Lakota Princess (12 page)

“There was one gander, one male who loved her more than any other…”

“Why don’t you,” the Duke of Windwright cut in, “hunt for two or three years at a time, or raise the animals for slaughter, or…”

All the rest of the table groaned except for Estrela, who was only too glad for the interruption.

“The Indian does not wish to disturb the balance of nature,” Estrela said. “And so he takes only what he needs and leaves the rest.”

“Bad show, I say. Jolly bad show.”

“Yes,” she said, “we could discuss the economics of the Indians and—”

“Waste Ho,” Black Bear snapped at her. “I am telling a story.”

“Yes, well, I—”

“Please continue.”

“I want to hear more.”

“Yes, pray, finish your story.”

Black Bear grinned, the gesture not sitting well with Estrela. “The goose,” he carried on, “the beautiful goose could not decide on just one gander. And the one who loved her most of all was but one among the many and she wanted many. And so she took many to her, not realizing that the gander seeks only one mate.”

He paused, and his focus on Estrela was such that he didn’t even notice the gasps from around the table at so delicate a subject.

But no one stopped him. All, except the Duke of Windwright, seemed entranced with him. And whether it was his deep baritone or the unusual content of the story that mesmerized them, Estrela could not tell. She only knew that he held the attention of most all seated around the table.

“Yes, she had many,” he continued.

“Bad show, I say,” the Duke of Windwright spoke. “Jolly bad show, making your women work—actually work—why I’ve never heard of such a thing—except servants, of course, but then—”

“The gander,” Black Bear continued as though the Duke weren’t at that moment speaking, “will allow no competition with the mate that he seeks and so one by one the males vying for this beautiful goose’s favor fought among themselves until not one male bird lived. And she looked in vain for the one gander who had loved her more than any other. But he had gone to seek his mate elsewhere believing that she, like the sparrow, could not be satisfied with only one mate. And so died out her race, not because of man hunting her, not because of the wolf or bear who would seek her meat, but only because the female goose sought to have more than one mate.”

He paused and glanced around the table. “And so it is,” he said to his entranced audience, “that we learn from the geese that a woman must seek only one mate. And the more beautiful the bird, the more careful she must be to ensure she chooses only one.”

“Dare I ask, young man,” the Duke of Windwright plowed right in, “are all your women servants?”

Black Bear ignored the Duke as did the others.

“Oh, that was lovely.”

“Tell us more!”

“Yes, please, more!”

Black Bear held up a hand. “I will tell another tale tomorrow at the morning meal, if you are all here again.”

And while exclamations of joy and wonder resounded around the table, Estrela groaned.

It would be the same story, told again, a bit differently, said over and over until Black Bear determined that she’d been suitably chastised.

And Estrela made a mental note to ensure she missed each breakfast meal in the future.

“Well, it is my belief,” the Duke of Windwright carried on, “that the Indians must be saved from themselves. Yes, I believe that—”

“I think the gander acted most irrationally.” Estrela’s quiet statement, said amid the Duke’s meanderings, had the effect of silencing all other chatter at the table, including the Duke’s and as Estrela glanced down the table’s length to peer at Black Bear, she noted that every single pair of eyes were turned on her.

“And what would you have him do?” Black Bear asked, each person at the table looking to him. “Wait until the silly goose decided she wanted him more than any other?”

“He could have waited,” Estrela countered, recapturing the attention of everyone present. “Had he truly loved her, he would have waited.”

“Waited for what? She was taken. Before he even had a chance to take her, she was taken.”

“Who was taken?” the Duchess of Colchester intervened. “Did I miss something in the story?”

“He could have understood,” Estrela replied.

“Understood what?” The Duchess interrupted.

Black Bear nodded in agreement, repeating, “Understood what?”

Estrela snorted. “If he believed in her, he would have known—he just would have known.”

“He’s a bird,” Black Bear said. “He’s incapable of thinking.”

“Known what?” It was the Duchess who spoke.

“Then why tell the story if the gander is such a fool?” Estrela asked.

All heads turned back toward Black Bear.

“Because the story has a moral,” Black Bear said, each word clipped. “We are supposed to
learn
from such a story. Most people do unless they have the morals of a sparrow.”

Estrela flushed and looking down the length of the table, she saw that each person present gazed at her as though they watched a fox surrounded by hounds.

“Well,” she said, “I think you should pick a more intelligent bird in the future, unless you want your characters to act so…so…stupidly.”

And with this said, she jumped from the table, upsetting her plate and knocking over her cup of tea.

“Oh! See what you’ve done?” She addressed Black Bear.

“I’ve done… You are the one who—”

“How could you?” Estrela threw down her napkin just as a servant came up behind her. “Why don’t you use swans next time, or wolves—at least they have a certain intelligence that I find sadly lacking in the gander.”

She spun about, upsetting the servant, his tray of food, and the tea. But the servant was well-trained and caught the tray before any damage could be done.

Black Bear watched her leave, but only for a moment before he, too, arose. And though his movements were slower than Estrela’s, he still moved quickly to follow her.

Too quickly.

The servant stood behind him. The tray of food and tea crashed to the floor, most of its contents spilling innocently, except for the tea, of course, which landed on the Duchess of Colchester.

And as she, too, jumped to her feet, wiping at her dress and holding it away from her, one could hear her say to an oddly silent room, “Oh my, oh my, did I miss something from that story?”

The only response to her question was complete and utter silence.

Chapter Seven

Black Bear took to the streets. He had to get away.

Grabbing his bow and quiver full of arrows, he dashed out of the Colchester House at a fast trot that, if he chose to, he could continue for days.

He had no intention, however, of running for days. He just needed to clear his mind, and running provided the means.

He fled through the streets of Mayfair, past the manicured lawns of the aristocratic town homes, past Berkeley Square, onward until he reached the iron gates of Hyde Park; there, once inside, he found the solitude and peace he was after.

It was late morning, the dew still clinging stubbornly to the newly mowed grasses and, as he sprinted over pathways and around late-year flower gardens, he experienced the sensation of his troubles being shed with his exertion. The park looked foreign to him with its sedate, carefully controlled flower beds and neat ponds, but it didn’t matter. It was still nature and Black Bear breathed in deeply, the scent of flowers and the unmistakable feel of crisp, autumn air acting as a soothing balm to the turbulence of his thoughts.

Suddenly it was too much. The wild scents, the feel in the air, even the gray sky overhead reminded him of home, and without willing it, he saw the faces of his friends and family before him.

Had Black Bear been able, he would have cried at that moment, so great was his distress.

But he didn’t, he wouldn’t—not in public. And so he stoically masked all feeling.

He sighed.
Home.
How he longed for the familiarity of the faces of his relatives, of his grandfathers. How he longed to return there, to hear the wisdom of the elders, the quiet reassurance of his mother.

But it was not to be.

He had to fight his own war here in this foreign land. And all he had to rely on were his own senses, his own observations and knowledge.

He quickened the pace of his run, oblivious to the stares he received from passersby.

Estrela—Waste Ho Win—Pretty Voice Woman. What was he to do
about
her?

He didn’t know, and, where he was usually quite decisive, he suddenly found himself wavering over the decisions he must make.

Should he snub her and return home as his pride demanded of him? Should he attempt to reason with her?

Should he steal her?

He had little enough love for the white society in which he found himself and no respect whatsoever for their laws, which hindered a man’s freedom. The more he thought of it, the more he liked the idea. Why not steal her as he had intended this morning? It would be talked about, sung about in his camp for years to come. Such an act would bring honor to him, to his family.

However, such an act would alienate Waste Ho and make her captive, something he hesitated to do.

Despite her betrayal, despite her reluctance to tell him at once of her situation, he still respected her right to her own freedom, and he hesitated doing something that would overthrow her own power of choice.

Besides, she must care for him, otherwise she wouldn’t have given herself so freely—

He couldn’t think of it. He couldn’t allow himself to consider how she had responded to him…

Where was her husband? Why was he not here protecting her? From gunshots? From other men?

Black Bear sprung forward, quickening his pace even more.

He fled over a path directly parallel to the Serpentine River, watching the ducks, the swans, and other fowl in his peripheral vision. At last he sighed.

He must come to some decision. This he knew; this he must confront, yet still he hesitated. He could not fathom it all.

She was married.
Married!

Were all his efforts wasted, then? Were all these years spent waiting and planning for her return to come to nothing? He had invested so much time, so much energy in this, his search for her. And for what? To discover it had all been unnecessary?

She had broken her own vow to him, something he had never considered she would do.

He could make no sense of it. This was not the woman he knew. The Waste Ho of his experience would never dishonor herself in such a way. Had she changed so much?

Lost in his thoughts, Black Bear squinted his eyes as he tore over the paths of Hyde Park, bringing to mind the Waste Ho he had known back in their own country, recalling again his vow to her.

Her hair, caught in two braids at the side of her head and held there with blue and red strips of rawhide, had sparkled beneath the sun. And though her hair gleamed pale in the light and her eyes shimmered like the pure blue of morning sky, she had been the epitome of Indian beauty—her looks renown, even within the entire Lakota Nation, her manner properly shy, her lashes lowered to show respect and her melodic voice, soft, never harsh upon the ears.

It was this memory of her that Black Bear carried with him as he sought out his father on this day almost three years ago.

“I must go after her,” Black Bear said to his father as the two men sat within their family’s tepee.

“My son,” his father responded, “why do you say this?”

“She is mine. We made the vows, I just hadn’t spoken to her parents yet. I promised her that I would come after her, that I would find her and so I must. Besides,”—here Black Bear lowered his voice, speaking so that his mother would not hear him and become concerned—“I have received a message from Wakan Tanka. I dreamed a vision of her. In this vision, I saw Waste Ho’s death, but also within the same vision I dreamed of her life—with me. I have spoken of this to Two Eagles, whom we know carries much medicine, and he has told me that I must go to her if I wish her to stay alive. He told me that I, and I alone, have the power to save her. She is my responsibility. I must go to her.”

His father listened in silence, then he nodded, thereby giving his approval. And Black Bear, looking at the older man, saw the spark of admiration there within his father’s eyes. And though his father would never speak it, Black Bear could feel his father’s pride, the older man’s confidence in his son. It was a good thing. It gave Black Bear much courage, a welcome commodity in this, his struggle to locate Waste Ho Win. It provided him with the strength and the will he would need in the years to come.

And so the quest had begun. Black Bear had started to listen to the white man, to observe him interacting with the environment.

Why did the white man trade? For what? Not food. Not beads. Not cooking utensils. No, something that Black Bear had been hard pressed to comprehend, gold, a substance that the white man appeared to value above all else, above even his life. Why?

Black Bear hadn’t understood, couldn’t understand, seeing no practical use for the stones; still, he’d begun to imitate the white man’s trade and within a short period had accumulated so much of the white man’s strange wealth, he knew he could begin his long trek to the east.

What a fool he had been, he realized now, thinking back on it all. He hadn’t known there were different values on each of the nuggets, hadn’t known nor understood the system of the white man’s money and he had discovered soon enough that he had been cheated. Cheated by the traders in his own country.

Those nuggets he had traded for, the gold the traders had given him were worthless. Fool’s gold, they had called them. Fools gold—aptly named, Black Bear decided, since he had certainly felt the fool.

But there had been something far worse than being made the fool, something Black Bear couldn’t even now understand; that first excursion into the white man’s world revealed one other point he had overlooked: he, as an Indian, was not permitted to travel within the white man’s world without escort—escort by a white man.