Louisiana History Collection - Part 1 (32 page)

“You have it right, though if I had been so honored as to marry into the Sun class, my children would have been Nobles.”

“But your possessions?”

“They would still have been mine, always supposing that I was not so overwhelmed by my royal relatives that I was persuaded to give them up. If they were not needed, then most likely I would have given them to my daughter as a dowry.”

“And in any case they would have descended to your children on your death?”

“This is so. Your inheritance is different, I know, by way of the father. But how unreasonable it is! Every child knows its mother, but who can say without doubt who his father may be?”

“Just so,” Elise said with a wry smile. “But among the men of the Natchez there are some, particularly the Great Sun, who have more than one wife. How can this be, if women are free to leave a marriage at will?”

“Most often it is the Suns who have a second or third wife. It is the honor, the hope of advancement for the children, the family, you see, that makes a woman accept such a position. And then there are times when many men are killed in war so that there are more women than there are men of an age to be husbands. Besides, it is not always a cause for jealousy if a man takes another wife. It is done often because the first is pregnant and no longer wishes to please him in the bed furs. Sometimes a woman will suggest that he take another wife because she wants to avoid all possibility of pregnancy while nursing her baby. Though the leaves can be used, it will weaken her and perhaps cause her milk to cease flowing. And if, when her child is weaned, she is unable to live with the second wife, then she can leave, taking her child and the possessions she brought with her.”

Elise nodded, mulling over the curious arrangement of the Natchez, and they walked on. They passed a large house set up on piles, the wood of which was polished to a satin gleam. There was a ladder lying on the ground beside it, and as they drew even a woman picked it up, set it against the door, and climbed up into the house. Glancing in, Elise saw her shaking out a coverlet that was unmistakably of French design. Behind the woman could also be seen piles of clothing, stacks of dishes, the legs of chairs, the solid bulk of marriage chests, and even what appeared to be the black snout of a cannon. The house was a storeroom for the booty that had been taken from Fort Rosalie and the houses of the French, and the slickly polished piles were to keep rats and mice from climbing up to damage the goods. Elise closed her eyes, turning quickly away.

They stepped around a pair of young girls playing at something like pick-up-sticks in the middle of the path. From a nearby doorway, two slightly older sisters looked up from where they were taking turns grinding corn to call a greeting. A dark-eyed cherub, wearing only a cloak about his shoulders and moccasins on his tiny feet, toddled from around the hut and stood rocking on his feet in front of them. Proud in his plump, copper nakedness, crowing with glee, he grinned up at them. His eyes were black and his hair fine and straight. Elise, staring down at him, felt an odd pain under her heart. Little Quail bent to scoop the boy up, robbing her now against his smaller one. A white-haired woman rounded the hut with hurried steps, dragging a half-scraped deer hide. She laughed toothlessly, scolding without heat as she saw the boy in Little Quail’s arms. Greeting them, she began to talk, her wary gaze touching Elise now and then, but always returning to Little Quail.

Elise looked away. She had the uncomfortable feeling, as the old woman let out a cackle of mirth, that she was the subject of conversation. It made her uncomfortable that she could not fully understand, though otherwise she found that she didn’t mind. She thought idly that she must begin to improve her Natchez if she wasn’t to feel left out.

A flicker of movement caught her gaze and she looked toward the back of the hut. It was a dark column of flies that had attracted her attention, flies buzzing around the viscera of the deer the old woman had been cleaning. They had been disturbed by the approach of a warrior. His movements, stealthy, too hurried, made her watch him as she waited for Little Quail to finish talking. With his knife tip, the man raked an intestine from the pile of refuse, slitting it and spilling the contents on the ground. He took a pair of what appeared to be stout supple canes from under his arm and rubbed them in the entrails and their spilled contents. Satisfied, he glanced quickly around, turned, and walked away.

He had not recognized her in her Indian clothing or had perhaps taken her for a French slave of no importance, but Elise had known him instantly. What he was doing, whether it was some Indian trick or merely an unsavory habit, she did not know, but she was certain that the warrior had been Path Bear.

They walked on after a few minutes. Picking up their conversation, Little Quail said, “You spoke of the Great Sun and his wives. The poor man has been much too busy. Both his first wife and his second are now pregnant and will have nothing to do with him. It may be he will soon be looking for another.”

“Perhaps his gaze will light on you?”

Little Quail laughed softly, but did not deny the possibility.

“If it did, would you wed him, despite the danger?

“Danger?”

“Of being strangled should he die before you.”

“The Great Sun lives long, in most cases. He does not go to war and his house stands high, where it is cool and healthful.”

“Still, I would think he would have trouble finding a wife. It would seem more likely that he would take a mistress like our own King Louis.”

“A mistress! Never!” Little Quail exclaimed.

“What would be wrong with that?”

“It isn’t done.”

“Oh, come, it’s well known that such things happen a great deal in the village.”

“Well known by whom?”

“We heard it constantly at the fort and I myself knew several men who enjoyed visits from Indian woman who also had husbands and children here.”

A smug smile curved the mouth of the Indian woman. “Indian women. That’s different.”

“What do you mean, different?”

“There is nothing unusual in the activities outside marriage, or otherwise, of women. It is our privilege. But men are required to be faithful. An Indian man discovered in the arms of another woman can be put to death on the order of his wife.”

“You don’t mean it.”

“But I do.”

“And — and not the other way around?”

“Why should it be so merely because that is the way of it among the French? The women of the Natchez are not so bound. It is our right to take as many gallants as may please us regardless of the protests of our husbands.”

“Surely they would divorce you for it.”

“No, why? It would be to lose everything for the man while his wife would lose nothing. In any case, it is not possible. Divorce is a thing of women.”

Elise stared at her with her mouth open, then gave her head a shake as if to clear her thoughts. “I don’t understand. If women are so powerful, then how does it happen that they are given to men visitors, such as the French? I know this happens because Reynaud mentioned it himself.”

“This is a matter of courtesy, but it requires the woman’s approval. It is seldom withheld, for according to the wise men it brings new blood into the tribe, and anyway we females are curious about men who are strangers. Don’t you find it do yourself?”

Thinking of Reynaud and the way she had reached out to touch his tattoos on that first night, Elise felt the color rise to her cheekbones. Her answer was barely audible. “I suppose.”

There was the smell of woodsmoke and cooking food on the air. In nearly every hut at least one pot, if not two or three, bubbled near the fire. At some there were men gathered to eat, for except on feast days there were no regular mealtimes; each person ate as he grew hungry and found food prepared. A part of the delicious aroma on the air, however, came from the smoking racks. It was a good day for smoking meat, being dry, cool, and bright, and there were strips of deer, bear, opossum, and even the tail of an alligator hanging over the slow-burning fires.

Adding to the smoke was a great fire inside a small hut. The door stood open for ventilation and inside could be seen what appeared to be large rocks being baked. Elise nodded in that direction, asking what the purpose might be.

“The sweat hut,” Little Quail said, the words clipped.

“Oh, a kind of steam bath,” Elise said, having some faint remembrance of hearing it spoken of by that name.

“Water is poured on the hot rocks to make steam, yes. It is used to relieve extreme fatigue or as a purification ritual. It is being prepared now for Hawk-of-the-Night.”

“I see.” She had not realized it would be turned into a ceremony, this running of the gauntlet. It made it seem worse somehow, more dangerous.

“He will fast during the day, then spend several hours in the sweat hut this evening. Afterward, still fasting, he will wait out the night in the temple.”

Elise swung to face the other woman, putting out a hand to stop her. “Won’t that make him weak?”

“It will focus his mind fully on what will happen and how he must withstand it.”

“Is there anything I can do to help?”

“You have done enough.” The young woman turned her face away.

“What is it?” Elise asked. “What have I done?”

“Nothing.”

“Little Quail, please!”

The other woman swung back to meet her gaze, her dark brown eyes steady. “Very well. I said before that Hawk-of-the-Night would not die, but I fear for him, I do fear for him. Path Bear wanted to be war chief, expected to be war chief, but the women influenced the wise men in the council of elders and they chose the brother of the Great Sun. Path Bear was sent instead to fetch the man who has always been his rival, has always been a better warrior, a better man, though he is but half Natchez. You gave Path Bear the excuse he needed to bring down the man who was chosen above him. He will do everything in his power to see that Hawk-of-the-Night does not recover from the gauntlet. At this time my people do not need cunning and bravado but a man of intelligence and daring and steadfast purpose. Without him, we may be doomed. If Hawk-of-the-Night dies, it will be upon your head, as the fate of the Natchez will be upon your head.”

“I didn’t know it would come to this.”

“You are not of the Natchez or you would have thought.”

“No,” Elise said, a hard note in her voice, “I am not of the Natchez.”

They stood staring at each other with the distrust, absent until now, of enemies. A chill breeze flapped Elise’s skirt, exposing one leg to the thigh; she scarcely noticed and did not feel the rise of gooseflesh on her naked skin due to the greater chill inside her. Around her the Indians went about their tasks, chopping wood, grinding tools, and sharpening weapons, calling to each other and the omnipresent dogs, yelling in play. Nothing had changed, and yet she was suddenly aware of being French and among foes, in a way she never had before.

“Elise! Oh, Elise!”

She swung around at the sound of her name. Running toward her, stumbling over her ragged skirts and with her hair straggling around her face, was Madame Doucet. The woman threw herself on Elise, clutching her arms and sobbing.

Elise caught her, holding her with compassion. “What is it? Tell me.”

“My little Charles! I knew, I knew it. It was he they killed. It was he they strangled, cruel monsters that they are; strangled in his youth, ah,
mon Dieu
, so young, so young. And for nothing. Nothing. I told you! I did tell you how it would be. I knew. Somehow I knew.”

“Calm yourself, I beg you.” Elise patted her shoulder, tears rising to her own eyes for the woman’s grief and for the terrible picture she painted with her incoherent words that somehow became mixed with a deep and private desolation Elise did not care to examine. She drew a deep breath, saying, “Think of your daughter.”

“Yes.” Madame Doucet drew back. “I must be strong. My poor daughter, to lose her child and in such a way. I fear for her. She isn’t strong and she has been working so hard, so hard. I must help her. She needs me. But, oh, Elise, my poor little grandson. He was alive, had survived that terrible massacre, and they killed him. They killed him! Murderers, oh, they are cruel murderers.”

It seemed at that moment that Madame Doucet was right. What had either of them to do with such people? Why should she care for their approval or feel guilt at their anger? What did it matter that tomorrow one of them would be whipped for her sake? If Reynaud had not held her against her will, there would be no need. She was French. She belonged with her people. She turned to Little Quail.

“Is there any reason why I should not visit with Madame Doucet’s daughter and perhaps some of the others?”

“None that I know of.”

“Then I will thank you for your kindness this morning and bid you good day.”

Despite her defiance, the visit was not a success. Madame Doucet’s daughter was ill with grief and an infection in her head wound that she had refused to have treated by the Indians. She was hardly aware of where she was, much less of who had come to see her. Filthy, rail-thin from lack of nourishment, she lay on a bench in a small hut set off by itself among the Stinkards. Off and on through the afternoon, some of the other Frenchwomen came to visit and to speak to Elise. There was an odd constraint about them, however, as if they did not trust her. They knew she had been with Reynaud, knew something of the circumstances. Still, their resentment that she was wandering around the Indian village free and unencumbered, that she was dressed as an Indian and ensconced among the Suns, that her shining hair hung down her back while theirs had been shorn to indicate their slavery, was an obvious and solid thing. They seemed to think that she had betrayed them in some way, and though they did not want to antagonize her for fear that she might be able to harm them or else in the hope that she could help them if she chose, they saw no reason to treat her as one of them, the slaves of the Natchez.