Proud Wolf's Woman (7 page)

Julia didn’t understand since Neeheeowee spoke a language she did not know. But Wahtapah was there and Wahtapah intervened, saying, “My Cheyenne brother says that feathers are good medicine. We get them from the mighty eagle. It is not easy for us to obtain them, for the eagle is swift and clever. The feathers
—
they show a warrior’s accomplishments on the battlefield. Here,” Wahtapah said, pointing to one of the feathers that Neeheeowee held. “Do you see that feather there? Can you see how my brother has cut away a part of the top, with horsehair attached to it?”

Julia nodded, murmuring a “yes” at the same time.

“That feather there,” Wahtapah explained for Neeheeowee, “represents his first coup.”

Neeheeowee nodded at Julia, then at Wahtapah, then in broken Lakota, Neeheeowee asked of Julia, “Okicahniga coup?”

Julia could barely understand him, though at length Wahtapah translated, saying, “He asks you can comprehend what a coup is?” to which Julia shook her head.

Neeheeowee frowned and raised his shoulders toward Wahtapah.

“A coup is an accomplishment,” Wahtapah said. “It means to strike the enemy. It is the mark of a courageous man. In our camps, these things are talked about and bring glory to a man.”

Julia nodded, saying, “I see.”

Wahtapah smiled and, getting to his feet, said, “I must go now to see what keeps my brother, Tahiska, and his wife. Stay here. My Cheyenne brother will protect you.”

Julia nodded and glanced over to the Cheyenne warrior, who sat staring back at her. But Julia didn’t flinch. She had come to realize that these warriors would do her no harm. In fact, she felt quite safe with them, protected. And so she smiled at Neeheeowee and he glared back at her for some time.

He didn’t replace the feathers in his hair, however, and at length, he rose to his feet and came over to Julia, squatting down beside her.

Julia looked over toward him. His dark eyes stared back at her, and in them she saw a message, an emotion she could barely discern. And then all at once, it came to her. He liked her. Her heart seemed to stop beating at the thought, but soon her pulse began to beat again, not normally as it should, but rather racing as though she were running.

She stared back at him, unable to drop her gaze. The man was exotic, handsome, and alluring beyond description and he seemed to want her. She could barely breathe.

Neither of them spoke; there was no need for it. Instead, Neeheeowee extended one of the feathers toward her.

Julia reached out toward it, and, uncertain, she stopped, but Neeheeowee gestured her onward, and Julia placed her hand upon the feather, taking it from him. She wondered if Neeheeowee felt the touch of her fingers as they grazed over his own, and she glanced up to catch a slight shudder of reaction from him.

Was it her touch that had caused that reaction in him? She couldn’t believe it was so. Still she looked up toward him, and, as she did so, she caught Neeheeowee’s brief smile before, turning, he strode from the camp as quickly as if he were chased by wolves.

She watched him for a moment, watched his graceful walk, the way his breechcloth moved in and out, exposing a bit too much of his backside for her view; then, sighing, she glanced back down at the feather.

It was beautiful, and, as she gazed back at the man hurrying away, she was struck by an odd realization: Its giver was just as beautiful.

It was a unique thought for Julia, who had been inclined to believe the worst of the Indian.

And she wondered, as she watched him go, if all Indians were as wonderful as he.

Somehow she didn’t think so.

It was sometime later that Julia had learned that the giving of an eagle feather was something special to the Indian. For a man to give a woman a feather meant that he held her in high esteem and perhaps, further, that he held her in affection. Julia had kept the feather, tucked under her clothing in her room in Fort Leavenworth. She had it still, not with her now, but back at the fort. She’d never thrown it away, not even when she had married Kenneth. She’d never been able to bring herself to do that.

She sighed. That had been a long time ago. Too many years had passed for her to know the Cheyenne warrior anymore. Neeheeowee had changed. She had changed. It was likely he was married and would not be able to explain Julia to his wife. Perhaps that was why he had not come to her rescue. Or perhaps, after all these years, he no longer honored the special relationship they had once shared.

Julia shut her eyes, unwilling to admit to the hurt that the thought caused. And suddenly she remembered, other things: The possibility of love all those years ago, her fear of it, her withdrawal from it.

She had been too prejudiced to see what-was there. Besides, she had been so certain that she could create that same kind of love with Kenneth.

Julia sighed. What good did it do her to think of these things now? The past made little difference anymore. She grimaced. Could it be that Neeheeowee might bear her a grudge? He had, after all, given her the feather, he had as much as told her she was special to him…and she had…run away from it.

Was he now giving her back her due? She shut her eyes, frowning. What else could she expect from him?

“Tsehetoo’otse!”

A small, Indian girl suddenly appeared out of nowhere, jostling Julia. And Julia, losing her balance, fell forward, onto her knees.

“Nestsehetoo’otse!”

“Tatsehetoo’otse!”

Another child, then another and another ran on past Julia. Not one of them offered her assistance, not one even bothered to look at her, one kicking out at her, giggling, and Julia, looking up, felt hard-pressed at this moment to champion the Indians—any of them—including Neeheeowee.

What was she to do about her enslavement?

She couldn’t run. She’d become forever lost. She wished now that she had paid closer attention when, seven years ago, the three young warriors had tried to teach both Kristina and her how to track and find their way on the prairie.

She looked up, wondering, if only for a moment, if perhaps it would have been better if she, too, had been killed along with that ill-fated company of soldiers. Again, she tried to make sense of it.

Why did the Indians let her live? What purpose did her life now serve? Wouldn’t it have been better if they had just…

Enough!
She swore at herself, her thoughts.

She was alive…alive, which meant she had a chance, if only she could run away. If only…

She bowed her head. What opportunity did she have? When not fetching water, she was constantly chained to the noose. And no one seemed to spare her a single thought, not even her male captor.

Julia raised her head, looking up toward the heavens, through the tops of the cottonwoods. She breathed in deeply. What was she to do?

Unbidden, an image of Neeheeowee came again to mind. Should she throw herself on his mercy? Should she beg him to set her free?

Never!

She remembered him, his backside today, his irritating, graceful gait as he had walked away from her—only minutes ago. Suddenly her situation seemed too much to bear, and Julia, unable to understand the why of it, any of it, silently denounced everything involved with it: her parents, her husband, white man and Indian alike.

She came slowly to her feet there on the path, and balancing the water bags on her hips, she continued her hike toward the stream, resigning herself to the fact that she no longer commanded her own life. And it was no small revelation that convinced Julia she could champion no one any longer—white or red. Betrayed by both cultures, her disenchantment toward life in general grew, spreading malaise within her as though she were on fire, encompassing all within its path: the good along with the bad. She closed her eyes, knowing that she could no longer consider herself a part of either world anymore, especially a culture which committed, even laughed at, the destruction of another human being, no matter what its civilized or savage aspect.

Without consciously willing it, she suddenly felt doomed, more so than at any other time—doomed to be neither white nor red, doomed to belong nowhere.

And it was this, perhaps more than anything else, which caused Julia to look within herself, searching for a spark of inner strength. And oddly, she found there, within herself, a shred of courage, a semblance of her spirit that would not allow her to quit. She found there an ability to cloak herself in insouciance.

And though another might not appreciate it, Julia knew she could at least pretend, if only for herself, that none of this mattered: not her captivity, not her heartache, not even Neeheeowee’s disregard for her. She could assume, if only for a little while, a nonchalance. And if she might truly feel the apathy of her plight, she determined that no one would know it.

“I will not quit!” she murmured to herself, and squaring back her shoulders, Julia lifted her head.

Rags or no, grime or no, she would allow no one, especially not Neeheeowee, or any other Indian, to realize she had lost. Lost faith in herself, faith in her fellow man, in Neeheeowee, faith in the gods that be. And though outwardly she might assume the appearance of being unaffected by her captivity, deep within her soul, Julia knew she would never be the same.

Her world, she herself, had forever changed.

“What do you know of the white captive?”

Neeheeowee’s question was met with silence. But at length Mahoohe, Red Fox, grinned, eyeing his brother-in-law with sly appreciation.

“Eaaa!
She is pretty, despite her rags, is she not?”

Neeheeowee snorted. “Do you think I care whether a white slave is pretty or not?”

His brother-in-law merely raised an eyebrow. “And why would you not?”

Neeheeowee grunted, his only response.

The two men sat side by side within the lodge of Mahoohe, a buffalo robe laid out comfortably beneath them. Beside them, the men’s war shields and bows hung from the inner tepee lining, within their reach, while their quivers full of arrows were strung from the same, ready for use. The bottom flaps of the tepee were rolled up to permit fresh air into the lodge while the usual cooking stones and the buffalo-paunch which served as cooking pot were relegated to the outside, the cooking to be done in the open on this hot, spring day. The scent of sage on the floor, of sweet grass burning in the air, perfumed the atmosphere, already scented with the familiar tepee smells of leather, rawhide, and smoke. Sounds of camp life, of children playing outside, filtered into the lodge, forming a sort of muted background to their conversation. Now and again, the aroma of buffalo and wild turnip stew wafted into the lodge, enticing the taste buds of those within, churning an empty stomach.

Neeheeowee glanced to the spot where Mahoohe’s wife had chosen to store the family’s possessions. The parfleches, which acted as a sort of chest of drawers, now held Neeheeowee’s things, too. They were neatly set off to the side, these brightly beaded buffalo bags, whose designs depicted the special dream sequences belonging specifically to Mahoohe and his family.

The tepee flap suddenly opened, catching Neeheeowee’s attention, and he looked up to see Voesee, Happy Woman, Mahoohe’s sister, leading her small son into the lodge; both were followed by Aamehee, Always A Woman, Mahoohe’s wife.

It was an unusual sight, to see Mahoohe and his sister, Voesee, together since custom dictated that after a certain maturity of age, Cheyenne siblings of different sexes could not be alone with one another, nor could they speak to each other—at least not directly. And though this might seem strange to an outsider, to the Cheyenne, this conferred the greatest respect upon one’s brother or toward one’s sister.

But Voesee was not known for keeping tradition, and Neeheeowee feared she had something to say to him, something which must be important since she dared to flaunt Cheyenne custom. And though the two women kept their gazes down to show respect as they entered the tepee, cloaked about the both of them was a sense of expectancy.

All at once Voesee looked up and smiled. “Tell these two, big warriors,” Voesee spoke to Aamehee, as both women and the boy fully entered the tepee, Voesee and Aamehee moving off to the left to cross behind the men, while the boy sat down at once. “Tell my two brothers,” Voesee continued as the two women made their way around the tepee to the women’s quarters, sitting down across from the males, “that we heard them speaking of the white captive and that I believe the white woman should be bought. She would make a good wife, I think.”

Mahoohe choked on the buffalo jerky he was eating, while Neeheeowee grunted. Mahoohe sent his wife an imploring look. “My wife,” he said, being careful not to speak to his sister directly, “tell my sister that she does her brother great dishonor to speak of such things in front of him.”

Aamehee looked down not bothering to say a word, though she brought a hand up to cover her mouth, as though she hid a grin. Voesee, however, smiled openly.

“Will you explain to your husband,” Voesee quietly addressed Aamehee again, “that he need not worry overmuch. Tell him that I did not mean
he
should marry the white slave.”

“My sister is surely not thinking of her own household!”

Voesee grinned while Aamehee laughed softly.

“Hova’ahane,
no, no my husband,” Aamehee said aloud. “Your sister was not thinking of bringing the white captive into her own home…something else…someone…”

“…from our northern relatives,” Voesee spoke so softly, she could barely be heard. “Someone like…”

Neeheeowee heard. Neeheeowee groaned, but he said nothing…yet…

And Voesee, still addressing her brother’s wife, said, “…like… Our northern brother-in-law has been too long without wife. It is time he came out of mourning and found himself—”