TAHN-TÉ AMONG STRANGERS
The one thing to which the boy gave awed attention was that when the
time came for the villages to fight--a leader would be born to
them--if the people of the valley were true to their gods they would
be strong always, Ki-pah the prophet told them to remember always the
war star in the sky--the star Po-se-yemo had told them of, when it
moved, the time to make war would be here.
And when the time came to fight, a leader would come to them, as he,
Ki-pah had come! Because of this thought was the heart of the boy
thrilled that he had been called a reed by the river--a reed through
which music of the desert gods might speak.
He was filled with wild fancies of mystic things born of these
prophecies. And the old men said that perhaps this was the time of
which Po-se-yemo, the god, and Ki-pah, the prophet, had told!
The vote of a Te-hua council has to be the agreement of every man, and
the star of the morning brought dawn to the valley before the last
reluctant decided it was well to send a messenger to learn of the
strange gods.
But as the sun rose Tahn-té bathed in the running water of the river,
and his prayer was of joy:--for he was to go!
In joy, and with the light of exaltation in his face he said farewell
to boy thoughts, and walked lightly over the highlands and the valleys
to Ua-lano, and thence followed the adventurers to Ci-cu-yé and bent
the knee to Father Luis, and kissed the cross, and let water be
sprinkled over him, and did all the things shown him with so glad a
heart that the devoted priest gave praise for such a convert from the
pagan people. So pleased was he with the eagerness of Tahn-té to
learn, that he made him his own assistant at the ceremonies of the
Holy Faith.
And after each one, the boy washed his hands in running water, and
scattered prayer meal to the gods of the elements, and to the Sun
Father God, and knew that in Provi-whah his mother was praying also
that he be not harmed by the god of the gold hunters--and that he come
back strong with the white man's magic.
The boy Ka-yemo of the Tain-tsain clan was also sent--but neither boy
was told of the quest of the other. The old men decided it was better
so. Without pay they went with the Spanish adventurers, one serving
the men of arms and learning the ways of the strange animals, and the
other serving the priests and learning the symbols of the strangers'
creed of the one goddess, and two gods, and many Go-h[=e]-yahs, called
saints by the men of the iron clothes.
They both saw many strange things in Ci-cu-yé, and they saw the
strange Indian slave, whom the old men of Ci-cu-yé instructed to lead
the men of iron from their land with the romance of Quivera. And the
slave did it, and told the strangers of the mythic land of gold and
gems, and lost his life in the end by doing so, but the life of the
romance was more enduring than any other thing, and the spirit of that
treasure search still broods over the deserts and the mountains of
that land.
But the stay of Ka-yemo was not even the length of the first winter
with the strangers. For in Tiguex where the great captain (Coronado)
wintered, and made his comfort by turning the natives out of their
houses, there was a season of grievous strife ere the Spring came, and
the two boys of Te-hua saw things unspeakable as two hundred Indians
of the valley, captured under truce, were burned at the stake by the
soldiers of the cross.
One of the reasons for the crusade to the north as written in the
chronicles of Christian Mexico was to save the souls of the heathen
for the one god,--and his advocates were sending the said souls for
judgement as quickly as might be!
Tahn-té stood, pale and tense in the house where the chapel of Fray
Juan Padilla had been established,--once it had been the house of the
governor of the village who might even now be among the victims of the
broken trust.
On the altar was a crucifix in gold on ebony, and the eyes of the boy
were not kindly as he regarded it.
"They lie when they say you are a god of peace like our god
Po-se-yemo," he said. "They lie when they say you are the god of the
red man--you are the white god of the white people--and you will let
the red men hold not anything that your white children want!"
He heard himself speak the words aloud there alone where the new altar
was--he seemed to hear himself saying it over and over as if by the
sound of his own voice he could kill the sound of the tortured red men
in the court.
A blanketed figure ran in at the open door, halted at the sound of
Tahn-té's voice--and then flung himself forward. It was Ka-yemo and
his teeth were chattering at the thought of the inferno without.
"It may be they will not look for us here," he said as he saw who it
was in the chapel--"Perhaps--if one keeps near--to their strong god:
and you are close also--and--"
"I stay close because it is my work,"--said Tahn-té. "Some of the men
tied to the stakes out there bent before their strong god and said
prayers there.--Did it save them?"
"They will kill us--we will never see our people--they will kill us!"
muttered Ka-yemo shaken with fear.
"I do not think they want to kill us:--they still need us for many
things. We are only boys, we have not wives that we refuse to give to
the white men--if we had it might be different, who knows?"
"Is that the cause?"
"The white men will give a different one--but that is the cause!
The men of this valley think it is enough if they give their
houses, and their corn, and their woven blankets to their fine white
brothers:--the red men are foolish men,--so they burn at the stake
out there!"
Ka-yemo stared at him, and crouched in his blanket.
"You say strange things," he muttered. "I think when they get crazy
with the spirit to kill that they will kill us all. I do not stay to
be killed--I go!"
Tahn-té staring at the emblems of holiness on the altar scarcely heard
him.
"I go, Tahn-té,--I go if I have to swim the river with the ice.--Do
you stay here to be killed?"
"I am here to learn many things--I learn but little yet, I cannot
go."
"But--if you die?"
"I think it is not yet that I die," said Tahn-té--"There is much to
do."
"And--if I live to see--our people?"
"Tell my mother I am strong--and I feel her prayers when the sun comes
up. Tell the governor I stay to learn what the white god does for the
red men; when I have things to tell the people I will come back to
Povi-whah."
But the ice of that winter melted, and the summer bore its fruit, and
the second spring time had come to the land before Tahn-té crossed the
mesas and stood at his mother's door.
"Thanks--that you have come," she said, and wept, and he held her hand
and did not know the things to say, only:--"Thanks that our gods have
brought me back."
"And the magic of the white man?"
"It is here," and he opened a bag made of buffalo skin, and in it were
books and papers covered with written words. She looked on them with
awe. Her son was only a boy but he had won that which was precious,
and earned honors from the men of her tribe and her clan.
"Not to me must you tell it first," she said--"The Ruler will hear
you, and the governor,--they will decide if it is to be known, or if
it is to be secret."
The old men sprinkled prayer meal--and smoked medicine smoke over the
books to lift any lingering curses from the white men's god, and then
the boy opened the pages and made clear how the marks stood for words,
and the words put all together stood for the talk of the white god. It
was a thing of wonder to the council.
"And it is a strong god?" asked the Ruler.
"It is strong for war:--not for peace," said the boy.
"Ka-yemo brought back the words of the medicine-man of the grey
blanket who talked of their god. All his talk was of peace and of love
in the heart. Is that true?"
"It is true. He was a good man. It may be that some men are born so
good that even the gods of the men of iron cannot make them evil. And
Padre Luis was born into the world like that."
"We listen to you to hear of the moons and the suns since you went
away."
The boy told of the fruitless search to the east for the wonderful
land of the slave's romance, where the natives used golden bowls
instead of earthen vessels for food, where each soldier was so sure of
gaining riches that the weight of provisions carried was small lest
the animals be not strong enough to carry all the gold and the food
also.
The old men laughed much at this search for the symbol of the Sun
Father along the waters of the Mischipi, and commended the wise men of
Ci-cu-yé who had the foresight to plan the romance, and to send the
slave to lead the adventurers to the land of false dreams.
It was bad, however, that the strangers had not lost themselves in the
prairies, or were not killed by the fierce tribes of the north:--it
was bad that they came back to the villages of the P[=o]-s[=o]n-gé
river.
Then the boy told of the final despair of the conquerors, and their
disheartened retreat to the land of the south. For two years they had
terrorized the people of the land--worse enemies than the Navahu or
the Comanche or the Apache fighter, then when they had made ruins
where towns and gardens had been, they said it was all of no use since
the yellow metal was not found in the ground.
"Did the wise men of iron not know that where the yellow metal is in
the earth, that there is ever the symbol of the Sun Father, and that
it must be a thing sacred and a hidden place for prayer?"
"They did not know that:--no man told them."
K[=a]-ye-fah, the ancient Ruler blew smoke from his pipe to the four
ways, and spoke.
"Yet among the men they burned to ashes in the village square were
many who could have told them that, and three who could have told them
where such prayer places were hidden! It is well, my children, that
they did die, and not tell that which the Sun Father has hidden for
his own people:--it is well!"
"It is well!" echoed the others of the council.
"We all die when the day or the night comes,"--continued the old man.
"It is well that we die in bravery for the sake of the others who have
to live and walk the earth path. It is well that we have strong hearts
to think about. One day I shall go in the ground with my fathers; I am
old, and the trail has been long, and in my old days the sunlight has
been covered for me."
Tahn-té did not know what he meant, but the other men bent their heads
in sympathy.
"It is twice four moons since my child K[=a]-ye-povi was carried away
in the darkness when we fought the Navahu in the hunting grounds to
the west,"--he continued. "No one has found her--no trader has brought
her back. When a woman, she will not know her own people, or our own
speech. I think of that, and grow weak. Our people have never been
slaves--yet she will be a slave for our enemy the Navahu! So it is
that I grow old more quick, and the time may come soon to sleep on our
Mother--the Earth."
"We wish that it comes not soon," said the governor, and the others
signified their assent.
"Thanks, thanks that you wish it. I do not speak of it to give sad
hearts. I speak because of the days when I may be gone, and another
than me will hold the knowledge of a sacred place where the Sun Father
hides his symbol. It is good that I hear of the men who let themselves
go into ashes, and when if they had said once:--'I know where it
is--the metal of the Sun!' all might have gone free and lived long
days. My children:--it may be that some day one of you will hold a
secret of the sacred place where strong magic lives! If it be so, let
that man among you think in his heart of the twenty times ten men who
let themselves be burned into ashes by the white men of iron! Guard
you the sacred places--and let your ashes go into the sands, or be
blown by the winds to the four ways. But from the sacred things of the
gods, lift not the cover for the enemy!"
The old man trembled with the intensity of the thought and the dread
of what the unborn years might bring.
After a moment of silence the governor spoke:
"It may be that you live the longest of all! No one knows who will
guard the things not to be told. But no Te-hua can uncover that which
belongs to the Sun Father, and the Earth Mother."
"It is true:--thanks that it is true!"--said the other men, and
Tahn-té knew he was listening to things not told to boys.
"Thanks that you speak so," said the Ruler. "Now we have all spoken of
this matter. It is done. But the magic of the white hunters of gold,
we have not yet heard spoken. How is it, boy, that you have brought
all these signs of it:--what made blind their eyes?"
"Not anything," said Tahn-té. "It was a long time I was with them.
Some men had one book, or two, other men had papers that came in great
canoes from their land in Spain. Some had writings from their fathers
or their friends. These I heard read and talked of around the camp
fire. When they went away some things were thrown aside or given to
the padres who were to stay and talk of their gods. All I found I hid
in the earth. The people of Ci-bo-la killed Padre Juan, and I traded a
broken sword for his books and his papers. The sword I also had
buried. They were afraid of the books, I had learned to read them, and
I was not afraid."
"And you came from Ci-bo-la alone?" asked the governor,--"it is a long
trail to carry a load."
"All was not carried from there. I came back to Ci-cu-yé to learn more
from Padre Luis who meant to live there. He did not live so long, but
while he lived he taught me."
"The men of Ci-cu-yé killed him too?"
"They made him die when they said I must not take beans or meal to him
where he lived in a cave, and where he made prayers for their shadow
spirits."
"You wanted that he should have food?" asked the Ruler.
"I wanted that he should live to teach me all the books before the end
came," said the boy simply. "It is not all to be learned in two
winters and one summer."
"That is true," said K[=a]-ya-fah the Ruler. "All of a man's life is
needed to learn certain things of magic. It is time now that you come
back and begin the work of the Orders. You have earned the highest
right a boy has yet earned, and no doors will be closed for you on the
sacred things given to people."
"We think that is so," said the governor--"no doors will be closed for
the son of S[=aa]-hanh-que-ah, the Woman of the Twilight."
This was the hour he had dreamed of through the months which had
seemed horrible as the white man's hell. One needs only to read the
several accounts of Coronado's quest for the golden land of the Gran
Quivera in 1540-42 to picture what the life of a little native page
must have been with the dissatisfied adventurers, by whom all
"Indians" were considered as slaves should their service be required.
Men had died beside him on the trail--and there had been times when he
felt he too would die but for the thought of this hour when he could
come back, and the council could say--"It is well!"
"I thank you, and my mother will thank you," he said with his eyes on
the stones of the kiva lest the men see that his eyes were wet. "My
mother said prayers with me always, and that helped me to come back."
"The prayers of the Shadow Woman are high medicine," assented one of
the men. "She brought back my son to live when the breath was gone
away."
"As a little child she had a wisdom not to be taught," affirmed the
Ruler--"and now it is her son who brings us the magic of the iron men.
Tell us how you left the people of Ci-cu-yé."
"They were having glad dances that the Christians were gone, and that
the padres were dead as other men die. So long as they let me I
carried food and water to Padre Luis. Then they guarded me in the
kiva, and laughed at me, and when they let me go I knew it was
because he was no longer alive. No:--they did not harm me. They were
too pleased that I could tell them of where their slave whom they
called the 'Turk'--led the gold hunters searching for the Quivera of
yellow metal and blue stones. They had much delight to hear of the
woeful time of the white men. I could stay all my days at Ci-cu-yé and
be precious to them, if I would talk of the trouble trail to Quivera,
but when I had seen that the Padre was indeed gone to the Lost Others,
my work was no more at Ci-cu-yé. I took his books also for my own--and
all these things I have brought back at Povi-whah to make good my
promise when I went away. Some things in the books, I know, and that I
can tell you. Of the rest I will work until I do know, and then I can
tell you that."
"That is good," said K[=a]-ye-fah the Ruler. "You shall be as my son
and in the long nights of the winter moons we will listen. The time
told of in the prophecies of Ki-pah is coming to us. He said also that
in each danger time would be born one to mark the way for the people
to follow--in each danger time so long as the Te-hua people were true
to the gods!"
Tahn-té breathed on the hand of the old men, and went up from the kiva
into the cool night of the early summer.
It was too wonderful a night for aught but to reach up in thought to
the height of the warm stars. They came so close he could feel their
radiance in his heart.
Twice had his name in council been linked to the prophecies of the
wise and mysterious prophet of the ancient days! Always he had known
that the Woman of the Twilight and he were not to live the life of the
others. He had not known why they were set apart for unusual
experiences, but to-night he dared to think. With the words of the
wise men still in his ears--the rulers who could make and unmake--he
knew that no other boy had ever heard the praise and promise he had
heard. He knew they thought they were giving words to one who would be
a leader in the years to come--and this first night under the peace of
the stars, he was filled with a triumph and an exaltation for which
there were no words.
He would be a leader--not of war--not of government for the daily
duties of village life, but of the Things of the Spirit which seemed
calling within him to highest endeavor. He knew as yet nothing of
Te-hua ceremonies--he had all to learn, yet he felt inspired to invent
some expression for the joy which was his.
The new moon seemed to rest on the very edge of the mesa above
him:--the uplifted horn looked like a white flame rising from purple
shadows.
A white flame!--a _white_ flame!
To the Indian mind all signs are symbolic,--and the flame was exactly
above the point where the light was set ceremonially and regularly to
light the Indian god back to his own people!
A point of white flame above that shrine of centuries!
No eyes but his saw it at exactly that angle--of course it was not
meant for other eyes. It was meant that it should be seen by him alone
on his first night with the people he meant to work for! With the
memory of the prophecies in his ears had he seen it. It could mean
only that the god himself set it there as a proof that the devotion of
Tahn-té was acceptable--and that he had been born of his mother that
the prophecies might be fulfilled at the right time--and that the
light of the moon on his face had meant----
His thought came so quickly that all the air of the night appeared
alive with the unseen--and the unseen murmured in his ears, and his
memories--and in his heart!
Suddenly he stretched his open hands high to the stars, and then ran
across the level to the foot of the bluff. It was high and very steep,
but wings seemed his--his heart was on the summit, and his body must
follow--must get there before the white flame sank into the west--must
send his greeting to answer the greeting of the god!
In the pouch at his girdle was the fire flint, and a wisp of the silky
wild flax of tinder. Two sticks of dead scrub piñon was there; he
broke them in equal lengths and laid them in the cross which is the
symbol of the four ways, and of the four winds from which the sacred
breath is drawn for all that lives--the symbol also of union by which
all human life is perpetuated. All fires of sacrifices,--or of magic
power, must commemorate these things which are sacred things, and
Tahn-té placed them and breathed upon them, and touched them with the
spark from the white flint, and then arose in joy and faced the moon
yet visible, knowing that the god had seen his answering flame on the
shrine--and that it meant a dedication to the Things of the Spirit.
And as he stood there on the mesa's edge, exalted at the wonder of the
night, he did not speak, yet he heard the echo of words in his own
voice:--"_No one but Tahn-té shall gather the woods for the fire to
light Po-se-yemo back;--and when he sees the blaze, and comes back,
you will tell him it was his son who kept the fire!_"
Like a flash came the memory of that other time at the edge of that
other mesa in Hopi-land! He had said those words to his mother--and
had forgotten them. He could never forget them again, for the god had
sent them back to him to remember. And Tahn-té trembled at the
wondrous signs given him this night, and sprinkled meal to the four
ways, and held prayer thoughts of exaltation in his heart.
And this was the last day of the boy years of Tahn-té.
He began then the years of the work for which his Other Self told him
he had been born on earth.