The Prairie, Volume 2

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The Prairie, Volume 2 Page 15

by James Fenimore Cooper


  “No,” replied the supplicant; “it is not the voice of Tachechana that you hear, but this boy, speaking with the tongue of his mother. He is the son of a chief and his words will go up to his father’s ears. Listen to what he says. When was Mahtoree hungry and Tachechana had not food for him? When did he go on the path of the Pawnees and find it empty, that my mother did not weep? When did he come back with the marks of their blows, that she did not sing? What Sioux girl has given a brave a son like me? Look at me well, that you may know me. My eyes are the eagle’s. I look at the sun and laugh. In a little time the Dahcotahs will follow me to the hunts and on the war-path. Why does my father turn his eyes from the woman that gives me milk? Why has he so soon forgotten the daughter of a mighty Sioux?”

  There was a single instant, as the exulting father suffered his cold eye to wander to the face of the laughing boy, that the stern nature of the Teton seemed touched. But shaking off the grateful sentiment, like one who would gladly be rid of any painful, because reproachful, emotion, he laid his hand calmly on the arm of his wife, and led her directly in front of Inez. Pointing to the sweet countenance that was beaming on her own, with a look of tenderness and commiseration, he paused, to allow his wife to contemplate a loveliness, which was quite as excellent to her ingenuous mind as it had proved dangerous to the character of her faithless husband. When he thought abundant time had passed to make the contrast sufficiently striking, he suddenly raised a small mirror, that dangled at her breast, an ornament he had himself bestowed in an hour of fondness as a compliment to her beauty, and placed her own dark image in its place. Wrapping his robe again about him, the Teton motioned to the trapper to follow, and stalked haughtily from the lodge, muttering, as he went--

  “Mahtoree is very wise! What nation has so great a chief as the Dahcotahs?”

  Tachechana stood for a minute, as if frozen into a statue of humility. Her mild and usually joyous countenance worked, as though the struggle within was about to dissolve the connexion between her soul and that more material part whose deformity was becoming so loathsome. Inez and Ellen were utterly ignorant of the nature of her interview with her husband, though the quick and sharpened wits of the latter led her to suspect a truth, to which the entire innocence of the former furnished no clue. They were both, however, about to tender those sympathies, which are so natural to, and so graceful in the sex, when their necessity seemed suddenly to cease. The convulsions in the features of the young Sioux disappeared, and her countenance became cold and rigid, like chiselled stone. A single expression of subdued anguish, which had made its impression on a brow that had rarely before contracted with sorrow, alone remained. It was never removed, in all the changes of seasons, fortunes, and years, which, in the vicissitudes of a suffering, female, savage life, she was subsequently doomed to endure. As in the case of a premature blight, let the plant quicken and revive as it may, the effects of that withering touch were always present.

  Tachechana first stripped her person of every vestige of those rude but highly prized ornaments, which the liberality of her husband had been wont to lavish on her, and she tendered them meekly, and without a murmur, as an offering to the superiority of Inez. The bracelets were forced from her wrists, the complicated mazes of beads from her leggings, and the broad silver band from her brow. Then she paused, long and painfully. But it would seem, that the resolution, she had once adopted, was not to be conquered by the lingering emotions of any affection, however natural. The boy himself was next laid at the feet of her supposed rival, and well might the self abased wife of the Teton believe that the burden of her sacrifice was now full.

  While Inez and Ellen stood regarding these several strange movements with eyes of wonder, a low soft musical voice was heard saying in a language, that to them was unintelligible--

  “A strange tongue will tell my boy the manner to become a man. He will hear sounds that are new, but he will learn them, and forget the voice of his mother. It is the will of the Wahcondah, and a Sioux girl should not complain. Speak to him softly, for his ears are very little; when he is big, your words may be louder. Let him not be a girl, for very sad is the life of a woman. Teach him to keep his eyes on the men. Show him how to strike them that do him wrong, and let him never forget to return blow for blow. When he goes to hunt, the flower of the Pale-faces,” she concluded, using in bitterness the metaphor which had been supplied by the imagination of her truant husband, “will whisper softly in his ears that the skin of his mother was red, and that she was once the Fawn of the Dahcotahs.”

  Tachechana pressed a kiss on the lips of her son, and then withdrew to the farther side of the lodge. Here she drew her light calico robe over her head, and took her seat, in token of her humility, on the naked earth. All the efforts of her companions, to attract her attention, were fruitless. She neither heard their remonstrances, nor felt their gentle touch. Once or twice her voice rose, in a sort of wailing song, from beneath her quivering mantle, but it never mounted into the full wildness of savage music. In this manner she remained unseen for hours, while events were occurring without the lodge, which not only materially changed the complexion of her own fortunes, but left a lasting and deep impression on the future movements of the wandering Sioux tribe.

  CHAPTER X.

  “I’ll no swaggerers: I am in good name and fame with the very best:--Shut the door;--There come no swaggerers here: I have not lived all this while, to have swaggering now:--shut the door I pray you.”

  Shakspeare Mahtoree encountered, at the door of his lodge, the persons of Ishmael, Abiram, and Esther. The first glance of his eye, at the earnest and threatening countenance of the heavy-moulded squatter, served to tell the cunning Teton, that the treacherous truce he had made, with these dupes of his superior sagacity, was in some danger of a violent termination.

  “Look you here, old gray-beard,” said Ishmael, seizing the trapper, and whirling him round as though he had been a toy; “that I’m tired of carrying on a discourse with fingers and thumbs, instead of a tongue, ar’ a natural fact; so you’ll play linguister and put my words into up-and-down Indian, without much caring whether they suit the stomach of a Red-skin or not.”

  “Say on, friend,” calmly returned the trapper; “they shall be given as plainly as you send them.”

  “Friend!” repeated the squatter, eyeing the other for an instant, with an expression of an indefinable meaning. “But it is no more than a word, and sounds break no bones and survey no farms. Tell this thieving Sioux, then, that I come to claim the conditions of our solemn bargain, made at the foot of the rock.”

  When the trapper had rendered his meaning into the Sioux language, Mahtoree demanded, with an air of surprise--

  “Is my brother cold? buffaloe skins are plenty. Is he hungry? Let my young men carry venison into his lodges.”

  The squatter elevated his clenched fist in a menacing manner, and struck it with violence on the palm of his open hand, by way of confirming his determination as he answered--

  “Tell the deceitful liar, I have not come like a beggar to pick his bones, but like a freeman asking for his own; and have it I will. And, moreover, tell him I claim that you, too, miserable sinner as you ar’, should be given up to justice. There’s no mistake. My prisoner, my niece, and you. I demand the three at his hands, according to a sworn agreement.”

  The immoveable old man smiled, with an expression of singular intelligence, as he answered--

  “Friend squatter, you ask what few men would be willing to grant. You would first cut the tongue from the mouth of the Teton, and then the heart from his bosom.”

  “It is little that Ishmael Bush regards who or what is damaged in claiming his own. But put you the questions in straight-going Indian, and when you speak of yourself, make such a sign as a white man will understand, in order that I may know there is no foul play.”

  The trapper laughed in his silent fashion, and muttered a few words to himself before he addressed the chief--

  “Let the
Dahcotah open his ears very wide,” he then said, “that big words may have room to enter. His friend the Big-knife comes with an empty hand, and he says that the Teton must fill it.”

  “Wagh! Mahtoree is a rich chief. He is master of the prairies.”

  “He must give the dark-hair.”

  The brow of the chief contracted in an ominous frown, that threatened instant destruction to the audacious squatter, but as suddenly recollecting his policy, he craftily replied with a treacherous smile--

  “A girl is too light for the hand of such a brave. I will fill it with buffaloes.”

  “He says he has need of the light-hair too; who has his blood in her veins.”

  “She shall be the wife of Mahtoree; then the Long-knife will be the father of a chief.”

  “And me,” continued the trapper making one of those expressive signs, by which the natives communicate with nearly the same facility as with their tongues, and turning to the squatter at the same time, in order that the latter might see he dealt fairly by him; “he asks for a miserable and worn out trapper.”

  The Dahcotah threw his arm over the shoulder of the old man, with an air of great affection, before he replied to this third and last demand.

  “My friend is old,” he said, “and cannot travel far. He will stay with the Tetons, that they may learn wisdom from his words. What Sioux has a tongue like my father! No, let his words be very soft, but let them be very clear. Mahtoree will give skins and buffaloes. He will give the young men of the Pale-faces wives, but he cannot give away any who live in his own lodge.”

  Perfectly satisfied, himself, with this laconic reply, the chief was moving towards his expecting counsellors, when suddenly returning he interrupted the translation of the trapper by adding--

  “Tell the Great Buffaloe” (a name by which the Tetons had already christened Ishmael,) “that Mahtoree has a hand which is always open. See,” he added, pointing to the hard and wrinkled visage of the attentive Esther, “his wife is too old, for so great a chief. Let him put her out of his lodge. Mahtoree loves him as a brother. He is his brother. He shall have the youngest wife of the Teton. Tachechana, the pride of the Sioux girls, shall cook his venison, and many braves will look at him with longing minds. Go, a Dahcotah is generous.”

  The singular coolness, with which the Teton concluded this audacious proposal, confounded even the practised trapper. He stared after the retiring form of the Indian, with an astonishment he did not care to conceal, nor did he renew his attempt at interpretation, until the person of Mahtoree was blended with the cluster of warriors who had so long, and with so characteristic a patience, awaited his return.

  “The Teton chief has spoken very plainly,” the old man then continued; “he will not give you the lady, to whom the Lord in Heaven knows you have no claim, unless it be such as the wolf has to the lamb. He will not give you the child, you call your niece; and therein I acknowledge that I am far from certain he has the same justice on his side. Moreover, neighbour squatter, he flatly denies your demand for me, miserable and worthless as I am; nor do I think he has been unwise in so doing seeing that I should have many particular reasons against journeying far in your company. But he makes you an offer, which it is right and convenient you should know. The Teton says through me, who am no more than a mouth-piece, and therein not answerable for the sin of his words, but he says, as this good woman is getting past the comely age, it is reasonable for you to tire of such a wife. He therefore tells you to turn her out of your lodge, and when it is empty he will send his own favourite, or rather she that was his favourite, the “Skipping Fawn,” as the Siouxes call her, to fill her place. You see, neighbour, though the Red-skin is so minded as to keep your property, he is willing to give you wherewithal to make yourself some return!”

  Ishmael listened to these replies to his several demands with that species of gathering indignation, with which the dullest tempers mount into the most violent paroxysms of rage. He even affected to laugh at the conceit of exchanging his long-tried Esther for the more flexible support of the youthful Tachechana, though his voice was hollow and unnatural in the effort. But Esther was far from giving the proposal so facetious a reception. Lifting her voice to its peculiarly audible key, she broke forth, after catching her breath like one who had been in some imminent danger of strangulation, as follows--

  “Hoity-toity; who set an Indian up for a maker and breaker of the rights of wedded wives! Does he think a woman is a beast of the prairie, that she is to be chased from a village by dog and gun. Let the bravest squaw of them all come forth and boast of her doings; can she show such a brood as mine. A wicked tyrant is that thieving Red-skin, and a bold rogue I warrant me. He would be captain in-doors as well as out! An honest woman is no better in his eyes than one of your broomstick jumpers. And you, Ishmael Bush, the father of seven sons and so many comely daughters, to open your sinful mouth, except to curse him! Would ye disgrace colour, and family, and nation, by mixing white blood with red, and would ye be the parent of a race of mules! The devil has often tempted you, my man, but never before has he set so cunning a snare as this. Go back among your children, friend; go, and remember that you are not a prowling bear, but a Christian man, and thank God that you ar’ a lawful husband!”

  The clamour of Esther was anticipated by the judicious trapper. He had easily foreseen that her meek temper would overflow at so scandalous a proposal as repudiation, and he now profited by the tempest, to retire to a place where he was at least safe from any immediate violence on the part of her less excited, but certainly more dangerous husband. Ishmael, who had made his demands with a stout determination to enforce them, was diverted by the windy torrent, like many a more obstinate husband, from his purpose, and in order to appease a jealousy, that resembled the fury with which the bear defends her cubs, was fain to retire to a distance from the lodge, that was known to contain the unoffending object of the sudden uproar.

  “Let your copper-coloured minx come forth, and shew her tawney beauty before the face of a woman who has heard more than one church bell, and seen a power of real quality,” cried Esther, flourishing her hand in triumph, as she drove Ishmael and Abiram before her, like two truant boys, towards their own encampment. “I warrant me, I warrant me, here is one who would shortly talk her down! Never think to tarry here, my men; never think to shut an eye in a camp, through which the devil walks as openly as if he were a gentleman, and was sure of his welcome. Here, you Abner, Enoch, Jesse, where ar’ ye gotten to. Put to, put to; if that weak-minded, soft-feeling man, your father, eats or drinks again in this neighbourhood, we shall see him poisoned with the craft of the Red-skins. Not that I care, I, who comes into my place, when it is once lawfully empty, but, Ishmael, I never thought that you, who have had one woman with a white skin, would find pleasure in looking on a brazen--ay, that she is copper ar’ a fact; you can’t deny it, and I warrant me, brazen enough is she too!”

  Against this ebullition of wounded female pride, the experienced husband made no other head, than by an occasional exclamation, which he intended to be the precursor of a simple asseveration of his own innocence. The fury of the woman would not be appeased. She listened to nothing but her own voice, and consequently nothing was heard but her mandates to depart.

  The squatter had collected his beasts and loaded his wagons, as a measure of precaution, before proceeding to the extremity he had contemplated. Esther consequently found every thing favourable to her wishes. The young men stared at each other, as they witnessed the extraordinary excitement of their mother, but took little interest in an event which, in the course of their experience, had found so many parallels. By command of their father, the tents also were quickly thrown into the vehicles, as a sort of reprisal for the want of faith in their late ally, and then the train left the spot, in its usual listless and sluggish order.

  As a formidable division of well armed borderers protected the rear of the retiring party, the Siouxes saw it depart without manifesting the smallest ev
idence of surprise or resentment. The savage, like the tiger, rarely makes his attack on an enemy who expects him; and if the warriors of the Tetons meditated any hostility, it was in the still and patient manner with which the feline beasts watch for the incautious moment in their victims, in order to ensure the blow. The councils of Mahtoree, however, on whom so much of the policy of his people depended, lay deep in the depository of his own thoughts. Perhaps he rejoiced in so easy a manner of getting rid of claims so troublesome; perhaps he awaited a fitting time to exhibit his power; or it even might be, that matters of so much greater importance were pressing on his mind, that it had not leisure to devote any of its faculties to an event of so much indifference.

  But it would seem that while Ishmael made such a concession to the awakened feelings of Esther, he was far from so easily abandoning his original intentions. His train followed the course of the river for a mile, and then it came to a halt on the brow of the elevated land, and in a place which afforded the necessary facilities. Here he again pitched his tents, unharnessed his teams, sent his cattle on the bottom, and, in short, made all the customary preparations to pass the night, with the same coolness and deliberation as though he had not just hurled an irritating defiance into the very teeth of his dangerous neighbours.

  In the mean time the Tetons proceeded to the more regular business of the hour. A fierce and savage joy had existed in the camp, from the instant when it had been announced that their own chief was returning with the long-dreaded and hated partisan of their enemies. For many hours the crones of the tribe had been going from lodge to lodge, in order to stimulate the tempers of the warriors to such a pass as might leave but little room for the considerations of mercy. To one they spoke of a son, whose scalp was drying in the smoke of a Pawnee lodge. To another, they enumerated his own scars, his disgraces, and defeats; with a third, they dwelt on his losses of skins and horses, and a fourth was reminded of vengeance, by a significant question, concerning some flagrant adventure, in which he was known to have been a sufferer.

 

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