The Last of the Chiefs Part 27

A form darkened the doorway, and Albert came in. He rushed to d.i.c.k when he saw that he was conscious again, and shook his hand with great fervor. The warriors went on with their tasks or their smoking, and still took no notice.

"This is a most wonderful place, d.i.c.k," exclaimed the impressionable Albert, "and Bright Sun has treated us well. We can go about the village if we give a promise, for the time, that we'll not try to escape."

"He's been here," said d.i.c.k, "and I've given it."

"Then, if you feel strong enough, let's go on and take a look."

"Wait until I see if this head of mine swims around," said d.i.c.k.

He rose slowly to his feet, and his bandaged head was dizzy at first, but as he steadied himself it became normal. Albert thrust out his hand to support him. It delighted him that he could be again of help to his older and bigger brother, and d.i.c.k, divining Albert's feeling, let it lie for a minute. Then they went to the door, d.i.c.k walking quite easily, as his strength came back fast.

The warriors of the Akitcita, of whom fully a dozen were now present in the great lodge, still paid no attention to the two youths, and d.i.c.k surmised that it was the orders of Bright Sun.

But this absolute ignoring of their existence was uncanny, nevertheless. d.i.c.k studies some of the faces as he pa.s.sed. Bold and fearless they were, and not without a certain n.o.bility, but there was little touch of gentleness or pity, it was rather the strength of the wild animal, the flesh-eater, that seeks its prey.

Sioux they were, and Sioux they would remain in heart, no matter what happened, wild warriors of the northwest. d.i.c.k perceived this fact in a lightening flash, but it was the lightening flash of conviction.

Outside the fresh air saluted d.i.c.k, mouth and nostrils, and the ache in his head went quite away. He had seen the valley by moonlight, when it was beautiful, but not as beautiful as their own valley, the one of which they would not tell to anybody. But it was full of interest. The village life, the life of the wild, was in progress all about him, and in the suns.h.i.+ne, amidst such picturesque surroundings, it had much that was attractive to the strong and brave.

d.i.c.k judged correctly that the village contained about two hundred winter lodges of bark and poles, and could therefore furnish about four hundred warriors. It was evident, too, that it was the scene of prosperity. The flesh of buffalo, elk, and deer was drying in the sun, hanging from trees or on little platforms of poles. Children played with the dogs or practiced with small bows and arrows. In the shadow of a tepee six old women sat gambling, and the two boys stopped to watch them.

The Indians are more inveterate gamblers than the whites, and the old women, wrinkled, hideous hags of vast age, played their games with an intent, almost breathless, interest.

They were playing Woskate Tanpan, or the game of dice, as it is known to the Sioux. Three women were on each side, and they played it with tanpan (the basket), kansu (the dice), and canyiwawa (the counting sticks). The tanpan, made of willow twigs, was a tiny basket, about three inches in diameter at the bottom, but broader at the top, and about two inches deep. Into this one woman would put the kansu or dice, a set of six plum stones, some carved and some not carved. She would put her hand over the tanpan, shake the kansu just as the white dice player does, and then throw them out. The value of the throw would be according to the kind and number of carvings that were turned up when the kansu fell.

The opposing sides, three each, sat facing each other, and the stakes for which they played--canyiwawa (the counting sticks)--lay between them. These were little round sticks about the thickness of a lead pencil, and the size of each heap went up or down, as fortune s.h.i.+fted back or forth. They could make the counting sticks represent whatever value they chose, this being agreed upon beforehand, and the old Sioux women had been known to play Woskate Tanpan two days and nights without ever rising from their seats.

"What old harpies they are!" said d.i.c.k. "Did you ever see anybody so eager over anything?"

"They are no worse than the men," replied Albert. "A lot of warriors are gambling, too."

A group of the men were gathered on a little green farther on, and the brothers joined them, beginning to share at once the interest that the spectators showed in several warriors who were playing Woskate Painyankapi, or the game of the Wands and the Hoop.

The warriors used in the sport canyleska (the hoop) and cansakala (the wands). The hoops were of ash, two or three feet in diameter, the ash itself being about an inch in diameter. Every hoop was carefully marked off into s.p.a.ces, something like the face of a watch.

Cansakala (the wands) were of chokecherry, four feet long and three fourths of an inch in diameter. One end of every wand was squared for a distance of about a foot. The wands were in pairs, the two being fastened together with buckskin thongs about nine inches in length, and fastened at a point about one third of the length of the wands from the rounded ends.

A warrior would roll the hoop, and he was required to roll it straight and correctly. If he did not do so, the umpire made him roll it over, as in the white man's game of baseball the pitcher cannot get a strike until he pitches the ball right.

When the hoop was rolled correctly, the opposing player dropped his pair of wands somewhere in front of it. It was his object so to calculate the speed and course of the hoop when it fell it would lie upon his wands. If he succeeded, he secured his points according to the s.p.a.ces on each wand within which the hoop lay--an exceedingly difficult game, requiring great skill of hand and judgment of eye. That if was absorbing was shown by the great interest with which all the spectators followed it and by their eager betting.

"I don't believe I could learn to do that in ten years," said Albert; "you've got to combine too many things and to combine them fast."

"They must begin on it while they're young," said d.i.c.k; "but the Indian has a mind, and don't you forget it."

"But they're not as we are," rejoined Albert. "Nothing can ever make them so."

Here, as in the house of the Akitcita, n.o.body paid any attention to the two boys, but d.i.c.k began to have a feeling that he was watched, not watched openly as man watches man, but in the furtive dangerous way of the great wild beasts, the man-eaters.

The feeling grew into a conviction that, despite what they were doing, everybody in the camp--warrior, squaw, and child--was watching Albert and him. He knew that half of this was fancy, but he was sure that the other half was real.

"Albert," he said, "I wouldn't make any break for liberty now, even if I hadn't given my promise."

"Nor I," said Albert. "By the time we had gone ten feet the whole village would be on top of us. d.i.c.k, while I'm here I'm going to make the best of it I can."

In pursuance of this worthy intention Albert pressed forward and almost took the cansakala from the hands of a stalwart warrior.

The man, amazed at first, yielded up the pair of wands with a grin. Albert signaled imperiously to the warrior with the hoop, and he, too, grinning, sent canyleska whirling.

Albert cast the wands, and the hoop fell many feet from them. A shout of laughter arose. The white youth was showing himself a poor match for the Sioux, and the women and children came running to see this proof of the superiority of their race.

The warrior from whom he had taken them gravely picked up the cansakala and handed them back to Albert, the other warrior again sent canyleska rolling, and again Albert threw the wands with the same ill fortune. A third and fourth time he tried, with but slight improvement, and the crowd, well pleased to see him fail, thickened all the time, until nearly the whole village was present.

"It's just as hard as we thought it was, d.i.c.k, and harder," said Albert ruefully. "Here, you take it and see what you can do."

He handed cansakala to d.i.c.k, who also tried in vain, while the crowd enjoyed the sport, laughing and chatting to one another, as they will in their own villages. d.i.c.k made a little more progress than Albert had achieved, but not enough to score any points worth mentioning, and he, too, retired discomfited, while the Sioux, especially the women, continued to laugh.

"I don't like to be beaten that way," said Albert in a nettled tone.

"Never mind, Al, old fellow," said d.i.c.k soothingly. "Remember it's their game, not ours, and as it makes them feel good, it's all the better for us. Since they've beaten us, they're apt to like us and treat us better."

It was hard for Albert to take the more philosophical view, which was also the truthful one, but he did his best to reconcile himself, and he and d.i.c.k moved on to other sights.

d.i.c.k noticed that the village had been located with great judgment. On one side was the river, narrow but swift and deep; on the other, a broad open s.p.a.ce that would not permit an enemy to approach through ambush, and beyond that the forest.

The tepees stood in a great circle, and, although d.i.c.k did not know it, their camps were always pitched according to rule, each gens or clan having its regular place in the circle. The tribe of the Mendewahkantons--a leading one of the Seven Fireplaces or Council Fires of the great Sioux nation--was subdivided into seven gentes or clans; the Kiyukas, or Breakers, so called because they disregarded the general marriage law and married outside their own clan; the Que-mini-tea, or Mountain Wood and Water people; the Kap'oja, or Light Travelers; the Maxa-yuta-cui, the People who Eat no Grease; the Queyata-oto-we, or the People of the Village Back from the River; the Oyata Citca, the Bad Nation, and the t.i.ta-otowe, the People of the Village on the Prairie.

Each clan was composed of related families, and all this great tribe, as the boys learned later, had once dwelled around Spirit Lake, Minnesota, their name meaning Mysterious Lake Dwellers, but had been pushed westward years before by the advancing wave of white settlement. This was now a composite village, including parts of every gens of the Mendewahkantons, but there were other villages of the same tribe scattered over a large area.

When d.i.c.k and Albert reached the northern end of the village they saw a great number of Indian ponies, six or seven hundred perhaps, grazing in a wide gra.s.sy s.p.a.ce and guarded by half-grown Indian boys.

"d.i.c.k," said Albert, "if we only had a dozen of those we could go back and get our furs."

"Yes," said d.i.c.k, "if we had the ponies, if we knew where we are now, if we were free of the Sioux village, and if we could find the way to our valley, we might do what you say."

"Yes, it does take a pile of 'ifs,'" said Albert, laughing, "and so I won't expect it. I'll try to be resigned."

So free were they from any immediate restriction that it almost seemed to them that they could walk away as they chose, up the valley and over the hills and across the plains. How were the Sioux to know that these two would keep their promised word?

But both became conscious again of those watchful eyes, ferocious, like the eyes of man-eating wild beasts, and both s.h.i.+vered a little as they turned back into the great circle of bark teepees.

Chapter XVI The Gathering of the Sioux

d.i.c.k and Albert abode nearly two weeks in the great lodge of the Akitcita, that is, as guests, although they were prisoners, whose lives might be taken at any time, and they had splendid opportunities for observing what a genuine Spartan band the Akitcita were. Everyone had his appointed place for arms and his rush or fur mat for sleeping. There was no quarreling, no unseemly chatter, always a grave and dignified order and the sense of stern discipline. Not all the Akitcita were ever present in the daytime, but some always were. All tribal business was transacted here. The women had to bring wood and water to it daily, and the entire village supplied it every day with regular rations of tobacco, almost the only luxury of the Akitcita.

Both d.i.c.k and Albert were keenly observant, and they did not hesitate also to ask questions of Bright Sun whenever they had the chance. They learned from him that the different tribes of the Sioux had general councils at irregular intervals, that there was no hereditary rank among the chiefs, it being usually a question of energy and merit, although the rank was sometimes obtained by gifts, and ambitious man giving away all that he had for the prize. There were no women chiefs, and women were not admitted to the great council.

The boys perceived, too, that much in the life of the Sioux was governed by ancient ritual; nearly everything had its religious meaning, and both boys having an inherent respect for religion of any kind, were in constant fear lest they should violate unwillingly some honored law.

The two made friendly advances to the members of the Akitcita but they were received with a grave courtesy that did not invite a continuance. They felt daily a deepening sense of racial difference. They appreciated the humane treatment they had received, but they and the Sioux did not seem to come into touch anywhere. And this difference was accentuated in the case of Bright Sun. The very fact that he had been educated in their schools, that he spoke their language so well, and that he knew their customs seemed to widen the gulf between them into a sea.

They felt that he had tasted of their life, and liked it not.