Laughing Boy

by Oliver La Farge

  The first day was sparkling, crisp, and sunny. The first day was one of stunned, dull realization. He wandered about uncertainly and drugged himself with detailed, long-drawn-out memories. And in the end, he would return to the beginning of his circle and stand or sit motionless and groan. It was a long day and a strange one; later he did not remember it clearly.

  The second night he tried hard not to sleep, but it was hard, with cold, hunger, fatigue, and the fire. He dozed a good deal, and his memories became very accurate dreams into which slowly would creep a sense of horror without reason, until he woke, not knowing he had slept, continuing the thought and the mood. He tried to pray, but it was chiefly ejaculations and the names of the gods. It was an endless and terrible night.

  Daylight, when at last it came, was a release. He shook himself, thinking, 'I must be calm, I must think clearly. This is no time for wandering without getting anywhere.' He quieted himself for a time, achieving a state of apparent resignation which enabled him to pray, but the oft-repeated hozoji sounded hollow. He did not really think there was anything beautiful; he was just acting as he thought he ought.

  Plenty of people had died in his neighbourhood; there had been mourning and grief, when every one had stayed close to the hogahns for four days. But this was different. He had seen the bereaved, he had seen real sorrow upon them, but he could not believe that they had felt as he did.

  He was alone in more than the physical sense. No one, not even Jesting Squaw's Son, could come near him. All his life, wherever he was, however long he lived, he would remain alone. It would always be like this. The one companionship in the world had gone; when the sun has been destroyed for a man, what comfort is there in a world of moonlight?

  He had nothing to do in the canon save tend his fire and think. He would get hold of a thought, work it over and over until he lost all sense of proportion towards it, and finally put it in a phrase or a simile, so that it obtained substance and could not be dismissed.

  He hated to watch it grow dark; he felt afraid of the night. He did not want to be shut into that little space of firelight with all the things he was thinking. Alone, alone, all life alone, all life carrying this pain inside himself. He might as well die. But she wanted him to live. It was the third night, and he was approaching the stage of visions. Outlines of things dimly seen in the starlight changed and assumed startling forms. He became the audience listening to unseen people arguing as to whether he ought to kill himself or not. He knew he ought to live, but he could not control which side might win.

  He couldn't always follow very well what was going on. Extraneous things intruded themselves. There were people all around, pitying him. It was being insisted upon that loneliness and pain were not worth enduring for a whole lifetime, without purpose.

  'But I have to live for her,' he said aloud, and thought hard about her.

  Then he saw her, standing on the other side of the fire. He started to his feet, choking with all a Navajo's terror of the walking dead. He was dissolved in fear, but she was gone. He was alone, the voices were gone, the people. He sat down, trembling, and quite wide awake. Evidently he did not want to die, but he had no will to live; he did not know himself, it would be wrong to make a decision now. Little by little he grew drowsy, and dozed in snatches. Perhaps her coming was a good thing; one would not expect her ghost to be like other people's.

  This, too, became a discussion outside himself. The spirits of the dead are bad; if they walk, it is for destruction. She is different, she would come to protect him. She would lead him to some frightful end. But no one could imagine blue fire coming out of her eyes and mouth. It went on and on. There was an outline of something he had not seen before, it moved and he felt his scalp crawl. Then he let out a deep sigh and related. It was a bush, some little distance away. Dawn was coming.

  A little water and the clear sunshine revived him for a time, but soon he was tired and miserable again, listlessly occupying himself with gathering more firewood, bringing a branch at a time, setting aside without interest those that would do for making a sweat-bath. Later, he thought of that day as the day of treason. He protracted his occupation, being meticulous about finding all the wood in one section before moving to the next. He thought of the eventual bath, which should wash him clean of the taint of death; he wished it might wash out his mind. He thought that if he never had met her, he would be happy now, remembering Slender Hair riding by and telling him of the dance that was to be, remembering himself riding, singing, down to Tsé Lani, the firelight and that girl, remembering what chance, what meeting of eyes in a crowd, his uncle's tactlessness, had put an end to a young man who had no cares.

  The thought stayed with him as he wandered about kicking up the snow for bits of dead wood. He knew that it was an entity in itself, and saw it as a tall old man who leered as he walked beside and slightly behind him, a bad, strong old man. The old man kept at him about it, that he had been a fool, that he should have avoided all this. And he thought, in answer, that it was too late now, why couldn't he be left alone? He tried to explain to himself, to the old man, that he couldn't have helped doing what he did. He himself, as a third person, repeated that all the suffering was worth while for the happy months, but the old man only sneered. He tried to get himself in hand, and think of a new design for a belt, but that was useless. He would walk around for a long time without looking for wood at all. Picking up his pony's tracks, he followed them out into the main cañon until he saw the horse in a sheltered place under the east wall, then, realizing how far he had gone from the place of vigil, hurried back. Everything had gone to pieces, he did everything wrong. The old man had waited for him, he was triumphant over this breach of observance.

  Nightfall was at least a change. Having plenty of wood, he built the fire up high, and went to some trouble to make himself comfortable. This was the fourth night, he was more or less out of his head. The old man had long ceased to be a personification and become a reality; he got in under the same blanket and hammered, hammered at him about the unfortunate past. Laughing Boy saw an empty, drifting future, always with this old man. He saw himself a long time from now, and the dead boy who had ridden down to Tsé Lani crying across a gap full of darkness to the empty husk of a man who had destroyed him. He tried to call on the gods, but there came only Hunger People, Old Age, and Cold Woman. Yellow Singer and his wife were there, looking sorry for him in that unpleasant, understanding way, like the day he was married. They all looked at him that way. He saw the stricken face of Jesting Squaw's Son, and thought, 'You too have received the wound, but you were lucky, the knife was pulled out as soon as it was thrust into you.'

  The old man was pulling at his bow-guard. There was something around his right wrist, and that seemed to be being pulled too. The old man said,

  'Where did you get that bow-guard?'

  'I made it.'

  'I'll give you six dollars for it.'

  'I don't want to sell it.'

  He did not really speak, but the words were saying themselves for him in answer to the old man, from a great distance, all the way from that hogahn by Tsé Lani.

  The old man went on, 'That turquoise is no good, and the work is not very good.'

  The work was good. He touched the silver with his right hand, to show the four-points-with-three-points design. But it was not that design, it was not the bow-guard he made at T'o Tlakai, it was that one he made at their hogahn, the one with stars-following.

  He said out loud, 'This is the one I made when she was weaving. I will not sell it.'

  He felt the thing on his right wrist; it was the thin, gold circlet. He saw her hand and arm under the blankets, he saw the tomb in the dusk, and her face as he bent over it, so still. His in-turned torment was obliterated by the memory of that exalted agony. He remembered her last kiss, and her voice, and the mound of her blankets and jewels above her. His arms clutched about his knees, his left hand closed around the foreign bracelet, and he began to weep, tears pouring plen
teously. As though they were rain on the desert, a coolness spread through him, a sense of majestic beauty.

  He threw his arms wide, looked up, and began to pray,

  'House made of dawn light,

  House made of evening light,

  House made of dark cloud,

  House made of he-rain...'

  The old man was gone, and the Hunger People and all the rest. He stood up, stepping back from the fire, stretched out his hands, and his prayer rose in powerful song,

  'Kat Yeinaezgani tla disitsaya...

  'Now, Slayer of Enemy Gods, alone I see him coming,

  Down from the skies, alone I see him coming.

  His voice sounds all about,

  His voice sounds, divine.

  Lé-é!

  'Now, Child of the Waters, alone I see him coming...'

  He finished, and stood with high head and hands still held forth. A log on the fire fell in, the flames leapt up, slightly dazzling his sight. When it had cleared, along the level of his finger-tips he saw a Une dividing a deeper from a lesser blackness. The line spread right and left, and now along its upper edge a white glow appeared and widened; the sky above was changing from black to blue, the cliffs of the far side of the main cañón were silhouetted against the corning day.

  'Hozoji, hozoji, hozoji, hozoji!

  'Dawn Boy, Little Chief,

  Let all be beautiful before me as I wander,

  All beautiful behind me as I wander,

  All beautiful above me as I wander,

  All beautiful below me as I wander.

  Let my eyes see only beauty

  This day as I wander.

  In beauty,

  In beauty,

  In beauty,

  In beauty!'

  He let his arms fall. 'Thanks!'

  He rearranged the fire to make a lasting, small flame, enough to melt snow in the coffee-pot for drinking and refreshing his hands and face. He looked over towards the niche, a shadowy place; the rocks on each side of it were touched irregularly with sunlight.

  I nearly lost you, little sister, but now I have you for always.

  He began praying again, quietly and earnestly, not in set terms, but according to his need. He had come out of that closet in himself now, and things had fitted back into place. He was grave, and there would be many times when he would go by himself to feel a beloved pain, but regret for the knowledge of happiness that had made that pain possible was ended. He had a clear conscience to pray.

  He built his sweat-lodge, and, since it was hard to get mud out of the frozen ground, covered it with blankets. In the mid-afternoon he put in the hot rocks, stripped, and entered. He had made it good and hot; he sat in there chanting as long as he could stand it, then he burst out, rolled in the snow, and dressed hastily. He felt infinitely better. He looked at the sun, low in the west; the fourth day was ended.

  He felt clear-headed, peaceful, washed, and very hungry as he tracked his pony. The animal greeted him with a whinny; its legs were stiff from the hobbles, and it had fallen off from lack of feed. He rode back to the camp, and tethered it while he broke his fast with coffee. Then he saddled and mounted. Before he rode on he turned towards the niche and sat still until his mount jerked at the reins.

  But we shall never be far from each other, he thought, always alone but never lonely. As he rode away he repeated, 'In beauty it is finished, in beauty it is finished, in beauty it is finished. Thanks.'

  II

  It was nearly dark when he climbed out of the head of the canon onto the top of So Selah Mesa. He urged his pony along the level going, anxious to get to the settlement in Jaabani Valley as soon as possible. There was only a day-old moon, and a cold wind blew across the open. It was a talking wind, a voice of sorrow in the growing darkness, and Laughing Boy had been too long alone. He wanted a respite from self-communion; he wanted company and things happening, the old life, support. He was homesick for old, familiar things.

  This cold plateau was nowhere, a waste land separating the human world from the enchanted. It was always dark here, and a cold wind blew, and there was always a small moon setting.

  I shall be whimpering in a moment, he thought. I am unworthy of myself and of her. Do I forget everything? It's because I am cold and hungry. I might sing. He began,

  'I rode down from high hills...'

  but the high-pitched love-tune affronted the night. He stopped, with a catch in his throat.

  I will not cry. This is not a thing to cry over; it is a beautiful thing, to be thought of gravely. I devote my life to it, not just cry. He began to chant, in a deep voice:

  'With a place of hunger in me I wander,

  Food will not fill it,

  Aya-ah, beautiful.

  With an empty place in me I wander,

  Nothing will fill it,

  Aya-ah, beautiful.

  With a place of sorrow in me I wander,

  Time will not end it,

  Aya-ah, beautiful.

  With a place of loneliness in me I wander,

  No one will fill it,

  Aya-ah, beautiful.

  Forever alone, forever in sorrow I wander,

  Forever empty, forever hungry I wander,

  With the sorrow of great beauty I wander,

  With the emptiness of great beauty I wander,

  Never alone, never weeping, never empty,

  Now on the old age trail, now on the path of beauty I wander,

  Ahalani, beautiful!'

  It was a prayer. He ended with four solemn hozoji's that seemed to travel out from him and fill the darkness. That is a good song, he thought. I shall sing that often, at evening, when I am alone. But I wish we would get to where there are people.

  It had been night for more than an hour when he came to the edge of the mesa, looking down into Jaabani. He saw the little pinpricks of fires, very distant. Then, as he watched, near them another began, and grew, until a tall flame rose, throwing light all about it. He heard a drum beat and faint voices singing, and saw around the blaze a wide circle of branches, and people moving. They were beginning the last night of a Mountain Chant, the ritual within the Dark Circle of Branches.

  'Come on, my pet!' His horse began slowly descending the trail in the starlight. As they went down, he sang his song again. This was very good. When Reared in a Mountain returned to his people from the homes of the gods, he taught them these prayers and songs, and they held the Mountain Chant for him, because he was unhappy among them. Even so was he. He was rejoining his people in the presence of the gods. Ah, if she could have been here!

  The singing grew louder, the triumphant songs. Now he could make out the words. They were completing the magic of the tufted wands. He drew rein a few yards from one of the camp-fires, tasting again the sense of his isolation. Then he dismounted.

  Only a few people remained outside the circle, but he found a hospitable pot of broth, some chunks of mutton still in it, bread to dip, and coffee.

  'Where do you come from, Grandfather?' the woman asked.

  'From Chiziai.'

  'Where are you going?'

  'To this dance.'

  'That is a good saddle-blanket; who made it?'

  'My wife, she weaves well.'

  'Is she here?'

  'No, she stayed behind.'

  III

  The brush fence enclosed an oval some forty feet across, in the centre of which blazed the bonfire, higher than a tall man. All around the edge sat people, several hundreds of them; they were happy, their faces were grave but joyful. At one end were the singers.

  Now Red God came into the open space, leading a file of dancers, the Grandfather of the Gods, who guided Reared in a Mountain through the homes of the Divine Ones, who saved him from the Utes. With his plumed sticks and his sacred insignia, Red God led the dance before them.

  Talking God and South God and Young Goddess came before them with dancers, and all the place was full of sacred songs. They were leading good dances, with good musi
c.

  The magicians came in and planted the yucca root. They sang and danced about it; the yucca grew, it became tall, it flowered. In midwinter the enchanted yucca bloomed before them. These were the magics that the people of distant tribes brought to the first Mountain Chant. Now the magicians placed the board and the disk of the sun on the ground, the people all shouted, 'Stand! Stand!' The board stood up on end, the sun rose to the top and set slowly; four times the sun rose and set by magic; then the board lay flat again.

  A man, stripped to his breech-clout, danced before a basket. Out of the basket an eagle feather rose; it danced up into the air, to the height of the man, and there it moved backward and forward in time with him.

  Jesters came in, dressed as Americans and Mexicans, and made the people laugh. The spirits of the ancestral animals, hovering over the brush circle, were made happy. Laughing Boy, sitting among friendly strangers, smiled at them and said,

  'It is good!'

  The great central fire and the small fires that people made for themselves, kept the place warm. He had eaten, he was comfortable. He did not realize how sleepy he was. At times the details of what he was watching became blurred and he drowsed deliciously; but he was permeated with the general feeling of the prayer, and he looked upon it as he had when an uninitiated child.

  Young men painted all white with black forearms, foxskins hanging from their waists, came in with the magic arrows adorned with breath-feathers. This was the holiest part; this was the charm that the Tall Gods taught to Reared in a Mountain in their divine home. The young men danced, they swallowed the arrows and shouted in triumph; these were the very acts of the gods.

  Laughing Boy felt a deep sense of peace, and rejoicing over ugliness defeated. The gods danced before him, he felt the influence of their divinity. The naked youths danced with torches, they bathed in flame, they leapt through and through the fire. He had been bathed in flame, he had been through a fire.