Full Circle

by Rosanne Bittner

  “It will be sooner than that,” Evelyn promised. She waited for Anita to leave, then looked at the reverend, who had sat down in Anita’s chair. “You can be a very callous man, Reverend Phillips.”

  The man lost his smile, his eyes widening in surprise. “What?”

  “You talk about the Sioux in front of Anita as though she were not one of them, as though she had no feelings.”

  The man’s face reddened. “Well, I—I…”

  “I have seen you do it several times, and it hurts her, Reverend. Don’t you know by now how she feels about you?”

  “About me?” His dark eyes betrayed his surprise and confusion.

  “You are a good man, Reverend dedicated devoted intelligent. But when it comes to women, you have a blind spot. Anita Wolf is in love with you. You should be bringing her flowers, not me.” Why was it suddenly so easy to say it? “She is Sioux, Reverend but she is a woman first, a very lovely, educated respectable woman who happens to worship the ground you walk on. I think you are a fine man, but I will never look at you the way Anita does. If you are truly wanting to marry and start a family, I am not the woman for that. Talk to Anita. Get to know her, and stop looking at her as someone unworthy just because she has darker skin than we do.”

  A look of hurt pride came into his eyes, and he rose from the chair. “It is not your place to tell me who I should love, Miss Gibbons.”

  “I’m sorry, Reverend but I care very much about Anita, and I can’t stand to see you behave almost as though she doesn’t exist. I also care about you, and I know you are at a point in your life where you are tired of being alone. You want a wife, a home, children. Anita can give you those things.”

  As the reverend rose, Evelyn could see he was struggling against his embarrassment. “I am glad you’re better,” he told her, “and I thought you should know Black Hawk is free again. While we are on the subject of who we should and should not love, I hope you do not have the feelings for Black Hawk that I suspect you have. He would never allow himself to become involved with a white woman, and I hope you realize how it looks for a white woman to be involved with an Indian man. I am not speaking for myself, Miss Gibbons, but for the soldiers and settlers who would look upon such a thing as a gross sin.”

  Evelyn felt a flush of anger and disappointment warm her face. “And how would you look at it, Reverend? You are a man of God, vowed to love all people equally.”

  “Are you saying you love Black Hawk?”

  “I am only saying that when it comes to loving all human beings, we cannot draw a line and say we love them only so far. We either love and accept all people fully, or we don’t. I believe that God sees no color, no race, and if you are a true man of God, neither should you.”

  He grasped the lapels of his suit jacket and straightened it nervously. “You are quite an outspoken woman, Miss Gibbons. I saw that the first day you arrived here. I know you are dedicated and brave, and that you are doing your best; and you already know that I care very much for you, which is why I must warn you to be careful how you talk and whom you go off to see alone. You are risking your job… and your reputation.”

  “You know that I am right, Reverend. I can only pray that I will continue to have the support of you and Janine. I was sent here to teach the Sioux, and I will do whatever I have to do to bring them into our fold and help them learn to live a new way. As far as my personal life, neither Mission Service nor the government has any business telling me how I must behave or whom I should love.”

  Phillips pushed the chair aside, his face flushed. “You are the most frustrating woman—”

  “You do care deeply about the Sioux, Reverend. I can see it in your eyes, and in the fact that you have spent four years here already.”

  He met her gaze. “Of course I care.”

  “Then stop looking at them as though they were some strange race from another world. They are human beings, with feelings and families, a lost people groping to find themselves again. And Anita is just a woman, as educated and refined as any white woman, certainly more beautiful than most. Open your eyes and see her for who she really is, Reverend, a young woman with so much to offer.”

  John Phillips just stared at her a moment. “You have overstepped your bounds, Miss Gibbons. I am glad you are recovering, and I appreciate all you are doing here. I hope they find whoever did this terrible thing to you so that we do not have to worry about your being in danger. I know your intentions are good, but I would appreciate it if you would not mention this again, nor attempt to tell me how I should conduct my ministry. You are only a teacher, and I will remind you that you are here at the permission of Mission Services, who encouraged the government to grant the money to support you. You must conduct yourself in a proper manner befitting your post here. I know how much this job means to you, which is the only reason I warn you to be careful how you behave… and to whom you show affection. I think you have let your concern for these people carry away your emotions to a place more personal than is proper. Do not lose your perspective, Miss Gibbons.”

  Evelyn knew she had offended him deeply, so deeply that she wondered if she could ever again enjoy the close friendship they had known until now. “I mean harm nor hurt to anyone, Reverend. I do what I do out of love, just like you do.”

  He nodded. “We just have two different ways of looking at things, I suppose.” He sighed. “I can see you are right about one thing. I admit I have been infatuated by your beauty and your dedication, but I see now that we could never get along. You are too independent for the average man, perhaps for any man.” He shook his head. “What a waste.”

  As he turned and left, a heavy feeling pressed on Evelyn’s heart. Maybe he was right. She would never find a man to put up with her, and she and Black Hawk were certainly too different to think there could ever be anything between them. At the moment she didn’t care about her dreams or his vision. She could not imagine how any of it could ever come to be. Black Hawk would flee to his camp and seldom return—and certainly not to her. She had left poor Steven back in Wisconsin. He was probably already engaged to someone else. Now she had lost one of her best friends, would probably lose Janine once the reverend told her what she had said; and eventually she would probably lose Anita’s friendship, for she had surely spoiled any chance Anita had of winning the reverend’s heart. Her big mouth and her good intentions only kept getting her in trouble.

  A deep loneliness engulfed her, and she found herself wishing she could curl up into Black Hawk’s arms. When she curled into her pillow instead, the flowers Reverend Phillips had brought her fell to the floor.

  Otter Woman awoke to a pounding at her cabin door. She quickly rose, wearing a thin, sleeveless flannel gown.

  “What is it, child?” her grandmother asked, sitting up on a pile of robes in one corner of the room, where she preferred to sleep instead of in a bed.

  When someone pounded again, Otter Woman’s chest tightened with fear. She already knew that Black Hawk had been released from jail. “Stay there, Grandmother,” she said quietly, then turned up an oil lamp and went to the door. “Who is it?”

  “You know who it is,” came Black Hawk’s deep voice. “Let me in, or I will break down this door!”

  “I did what I thought was best for you, Black Hawk,” Otter Woman said firmly. “If they had kept you in jail any longer, or if the white bitch had died, I would have come forward. I would not have let you suffer.”

  “But you did not mind if she suffered!”

  The door suddenly burst open, and Otter Woman screamed as Black Hawk lunged for her. She ran to a corner, but there was no getting away from him. He grabbed her arms and slammed her against the wall.

  “Do not kill me! Do not kill me!” Otter Woman wailed.

  “You stay away from my granddaughter!” the old woman screeched. She rose from her bed and began clawing at Black Hawk, but he seemed to notice her flailing at him no more than if she were a mosquito. He yanked
Otter Woman away from the wall, and, still grasping her wrists, he flung her across the room against yet another wall. He forced her left hand over to her right so that he could hold both her wrists in one powerful hand. He turned to the wizened old lady.

  “You stay away, ancient one!” he ordered. “You know that your granddaughter did a bad thing! She interfered with a vision that must be fulfilled!”

  Otter Woman’s grandmother stepped back, putting a hand to her chest. “What is this you have done, Otter Woman?”

  Black Hawk turned his fiery gaze back to Otter Woman, who stood panting, her hair hanging partially over her face. “You said nothing to me of a vision.”

  “I did tell you! You did not want to hear it! The white woman is a part of it, and to interfere or try to harm her will bring you great shame! I will decide who I will and will not see, not you! You could have killed her! You tried to kill her, because of your jealousy! I tell you now, Otter Woman, that you will never again be welcome in my camp or in my bed!”

  Otter Woman grimaced at his painful hold on her wrists. “I am sorry, Black Hawk. I would not have let you stay in that jail one day longer; and I am sorry that I have somehow interfered with a holy vision.”

  “Sorry? You should be grateful that I did not tell the authorities who tried to kill the white woman!”

  “I am! I am grateful, Black Hawk! Please do not hurt me!”

  He shoved her against the wall again. “I will not hurt you… this time! But if you ever again bring harm to the white woman, or even go near her, you will suffer for it! She could also have told the agency who tried to kill her, but she did not. She protected you! Remember that, the next time you think about harming her!”

  “I will, Black Hawk. I will remember! Please don’t turn me away.” Otter Woman began to cry. “Please let me come to you.”

  He looked her over scathingly. “You will find many other men to satisfy your needs!” With his right hand he reached out and grabbed hold of her hair. He let go of her wrists then, and Otter Woman screamed when he used both hands to bunch up her hair and jerk her forward, pushing her to the floor, facedown. She wriggled and screeched and cursed, trying to reach backward to claw at him, but all to no avail. She begged him not to do what she knew he meant to do. Others in the village could hear the commotion, but they did not interfere. They understood that it was necessary. This was a battle between a man and a woman, enough reason to stay out of it; but since the man was Black Hawk, who had been sorely wronged by Otter Woman, there was even more reason to let the man do what he must do. Otter Woman was a loose woman, a troublemaker. She must be punished.

  Amid screams and struggling, Black Hawk kept hold of Otter Woman’s hair in his left hand, and with his right hand he yanked his knife from its sheath. With one quick whack he lopped off her hair close to the head so that all that was left were short, scraggly stubs.

  “No! No! No!” the woman screamed, putting her hands to her head and fingering what was left of her once-beautiful dark mane.

  Black Hawk threw down the handful of hair and shoved his knife back in place. “Be glad it was not your throat that I cut!” he growled. He stormed out, and Otter Woman drew up her legs, shivering in wrenching sobs.

  “I warned you,” her grandmother told her, tears coming to her own eyes. “I told you to stay away from that white woman.”

  Otter Woman curled into a ball of shame and horror and felt her hair again. “I wish the arrow had found her heart!” she sobbed.

  Fifteen

  Evelyn sat beside Anita inside the circus tent, enjoying the looks on the faces of the Sioux as elephants and camels were paraded before them. The spectacle was amazing enough for the surrounding settlers and traders who had come to watch, but the Indians were awestruck, some even fearful. Many stayed away altogether, sure evil spirits lived in the strange animals.

  On the way inside they had passed cages containing monkeys and tigers. Most of the Indians shied away from the monkeys, afraid of them because they so resembled humans in their faces and hands. Their reaction brought Black Hawk to mind. Evelyn had hoped perhaps he would bring Little Fox to the circus, but Anita told her he had not been heard from since he had been freed… except for one stop.

  “My brother says Black Hawk went to see Otter Woman,” Anita had told her. “He was very angry with her, and he cut off all her hair.” Word traveled fast among the Sioux, and Evelyn knew that by now probably every tribe on the reservation knew it was Otter Woman who had hurt her, but no one would admit it to the soldiers, and no arrests had been made. Lieutenant Teller had visited her and offered to post a guard for her, but she had insisted she was not afraid and wanted no special favors.

  Still, she could not help a secret worry that Otter Woman would try to hurt her again. She was determined not to let the woman keep her out of the villages and make her afraid to visit Sioux families. In fact, now that she was better, she had decided she would return to Black Hawk’s camp, no matter what anyone thought of it, and in spite of the danger. So much had been left unfinished between them. She was not even sure she could find his camp, but if she talked to Night Hunter, she was sure the old man could get the message to Black Hawk to look for her at a specified time and day. She could take Anita with her as far as one of the villages, so the reverend would not suspect what she was really doing.

  Reverend Phillips had remained rather cool to her, but Janine and Anita were as friendly as ever. Apparently, the reverend had said nothing to either of them about his conversation with her or the fact that he was upset with her. Anita probably did not know she had mentioned to the man that Anita loved him; and Janine had apparently dismissed the idea as impossible. If the woman had been treating Anita differently, Anita had said nothing about it. She hoped she had planted a seed of love for Anita in Reverend Phillips’s mind and heart, and that he would seriously consider the things she had told him.

  She tried to concentrate on the wonderful show about to take place before her, glad she was well enough to come. She had been up and around for eleven days now, had even taught school the past few days. She used a sling for her left arm because it was still too sore to move too much, but she could use it when necessary and was forcing herself to do exercises to gain back her strength.

  It felt good to be almost back to normal, and she would not have missed the circus for the world. The circus tent had been set up on an incline so that the one and only ring where acts would take place was at the lowest level, and the audience could sit at a gradual rise up a hill and see everything that was going on. So many curious Sioux wanted to see the show that they had to be divided into groups. Three shows a day would take place today and tomorrow, since only about four hundred people at a time could get inside the viewing area. Outside the tent were the caged animals, as well as clowns and many brightly painted wagons.

  The circus announcer stepped up onto a platform, holding a megaphone to announce the first act. From where she sat, Evelyn thought the man looked quite handsome. He wore a red jacket and knee-high black leather boots; and his dark hair was neatly slicked back. “Ladies and Gentlemen!” he announced. “I am Herbert True, manager of the spectacular O’Banyon’s Circus Extravaganza! Today several acts of bravery and astounding skill will take place before your very eyes, right here in our circus ring! First, a most daring event!”

  Five huge boxes had been pulled by horses into the arena, then the horses unhitched so that the boxes could be shoved against openings in a cage set up in the arena. Men jumped up on the tops of the boxes, then slid open doorways to let five huge tigers into the cage. As they growled and paced nervously inside, people gasped and stared at the beautiful but ferocious-looking animals.

  “Now you know why there is a cage in our arena!” Herbert True shouted through the megaphone. “These exotic animals are called tigers, and they are from India, a land far, far away and across the Pacific Ocean. You will see that even the wildest beasts can be tamed, if a man is bra
ve enough to do it! We have that man! Ladies and gentlemen, meet Adolph Dierdorf, the bravest man who ever walked this land!”

  The announcer put out his arm, and a man came running through the tent to the arena wearing revealing tights and an open shirt. Evelyn smiled at what an odd lot these circus people were. She realized most of the Sioux understood little of what the announcer had said, but they didn’t need to. It was obvious what was happening, and when Adolph Dierdorf entered the ring with the tigers, they watched wide-eyed in near silence as the man put the tigers through their act. Evelyn was herself distracted when she looked down to her left to see Seth Bridges and his two adopted daughters. She was glad Bridges had thought to bring the girls to the circus, but she couldn’t help wondering if he was only putting on a show for others, pretending to be a good father. She felt mixed emotions for not having had the time to try to visit the girls and talk to their father again; even though she did not know just what she could do about the situation. She had caused enough trouble lately and was not sure she should take the chance of stirring up more.

  The tiger show was followed by a variety of other acts, all appropriately accompanied by a circus band: jugglers, a balancing act, a trapeze act that brought gasps and wondrous “ooohh’s” from the crowd, and the Pretzel Woman, a female contortionist, whose body movements were both astonishing and embarrassing. The few white women present covered their eyes, but Evelyn hardly noticed. Her entertainment was in watching the faces of the audience, especially those of the little Indian children.

  O’Banyon’s Circus Extravaganza finally ended, and Herbert True announced that the next show would start in two hours. An excited Anita left Evelyn to go and find the tiger cages outside, and Evelyn decided to try to talk to Lucille and Katy Bridges. She noticed that Sergeant Desmond had appeared from somewhere and was talking to Seth Bridges as the crowd dispersed. Lucille and Katy had run ahead to look again at some of the wagons and animals outside the tent. Evelyn hurried after them, catching up with them at a cage of monkeys.