Caspion & the White Buffalo Read online

  Yet her favor had not lessened—her laughing eyes were more open to him than ever. While she lowered them out of modesty as they passed in camp, when he surprised her one day along the path gathering wood, she stood full before him, smiling, then dropped her bundle and ran with the grace of Wokaihi, the antelope, escaping into the trees while he bounded after, trailing her bright laughter and fresh scent over thickets, brush, and deadfall, through twisting limbs and shadows till he found her, the sunlight dappling the golden dun of her deerskin dress, her essence wild, unadorned, and chaste—ever a maiden’s finest allurement. She stood with her head thrown back, exposing the long line of her pulsing neck, like a beautiful doe, of narrow chin and watchful eye, panting, out of breath, waiting in the secluded clearing where they could at last touch and speak freely of their love. Both were straight-limbed and tall, their long hair flowing together like one black mane as they gently rubbed noses and joined hands. It was then she warned him of her brother.

  “We were still children the day we flushed the nesting dove,” she said. “She fluttered along the ground as if crippled by a broken wing. I ran after her, called by her clever pretense. But Dog That Smiles was not fooled. He stayed behind and cruelly destroyed her nest and eggs. Then he chased me back to camp, shouting: ‘Broken Wing Bird, Broken Wing Bird’—taunting me with the name I am proud to carry always. And ever since that time I’ve known there would never be enough to fill his greed. He has the Vehos’ hunger. He shames himself and our lodge; he shames me. And now he speaks bitterly of you, Nameho, my beloved, though you have paid him twice in horses for my hand. That you bravely count coup on an enemy and Spirit Hunter, he laughs. Of the Sacred White and your vision, he spits in the fire and laughs. But he hesitates to speak beyond the lodge, and never unless the flap is down. He fears the great respect all hold for you. I do not hear him. His words go out the smoke hole, ashes of a heart blackened by envy. He became your friend to hurt you, Nameho. Beware of my brother.” She looked sadly away. “There is good in Dog That Smiles, but more that is bad.”

  “This winter, my dove,” Running Hawk vowed, lifting her face to his, “I will steal enough horses to drown such greed and grant him glory in the act. When spring comes, he will give you to me. And Young Bird will bear my children and nest in my lodge for all her days and mine.” He wiped a tear from her laughing eye; his hand hushed her lips. They shared the silence of the singing wind as they slowly returned to the path.

  So it was a very confused and somber young warrior who approached his uncle one morning shortly before the first snowfall and told him all that had happened concerning his recent coup, careful not to color the event with any detail other than what was directly observed, stating only as he finished his conviction that he’d encountered a Veho Maiyun, a Spirit Hunter. Awoke In Winter’s grave, deeply-lined face betrayed no opinion. He raised his eyes to the zenith, his long white hair falling far down his back, then slowly turned his gaze over the four quarters till he stood facing south, letting the sun bathe his many wounds with its warmth. His great nose scented memories borne on the wind.

  “Winter is near,” he said at last; “It’s a good day for a sweat.” Then he turned to Running Hawk. “Come. We will sit together and consider this. A purifying sweat may help us see clearly.”

  There was much to prepare before taking a sweat; first, the lodge to build. Awoke In Winter selected a site nearby and began gathering stones from the river while Running Hawk cut willow limbs along the bank. From the northwest an occasional cloud passed in a high arch through the chill blue sky. But the bustling wind stayed to the treetops, causing no discomfort. The last yellow leaves fell in spiraling descent over the water and slowly drifted away. Presently, Awoke In Winter called to his nephew, laughing as he pointed to a large snapping turtle surfaced mid-stream, observing them.

  “Ho! The Underwater Man comes to see that we do it right. I tell him ‘Rest easy old one, go, sleep the winter in your underwater home, we have not forgotten what you taught our fathers long ago.’” For the Underwater Man, the long-lived turtle, had given the Cheyenne this knowledge, the instructions once passed to a mythical warrior on how to fashion the lodge after the shape of its shell, and of the sweats various functions and blessings. Doubtless the steam affected many cures, opening the flesh to communion with benevolent spirits; the Cheyenne for generations had experienced its restorative powers. And Awoke In Winter knew better with each passing season that if nothing else a sweat soothed his aching bones, thus granting a rare tranquility essential for reflection, settling the mind’s turbid currents for clear thoughts to surface.

  After binding and staking the frame, they covered it over with spare lodge skins obtained from Yellow Calf. Above the entrance they attached a buffalo skull, for the buffalo arose each spring from the same great cave where the Underwater Man slept the winter. As with all lodges the entrance faced east, towards the rising sun—source of all beginnings. Inside, Awoke In Winter arrayed two robes for them to sit upon then placed heated stones in the center pit. Running Hawk carried a full water bag up from the river. Preparations complete, they stripped to their loincloths and entered.

  Awoke In Winter poured water from a hollow gourd over the heated stones, strictly invoking the four quarters, Nivstanivo, with his song, calling to the zenith as the vapors swiftly rose, enveloping them. The process was repeated four times, the sacred number. Soon they inhabited a heated womb, breath and steam made one, their bodies lathered in a healthful sweat, benumbed, suspended in the timeless mist. In the hum of the passing wind came the distant song that had called him forth…Running Hawk rode towards the dim glow of the Veho’s camp, distinctly entering the scene once more, saw the colors bleeding from blue to red, the luminous fringe surrounding the Sacred White, and the fluid darkness circling the wallow, closing like a noose; then the white rose with the wind, filling his panicked thoughts as he struck the Spirit Hunter with the Thunder Bow and fled. His eyes opened with a start. Awoke In Winter sat gazing on.

  “What is it you saw, nephew?”

  “My fear, uncle.”

  Awoke In Winter nodded as he poured more water over the stones; the rising vapors helped clothe his nephew’s shame. He waited, letting the silence calm the anxious heart; then he spoke: “I too saw your fear. But fear born of confusion, not of man. You bravely met your enemy and struck him with vigor. An enemy who sat before the Sacred White, calling you with a spirit song. A worthy enemy. And the worthiness of your deed is marked by your fourth feather and reflected in your Thunder Bow’s red sheath. Honor attends fidelity; much that was foreseen has occurred. But the endless white of your sun dance vision remains a mystery, like all beyond the Blue-Sky Space. How it connects with this event or one to come, I know not. Time may yet provide its meaning. But this I know, the Veho was no spirit. Not the Spirit Hunter of legend who would carry you off in a whirlwind. The root of your fear. In this you were mistaken. A spirit would not place the dead in the ground or leave a trail through the grass. Spirits never disturb the dead, only the living. And not the flesh of the living, they speak to their kindred trapped within. So never fear a spirit.

  “No, nephew, from confusion grew fear. But as the fear falls away like the frail leaves of summer, hear this deep-rooted truth: you were wise not to harm the Veho. You would have disturbed a sacred meaning, a fate that plays at the world’s rim.

  “You know that few have ever killed a white. I in all my winters have never seen one. It is an act granted beyond our understanding. What is known after all?” Awoke In Winter held out his hands to display their emptiness. “Sky and earth are everlasting. Stone is eternal. Only death is certain. But it is said…that when one kills a Sacred White, its spirit flows to him, their souls are wedded. And the power of the white follows him for a time, sharing in his life, then leaves. But the man is changed forever…like a child born of that union. The white is a being that never dies, but appears and reappears as the Great Spirit wills, and occasionally a man is granted t
he gift of its soul embodied in the white robe. It will bring good medicine and many blessings. But should he keep the robe beyond the time it begins to yellow, which means its spirit is called to another form, the medicine turns bad and misfortune follows. So truly…the Veho is a Spirit Hunter, captive to the sacred. The white is in him, and though he knows it not”—the old man tapped his temple—“his heart will know, and one day it will be manifest in his actions. The Spirit Hunter bears the grave burden of the sacred soul.”

  “But why a Veho, uncle?” Both gazed in question.

  “This I cannot say. It has happened. That is all.”

  Running Hawk now spoke of a new, more urgent fear, the shadow cast by Dog That Smiles that threatened his union with Broken Wing Bird. Awoke In Winter listened and had long suspected as much; he answered that the Dog’s surly manner barked of betrayal. And he warned Running Hawk against offering further gifts to placate him.

  “Feed his greed, his envy grows. He who takes and cannot give resents the one he cannot equal. His heart only hardens before your gifts. Give nothing more. Be patient.”

  “Winter is long, uncle. I have waited long. Come spring, I wait no longer.”

  “Be patient, nephew,” the old man smiled. “Your mother, Yellow Calf, speaks to his even now among the Quilters. Perhaps Willow That Sings can soften her son’s heart. She is a good woman; her own wishes once meanly ignored by her brother. And I will speak with Black Hand, the protector of the People. His pretty daughter, Falling Shadow, could set the Dog’s tail wagging…and feed him greater concerns.”

  “But uncle,” Running Hawk cautioned, “she already has eyes for Wears The Wind. And he for her.”

  “Oh. That is good. I had forgotten he is no longer a Contrary, at odds with his nature. Falling Shadow is a pleasure to behold. Still, I will speak with Black Hand while it is yet undecided. The Dog is a warrior of merit. He awaits an opportunity to prove himself. A chance to lead. Black Hand knows you’ve spoken for Broken Wing Bird and that her heart has answered. He seeks harmony among the People. And when two hearts will to join and are justly matched, it must be granted or disruption follows. Only fire can stanch the wound.”

  Awoke In Winter was silenced by his own words, saw in the mist before him the barren waste of his long life; his own betrothal once destroyed by a ruthless rival, an injury left unavenged to preserve tribal peace. What was denied him in the flesh he sought in the spirit, fed all his devotion to the tribe, to his younger sister, and later to her son. But his heart still ached for the one torn from him many winters ago. He looked Running Hawk full in the eye—something rarely done.

  “Nephew, I know your longing. Take heart. The snow melts in the spring no matter how long the winter. And remember, let your actions cast no doubt on her virtue. For the Dog lays in wait, and such ice never melts.”

  “I hear you, uncle. I will honor your wisdom.”

  But that evening after speaking with Black Hand, Awoke In Winter returned to his lodge a deeply troubled man, haunted by the sharp-fanged starlight and his own bitter past reflected in what he’d just witnessed. Another had spoken with Black Hand before him—the scent of the Dog lay all about the lodge. Indeed, the Dog hungered for the Chief’s Daughter. And despite her firm disinterest, an arrangement had been discussed. Though none of this was shared with Awoke In Winter, he read it clearly in Falling Shadow’s pained silence and Black Hand’s cool disregard. Their Chief who’d taken so many scalps that the “black hands” denoting his coups filled the flesh side of his robe, who’d once burned his own hand rather than risk bringing smallpox to the People, he who’d led them faithfully with such selfless courage now stood before the fourth hill of life, his eyes ablaze with wanton fever—the longing to return to the second hill in the arms of a beautiful young wife.

  VII. On The Range

  The days passed pleasantly enough for Caspion; dream-like and warm, of common routine. He camped by a stand of cottonwood on the southern exposure in a range of rolling hills. A spring oozed from the higher ground, forming a freshet that flowed into a shallow pool cupped by a limestone outcropping. The pool reflected several cottonwood saplings and a lone scraggly cedar bent like an old woman standing thereby. The stream continued cutting downhill till it fed into the Pawnee winding through the valley beyond. The site provided a good view of the surrounding terrain with no hidden approaches. He could easily observe anyone coming for up to a mile in any direction; except southeast through the timbered creek—but he held the high ground so he felt about as secure as circumstance would allow a lone hunter on the edge of Indian Country. Yet he was even more wary of white renegades who gathered in wolf packs to follow the lucrative hide trade and plunder the harvest of other men’s labor, often dressing in the guise of Indians, leaving arrows in a slain hunter to further cloak their treachery. A deep black robe sold for $75; the white alone was worth hundreds—so it paid to keep a vigilant eye on the horizon, and close by, to see if the shadow cast belonged to oneself or another.

  After fleshing the hide to its proper thickness, Caspion rubbed in the stewed curing compound. The robe was left to soak in the pool overnight and each morning staked out again; the compound reapplied and worked deeper into the skin, seeking the soft pliancy desired. This task only occupied a portion of his day, the remainder he spent scouting through the radius of hills. On the fourth day he spied a small herd of buffalo grazing on a wind-sheltered slope. He killed twelve in one stand then spent the bulk of that day and the next in skinning and transporting the hides back to camp, trailing the load behind Stump on a makeshift travois. There, downwind, he staked them out to dry; a simple sun-cure adequate for flint-hides destined for tanneries back east.

  While the days passed with swift assurance, the nights were altogether another story. Long and fitful. He’d douse his cooking fire at sundown, a beacon certain to draw man; but the gathering darkness only called forth the chill wind to gnaw his bones as the wolves circled with growing defiance, and he longed to build it up again. Never truly bedding down, he’d sit against a tree, blanket pulled about his shoulders, and stare into the night. Occasionally the foreground took on a subtle glow of reddish hue, heightened by a lull in the wind or the silence following a wolf’s long howl; a veiled illumination cast from no perceived source. He’d rub his eyes and blink, seeing nothing but a dark void beyond the shimmering white of the robe soaking in the pool. He tried to calm his fears with music, but the guitar resisted his touch, so he cradled his rifle beneath the blanket and awaited sleep. Each time he dozed off he was startled awake by the whip of the Thunder Bow and the ghostly image of three warriors riding his way. He’d squint, anxiously searching the darkness, relieved to see only Two-Jacks and Stump standing nearby, both hobbled and tethered against the wolves’ bold stratagems. And curiously enough, though there was no fire, he intermittently caught the flash of the wolves’ yellow eyes and easily discerned their prowling shapes. Caspion would stand and hurl stones till a sharp yelp confirmed he’d hit his mark, and the pack scattered for a time.

  Beyond the fifth night he dreamed no more of the mounted warriors, though the recurrent vision of the robe heaving with uncanny life above the flames still haunted his sleep. Each awakening was now accompanied by that brief illumination he’d witnessed, like a gust of reddish hue swept before a black wind; the phenomenon came almost at will, of varying length and effect, calming him. He could focus on an area and distinctly see clumps of grass and the lay of terrain, and if the wolves were about he could identify them individually, compare their manner and disposition. And they answered his gaze, the mule and horse as well, the animals all strangely intent on their observer. But the vision-gift was granted only upon awakening and briefly held, gone with the passing moment. He was no longer frightened, for the wolves kept their distance, only puzzled as to what and why.

  By the fifth day the robe was ready; its edges contoured and the last coarse hairs removed. Caspion ran his hands over the white supple fur, then held the robe up
and snapped it hard, testing its pliant strength, inhaling its sweet aroma. The weight pulled at his arms, for the robe was as wide as he was tall and half again as long. When mounted on Two-Jacks, it draped from his shoulders past his boots and covered the horse from flank to withers. Caspion set his heels and rode with an exhilaration akin to flight in a sweeping arc upslope beyond the camp, wrapped warm as a babe before the brisk wind. That night, curled in its soft folds, he slept peacefully for the first time in many days. His dreamless sleep visited only once, shortly before dawn, by a hesitant ghost. Was it Tillman’s shade?—fidgeting, ever doubtful, standing nearby as if anxious to share a word. Caspion awoke to the combined ruckus of mule and horse and saw the huge bulk of a bear raised on its haunches. He grasped his Henry and slowly stood; man and bear captive in that brief illumination—predators eye to eye. Then the bear turned its head skyward and pivoted, returning to all fours to lumber off into the night. Caspion pulled the robe around his shoulders and waited for the stars to fade.

  With sunrise the realization struck that he’d neglected to place a cross at Tillman’s grave. He fixed his eyes on the lone cedar standing rugged and durable before the wind and determined to fashion a cross to match Sam’s stubborn, rock-hard faith. After a cold biscuit and coffee, he fetched his ax and chopped down the cedar; he trimmed the limbs and shaped a point at the lower end then cut off the upper third to form the cross-member. This he notched to the main staff and secured with strips of rawhide. Finished, he drove it in the ground with the broadside of the ax and stood back, judging it fit to serve the purpose. Before returning to Tillman’s grave, however, he still had the flint-hides to dust with bug poison and cache for later retrieval.