"If I'd wanted to kill you," Hart said quietly, hoping the Indian could speak American, "I wouldn't have shot the cat." The redman grunted agreement; he turned and knelt beside the animal carcass and commenced to skin it. He signaled to Hart that the other cat was his, and it didn't seem polite to refuse, so he set about following the Apache's example.
Heartened by this small communication, Hart tried to tell the brave why he'd come to the Arizona Territory. Using sign and some pidgin Spanish mixed in with American, he told him he was an artist, come to paint the Apache.
The Indian looked at the white man with so potent a mixture of disgust and disdain that Hart stopped speaking, realizing too late how a man who struggles daily for barest subsistence views one who has such luxury to choose his pursuits.
Hart asked to be taken to the ranchería, as the Apache called their villages; the brave said no. It was apparent he understood all Hart said. Hart asked if he could direct him to a village that might be more cooperative. The brave said, "Go from here." Hart turned to leave, but on a hunch he pulled a sketch he'd made earlier from his pouch, and pressed it into the Indian's hand. The brave made as though he would cast it back, but instead his dark eyes swept Hart's searchingly, then he snatched the paper from his hand and once again left him standing quite alone.
Hart had painted for hours on what must have been the shore of an ancient sea, long since turned to desert. The surface stain of manganese oxide or iron had tinged the rocks around him black, while before him stretched the colorful seabed covering a thousand square miles or more, ringed comfortingly by purple mountains.
Tiny seashell fragments, worn to wisps by a thousand years of winds they should never have felt at all, had left pearlized dust at his feet, while razor ridges guarded his left, and red butte sentinels, his right. The only movement to catch his eye all afternoon was a solitary lizard, who paused for protection beneath a saguaro cactus, then darted beneath a creosote bush to enjoy the shade.
Hart shifted position to catch the swift movements of the tiny lizard, and the scorpion struck. It had crept unnoticed beneath his trouser leg as he concentrated on his painting; a sting like the piercing of a hot knife stabbed him, and he leapt up stomping and jumping, until the ugly creature dropped to the ground and scurried off. "Damn!" he shouted to the empty desert; feeling foolish and vulnerable, he began to collect his gear. The queasiness began within a minute or two. Shocked by the swiftness of the poisoning, Hart found it was becoming difficult to focus. His leg blazed with a numbing pain and began to swell and blacken. Sweat dribbled down Hart's face, and barely able to drag his poisoned leg behind him, he turned toward camp, feeling sicker with every step.
There was a snakebite kit in his saddlebag, but in his confused state, he couldn't think what the remedy was for scorpion sting. His hand trembled so, he couldn't hold the small first aid book steady enough to read, and lights like crazed fireflies danced before his vision.
Hart shook with cold long before the sun went down; with grave difficulty he wrapped himself in a blanket, using his saddle as a pillow, and collapsing onto the ground, he tried to control the shaking of his spastic limbs. He recognized the circling buzzards as he quivered on the sand; how desperate they must be to sense incapacity so quickly, he thought through his daze.
He drifted in and out of delirium, with the predatory birds a constant in his mind. Terrifying visions, funny visions, absurd visions, materialized and faded. A searing thirst made him beg for water—he heard himself. In his fantasies, it seemed to him that someone brought it to him, but the damning thirst made him sure that was a lie.
He felt his body swell and diminish, felt roasted and frozen in turn, felt madness engulf him and death tug at his sleeve.
A soft, chanting sound like the voice of the wind drifted in and out with Hart, yet when he finally awakened, the chant still sounded near at hand.
The sick man focused, or tried to. The sound ceased. A figure bent above him, a skin bag of water in his hand. The old Apache warrior grunted satisfaction, it seemed, at Hart's being alive. He dribbled a small stream of the warm liquid toward the sick man's mouth and pulled the bag away when Hart sought to swallow too much. The impassive face revealed nothing; so, too weak to fear, Hart drifted off again into unconsciousness.
Hart lay, frail as a newborn, in a wickiup at the Apache ranchería. He was never certain how Gokhlaya—for that was his savior's name—had managed to transport him there. Two hundred and seventy pounds and six feet six inches of dead weight is not an easy burden for a man five feet five. Perhaps even in his delirium Hart had been able to sit a horse, but he had no recollection of the journey.
The wickiup was a dome-shaped dwelling made from a framework of poles joined at the top, with an overcovering of bear grass, yucca leaves, rushes, and brush. On one side was a low doorway, a skin throw stretched over it for protection and privacy. Smoke from the central firepit was a constant annoyance to the fevered guest, but aside from this the wickiup was a sound and comfortable dwelling.
Gokhlaya and a woman tended Hart in his illness. At first the sick man assumed the girl to be the Apache's wife, but this was not the case; nor was the wickiup his home, but simply a place he had commandeered for Hart's convalescence.
The need to be able to move at a moment's notice made furniture an unnecessary luxury to the Apache. Beside the wooden bed frame that raised the brush and grass on which Hart lay a foot or two above the ground, he saw a pot, a skillet, a dishpan, and a vessel in which to boil meat, soup, and tulapai; a tus, or water jug, a few bowls, grinding slabs and stones for pounding.
The girl, whose name he came to know as Destarte, labored over nutritious meals to strengthen her patient. Hart sipped only soups and gravies at first, then a wheaten bread baked in corn husks under ashes on the floor was added, and a strange concoction called suzor made from the crushed bean pods of the costa tree, and a meal of honey-boiled corn with a fungus called smut.
Destarte spoke as she worked, or sang softly, as a woman does with a small baby who cannot understand but needs the comfort of a human voice. Hart thought she might have been picked to nurse him because she spoke some English as well as Mexican and Apache; he found that when his strength permitted, he could communicate with her fairly well.
The Apache language was intricate and tonal; Hart had become accustomed to its strangely mellifluous cadences while only semiconscious. There seemed to be many more vowels than in English; he counted more than fifty and they glided from one tone to another to make mastery difficult. There were twenty-five or thirty consonants and so many roots or stems that once he'd figured out the system, the formation of new words became easy. He found that a very complex thought could be conveyed by a single word, just as a single line in a drawing can express enormous complexity.
Destarte told him that mescal roots and heads were collected by the women in the spring and cooked for days at a time, in pits, to create a food much prized by the tribe. Berries, cactus fruit, yucca, and pinon nuts, she said, were plentiful in season, and were also staples of the People's diet. An acorn called cherchil rendered a coffeelike drink when it had been roasted, and meat boiled, broiled, or jerked appeared in turn... Hart listened to her low, lyrical voice when he was too weak to talk, and later he asked so many questions that she would laugh and tell him to be still and save his strength.
Destarte was tall by Apache standards, perhaps five feet seven or eight—she had a lithe, muscular body beneath the buckskin skirt and shirt she wore. Her glistening dark hair was waist length; pulled tight back from a face coppery in color as a newly minted penny. Her name, according to Gokhlaya, meant Morning Mist.
Hart had ample time to study the girl. His eyes followed her as she busied herself about the wickiup or knelt gracefully beside him, to spoon food or medicine into her patient. Daily she would unwrap his limbs respectfully to massage them, carrying out the duty artfully and with none of the embarrassment at his nakedness that a white woman would have shown.
He saw that Destarte's face was free of lines and its planes were wider and flatter than those of the women of his own race, yet they had not the Mongolian look of the Plains Indians, and he could not guess her age. Her cheekbones were high and prominent, her dark eyes, which sought out every nuance in his condition, were intelligent and alert; and despite the animation of her eyes, there was about her a kind of serenity that comforted him and brought him peace.
Each night, in a curious ritual, Gokhlaya would visit his guest in the wickiup; he would question Destarte about her patient's condition, and as Hart gained strength, the two men would converse. Like many Apaches, Gokhlaya could speak both Mexican and American, as well as his own tongue.
"Why didn't you kill me?" Hart asked when he was finally able.
"It is no sin to kill enemies or to rob them," Gokhlaya replied with equanimity. "But if one man accepts a favor from a stranger, that stranger becomes related to the tribe, and the man must recognize his duty and let the stranger share his comforts." Hart looked puzzled.
"You killed the mountain lion," Gokhlaya responded. "You gave me the paper of enchantment." Hart realized he spoke of the portrait. "The obligation was clear." The Indian said this solemnly and left no room for further questioning.
It took more than a month for Hart to recover his strength; when he finally ventured from the wickiup for exercise, he could see that he was watched with wariness and hostility by the other braves. It was apparent Gokhlaya was held in respect, and only his sanction protected the white visitor.
Destarte told her patient that Gokhlaya was known among the People as a highly respected loner; he thought perhaps that was why both encounters in the desert had been solitary ones. Yet, with Hart, Gokhlaya was curiously forthcoming. The white man thought long and hard about that; was it that he, a stranger, and a helpless one, posed no threat to Gokhlaya, so the Apache could confide with impunity? Was it that the loneliness of the Apache's hard life had finally caught up with him and he, at last, needed a friend? Was it that like all leaders, he dared not choose a confidant from the ranks of those he led? Or was it some other bond linking the two men in the spirit world, of the sort that binds friends through different lifetimes? Destarte told Hart the Apaches believe kindred souls find each other in successive lives, just as the souls of enemies remain bound, until the debt is paid.
Whatever the genesis of the connection, Gokhlaya would arrive each night, and the two men would speak of their separate worlds, until the coals of the fire burned to embers. "I need to understand the thinking of the white-eyes," Gokhlaya said in explanation.
"And I wish to learn the way of the Apache," Hart told him in return. "I mean to record your way of life so that my people will better understand." Gokhlaya accepted this solemnly, for the tribe was worthy of respect.
Hart thought the Apache's speech quaint and slightly archaic, but powerful in its simplicity, and he loved to listen, often sketching Gokhlaya as the old man sat and unfolded the story of his life. Gokhlaya called Hart "Firehair," and seemed not only willing to share knowledge with him, but eager to learn from him in return.
"I was born in No-doyohn Canyon, Arizona, the first moon of summer in the year the white-eyes call 1829," Gokhlaya said in the singsong rhythm of Indian oral history. Apaches tell their stories, if they choose to, at their own pace and in their own way, Hart found. The answer to a question might come to you far from the beginning of the tale, but in the telling, you could learn much beyond what you'd asked for.
"In that country which lies around the headwater of the Gila River I was reared. This range was our fatherland; among these mountains our tipis were hidden. The scattered valleys contained our fields; the boundless prairies, stretching away on every side, were our pastures; the rocky caverns were our burying places.
"I was fourth in a family of eight children—four boys and four girls. Four is a magic number to my Bedonkohe tribe and it has brought me to a special destiny.
"As a babe I rolled on the dirt floor of my father's tipi, hung in my tsoch at my mother's back, or suspended from the bough of a tree. I was warmed by the sun, rocked by the winds, and sheltered by the trees.
"When a child, my mother taught me the legends of our people; taught me of the sun and the sky, the moon and stars, the clouds and storms. She also taught me to kneel and pray to Usen for strength, health, wisdom, and protection. It was forbidden to pray against any person, but if we had aught against any individual we could take vengeance. Usen does not care for the petty quarrels of men." Gokhlaya spoke the Great Spirit's name with immeasurable reverence.
"My father taught me the Way of the People, and often told me of the brave deeds of our warriors, of the pleasures of the chase, and the glories of the warpath.
"With my brothers and sisters I played at hide-and-seek among the rocks and pines; sometimes we loitered in the shade of the Cottonwood trees or sought the shucock, a kind of wild cherry, while our parents worked in the field.
"When we were old enough, we went to the field with our parents, not to play but to toil. When the crops were to be planted, we broke the ground with wooden hoes. We planted the corn in straight rows, the beans among the corn, and the melons and pumpkins in irregular order over the field. We cultivated these crops as there was need."
"Your childhood and mine were much the same," Hart told him with a chuckle. "My father, too, was a farmer who loved the land and respected its bounty."
"If only men could see our sameness," Gokhlaya replied, "not our differences, life would be good."
"How did you know what medicine to use to cure me of my sickness?" Hart asked, and Gokhlaya smiled a little on answering.
"The People know what herbs to use for medicine," he said. "We know how to prepare and how to give the medicine. This we were taught by Usen in the beginning; each generation has men who are skilled in healing. We know how to gather the herbs, prepare them, and administer the medicine. We know the prayers to say that make the medicine work. Usually about eight work together in making medicine, so the forms of incantations can be done well. Four attend to the incantations and four to the preparation of the herbs. But if one of the People is alone, he can do all this himself." It was easy to see the man was proud of this skill at healing, so Hart prompted him to elaborate.
"Some of us are adept in cutting out bullets, and arrowheads, with which warriors are wounded in battle. I myself have done much of this." He thought for a moment, as if to make sure he'd left nothing out, then said, "When disease and pestilence come to us, we are assembled and questioned by our leaders to find what we have done wrong, and how Usen can be satisfied. Sometimes sacrifice is necessary. Sometimes the offending one must be punished."
"What kinds of offenses might merit punishment?" Hart asked, making mental note of how he could portray this elaborate pageant on huge canvases.
"If an Apache allowed his aged parents to suffer for lack of food or shelter," Gokhlaya answered. "If he neglected or abused the sick, if he profaned our religion, or had been unfaithful, he might be banished from the tribe.
"The People have no prisons as you white men have. Instead, we send our criminals out from the tribe. Among us there is no worse punishment but death. Faithless, cruel, lazy, or cowardly members of the tribe are excluded in such a way that they cannot join any other tribe. Neither can they have any protection from our unwritten tribal laws. Sometimes these outlaw Indians band together and commit crimes that are charged against the regular tribe, but the life of any outlaw Indian is a hard one, and their bands are never very large. Besides, these bands frequently provoke the wrath of the tribe and secure their own destruction...." He nodded, as if to corroborate his own statement.
"What was your own family like?" Hart prompted him, warmed by the affection with which the man reminisced.
"When I was but a small boy," Gokhlaya remembered, "my father died. He had been sick a long time. When he passed away, carefully the watchers closed his eyes, then arrayed him in his best cl
othes. They painted his face, wrapped a rich blanket around him, saddled his favorite horse, bore his arms in front of him, and led his horse behind. In wailing tones they repeated his deeds of valor, as they carried his body to a cave in the mountain. Then they slew his horse, and we gave away or burned all his other property, as was customary in our tribe—after which his body was deposited in the cave, his arms beside him. His grave is hidden by piles of stones. Wrapped in splendor, my father lies in seclusion, and the winds in the pines sing his requiem, for he was a great warrior." Gokhlaya paused in respect, much moved by the memory.
"Why was the horse slain and the property dispersed?" Hart asked, surprised.
"It is a tribal law most sacred. The People will not keep any property from a deceased relative. Our tribal law forbids it. Otherwise the children of one who had much property might be glad when their father dies. This would be very bad." Gokhlaya frowned for emphasis, his mouth, no more than a sliver at best, became a slash of righteousness.
"After my father's death the care of my mother came to me. She did not remarry, although according to the customs of our tribe she might have done so immediately after his death. Usually, the widow who has children remains single after her husband's death for two or three years; but the widow without children marries again immediately. After a warrior's death, his widow returns to her people and may be given away or sold by her father or brothers. My mother chose to live with me, and she never desired to marry again...." He paused before continuing, and Hart felt the need to prompt him again. The Apaches were more comfortable with silences than were white men.
Paint the Wind Page 55