17 Stones

by Paul Telegdi

  On the water, Boyar was calm. He had been so ready to die, but now, he too saw a slim chance. He held onto the reed bundles firmly and gingerly he moved his legs to work some space for them. The mud resisted all his efforts. Still he pulled himself up, the reeds sinking lower in the water giving him more lift. Patiently he worked at it, carefully pushing down on the reeds, pulling up with his legs. Painfully slowly, the mud yielded to his stubborn tugs, a finger width at a time to a whole hand breath. Boyar looked up and saw this strange contraption of reeds right next to him and the shaman atop reaching for him.

  Chaiko dangled the rope, then fumbling underwater looped it around the boy’s chest, awkwardly getting around the bundles the boy held onto. Then Chaiko pulled, the raft swaying under him. The more they pulled the more the mud resisted, and at times Boyar slipped back half the distance so laboriously won. Both were tiring fast. Then another raft joined them and Ushi was there, lending fresh strength to the effort. “Pull,” Chaiko called and they all worked together winning another finger width. Unbelievably the boy came out of the water, a little at a time, the determination of the men fighting the intent that lurked below. “You shall not have him!” Chaiko aimed an exulting thought at the murkiness. “You shall not have him indeed.” It still took some time to wrestle Boyar free of the muck, to pull him onto the rafts and lay him panting and retching from the spent effort. The shaman and the trader then paddled with their hands to shore, keeping the rafts close together.

  They were overrun by the boys on shore who grabbed Boyar and carried him away from the bog. They caressed him, unmindful of the foul smelling slime that still coated him.

  Chaiko collapsed on shore. Tired, exhausted, spent, the reaction swept over him. His body shook and his limbs trembled. Convulsive sobs welled up and he could not catch his breath. Why did you not think of this sooner? You could have saved the other boy. And you call yourself a shaman??!

  Ushi who knew what was troubling Chaiko, put an arm around him and tried to comfort him. “You did your best. Your very best. There was nothing else that could have been done.”

  “But there w-was… and we h-have just proven it.”

  “You did what you had to. Told us what to do. Made the hard decisions a leader must.” Then he shook the shaman harshly, his voice turning hard. “Don’t you realize what a miracle you have achieved, saving the four?”

  “I will always remember the one I lost,” Chaiko said tiredly, “though I will be greatly thankful for the ones we saved.” He looked at a smooth spot on the water, hiding so much treachery under its calm surface. A young life gone.

  The others were too busy celebrating the victory just won, to be sharing this grief. One of them ran back to camp to summon help.

  In time some men arrived, and were told of the tragedy. They supported and led the group of naked boys and men back, shielding them from curious eyes. The news of this calamity soon flashed through the camp, and tearful women rose to watch the sad procession and morose men stood in awkward silence. Someplace in camp, the anguished cry of stricken parents rent the air, and Chaiko could hear their cry all night.

  In the darkness, when he no longer had to be manly, Dawn held him, cradled his head in her lap and rocked him back and forth, humming a sad, sad melody.

  Chapter 12

  The next day Chaiko wanted to know nothing of the world, nothing of the morning sunshine, nothing of the Gathering. He felt cast down by the events of the day before, lethargic, as if he too was held by the grip of the mud. He could not reconcile himself to the loss of the red-headed boy, holding himself responsible. If he had been quicker to come up with a solution, then maybe the boy would still be alive. They should have started with him first, given him a bundle of reeds to hold him up, long enough for them to effect a rescue. No one needed to die, if he would have been quicker... He hid himself in the flar, closing the flaps tightly to shut out the rest of the world. Baer came to talk to him, but Chaiko refused to listen to him. Ushi was also unsuccessful in luring the shaman out of his retreat, or even to join him, although he tried hard to talk his way into sharing the darkness. Only Dawn was allowed in but she resisted hurrying him as she knew that he needed to find a new balance that would accept the tragedy. He needed to forgive himself.

  Chaiko was in turmoil. He would have liked to turn away, to shut his mind to all the recriminations, but remembering how the River of Rocks had closed off his life, he revisited the events of the day before with brutal, merciless honesty. He walked through it, step by step, searching for all the things they could have done. Each time, he found his thinking sluggish and his belief surrendering prematurely to the inevitable. He was a shaman! He, more than anyone, should have known that belief preceded success, yet he had given up... and let the boy slip away. There was a solution, as events proved, but he was too quick to accept what fate presented him with and only roused himself in the last moment, to resist and save the last boy. He shuddered to think how close that had been. He had almost given up there as well.

  Still, he had not been negligent or cowardly. At times, he had risked everything to save all he could. And they had rescued four of the boys. Thus he tried to balance the success against the failure, but alas, found that the failure weighed on him even more heavily. He was guilty of the death of one boy, whom he never knew but who would henceforth exist in his mind forever to caution him... to warn him, never to give up.

  Dawn came into the flar to check on him, listening to his breathing in the darkness. His breath came with a soft regularity, leading her to guess that the worst of his self-scrutiny was behind him. She matched her breathing with his and waited sympathetically. The sounds from outside had become strangely distant and unreal.

  It was later still, when the silence had swallowed up even their breathing that she spoke in soft tones, “Each day we take care but trouble still finds us. We act and react, and do what we must with whatever aid we have at hand. Sometimes we win and sometimes we lose and we carry the memory of that into the future. Yet we can’t let the past hold the future ransom. We must let go of... failures and successes even, for the future must begin again, each time anew, with fresh hopes and aspirations...” Her words filled the quiet and the darkness, the meaning perhaps less important than the tone; calm, consoling, accepting. Then there was again just quiet.

  Chaiko started to put his life together again from a new perspective that now included the boy’s death. He still felt a sense of responsibility but the burden of guilt was gone. Enough, so he could put it aside to fill some later solitude; the present he needed for this Gathering. More than ever he needed to know about spirits and their world. If anybody would know, then these shamans here would and he could not let the opportunity slip away. Later, he would think of the death and other things. Later, he promised himself.

  He left the flar, blinking in the sunshine of the afternoon. He accepted some food from Dawn and chewed dutifully without tasting it. Ushi, seeing the shaman outside, came over to sit beside him in silence. Every once in a while he threw a sideways glance at him, measuring him. He knew him well enough to know that the other needed time to assimilate experiences, to weigh and balance things out. Chaiko sighed heavily and Ushi knew that the shaman was ready to face the world again.

  “Ushi, you did well and I thank you. We could not have saved the boys without your efforts. They owe their lives to you.”

  “Yes, I know,” Ushi said in a matter-of-fact voice, then added in a more sarcastic vein, “I am a hero.” That caught Chaiko’s attention as Ushi had intended. There are other people in the world than just you, the tone implied, not everyone is so invested in your qualms of conscience. Wake up! Do not waste your time! Chaiko marveled at how easy it was for his friend to turn his back on tragedy, just to accept things as they were and refuse the burden of them. Ushi summed it all up, “We lost one but saved four.”

  “Yes, we saved four,” Chaiko repeated woodenly, drawing the trader’s eyes on him again. “Oh, I am all right. I jus
t need to get used to things.” A silence followed before he added, “I suppose they will be burying the boy today.”

  “They did so already early this morning,” Ushi informed him. “There was no body to bury, so they buried some of his things. It was the year of his Becoming and he was learning to make baskets.” He nodded toward the other side of the fire where a fine wicker basket lay on the coverings. “The parents sent it to the shaman who tried to save their son’s life ...”

  “Yes, we tried,” Chaiko said heavily, his mouth drawn into a grim line. Again he had to wonder how much of his successes were driven by a fear of failure. Ah, well, that was another thing altogether... Then he shook himself, putting the matter from his mind, saving it to ponder on some night in the future when it wouldn’t be overwhelmed by a sense of failure. There was still a Gathering to attend to. Ushi left him thus.

  Dawn and Fire-Dancer were off to a rabbit skinning contest, if he had understood it right. In retrospect, it surprised him that Dawn showed interest in such a grisly sounding event, but then, he had been busy with his own thoughts and did not pay close attention to what she had told him. After some more consideration, he decided to search out Lefay, the shaman of the Blackfoot clan, and see what he could learn from him. The man was a little too quick to deny any special knowledge of spiritual things. How was it then that everybody else considered him to be such an expert?

  Lefay proved harder to locate than expected. Chaiko found the Blackfoot encampment without much trouble but the shaman was not there. He was judging some contest of jumping and tumbling, but on the other side of camp. That event turned out to be hard to find, and by the time he did, it was over and the people had already dispersed. One person thought that Lefay intended to attend a dancing exhibition at the Dorgays. So off Chaiko went again, at times struggling against the flow of the crowd. He found the event at last, the dancers completing elaborate figures to the heartbeat of drums. Bedecked with colorful feathers and dyed skins, outfitted with rattles of all kinds, they made a spirited display of motion merged with sound. It was a delight to the eye and a challenge for the ears to follow the ever complex rhythms. Again Chaiko did not find Lefay in the throng but stayed to watch a while, for the Dorgays took special pride in their presentation and were much sought after. When the music finally stopped and the flash of color subsided, life seemed just a little more ordinary. Chaiko resumed his search, asking here and asking there. People were eager to give him directions, any directions he suspected, after another fruitless search. He was almost ready to give up when he found Lefay eating a melon. He greeted him and sat down opposite him. Lefay looked at him searchingly, sighed then resumed eating the unripe melon. He rubbed his hand on his wrap and tossed the rind into the bushes. “How goes it with you, Standing-Rock?”

  “Not so well,” Chaiko admitted. “We lost a Blackfoot boy in quicksand.”

  “Yes, so I heard,” the other acknowledged. “A sad thing. A tragic thing. But I heard you saved four.”

  “Yes, four,” Chaiko allowed, then his tone turned purposeful. “I would like to learn more spiritual wisdom at this Gathering.”

  “Well then you have searched out the wrong man, for I am blind even to what I do not know,” Lefay said flatly, again disclaiming any knowledge and ability.

  But this time Chaiko was not going to be put off so easily. “If the sun says to the moon, I am not light, will the moon believe it?”

  Lefay laughed, pleased. “The moon might, if it is vain enough to claim all the luminescence to be his.”

  “I am vain only in my ignorance, so enlighten me.”

  “It seems you will not let an old man rest and enjoy his day. Very well then, ask your questions shaman and we will both see what comes out for answers.”

  “Tell me of spirits,” Chaiko pounced, eager now that he could finally ask.

  “I can tell you nothing for I do not understand them.”

  “Then you do not believe in spirits?” Chaiko asked, already feeling deeply let down.

  “I did not say that. I do believe in spirits, but I cannot explain them to you. Sometimes it is just a feeling. Of knowing that something else is behind the things I see or observe. But I can’t prove it even to myself, much less to anyone else. So you see, I do not know as much as you appear to hope. I am sorry to disappoint you.”

  “I do not like to depend on feelings,” Chaiko said cautiously. “Feelings have a way of misleading one.”

  “True,” Lefay nodded, “if you let your desires lead you, you might arrive at the wrong conclusion. But if you close your eyes and let your feelings lead you, you might discover something hidden to your eyes and ears.”

  Chaiko shook his head, it sounded like double-talk to him. But Lefay persisted. “To see something you must first believe what your eyes are telling you is true and there in front of you. After a while you cease even to question it, for your eyes never lie, now do they?” The man’s eyes glowed with pleasure. “It’s the same way with your feelings. You have to believe you feel what you feel to become aware of it. It’s a matter of training, I guess, and sometimes too much thinking just gets in the way.” Chaiko made a face that spurred Lefay on. “How do you explain color to a man who is blind from birth? How do you explain sound to the deaf? Perhaps by intuition.”

  Chaiko again shook his head but Lefay was quick to reassure him. “Ah, you are not yet ready to try your feelings, but keep my words in mind when you do.”

  “What did Bogan say about spirits?” Chaiko searched for something more solid.

  “I did not hear him talk about spirits in the same sense. He talked of the spirit of men, but as some inner, driving quality. He talked about the spirit of animals the same way, as some inner depth. And even of trees and rocks. All things having energy, a purpose and a destiny. But I think he held that man had more control over it than the rest... But now you ask too much of me, you would do better to ask Tomakon, he knows more stories about the man than I.”

  “Well then tell me one that you do know.”

  “This teaching he gave me long ago and I have locked it in my memory. Today I pass it onto you.” Lefay closed his eyes and collected himself. “A man lived in a cave with a great hunter and he ate well for there was always meat to be had. And the man repeated to himself each day, ‘Why should I hunt when there is one so much better than me, I would just get in his way?’ And he did not hunt but ate his fill. Then one day the great hunter died, and soon after so did the man for he had forgotten to hunt, forgotten how to feed himself.” Lefay opened his eyes and they shined with a strange brilliance.

  “What does this teaching mean?” Chaiko asked. But instead of answering Lefay closed his eyes again and continued.

  “A man lived in a cave with a very wise man who answered all of the questions people asked him. Grateful, the people brought him gifts of food, furs and many comforts. And the man who lived with him told himself, ‘What need do I have to learn, for there is so much wisdom here, no one will ask me any questions.’ And he too ate his fill. Then one day the wise man died and the man soon after, of ignorance. He had refused to learn.” Lefay stayed quiet, listening with his eyes closed.

  Chaiko waited a good while in the hope that the man would explain the teachings, but Lefay did not. Instead he smiled and asked self-satisfied, “Were those not great teachings?”

  “Perhaps they could be if you would care to explain them,” Chaiko returned and would have been vexed but he was familiar with the teaching technique. How often had he likewise challenged his pupils to find their own answers? The wily old fox was baiting him, in a manner of speaking. It seemed unlikely that Lefay would volunteer anymore, so Chaiko rose and excused himself, thanking the shaman for his time.

  “Anytime, anytime,” Lefay mumbled back, sniffing at another melon, hoping this one would be ripe.

  Chaiko sought and found Tomakon under his favorite tree, sprawled on some furs dozing in the late afternoon sun. Chaiko stood over him blocking the warm rays until t
he man became aware of him.

  “Lo, it’s you,” he said less than articulately as he pulled himself erect. “Na, sit then. Don’t make me break my neck staring up at you.” Chaiko sat and made himself comfortable, tucking his wooden leg under him. “What would you have of me?” the old man asked.

  “All my life I heard stories about Bogan. What he thought, what he said, and what he did. And it came to feel as if he were a member of my own family. I know him at least as well as my parents.” Chaiko was twisting his lips with his fingers, the gesture not lost on Tomakon.

  “Most of us feel that way about him,” the old shaman said from behind his many wrinkles.

  “No doubt. Yet, the more I hear of him, the less real he sounds.” Tomakon nodded in understanding. “Tell me one of his teachings then. One he taught, not one people tell about him.”

  Tomakon nodded, his lips pursed oddly over his shrunken jaws. “This teaching he gave me as I am now giving it to you. There once lived a man in a cave with a very wise man and a great hunter. And because the man was so wise, many came to seek his advice, bringing gifts to repay his wisdom. And because the man was a great hunter there was never a lack of meat by his fire. And the man with him asked himself, “Why would I hunt and what would I need to learn, when there is one so much better than me, who will always surpass me in all the things I would try? So I will eat my fill and I will enjoy the finest of things. So it was for many years. Then one day the great man died. And the man who had lived with him, died soon thereafter. I think he died of ignorance first then of hunger.” Tomakon then stopped speaking and looked satisfied with himself.

  “Would you care to explain it?” Chaiko asked, a frown on his face.

  “The teaching is in the story itself; tell it to yourself until it becomes clear. So it was given to me. I will be pleased to hear what you make of it.”