by David Treuer
Schiller, without dismounting, surveyed the damage, and said, “My own eyes show me the truth of your words and I will do everything in my power to make it right with the Agent.”
As for Schiller’s assistant, he said nothing, but he stared at Bimaadiz and his eyes bulged from their sockets. He seemed a different man entirely from the one he served. He had a dark beard and wore a long black coat that made him look like a priest. His name was Charles Luce. He would not stop staring at Bimaadiz.
Schiller told Jiigibiig, Zhookaagiizhigookwe, and Bimaadiz to clean up the garden as best they could. They had time. The Governor, Agent, and the other Chiefs were delayed at Crow Wing and wouldn’t be at the village until the day after the next.
“One thing, before I leave: I enjoy the hunt very much and as we will have many people here we need to provide some meat for them. Where is the hunting good around here? Where does the game hide?”
Jiigibiig was grateful. Schiller seemed like a good reasonable man.
“Bimaadiz can show you where to hunt—he’s the best hunter in all the area. He’s needed in the garden today, but tomorrow, early, he can go with you and show you hunting the likes of which you’ve never seen before.”
“That sounds reasonable. I think, though, I will hunt for the day today and if I don’t have any luck I will go out with your Bimaadiz tomorrow.”
Charles Luce, who still hadn’t said a word, finally spoke. Without taking his eyes off Bimaadiz, he said he would stay behind and oversee the repairs to the garden. Schiller agreed and left, anxious to hunt new territory. Jiigibiig and Zhookaagiizhigookwe took their leave, too. They needed to finish working some hides and dying porcupine quills—necessary decorations for Bimaadiz’s wedding outfit.
Bimaadiz sighed and began trying to fix the garden. He staked the broken corn stalks upright as best he could and set the trellises straight. He was committed to the work but was afraid that he was being rude to Charles Luce. He looked up and was surprised to see that Luce had tied his horse to the big elm and was walking toward him—the sand and dirt sticking to his black riding boots. Bimaadiz continued his work and Luce worked beside him. It was clear that Luce was unused to such manual labor. He was awkward on the uneven ground, his fingers fumbled with the trellises and with the knotted wiigoob that held the corn to the stakes. Bimaadiz thought it strange that such a man would work side by side with an Indian.
After a while Luce began to speak fluently in the language.
“You must be the pride of the village,” he said. “You are so strong and nimble and don’t mind honest work.” He paused and then, still looking at Bimaadiz strangely, he said, “But your hair is a mess. It looks as though you’ve been on the trail for days!”
It was true, Bimaadiz’s hair did look a little wild. With the excitement of the damage to the garden and the need to fix it as soon as possible, Bimaadiz had not had time to slick it down that morning. And it had collected dust, dirt, and twigs. When Bimaadiz stopped and combed it with his fingers, not wanting to contradict an important man like Luce, the assistant stopped working, too, and stared at Bimaadiz’s neck, his shoulders, and his lean torso.
“You are very strong,” Luce continued in the language. “You must live an active life.”
Bimaadiz didn’t know what to say. He felt that Luce was eating him up with his eyes. Bimaadiz resumed working and Luce returned to Bimaadiz’s side. He was so close it wasn’t long before their shoulders were touching.
“Perhaps when we’re done,” said Luce without looking at Bimaadiz, “you can show me where we can wash off the dust and dirt.”
Bimaadiz looked up and then out at the lake. “There is water everywhere and you can wash where you please. The lake is just there, though that’s where everyone collects water.”
“I want you to show me,” said Luce. “and perhaps you should bathe, too. You’re even dirtier than I am.”
Bimaadiz shrugged. Luce was strange—getting so close, saying those kinds of things, staring. And what’s more, it was clear that Luce was embarrassed somehow but that he couldn’t help himself; he couldn’t stop himself from saying these things, from sidling up close to Bimaadiz. He shuddered and blushed and acted like a deer full of ticks, rubbing itself and panting heavily. Bimaadiz returned to the work, sorting through the pumpkins and squash that hadn’t been broken. Luce was right there beside him, and he spoke in a low voice almost directly in Bimaadiz’s ear.
“We could be friends,” he suggested. “Men can be friends just like men and women are friends.”
And Bimaadiz finally understood what Luce was after. He stood straight and as sternly as he could he said, “I am supposed to be married in two days’ time and so I am not interested in making friends. I don’t have the time, and besides, I don’t want that kind of friendship with anyone.”
Luce trembled even more and stuttered. “I understand, I understand completely. I am sorry for bothering you. This is a busy time for you to be sure.” With that, he walked away unsteadily, tripping over the furrows, to where his horse was tethered to the ash tree and led it away toward the trading post without looking back.
Bimaadiz finished with the garden. It looked much better, though not as good as before it was wrecked. He went to his parents’ shack to clean up and help them finish his wedding clothes. It had been a strange day, marked by many different emotions and Bimaadiz, completely exhausted, was glad it was over.
4. The next morning, having heard that Schiller hadn’t managed to find any game, Bimaadiz sought him out and offered to take him into the woods in order to make sure he had the kind of hunt he wanted. Bimaadiz was trying to win favor, and besides, he knew that with all the visitors they would need to have a lot of meat. Luce was there when Bimaadiz approached Schiller, but he barely acknowledged Bimaadiz’s presence and said he could not go hunting as he had to prepare some of the documents pertaining to the upcoming negotiations. So Schiller and Bimaadiz set out together.
Bimaadiz walked alongside Schiller who was once again on horseback. Schiller asked him about the game—numbers and species—and was impressed with Bimaadiz’s knowledge. Schiller broadened his inquiries to include questions about trapping, the rice harvest, and a host of other things. Bimaadiz proved to be thoughtful, well informed, and uncommonly wise for someone his age and race.
Soon they reached the place Bimaadiz had selected—it was a ways past the mill and was ideal for a two-man hunt. There was a large swamp in the middle of which an island of sorts stood that was connected to the surrounding high ground by a thin neck of land. The island had been logged a few years previously and was covered in browse—small poplar and hazelbrush—which provided good food and cover for the deer. It was an especially good spot because most of the other food sources available to the deer—grass, mushrooms, clover, flowers—had been eaten up. Bimaadiz knew that the deer would be sleeping there during the day and eating there at night. They always stayed close to their food at that time of year. He also knew that the deer would not cross the deep boggy swamp and if startled or scared would flush across the narrow strip of solid ground that connected the island to the mainland.
Bimaadiz told Schiller to hide on one side of the neck and that he would cross the bog and push the deer off the island toward him. Schiller saw the wisdom of this and agreed. He got into position and Bimaadiz went around and began to cross the swamp in just his pants with the rifle slung over his shoulder.
It took him some time to cross the swamp quietly. Once he reached solid ground he put his shirt back on and unslung the Winchester. He checked to make sure the tube was full and that there was a shell in the chamber and he cocked the hammer halfway back. Then he began his hunt. He stalked quietly. He wanted to push the deer out but he didn’t want them to run because for all he knew Schiller was a terrible shot and wouldn’t be able to hit a deer bounding through the brush. It wasn’t long before he saw a small buck still i
n velvet curled under the drooping arms of a spruce. Bimaadiz took aim and fired. The buck’s head slumped. It was dead. Bimaadiz kept walking and in a few minutes he heard Schiller shoot. Once, twice, three times. Suddenly deer were running everywhere. Bimaadiz saw two yearlings bounding to his left. He shot the one in front and when the other stopped in confusion he dropped that one, too.
Bimaadiz heard more shots from Schiller, but he paid little attention. Deer jumped this way and that and no matter how poor a shot he had, no matter which way they ran or how thick the growth, Bimaadiz was rich in luck; every time he shot, a deer went down. He didn’t have time to reload, and by the time he reached Schiller the Winchester was empty.
Schiller was flushed and excited. He eagerly pointed to where three deer had fallen, and he was clearly proud of his work.
“I’ve never had such shooting,” he confessed. “I shot ten times and got three. How about you?” he asked. “I heard seven shots.”
“All my shots went true,” said Bimaadiz, as humbly as he could.
“I don’t believe it,” said Schiller.
Bimaadiz shrugged. “It wouldn’t pay to lie about it,” he said. “You’ll see for yourself in a few minutes.” With that, he leaned the Winchester against a tree and gutted Schiller’s deer for him in the blink of an eye. Once he was done he and Schiller walked back and one by one, Bimaadiz gutted his deer while Schiller smoked his short pipe and uttered praise, amazed at Bimaadiz’s skill.
They decided to fetch some young men and a wagon to load up and haul the deer back to the village. The shooting had only taken minutes but gutting, dragging, and loading the deer made for a long day’s work, and it was evening by the time all ten deer were hanging from a pole suspended from two trees to the side of the garden. Bimaadiz went to bed pleased but nervous. He knew Schiller admired him, but the next day the Governor, Agent, and delegation of Chiefs would arrive. He hadn’t seen Eta in days and he wouldn’t be allowed to see her until the wedding took place the next day or the day after. So, seeded with hope and watered with fear, Bimaadiz tried to sleep.
5. The next morning was both beautiful and quiet. A few clouds hung motionless in the sky and were so white, so perfectly formed, were so much the ideal of what scattered clouds should be, they made the blue sky in which they were suspended seem a deeper, more perfect blue—serene, infinite, and steady. The temperature had dropped overnight, and a thick casing of dew hung over everything. The trees and grass sparkled with it, and one’s every step released drops of moisture on the ground. A very slight, very cool wind meandered through the village making the flowers and clothes strung out on lines wave gently but silently in the silvery hush. The village itself had never looked so beautiful. All the cabins and lodges were in perfect shape and were snugged with elm bark and cattail screens. Great piles of straw and hay sat ready in the corrals. The official buildings—the small church, trading post, Agency office, and mill—were whitewashed and looked newly made. Young boys, unable or not allowed to sleep much past dawn, cut cedar boughs and stowed them in water-filled barrels lined up along the road, and as a group they slapped and flung them up and down the road to soothe the dust that was sure to rise later. The smell of cooking fires wafted down the trails to settle over the lake where it was gently pulled away from shore.
This beautiful calm lasted until noon. The people of the village kept close to their lodges and cabins. They were dressed in their finest clothes, weighted with beaded vests and bandolier bags, with quilled yokes and new moccasins. Some had sewn standards that designated their clan and had planted them next to the doors of their lodges or cabins—invitations for clan relatives from distant villages to stay with them during the negotiations.
At noon some of the boys from the village who had been sent to camp along the road the night before and who were sure to become runners someday raced back breathlessly into the village and shouted the news that the delegates would be riding in within a half hour. The people left their lodges and strolled down to the roadside to wait and the young boys once again lifted their dripping cedar boughs and beat the road dust down.
Soon, from around the bend, the villagers heard the jingle of harnesses and the clopping of hooves. Boys ran out and back shouting out the progress of the column the way whiskeyjacks flit back and forth between timber camps.
Finally, after much anticipation, the front delegation rode into view.
At the head of the procession rode the Governor, the Agent, the Priest, and the Colonel in charge of the cavalry garrison to the south. They all rode huge chargers, (except for the Priest who sat astride a small mare), tall and wide, whose coats glowed and whose muscles rippled under their skins. Their saddles were well-oiled saddles of the military type. And their clothes were free of lint and dust, the gold buttons of their tunics were polished, and all in all everything looked like it was freshly made so free were they from the dirt and wear of travel. They rode slowly, four abreast, and everything about them communicated the obvious power of their stations. Behind them rode a small contingent of cavalry officers on smaller, more agile, but no less impressive quarter horses. They were men who had seen a lot of action, and they rode straight in their saddles and did not look to either side at the villagers who lined the road.
This advance guard and the officials under their protection passed into the village, and some of the boys leapt into the road and guided them under the towering beech tree next to the garden where the village Chiefs stood waiting wrapped in treaty blankets and holding war pipes with long stems. The advance guard dismounted and began greeting the Chiefs while their horses were led by the boys to the large corral.
Meanwhile the Chiefs and war leaders from other bands and tribes were arriving. These were the people the villagers had really been waiting for. Everyone knew that the government and the army would define the future, and though they had arrived first, the future, as it were, was not there yet. The other bands and tribes—some of them longtime enemies—however, represented the real force and the real power the villagers had to contend with now. They controlled the portages, trade, travel, and most other aspects of daily life. Some of them were relatives. Some of them were enemies. Some were known and others were strangers. All of them excited keen interest in the onlookers.
They came in loose groups, unlike the regimental order of the cavalry. There were groups of local Chiefs who sauntered into the village on small horses and who sat astride their mounts casually. Some of them chatted amongst themselves while others smoked silently—looking down the actual and the symbolic road in front of them. Some of these Chiefs, all from allied bands of the same tribe as the villagers, nodded to villagers they knew, acknowledging blood or clan relations. They wore beaded vests edged with red piping, wool sashes, and elaborate bandolier bags. They had on black wool trousers with beaded drops and wore their best moccasins. The floral designs of their regalia and their easy manners made it seem like the forest had sent out its most beautiful fruit; a forest of flowers and vines had awakened and descended into town. A few of them wore treaty medals and one of them, the oldest of them all, sat on a travois wrapped in blankets. Bagonegiizhig was his name and he was sitting on the travois, facing the way they had come, wrapped in a blanket with only his head and arm sticking out. He was so old that he had shrunk to the size of a child, and he blinked sleepily in the travois. But no one, especially his enemies, were in doubt about how sharp his mind was or about the power of his speech. It was said that he had persuaded death to leave him alone and that he was over one hundred and twenty-five years old.
Behind this group walked representatives from bands that, technically, were related by language and custom to that of the villagers. But they lived far to the north, surrounded by water on little islands in remote tributaries to the big lake where no one ever visited. They were so isolated that they were unused to speaking to outsiders and knew no languages but their own. They had strange gestures, spoke a strang
e dialect, and were said to be fearsome medicine men. The villagers were careful not to look them in the eye.
Last in line were the Naadaweg. Some walked, having reached Crow Wing by canoe, and others from farther west rode small mustangs. They were quick people. All of them were tall and lean, and all of them were beautiful to look at. They were the traditional enemies of the villagers, and they had warred against one another for as long as anyone could remember. The band of marauders that had crossed the river the winter before and had captured Bimaadiz belonged to this group. The escalation in hostilities between the Naadaweg and the villagers was what had led to the negotiations in the first place. They all wore breeches of buckskin and bone breastplates. The stocks of their rifles were studded with brass tacks as were their pipestems. Their long hair was wrapped in quilled sheaths and many had pierced ears and noses. They looked both stern and magnificent as they sauntered into the village.
Behind the Chiefs and warriors came the baggage—gifts of furs, flour, pipestone, axes, hides, dried meat, and more—piled on travois pulled by small ponies. With the baggage were younger warriors, not yet proven in battle, and the wives and daughters of the most important Chiefs.
It took quite some time for the dignitaries to assemble under the basswood tree and for the horses to be led away. The less important people—children and wives, and young warriors—began to make camp in a large clearing next to the corral, west of the village. It was not until late afternoon that everything was ready and the proceedings could begin.
6. The Governor and the Agent made good speeches that were translated into the other languages by the interpreters. The village Chiefs made their own speeches welcoming the visitors to their home. Pipes were lit and smoked slowly, and then the feast began. There were great bowls of rice and platters of walleye cheeks, soup of boiled whitefish, and roasted squash. Whole hindquarters of deer were roasted on spits, and they dripped with fat when sliced and served. All of the wealth of the village was on display—the roast was salted and heaps of maple candy were passed around.