Joseph M. Marshall III (16 page)

Yet there were other things to concern the Hunkpatila. To the north, the Crow were crossing the Elk River and were seen scouting as far south as the head of the Tongue and the Rosebud Rivers. The Oglalas responded swiftly, but the Crow, owing mostly to their good horses, always managed to slip back to the protection of their own lands. Scouts to the southwest reported small contingents of Snakes and perhaps Utes probing into Lakota territory as well. So in the summer of the year that would come to be known as the Winter of Many Buffalo, the enemies of the Lakota provided many opportunities for Lakota fighting men to prove themselves.

Among the new crop of eager young fire breathers was Little Cloud, only recently given the new name of Little Hawk from his uncle, following the example of Worm. The boy was slender like his older brother, though his hair was darker brown. In him burned the same fire of commitment to a dream he had yearned to fulfill since he had picked up his first bow.

Crazy Horse and Little Hawk were a source of pride for their mothers and father. Where the older son was quiet, soft-spoken, and often serious, the younger was always laughing and playful. But wherever Crazy Horse went, Little Hawk followed, whether it was down a treacherously rocky slope in pursuit of an enemy or into a state of mind that lifted them to a level of daring and recklessness unknown to others. It was hard to comprehend that one was just past twenty and the other barely seventeen. Many who watched the pair in action speculated that the younger brother would eventually win more battle honors—if he could outlive his recklessness, others were quick to add.

Red Cloud had sent out the call for warriors the old way: each of his messengers carried one of the man’s individually marked arrows to the headman of a warrior society. High Back Bone took it upon himself to include the sons of Worm, though they had not yet taken membership in any society. He knew no one would refuse them.

After preparations were made, the throng of mounted warriors rode from the encampment to the trilling of wives, daughters, mothers, sisters, and grandmothers. Strongheart songs also rang through the camp to give them courage when they met the enemy. The reputation of Red Cloud was evident in that nearly - every able-bodied fighting man in several encampments joined his endeavor.

The tediousness of the long trail to enemy country was overshadowed by the power and spirit carried along by such a large group of fighting men. Rarely did so many warriors carry the banner of war at one time. In the evenings, the older men told stories of past fights and of men whose deeds were still emulated. Hero stories, they were called. Upon hearing them for the first time, most boys didn’t realize that the heroes in the stories were real. Some had lived in the time before horses, but the storytellers could make it seem as though it was only yesterday. Young men went to sleep with images of brave men whirling in their minds and awoke to a sense of purpose that drove them to face the long trail ahead.

Every morning a medicine man accompanying them arose and offered his pipe, asking for good things to ride with them and for courage to face the unknown as well as the enemy with a face. Then the throng would ride strong again.

High Back Bone started out leading a small group consisting of Crazy Horse, Little Hawk, Young Man Whose Enemies Are Afraid of His Horses (Young Man Afraid), Lone Bear, and He Dog. Soon enough, however, other individuals or small groups joined them. The Mniconju leader was known as a courageous warrior, and his reputation was further enhanced by the presence of the daring sons of Worm.

Among those who were invited to ride as part of Red Cloud’s immediate circle were Black Twin and his brother No Water. Before the group reached the Elk River, however, No Water began to complain of a toothache. The medicine man was quick to advise that it would be dangerous for No Water to continue since his medicine was from the fang teeth of the grizzly bear. A toothache was a warning, a bad sign not to be ignored. Reluctantly, it seemed, No Water took the trail home alone and no further thought was given to the matter.

They traversed the Elk River at a wide, shallow crossing. Red Cloud decided to keep the entire group together to maintain an advantage. The availability of so many fighting men was as much a tactical advantage as a numerical one. With feints and flanking movements, the Lakota wreaked havoc on each Crow encampment they attacked. Even the largest one they attacked couldn’t respond with adequate numbers of fighting men to effectively counterattack. The best they could do was hold the Lakota off long enough for women and children to flee to safety.

From each encampment, the Lakota made off with horses and as many guns as possible. The horse herd became so large that it became a tactical disadvantage. And so the decision was made to head for home.

Crazy Horse had accorded himself well, as had Little Hawk. Together, they had rescued several fallen Lakota, dashing in to snatch them up from under the very hooves of charging Crow warhorses. It astonished those who watched them that neither suffered so much as a scratch. Lone Bear, on the other hand, fell off his horse twice, but would not admit to some type of injury to his knee.

The Lakota crossed back over the Elk with only token harassment from the Crow. They understood that the extent of their success was directly proportional to the amount of shame suffered by their enemy. Therefore, revenge raids should be expected. The Crow were too proud, or too foolish, to let such an insult pass.

Scouts from one of the camps along the Powder River met the returning warriors and were quickly sent back to spread the news of success. But before he left, one of the scouts let slip a bit of news from the Red Cloud camp that was like an arrow into the heart of the young Crazy Horse. No Water, the younger brother of Black Twin, had become the husband of Black Buffalo Woman.

The grain of hope that Light Hair dared to allow himself to hold in his heart had grown into distinct possibility when, as Crazy Horse, he joined the line of hopeful young men waiting outside the girl’s lodge. That grain of hope had grown even more each time she stood with him under his courting robe and seemed reluctant to leave his embrace. Or perhaps it was only his imagination; this would not be the first time imagination totally ignored the boundaries and limits of reality.

High Back Bone, He Dog, and the others had been quick to turn their faces away at the news. There was nothing to be done and nothing to be said. Hearts were broken in an instant but they could not be healed in the same manner. Even those who did not feel his anguish were stunned to silence. The usually animated Little Hawk was subdued as his older brother gathered his things and took his leave of the warrior camp.

The land lay unchanged under the evening sky as young Crazy Horse rode in the general direction of the Hunkpatila camp. He rode on, lost in a new kind of pain, unaware that he had left his warhorse behind at the warrior camp.

The dogs announced his arrival in the Hunkpatila circle of lodges as he dismounted at the edge of the horse herd and turned his sorrel loose. He left his weapons at the door of his parents’ lodge and crawled inside.

The silence of the days that followed hung over the home of Worm like a deep, cold fog. Everyone remembered that No Water had returned alone soon after the raiders had left for Crow country. Soon after that, the family of Black Buffalo Woman announced that she had made her choice. Women who had watched the light-haired one grow into a broad-shouldered young man talked among themselves about this interesting turn of events. They remembered that he was so small when he had lost his mother, and that he had steadfastly endured the teasing of other boys because his hair was very light colored and wavy. Not unlike so many, he had already faced much difficulty in his life. So they didn’t blame him when he stayed in his parents’ lodge for several days. The fickleness of young women was always difficult to understand, they reminded one another. So, too, were the ambitions of grown men.

Days passed and soon enough the celebrations in the Red Cloud camp came to a stop. Little Hawk returned with his brother’s warhorse and with questions in his eyes, but his father shook his head and sent the young man on an errand. That evening Crazy Horse emerged from the lodge and announced to his mothers that he was hungry. They took it as a good sign and fed him.

Before the sun rose the next morning he was in the horse herd. The horse guards saw him catch the sorrel he had captured in the raid against the Snakes. But he spoke to no one. When a few old ones awoke to start cooking fires they saw him riding away to the northwest, armed and equipped for whatever he had in mind.

Half a month later he returned, his young face weathered by the sun and a familiar steadiness in his eyes. He had another new horse laden with goods that he turned over to his mothers to do with as they saw fit. They were quick to pass everything on to a few other families. For his younger brother, he had a fine new muzzle-loading rifle.

Crazy Horse said nothing of the trail he had traveled for nearly half a month. Though Little Hawk was full of questions, Worm understood that the journey was not so much for the length of the trail or a particular destination. It was more for what had to be left behind. So the young man took his place in his family’s lodge as if he had never left at all. He teased his younger brother and carried wood for his mothers and played the Arrow-in-the-Hoop game with a gaggle of little boys with dusty toes and bright, excited eyes.

Worm knew that the broken heart was not completely healed and perhaps it never would be. But he knew as all good fathers do that sometimes the best medicine for such a wound was life itself.

Summer passed. As warriors, the sons of Worm rode to the edges of Lakota lands to watch for enemies. As hunters, they scouted the buffalo herds or chased the elk into the Shining Mountains. Sometimes they rode alone but more often in the company of High Back Bone, He Dog, and Lone Bear. Always they returned with stories in their eyes or elk tied to their packhorses.

When the first cool breezes of autumn prowled the land, scouts were sent to select locations for winter camps. Buffalo scouts returned with news of the herds, and hunters began to practice in earnest with their best buffalo runners in preparation for the hunts.

As always there was news carried by visiting relatives or young men wandering the land in search of adventure. Among the Hunkpapa Lakota who roamed along the upper reaches of the Great Muddy to the north arose a leader whose name was Sitting Bull. It was said he achieved many honors on the field of battle as a young man and then turned to a different calling as a holy man, a healer. His keen insight and shrewdness and wise decisions on behalf of the people were invaluable and he was called upon to take on the responsibility of a headman. Further to the northeast from the lands of the Dakota just west of the lake country, the news was not as good. In spite of the marked papers of the white peace commissioners that bound both sides to the agreement, white settlers had overstepped the boundaries that their own kind liked to draw on their pictures of the land. So the Dakota were preparing to defend themselves. Such news brought slow, sad, knowing nods to the gray heads of old men. It would seem all the whites were alike.

On the waters of the Great Muddy, the large fireboats of the whites still paddled their way up and down the river, belching smoke and scaring away the animals and more than a few people as well. The boats stopped to trade now and then, and brought news of a great war between the whites to the east. The white nation had been split in half over the ownership of black-skinned men as slaves, it was said. Each half had raised great armies of soldiers and the war was on. Black-skinned men were not unknown to the Lakota; some had been seen by Sicangu warriors who had raided far to the south along the Grandfather River. What a strange purpose to have in life, some said—to be the property of white men.

So the autumn hunts were planned and done. The buffalo were plentiful in the north. Across the prairies and over the many hills, the thunder of galloping hooves rolled up from the grass like the heartbeat of life itself. Lakota hunters raced into the dark, undulating mass of hundreds and sometimes thousands of animals, each larger than a horse. Crazy Horse and Little Hawk rode among them, astride the fastest sprinters they owned, which were specially trained to overcome their natural fear of buffalo and to maneuver along and inside a herd to position their riders for several lethal arrow shots into the chest cavity of a dark behemoth that could outrun most horses.

A mounted buffalo chase was one of the most exciting things a man could do. There was always the risk of injury and death, but having once hunted buffalo from the back of a horse, no man could resist trying it over and over again. It was one thing to wait in ambush along a trail for black-tailed or white-tailed deer or at a waterhole for the white-bellied pronghorn, but chasing buffalo was the pursuit of life itself, testing one’s nerves and skills to the limit as fast as a horse could run.

The meat racks were bent under the weight of meat drying in the sun. Grandmothers were busy chasing hungry dogs and playful little boys away, to keep them from making off with too much. Later, the painted rawhide meat containers in each lodge were filled to bursting. The winter ahead would be the kind the old ones enjoyed the most, plenty of meat and little worry. Let the snow come often and fill the gullies, they would say after good hunts when the meat boxes were full. We will fill our bellies with meat and the evenings with stories.

As the summer camps broke up and the people split into smaller groups and headed for the winter encampments, word came from the south about the settlement on the Shell River where it curved south toward the end of Elk Mountain. The whites had started wintering there. Some of the Sahiyela who were friendly to whites learned that some, to enrich themselves, made other whites pay to use the river crossing to haul the big canvas-top wagons across. Many of the old men shook their heads and sighed in disbelief. First, the trading fort west of Horse Creek had become a soldier fort and thus had been repeatedly a cause of trouble. Then, the little settlements came along the river, like the one near Deer Creek; these were overlooked by the Lakota because there were only one or two whites. And now this—one more place where the whites were putting up their square houses and looking at the land around them as if it all belonged to them.