He liked her long hair, which flowed over a checked mantle that covered her thin shoulders. It was shiny and made him think of obsidian from Paha Sapa. He thought of his own black hair and he almost reached to touch it, but it barely showed below the soft round cap. He felt his face flush with shame and he looked away from her. He smoked and wondered if he would be allowed to have his long hair again. Perhaps he
was
a prisoner of the gabby little Frenchman. He stole a glance at the young woman—suddenly he was grateful to her for not being afraid of him—but she was engaged with the old woman with the crooked finger.

M
adeleine Soulas had left the market early that day. She was only needed when there were lots of fish and lots of customers. François was a good helper but he didn't have the personality to sell the fish. He was quiet and withdrawn, more at ease setting up the stall, filling the display trays, stacking boxes, chipping ice, and keeping the work area clean and uncluttered. Nevertheless, she liked François and when she baked, which was infrequently, she always brought him a large portion of sweetcake. He had never set foot in the Soulas flat, although René had invited him more than once. Perhaps he didn't feel comfortable around families, since he seemed to have none of his own.

Now Madeleine was making a raisin-and-honey cake. She had come to realize that she only baked when she was upset. The act of putting a sweet together, all the small steps, the measuring, the folding, the beating, the decorating, allowed her to think things through without really thinking. But now she had much to think over. Although Charging Elk wouldn't be with them for very long—and the shorter time the better—she was worried about how the
children would react when they saw this savage. Furthermore, she was angry with René for subjecting them to such a shocking discovery when they returned home from school. Thank God she had had the presence of mind to send the children to their grandmother s last night. They would have had nightmares all night long. Madeleine could almost see the future nightmares in the back of her mind—painted, screaming savages chasing the monstrous bison, or worse, the brave pioneers, through their troubled sleep. As she beat the batter a little more ferociously than usual, she thought, Well, Chloé can sleep with me tonight. She didn't care where René slept. Just so long as her children were safe.

Madeleine Soulas wiped a loose hank of hair away from her eyes with the back of her hand. Please, blessed Mary, please. And she was surprised and angry to see a tear fall into the batter.

 

 

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER SEVEN

F
ranklin Bell sat in the uncomfortably small Empire chair and watched
the consul general s secretary, Agnes Devoe, pour tea at a sideboard. He had a feeling that something unusual was in the air, but he had no reason in the world to feel that way. Perhaps it was the hour—four-thirty on a dark, wet late-January afternoon—that seemed unusual. Archibald Atkinson was normally out of the office by midafternoon, off to tea with visiting American dignitaries or attending a function with representatives of this or that French organization—or to his penthouse flat on Rue de la République. He was an avuncular man of limited energy because of his girth and age, and he often went home early to be with his wife, who suffered from allergies to just about everything. He once had confided in Bell that her doctor had told him that she would do better in a dry climate. The doctor had said Marseille was probably the worst place in the world for her allergies—dry but weedy in the summer, wet and windy in the winter. Of course, Bell had happily
interpreted the statement to mean that the old man was ready to move on, perhaps to retire back to the States. But a year and a half later he was still here and Bell was still vice-consul.

Now he possessed something of the same feeling as he had had then, a feeling of almost breathless excitement. So little really happened to him at the consulate, other than the business of bureaucracy, that Bell had taken to manufacturing his own excitement, the occasional burst of hopefulness that was invariably dashed by the reality of business as usual. With a little sniff of disgust, he thought of his futile effort to woo the lovely but now stone-cold Margaret Whiston, as he watched Agnes set a cup of tea on the desk before Atkinson.

At least Agnes was reliable, steady as an old horse. She was only three or four years older than Bell, but he thought of her as something of a spinster aunt, probably because she had been at the consulate through three consuls general and showed no sign of ever having been attached to any of them—or anyone else, for that matter. She was tall, erect, and unfashionably thin, but her dark blond hair was luxuriously done up in a bun.

“Well, Frank, how are things going with that hemp business?” The consul was still breathing hard from a trip to the bathroom. Bell estimated that he weighed at least 250 pounds, most of it straining the buttons on his waistcoat. With his small, shaved head, pug nose, and pudgy fingers, he looked like a fat, healthy baby with muttonchops. In spite of his ridiculous appearance, he commanded the respect of all those who talked with him for more than ten minutes. At sixty-six, his mind was strong and incisive.

“Same as always. Monsieur Latrielle wants to ship the finished product, but the cordage outfit in Boston wants the raw material. It's a real stalemate, but we're working on it.” Bell watched Agnes set the cup of tea on the desk before him. The backs of her hands were ridged with thin blue veins and were a bit more waxy
—almost translucent—than he had noticed before. “Thank you, Agnes.”

“That's good, Frank. We have to resolve this thing as soon as possible. You know those Irishmen back there—they're almost as stubborn as these Marseillais.”

“I have a meeting with Latrielle tomorrow at noon. I think he's softening a little—although he still says it's to his disadvantage to ship the raw stuff. I think this might be his last shot.” But Bell had noticed an air of distractedness about Atkinson, not at all usual. He wondered if the consul's wife had taken a turn for the worse. Again, that feeling of excitement, this time accompanied by a modest guilt, wormed its way into his bones. He took a sip of tea to occupy the momentary space that had developed between him and the old man. He half expected Atkinson to say something like “I've been here too long, Frank, it's time to go home, you can take over here.” Had the moment arrived, at last? He sneaked a glance over the rim of his cup toward Agnes, who sat at a little desk where she took notes of meetings. Her face betrayed nothing, as always.