Woman of Three Worlds

by Jeanne Williams

  Ducking into the wickiup, she emerged with two large narrow-necked basket-jars with hide handles woven into each side. They were coated inside and out with something like pitch and a dull red color showed through the outside layer. Since Apaches didn’t address one another by name, Brittany was making some up and she dubbed the younger girl “Pretty Eyes” as she smiled, said “Tus,” and handed over one of the jugs.

  They filled these at a spring feeding the creek. Pretty Eyes was smaller than Brittany and didn’t seem inclined to act as a captor, leading the way without looking back. When they knelt at the spring, Brittany had a fleeting impulse to knock the girl unconscious with a rock and run up the canyon, but she rejected it immediately.

  Retrace that arduous journey alone, without food? Even if the Apaches decided she wasn’t worth the trouble to follow, she’d never survive without a store of food. She needed more knowledge too, understanding of how to live in this fierce region. So she filled her tus also. On the way back to camp, Pretty Eyes taught her some Apache words, giggling at her pronunciation but patiently correcting her.

  Twilight was gathering. Hides and blankets had been spread in a half circle in front of Kah-Tay’s three wickiups. An old man wearing a feathered cap sang as he shuffled to one side, followed by drummers and more singers. Sara gave a signal.

  Kah-Tay strode to the middle of the semicircle. He wore a fringed shirt decorated with conchos and beads, strands of shell and turquoise, and several amulets. In the flickering light he looked savagely handsome.

  His green eyes glinted gold for a second as he glanced at Brittany before indicating that Big Jaw should sit at his left. A stately old man with a slight limp was seated on his right, and other men took seats till the places were filled. Women and children grouped behind the men. Kah-Tay rolled crumbled leaves in an oak leaf and lit and blew smoke toward the four directions.

  At his gesture, Sara, the old one Brittany had named “Grouchy,” and Pretty eyes started filling gourd bowls with food. Sara motioned to Brittany to serve the tray of acorn cakes.

  There were perhaps fifty people in this band, only a dozen of them warriors, though the older men and bigger boys probably hunted and could fight if necessary. After the men were served, bowls were passed to the women and children. When Sara signed that Brittany could eat she was ravenous but still couldn’t taste the horse meat, so she took mescal and acorn cakes and ate them as she sat a little apart from the others.

  When all had eaten their fill, Kah-Tay rose. He called Jody to stand beside him as he spoke, apparently recounting the story of how he’d regained his son. When he flourished the dead trooper’s rifle and sidearm, there were cries of applause.

  Drumming and singing began as more wood was heaped on the fire. Everyone danced around it in a circle except for the very aged and the children. Brittany stared in fascination at two youngish women whose lithe bodies were painted to highlight the nipples and thighs as they danced sinuously, naked except for a brief bit of buckskin belted low in front.

  They called out laughingly to Kah-Tay and the other raiders. Jody said to Brittany, “Bižan. Women no have husband. Ask for horses.”

  Had Zach ever seen this dancing? Brittany’s heart pounded with the drums. She felt as if she were stifling as those red-brown bodies twisted and swayed in the firelight. One of the bižan took Long Hair by the hand. They vanished into the night.

  The other approached Kah-Tay. His gaze searched out Brittany. Warning tingled through her along with an elemental stirring that terrified her.

  “I’m tired,” she murmured to Jody. “Where shall I sleep?”

  He slipped to Sara, who was now watching the dancing. The handsome woman sent the boy off with the knife from her belt, came to Brittany, beckoned toward the wickiup on the right of the biggest one. Entering, Sara took a blanket and tossed it to Brittany before she rejoined the celebration.

  Brittany sat down and took off her shoes and stockings. She longed to take off her stained clothing, feel the cool air on her skin, but she had no other garments, so she pulled off only her dress and was standing in drawers and chemise when Jody came in with a load of grass and small brush.

  “Tomorrow make better,” he promised, spreading his burden at one side.

  Brittany thanked him. In spite of the drummers, laughter, and light flickering through the uncovered lower part of the dwelling, she spread her blanket and fell into exhausted sleep.

  In the next days she learned some of the intricacies of Kah-Tay’s household and Diné society while she cooked, carried water and wood, and was put to helping tan the hide of the butchered horse. Kah-Tay had kept that, though his companions had been given the weapons and other horses.

  Each of the bižan had received a horse, and though she was still shocked at their shameless display, Brittany began to see that such practices were a way for widows and divorcees to get the plunder that they had no man to procure for them. After such an introduction, she was surprised to find the people strict and modest with each other. Unmarried girls were carefully chaperoned and children of Jody’s age began to play separately. Big Jaw had three wives and another older warrior had four, but the others had only one.

  Sara was not ordinary. Captured as a child by Mexicans, who’d given her the commonly used name, she had escaped and found her way back to her people. Many warriors had tried to win her but she had refused them all. She hunted, went on raids, and was highly respected, though she did women’s tasks expertly too. Pretty Eyes was the orphaned daughter of Kah-Tay’s brother and Grouchy was the widow of an uncle. Both men had been killed by white soldiers, which may have explained Grouchy’s venomous glares.

  Once when Brittany passed her, heavily laden with a bundle of wood and brush tied about by a long piece of rawhide that was secured over her forehead, Grouchy tripped her. Brittany went sprawling, skinning her palms.

  Sara stepped out of the wickiup. Without a word to Grouchy, she helped Brittany up, heaped the load of wood by the fire, and fetched a small bag from the assortment of medicines she had in her dwelling. The dark tallow paste she smeared on Brittany’s abraded hands stung for a moment but then had a cooling, numbing effect.

  After that, Grouchy showed her hatred only in her rheumy old eyes. Brittany worked hard but so did all the women, and much of their labor afforded a chance for companionship and joking, especially when they went out to gather foods that were ripe in the late summer—elderberries, chokecherries, wild currants, and grapes. These were eaten fresh and also dried.

  Bushels of mesquite beans and acorns were harvested, staples through the winter till spring feasting on newly baked mescal hearts and stalks. Prickly pear fruits were red-purple now, and, with a split piece of mesquite, Brittany gathered quantities of these in her burden basket, or tuts-ah, to be singed free of spines and eaten fresh or sliced and dried, or mashed to pulp and pressed into cakes.

  Stored in baskets and rawhide bags, this bounty was placed in several big caches, large pits lined on sides and bottom with smooth flat stones. The first layer of foods was placed on a covering of brush and each successive layer was overlapped with more brush.

  Brittany was surprised at her proud, shared feeling of accomplishment when the first cache was given a final padding of brush, overlaid with rocks, and plastered with mud. Finding the winter’s food along the canyons and mountain slopes, bringing it home, and preparing it was a world away from buying at the post trader’s or drawing rations from the quartermaster.

  She found the outdoor work infinitely preferable to scrubbing out heaps of laundry or being a servant to Regina. Gradually, too, she was coming to know the women, comprehend enough words to catch the drift of some conversations, experience some of the camaraderie she’d known with Bridget, Nan, Shelly, and Lillian.

  She became especially fond of a delicately beautiful young woman who was pregnant with a first child but still moved with a shy grace that caused Brittany to name her “Fawn.” The youngest wife of Big Jaw, Fawn had wide da
rk eyes, a sweetly curved mouth set off by dimples, and a delicious soft laugh. Her hair, washed with yucca root suds, was a thick cloud of black, fastened over her belt to keep it from dragging.

  Her older sister and cousin, also wives of Big Jaw, wouldn’t let her carry heavy loads or lift much, though her mother admonished her not to be idle, since staying active would ease the birth. Even Grouchy treated Fawn and the two other pregnant women with a consideration that impressed Brittany, just as she was amazed at the indulgence shown to children.

  She never saw a child slapped or spanked. An older one who misbehaved might be ridiculed, which quickly cured a pout or unruliness. By the time boys and girls stopped playing together, at five or six, girls began helping their mothers and boys began to bring in pack rats, squirrels, and rabbits.

  Both learned to swing up on a horse or mule and to use weapons. Some wives had always ridden to war with their husbands, and in these days of hounding by soldiers of both the United States and Mexico, fighting ability for any Apache was more important than ever.

  Though children were almost never physically punished, they were taught how to act. Brittany heard them told not to run into other families’ camp space or eat their food, to be kind to smaller children, and never to make fun of the old. Jody didn’t pester for food or help himself till the others had, but one evening Kah-Tay eyed him gravely.

  “My son, why did you refuse the sling-shot Dah-tse wanted to give you?”

  Jody squirmed unhappily. “Dah-tse is poor, father. His mother has no man. They have few hides and only the meat that’s given them.”

  “So it’s all the more important for Dah-tse to make a gift and have it courteously accepted,” Kah-Tay said. “Could you not use his sling to take some rabbits for him and his mother?”

  “I—I didn’t think of that.” Jody hung his head.

  Kah-Tay touched his shoulder. “You were wrong but from a good heart. Think of a way to let Dah-tse do you a favor and feel rich.”

  Far from lacking etiquette and rules, the Apaches had ingrained customs so complex that Brittany was sure she was aware only of the more obvious. A man couldn’t speak or look at his mother-in-law because his respect for her was supposed to be so deep. Fish abounded in the stream but were never eaten, because it was thought that long ago they had been people. Frogs were also shunned, and no one would kill a snake.

  Using someone’s real name was a serious matter and ordinary people called one another “friend” or by relationship terms once the “baby” name had been dropped, though names bestowed by Mexicans or whites could be used. In danger, when one called another’s true name, succor had to be given even at the cost of life, and a request, used with the name, was nearly always granted.

  To Brittany the most wonderful and amazing practice was the way a girl’s first menses, usually a frightening and shamed time for white girls, was made into a rite of thanksgiving and joy for the whole band, the most important ritual celebrated by this people so dreaded and notorious for ferocity.

  Pretty Eyes’s time was approaching. For months Grouchy had been working on the ceremonial dress, which required five buckskins, singing the proper songs as she sewed. Kah-Tay often went hunting, for the feast would require much food, and the women of his household were kept busy slicing venison thin for drying and working on the hides, two of which would be given to families who had contributed buckskins so Grouchy could start the dress.

  Tanning was the only job Brittany really loathed. After a skin had been buried for a few days in damp earth, it was soaked in water, stretched over a pole and the hair was scraped away with a horse rib. Next, every trace of flesh and fat was bladed off.

  When Brittany tried to rub brains into the skin, she gagged and vomited. Grouchy jeered. Pretty Eyes stared in astonished sympathy. Sara’s mouth twitched, but she took the evil-looking mixture and kicked dirt over the result of Brittany’s revulsion.

  “We need water,” she suggested.

  Brittany gratefully escaped, but made up for her squeamishness after the treated hide had been hung in the sun for a time, by pulling and stretching it for the many hours necessary to make it soft and pliable. She was surprised and delighted when Sara looked speculatively at her ragged dress and ruined shoes and said, “We have enough skins to make you a dress and moccasins.”

  The chill of autumn was already in the nights. Durable clothing would be a necessity before she attempted escape. “I will be glad,” she said gratefully.

  The Apache word for “thanks” was used only in circumstances where a tremendous favor or service had been performed. Sara’s keen gaze searched Brittany as if she were trying to read her thoughts.

  “Not good for woman of my brother’s house to look like a bižan,” she said.

  Hackberries and squawberries were ripe now, but when they had been collected and the tanning and jerking caught up with, in between other chores, Pretty Eyes and Sara helped Brittany make a skirt that reached halfway between ankle and knee, loose tunic that came below the hips, and thigh-length moccasins. At first Brittany was clumsy at punching holes in the hide with a bone awl and threading sinew through them, but she gained skill with each stint till Grouchy stopped her derisive chuckling.

  Though she was used now to unsalted food and had come to relish mescal and many things that had tasted strange at first, Brittany still avoided horse or mule meat and a delicacy produced by Kah-Tay’s hunting, a deer stomach filled with blood, wild onions, and herbs and boiled till the blood thickened; nor could she eat pack rats, boiled whole and then deftly skinned and disemboweled.

  “You eat pig, don’t you?” Sara demanded once when Brittany made her meal of acorn cakes rather than sharing deer stomach. “We wouldn’t do that unless we were starving! I suppose you like fish?”

  “Yes,” Brittany admitted.

  Everyone looked disgusted. “I have heard some white people like frog legs,” said Kah-Tay in a tone of disbelief.

  “I don’t,” Brittany assured him. “But in some cities they are thought very good.”

  Her companions shuddered. Brittany was glad when Jody drew attention away from the nasty eating habits of White Eyes by asking for a story.

  Kah-Tay glanced at Brittany. “Diné stories should be told in our tongue, Blanca.” It was the Mexican name he used for her, meaning white. “You understand a little?”

  “I can’t speak well,” haltingly returned Brittany in the dialect used by these Chokonen the most eastern group of Chiricahuas. “But I understand much.”

  He looked pleased and graciously looked toward the hunched figure of Grouchy. “My aunt, since our niece will soon become She Through Whom We Are Blessed, it is good to remember White-Painted Woman. Will you tell the story as it was given you?”

  Grouchy gave Brittany a grudging scowl, but being the focus of attention was too tempting to a childless widow to be refused. She settled herself more comfortably, turned her back on Brittany, and began.

  “More harvests ago than anyone can count, there was a terrible drought. Plants died. Without them, so did animals. Without either, so did men. White-Painted Woman was pure and beautiful but had never wished to marry. There was a tradition that someday the people would be saved by a virgin who gave her life for them. White-Painted Woman loved the sun and air and flowers but she decided to be the sacrifice. She left her band, went to a big rock, and lay there awaiting death.

  “There came a great storm. Thunder People shot fiery arrows and the clouds burst. White-Painted Woman trembled, sure the Thunder People would kill her, but Ussen, Creator of Life, made rain fall softly on her, and from it she conceived. The boy had no earthly father, so he was called Child of the Waters.

  “No one remembers exactly what happened next, but by the time Child of the Waters was growing up, a monster giant named Yehyeh had eaten every human except White-Painted Woman and her son. She hid the boy till he was old enough to hunt. Then she made weapons. He brought in a deer and was roasting meat when Yehyeh came in an
d demanded it.

  “‘I will fight you for it,’ said Child of the Waters. ‘We will each have four shots. You take the first.’

  “Yehyeh’s arrows were big pine poles. His chest was protected by four layers of stone. Child wore just a breechcloth and moccasins. His bow was little and his arrows were grama grass.

  “The monster laughed as he shot his huge arrow. The boy threw up his arms and shouted. The shaft splintered into useless bits. But Child’s grass shaft struck the stone over Yehyeh’s heart and broke the first layer.

  “Yehyeh was a little worried now. He worried more when his next giant arrow broke in midair and Child’s shot took away another coating of stone. Yehyeh’s third and fourth shafts also shattered, but when Child took aim for the fourth time, only one layer of stone protected the giant and through it, Child saw the monster’s heart beating.

  “His grass arrow pierced stone and heart. The monster fell.” Grouchy cleared her throat and smiled into Jody’s wide eyes. “After that, little son, Child killed other monsters till it was safe for people to come back. Ussen wasn’t sure the boy was really his son, though, and tested him by throwing a thunderbolt at him. It turned aside and Ussen knew Child for his own. He let his son and White-Painted Woman stay on earth a while to teach people good ways to live. Then he called them up to live with him from a spot near Warm Springs, where four prairies meet.”

  Again Grouchy paused. This time she placed her withered old hand on Pretty Eyes’ firm, shapely one. “Before she left, White-Painted Woman gave the Diné some of her power. She told us how to give a big ceremony for each girl when she becomes a woman. For these four days the girl has White-Painted Woman’s power to bless our people.”

  Tenderness faded from her eyes and voice as she confronted Brittany. “White Eyes have nothing like this. When Jeffords was our agent, he told me white girls were scared to be women.”