by Max Brand
At that, something stabbed him in the arm. He caught at the wounded place with his left hand, and that hand closed over something cold as the water itself, and slimy as the mud, and wriggling.
A beat of the other hand and a thrust of his feet against the bottom carried him to the surface, and as he reached it, he saw his right hand had gripped a big water snake just below the head!
Its eyes glittered terribly at Thunder Moon, and its lithe body lashed the surface of the little lake into foam.
There were two kinds of those snakes, as Thunder Moon had heard. From the touch of one of them, strong men sickened and died. The bite of the other was less dangerous than the bite of a dog.
But which kind had stung him and was now held by him, he could not dream. His terror paralyzed him; actually greater than his dread of the snake was his fear lest terror itself should force him to release the viper and let it sting him again.
He struck out for the shore, swimming with all his might with the snake thrust out before him at the end of a stiffened arm. Across his face the horrible, whiplike body of the snake slashed. It curled around the arm which held it, but still Thunder Moon did not let go.
And if he could master the creature with the might of his hands, would he not master the poison which might be in it, also?
He stood dripping on the shore, at last. Then he was amazed at the prodigious length and thickness of the creature. If he had grasped it in any other place, he could not have spanned its body. Only here behind the head, the neck was shaped small and fitted his hand. But yes, how huge it was, and still he held it safely, thrust far from his body, and it yawned its vast, ugly mouth in vain, and it thrust its tongue in and out, and displayed the curved and ominous fangs with which it was armed.
Suddenly it came to Thunder Moon that this was an exploit of which even one of the braves might be proud; far more, one of the young men of the tribe. And he, a boy, had done it! He had heard his father say that there was a great grip in his hand, and now here was the proof of it!
He smashed the head of the serpent on a rock and then measured it, with the greatest care, in length and circumference. Better still to take home the skin as a proof.
He paused, for he felt that after all they would not believe what he said, even though he should be able to show them the punctures in his wrist — unless those punctures showed the poison soon!
He looked at them curiously. There was a little run of blood from each of them, but otherwise they were of no importance. There was very little pain. And he felt another pang of wonder.
How was it that he was not sitting cross-legged on the bank, rocking himself to and fro, and howling with fear?
Thunder Moon blushed more deeply than any true Indian could have done. He had been ashamed before, but never like this. For now it was as though he had been suddenly divided from himself. On the one hand was the weak creature which had stumbled through life, worsted by every circumstance. On the other hand there was a brand-new self which had been bitten in the depths of the lake and had grappled with a great snake and carried it safely to the shore and destroyed it.
His eye fell to the serpent and measured it again from the tip of the head to the slenderly fashioned tip of the tail. Truly, it was a comforting thought to him!
But, in the meantime, there was another peril before him. Had not someone told him, that where there was one snake there was sure to be a second? The male and the female lived in pairs, and if one were killed the second would come to seek revenge!
He even thought that he saw a slender shadow glance through the water, and the glimmer of a pair of eyes watching him and waiting for him, when he should swim back to regain the bank on which he had left his bow.
He stepped back suddenly to the edge of the water.
“I have discovered a new self with no fear in me!” said Thunder Moon. “It is the gift of the Sky People!”
He caught up the limp, dead body of the snake and raised it to the heavens.
“I offer it to you in token of my thanks, Sky People,” said Thunder Moon. “My knife shall not touch it. I shall not boast of it to the men of the tribe. I shall not even tell my father. Because it is my gift to you, and you and I alone shall know about it!”
Now when he had said that, the last shadow of fear left him. He looked with a calm eye upon the waters before him, and he knew that the Sky People had indeed looked down upon him and heard his voice!
Chapter Five
AS A MATTER of fact, he was acting very much as an Indian boy might have acted under the same circumstances, except that there was in Thunder Moon a sensitiveness of soul such as few Indian boys ever possessed. He opened his heart at a stroke, and a vast confidence in his destiny flowed in upon him.
Then he dived from the shore, hardly thinking of what he did, but behold! The water curled around his toes with hardly a ripple, and he felt his body gliding smoothly through the lake. Joy flamed into the soul of Thunder Moon; this was no little thing to him; there was no one to tell him that we often do things better when we relax confidently; to him this was an open and manifest proof that the spirits which rule man had entered him and were giving him strength and skill.
He skimmed up to the surface again. The danger of a second snake in these waters was not even in his mind. He was occupied with his swimming, and certainly he had never swum so joyously and well. He reached the bank. He leaped up to his full height, brown body flashing in the sun, and his war whoop rang across the plain.
All things were suddenly possible.
He gripped the bow which he had left on the bank. He drew it back to his very ear with no effort. He sent the blunt-headed arrow at the trunk of a tree, and the arrow stood quivering and humming in the very center of that target!
Thunder Moon was only thirteen. That should be remembered. And at that age a boy can put on a new self like a new suit of clothes. That was exactly what he did. Not new in all respects, but new in certain ones.
For instance, he had always feared the company of his peers, but now he wanted to be seen and known by the other boys of the tribe. He wanted them to see what he could do. Above all, let Big Hard Face know that his faith had been justified!
He jogged down the bank of the stream, therefore, toward the place where he knew the other children were swimming and where, later, they would be running and wrestling on the bank. He stood upon a little hill, at last, and listened to the piping of their voices and saw the swirl of their games, and listened to the splashings of the water.
Then he walked lightly down to meet them.
They should have seen even from a distance that this was a different lad from the one they had always mocked and scorned, but the eyes of boyhood are blind, blind eyes. Now they regarded him with shrugged shoulders and with open laughter.
“Thunder Moon!”
It was a voice of command, and it came from Waiting Bear. He really should not have been playing among the boys, because, though he was only fifteen, he had already ridden in a war party, and he had counted coup upon the body of a dead Pawnee. He was a warrior, and a fit companion for the fighting men of the tribe. But he had come down here to the river bank to sun himself in the admiration of his former friends.
“Thunder Moon!” said Waiting Bear. “Give me your bow. I am going to shoot that hawk. It thinks that there are only children here, but I am going to show it that there is a brave among them!”
In fact, the hawk was floating very low in the air, with a lazy insolence. Sometimes it rested in the top of a small cottonwood on the bank of the stream, and sometimes it drifted out again in a low circle. It must have been an old and wise bird, knowing the difference between the powers of children and the powers of men. Never would it have ventured so close to the war bows of the Cheyennes.
“Do you hear me, Thunder Moon?”
“I hear you, Waiting Bear. But my bow is too strong for you to draw. You could not use it!”
In an instant, as though a danger signal had been giv
en, all the noise of the playing ceased, and there was a broad silence lying upon the river and the banks of it. Every head turned toward the two — to Thunder Moon in amazement, and toward Waiting Bear in fearful expectation.
For when a brave has been defied by a child, he must punish the latter.
Waiting Bear, however, could hardly believe his ears. Not a week before, he had cuffed this Thunder Moon upon the ear and sent him howling home to his father’s tepee.
So he called again: “Are you mad, Thunder Moon?”
“Take a little play bow, Waiting Bear,” said this strange new foster son of Big Hard Face. “Do not strain your arms uselessly with the big war bows. But I shall show you how this bow should be used!”
He put an arrow on the string and watched the hawk sailing out from the cottonwood on broad pinions.
“Sky People,” said Thunder Moon in his heart of hearts, “let them all know what strength you have given me!”
There was a little cloud floating in the center of the heavens, filled with snowy brilliance beyond the brilliance of pearls. And somehow the sight of it gave a greater assurance to Thunder Moon. Just over his head the hawk swept, and raising his bow suddenly, he pulled the shaft far back and let drive.
He made sure that it would pass harmlessly, far in front of the bird above him. But the soft flight of the sailing hawk was incredibly fast. Straight into the line of the danger it sped, then saw the slender, flying shadow and veered with a great beat of the wings.
It was too late. The arrow drove home, a tuft of feathers fluttered down. They heard the angry, terrified scream of the bird of prey which strove to wing away. But those broad pinions were half nerveless already. It staggered in the air, it descended in a ragged circle, then lost balance and tumbled over and over in the air and landed on its back with an audible thud at the very feet of Thunder Moon.
Waiting Bear, who had begun to make an angry approach toward the other, halted in astonishment, and a tingling shout of wonder rang from all the boys. They instantly hushed themselves. He who had performed that great feat was about to speak, and suddenly he had become one worth listening to.
He said in a voice which he forced into matter-of-factness: “You saw the hawk dodge, but my arrow turned also in the air and followed it. I had told it to go straight to the heart of that hawk, and you see that it was afraid to disobey me. This is something that you should learn also, Waiting Bear.”
He stopped and drew the arrow out and raised its red tip silently to the blue heavens above him. He did not speak aloud, but in his heart of hearts he said fervently: “For this, much thanks!”
Then he turned his back on the fallen hawk and went and sat down a little apart from the rest on the fallen trunk of a tree. He was trembling with joy and with pride so that he could not trust himself to mix with his fellows at once. And they, drawing together in knots, whispered and nodded eagerly for a moment. Then some of them went and drew out the best feathers of the bird which Thunder Moon had treated with such contempt, and they cut off its wings.
He did not apparently regard them, and yet in his heart he was glad, because he knew that when those wings were carried back into the camp, men would ask questions, and the story would be told, and then they would know of the thing which he had done. But as for himself, he had vowed a second time that he would not boast.
“People of the Sky,” said Thunder Moon in his heart of hearts as he sat by the river, “I am nothing. It is what you have poured into me that counts. This morning I was only a stupid and stumbling boy. I was an empty basket, but you chose to pour me full of treasures of strength and courage. Now I am strong, and I am not afraid!”
He looked back across the assemblage of the other boys who were returning to their games, and above their heads he encountered the angry glance of Waiting Bear. However, he knew that the latter would not take any direct notice of the insult which had been so openly offered to him. Later on, as time offered, Waiting Bear would strive to take the chance which might humiliate his rival.
But there was something more than anger in the glance of Waiting Bear. There was wonder, and awe, also. The old bull looks with amazement at the half-grown steer which dares to offer him battle!
“Thunder Moon! Thunder Moon!” came a sharp cry of many voices. “Enter the race. You run well!”
And they shrieked with laughter. Thunder Moon’s heart sank in him. He looked up to the blue sky, but small comfort flowed back upon his soul. To run a half mile out and a half mile back, which was the usual distance for a trial of speed, was, he felt, perfectly hopeless. He could not match himself against the lithe, lightly poised bodies of the other Cheyennes.
And yet over another and a shorter course he might win, perhaps — if the Sky People would blow him forward with their helping breath.
The voice of Waiting Bear: “Are you afraid to stand up and run? Are you afraid that I will beat you too badly, Thunder Moon?”
This was a form of challenge which he could not very well refuse. He stood up, but his heart was filled with doubt. Too often he had matched himself against even the little youngsters on the sandy banks of the river, and though he might fly away ahead of all, at first, in the end his legs grew leaden, and his chest was filled with fire, and they all brushed past him before the finish. Much he feared for the result now!
However, he could not refuse the test. He walked very slowly down toward them, gathering his dignity about him like a robe.
“Look yonder, Waiting Bear.” He pointed to a lightning-blasted willow, white as a ghost, and naked as a pole. It was a hundred paces off. “Look yonder. I shall run against you to that tree and back. Only to show you that it is easy for me to beat you. I do not care to waste my time running a long race.”
Chapter Six
THE TEETH OF Waiting Bear flashed in the intensity of his rage.
“You talk in a very loud voice,” said he. “I hear you, and I laugh. Perhaps the people in the tepees will hear you, also. But they will only smile. They are tired of laughing at Thunder Moon. However, do you really mean that you will run against me — against Waiting Bear?”
“Do you think that is wonderful?” said Thunder Moon, rejoicing inwardly. For he could see that his taunts had made the other tremble with rage and moisture had started out on his forehead. After all, it was easy to taunt, and if the Sky People chose to give him speed thereafter, it was well. But if they did not choose, at least he would have had the glory of making the new warrior, Waiting Bear, act like a peevish woman. All the eyes of the others were upon them. And the eyes of those boys would not fail to see everything. Their sympathy was already upon the side of Thunder Moon, for through many days, now, they had been suffering under the tyranny of their old playmate, Waiting Bear.
With all their hearts they wished that he might be beaten, but with all their hearts they disbelieved that he could be, for his flying feet had knocked up sand into all their faces, at one time or another.
“I think it is not wonderful, but very foolish,” said Waiting Bear. “And I should not care to run against a fool for nothing.”
“Do you wish to bet?” asked Thunder Moon seriously — for a contest on which there was betting was a serious matter indeed. It became almost as important as a feat in war.
He glanced upward. It seemed to him that the small white cloud had doubled in size and in brilliancy, and strength and assurance flowed in upon the heart of the boy suddenly.
“I will bet you the price of one of those long-legged horses which your father has given to you.”
Thunder Moon bit his lip. Of all things on earth, those horses were most dear to him. Of all things on earth, those chestnut steeds with the dashes of white on the forehead were most valued by his father, also.
“If you were to search your tepee,” said Thunder Moon calmly, “what could you find worth the price of one of my horses?”
Waiting Bear stamped in a rage. It was true that his father was not as wealthy as Thunder Moon. And he himse
lf had not yet accumulated any riches except — He gasped and his eyes distended and his voice almost choked as he cried: “I have two running horses, and—”
“Two running horses?” Thunder Moon smiled. “Why should I want them, when my own horses can carry me twice as fast as two of yours?”
“And I have a rifle in my tepee that never fails of its mark!” shouted Waiting Bear.
The whole nation knew about that rifle. For the father of Waiting Bear, mad with joy because his boy had accomplished a coup on a Pawnee at this early age, had bought for him one of the finest and newest of rifles. It was long-barreled, and yet it was light as a plaything, and it shot harder and farther than any other gun among the Cheyennes. Even such a boy as Waiting Bear became formidable with such a weapon in his hands.
Thunder Moon listened, and his heart beat with such a violence that it seemed to be tearing through his breast.
“Two horses and that gun — against one horse of mine?”
“Against only one, the tall one, with the white stockings on both forefeet.”
He had put his finger exactly upon the sore spot. It was the prize of all the herd. It was a very eagle for speed and endurance, and Thunder Moon winced in spite of himself. However, he felt that he had committed himself too far to draw back, and as for bargaining, it was like an insult to the Sky People. Only through their strength could he win, he felt sure, and if their strength was loaned to him, why need he fear to wager all the horses against the value of a feather?
“I shall accept that bet,” said he.
Waiting Bear leaped into the air and struck his hands together above him, while his yell smote the face of the swimming pool and echoed sharply back to him.
“It is mine! The great horse is mine!” he screeched. “You are all witnesses of what he has promised!”