brush and the grass had been beaten flat. This, the Navajo said, was a
track where the young braves had raced their mustangs and had striven
for supremacy before the eyes of maidens and the old people of the
tribe.
“Nas Ta Bega, did you ever race here?” asked Shefford.
“I am a chief by birth. But I was stolen from my home, and now I cannot
ride well enough to race the braves of my tribe,” the Indian replied,
bitterly.
In another place Joe Lake halted his horse and called Shefford's
attention to a big yellow rock lying along the trail. And then he spoke
in Navajo to the Indian.
“I've heard of this stone--Isende Aha,” said Joe, after Nas Ta Bega had
spoken. “Get down, and let's see.” Shefford dismounted, but the Indian
kept his seat in the saddle.
Joe placed a big hand on the stone and tried to move it. According to
Shefford's eye measurement the stone was nearly oval, perhaps three feet
high, by a little over two in width. Joe threw off his sombrero, took a
deep breath, and, bending over, clasped the stone in his arms. He was an
exceedingly heavy and powerful man, and it was plain to Shefford that
he meant to lift the stone if that were possible. Joe's broad shoulders
strained, flattened; his arms bulged, his joints cracked, his neck
corded, and his face turned black. By gigantic effort he lifted the
stone and moved it about six inches. Then as he released his hold he
fell, and when he sat up his face was wet with sweat.
“Try it,” he said to Shefford, with his lazy smile. “See if you can
heave it.”
Shefford was strong, and there had been a time when he took pride in
his strength. Something in Joe's supreme effort and in the gloom of the
Indian's eyes made Shefford curious about this stone. He bent over and
grasped it as Joe had done. He braced himself and lifted with all his
power, until a red blur obscured his sight and shooting stars seemed to
explode in his head. But he could not even stir the stone.
“Shefford, maybe you'll be able to heft it some day,” observed Joe. Then
he pointed to the stone and addressed Nas Ta Bega.
The Indian shook his head and spoke for a moment.
“This is the Isende Aha of the Navajos,” explained Joe. “The young
braves are always trying to carry this stone. As soon as one of them can
carry it he is a man. He who carries it farthest is the biggest man. And
just so soon as any Indian can no longer lift it he is old. Nas Ta
Bega says the stone has been carried two miles in his lifetime. His own
father carried it the length of six steps.”
“Well! It's plain to me that I am not a man,” said Shefford, “or else I
am old.”
Joe Lake drawled his lazy laugh and, mounting, rode up the trail. But
Shefford lingered beside the Indian.
“Bi Nai,” said Nas Ta Bega, “I am a chief of my tribe, but I have never
been a man. I never lifted that stone. See what the pale-face education
has done for the Indian!”
The Navajo's bitterness made Shefford thoughtful. Could greater injury
be done to man than this--to rob him of his heritage of strength?
Joe drove the bobbing pack-train of burros into the cedars where the
smoke of the hogans curled upward, and soon the whistling of mustangs,
the barking of dogs, the bleating of sheep, told of his reception. And
presently Shefford was in the midst of an animated scene. Great, woolly,
fierce dogs, like wolves, ran out to meet the visitors. Sheep and goats
were everywhere, and little lambs scarcely able to walk, with others
frisky and frolicsome. There were pure-white lambs, and some that
appeared to be painted, and some so beautiful with their fleecy white
all except black faces or ears or tails or feet. They ran right under
Nack-yal's legs and bumped against Shefford, and kept bleating their
thin-piped welcome. Under the cedars surrounding the several hogans were
mustangs that took Shefford's eye. He saw an iron-gray with white mane
and tail sweeping to the ground; and a fiery black, wilder than any
other beast he had ever seen; and a pinto as wonderfully painted as the
little lambs; and, most striking of all, a pure, cream-colored mustang
with grace and fine lines and beautiful mane and tail, and, strange
to see, eyes as blue as azure. This albino mustang came right up to
Shefford, an action in singular contrast with that of the others, and
showed a tame and friendly spirit toward him and Nack-yal. Indeed,
Shefford had reason to feel ashamed of Nack-yal's temper or jealousy.
The first Indians to put in an appearance were a flock of children, half
naked, with tangled manes of raven-black hair and skin like gold bronze.
They appeared bold and shy by turns. Then a little, sinewy man, old
and beaten and gray, came out of the principal hogan. He wore a blanket
round his bent shoulders. His name was Hosteen Doetin, and it meant
gentle man. His fine, old, wrinkled face lighted with a smile of kindly
interest. His squaw followed him, and she was as venerable as he.
Shefford caught a glimpse of the shy, dark Glen Naspa, Nas Ta Bega's
sister, but she did not come out. Other Indians appeared, coming from
adjacent hogans.
Nas Ta Bega turned the mustangs loose among those Shefford had noticed,
and presently there rose a snorting, whistling, kicking, plunging melee.
A cloud of dust hid them, and then a thudding of swift hoofs told of a
run through the cedars. Joe Lake began picking over stacks of goat-skins
and bags of wool that were piled against the hogan.
“Reckon we'll have one grand job packing out this load,” he growled.
“It's not so heavy, but awkward to pack.”
It developed, presently, from talk with the old Navajo, that this pile
was only a half of the load to be packed to Kayenta, and the other half
was round the corner of the mountain in the camp of Piutes. Hosteen
Doetin said he would send to the camp and have the Piutes bring their
share over. The suggestion suited Joe, who wanted to save his burros as
much as possible. Accordingly, a messenger was despatched to the Piute
camp. And Shefford, with time on his hands and poignant memory to
combat, decided to recall his keen interest in the Navajo, and learn,
if possible, what the Indian's life was like. What would a day of his
natural life be?
In the gray of dawn, when the hush of the desert night still lay deep
over the land, the Navajo stirred in his blanket and began to chant to
the morning light. It began very soft and low, a strange, broken murmur,
like the music of a brook, and as it swelled that weird and mournful
tone was slowly lost in one of hope and joy. The Indian's soul was
coming out of night, blackness, the sleep that resembled death, into the
day, the light that was life.
Then he stood in the door of his hogan, his blanket around him, and
faced the east.
Night was lifting out of the clefts and ravines; the rolling cedar
ridges and the sage flats were softly gray, with thin veils like smoke
mysteriously rising and vanishing; the colorless rocks were changing. A
long, horizon-wide gleam of light, rosiest in the center, lay low down
in the east and momentarily brightened. One by one the stars in
the deep-blue sky paled and went out and the blue dome changed and
lightened. Night had vanished on invisible wings and silence broke to
the music of a mockingbird. The rose in the east deepened; a wisp of
cloud turned gold; dim distant mountains showed dark against the red;
and low down in a notch a rim of fire appeared. Over the soft ridges and
valleys crept a wondrous transfiguration. It was as if every blade of
grass, every leaf of sage, every twig of cedar, the flowers, the trees,
the rocks came to life at sight of the sun. The red disk rose, and a
golden fire burned over the glowing face of that lonely waste.
The Navajo, dark, stately, inscrutable, faced the sun--his god. This was
his Great Spirit. The desert was his mother, but the sun was his life.
To the keeper of the winds and rains, to the master of light, to the
maker of fire, to the giver of life the Navajo sent up his prayer:
Of all the good things of the Earth let me always have plenty.
Of all the beautiful things of the Earth let me always have plenty.
Peacefully let my horses go and peacefully let my sheep go.
God of the Heavens, give me many sheep and horses.
God of the Heavens, help me to talk straight.
Goddess of the Earth, my Mother, let me walk straight.
Now all is well, now all is well, now all is well, now all is well.
Hope and faith were his.
A chief would be born to save the vanishing tribe of Navajos. A bride
would rise from a wind--kiss of the lilies in the moonlight.
He drank from the clear, cold spring bubbling from under mossy rocks.
He went into the cedars, and the tracks in the trails told him of the
visitors of night. His mustangs whistled to him from the ridge-tops,
standing clear with heads up and manes flying, and then trooped down
through the sage. The shepherd-dogs, guardians of the flocks, barked him
a welcome, and the sheep bleated and the lambs pattered round him.
In the hogan by the warm, red fire his women baked his bread and cooked
his meat. And he satisfied his hunger. Then he took choice meat to the
hogan of a sick relative, and joined in the song and the dance and the
prayer that drove away the evil spirit of illness. Down in the valley,
in a sandy, sunny place, was his corn-field, and here he turned in the
water from the ditch, and worked awhile, and went his contented way.
He loved his people, his women, and his children. To his son he said:
“Be bold and brave. Grow like the pine. Work and ride and play that
you may be strong. Talk straight. Love your brother. Give half to your
friend. Honor your mother that you may honor your wife. Pray and listen
to your gods.”
Then with his gun and his mustang he climbed the slope of the mountain.
He loved the solitude, but he was never alone. There were voices on the
wind and steps on his trail. The lofty pine, the lichened rock, the tiny
bluebell, the seared crag--all whispered their secrets. For him their
spirits spoke. In the morning light Old Stone Face, the mountain, was a
red god calling him to the chase. He was a brother of the eagle, at home
on the heights where the winds swept and the earth lay revealed below.
In the golden afternoon, with the warm sun on his back and the blue
cañon at his feet, he knew the joy of doing nothing. He did not need
rest, for he was never tired. The sage-sweet breath of the open was
thick in his nostrils, the silence that had so many whisperings was
all about him, the loneliness of the wild was his. His falcon eye saw
mustang and sheep, the puff of dust down on the cedar level, the Indian
riding on a distant ridge, the gray walls, and the blue clefts. Here was
home, still free, still wild, still untainted. He saw with the eyes of
his ancestors. He felt them around him. They had gone into the elements
from which their voices came on the wind. They were the watchers on his
trails.
At sunset he faced the west, and this was his prayer:
Great Spirit, God of my Fathers,
Keep my horses in the night.
Keep my sheep in the night.
Keep my family in the night.
Let me wake to the day.
Let me be worthy of the light.
Now all is well, now all is well,
Now all is well, now all is well.
And he watched the sun go down and the gold sink from the peaks and the
red die out of the west and the gray shadows creep out of the cañon
to meet the twilight and the slow, silent, mysterious approach of night
with its gift of stars.
Night fell. The white stars blinked. The wind sighed in the cedars. The
sheep bleated. The shepherd-dogs bayed the mourning coyotes. And the
Indian lay down in his blankets with his dark face tranquil in the
starlight. All was well in his lonely world. Phantoms hovered, illness
lingered, injury and pain and death were there, the shadow of a
strange white hand flitted across the face of the moon--but now all was
well--the Navajo had prayed to the god of his Fathers. Now all was well!
. . . . . . . . . . .
And this, thought Shefford in revolt, was what the white man had killed
in the Indian tribes, was reaching out now to kill in this wild remnant
of the Navajos. The padre, the trapper, the trader, the prospector, and
the missionary--so the white man had come, some of him good, no doubt,
but more of him evil; and the young brave learned a thirst that could
never be quenched at the cold, sweet spring of his forefathers, and
the young maiden burned with a fever in her blood, and lost the sweet,
strange, wild fancies of her tribe.
. . . . . . . . . . .
Joe Lake came to Shefford and said, “Withers told me you had a mix-up
with a missionary at Red Lake.”
“Yes, I regret to say,” replied Shefford.
“About Glen Naspa?”
“Yes, Nas Ta Bega's sister.”
“Withers just mentioned it. Who was the missionary?”
“Willetts, so Presbrey, the trader, said.”
“What'd he look like?”
Shefford recalled the smooth, brown face, the dark eyes, the weak chin,
the mild expression, and the soft, lax figure of the missionary.
“Can't tell by what you said,” went on Joe. “But I'll bet a peso to a
horse-hair that's the fellow who's been here. Old Hosteen Doetin just
told me. First visits he ever had from the priest with the long gown.
That's what he called the missionary. These old fellows will never
forget what's come down from father to son about the Spanish padres.
Well, anyway, Willetts has been here twice after Glen Naspa. The old
chap is impressed, but he doesn't want to let the girl go. I'm inclined
to think Glen Naspa would as lief go as stay. She may be a Navajo, but
she's a girl. She won't talk much.”
“Where's Nas Ta Bega?” asked Shefford.
“He rode off somewhere yesterday. Perhaps to the Piute camp. These
Indians are slow. They may take a week to pack that load over here. But
if Nas Ta Bega or some one doesn't come with a message to-day I'll ride
over there myself.”
“Joe, what do you think about this missionary?” queried Shefford,
bluntly.
“Reckon there's not much to think, unless you see him or find out
something. I heard of Willetts before Withers spoke of him. He's
friendly with Mormons. I understand he's worked for Mormon interests,
someway or other. That's on the quiet. Savvy? This matter of him coming
after Glen Naspa, reckon that's all right. The missionaries all go after
the young people. What'd be the use to try to convert the old Indians?
No, the missionary's work is to educate the Indian, and, of course, the
younger he is the better.”
“You approve of the missionary?”
“Shefford, if you understood a Mormon you wouldn't ask that. Did you
ever read or hear of Jacob Hamblin?... Well, he was a Mormon missionary
among the Navajos. The Navajos were as fierce as Apaches till Hamblin
worked among them. He made them friendly to the white man.”
“That doesn't prove he made converts of them,” replied Shefford, still
bluntly.
“No. For the matter of that, Hamblin let religion alone. He made
presents, then traded with them, then taught them useful knowledge.
Mormon or not, Shefford, I'll admit this: a good man, strong with
his body, and learned in ways with his hands, with some knowledge of
medicine, can better the condition of these Indians. But just as soon
as he begins to preach his religion, then his influence wanes. That's
natural. These heathen have their ideals, their gods.”
“Which the white man should leave them!” replied Shefford, feelingly.
“That's a matter of opinion. But don't let's argue.... Willetts is after
Glen Naspa. And if I know Indian girls he'll persuade her to go to his
school.”
“Persuade her!” Then Shefford broke off and related the incident that
had occurred at Red Lake.
“Reckon any means justifies the end,” replied Joe, imperturbably. “Let
him talk love to her or rope her or beat her, so long as he makes a
Christian of her.”
Shefford felt a hot flush and had difficulty in controlling himself.
From this single point of view the Mormon was impossible to reason with.
“That, too, is a matter of opinion. We won't discuss it,” continued
Shefford. “But--if old Hosteen Doetin objects to the girl leaving, and
if Nas Ta Bega does the same, won't that end the matter?”
“Reckon not. The end of the matter is Glen Naspa. If she wants to go
she'll go.”
Shefford thought best to drop the discussion. For the first time he had
occasion to be repelled by something in this kind and genial Mormon,
and he wanted to forget it. Just as he had never talked about men to the
sealed wives in the hidden valley, so he could not talk of women to Joe
Lake.
Nas Ta Bega did not return that day, but, next morning a messenger came
calling Lake to the Piute camp. Shefford spent the morning high on the
slope, learning more with every hour in the silence and loneliness, that
he was stronger of soul than he had dared to hope, and that the added
pain which had come to him could be borne.
Upon his return toward camp, in the cedar grove, he caught sight of Glen
Naspa with a white man. They did not see him. When Shefford recognized
Willetts an embarrassment as well as an instinct made him halt and step
into a bushy, low-branched cedar. It was not his intention to spy on
them. He merely wanted to avoid a meeting. But the missionary's hand
on the girl's arm, and her up-lifted head, her pretty face, strange,
intent, troubled, struck Shefford with an unusual and irresistible
curiosity. Willetts was talking earnestly; Glen Naspa was listening
intently. Shefford watched long enough to see that the girl loved the
missionary, and that he reciprocated or was pretending. His manner
scarcely savored of pretense, Shefford concluded, as he slipped away
under the trees.
He did not go at once into camp. He felt troubled, and wished that he
had not encountered the two. His duty in the matter, of course, was to
tell Nas Ta Bega what he had seen. Upon reflection Shefford decided to
give the missionary the benefit of a doubt; and if he really cared for
the Indian girl, and admitted or betrayed it, to think all the better of
him for the fact. Glen Naspa was certainly pretty enough, and probably
lovable enough, to please any lonely man in this desert. The pain and
the yearning in Shefford's heart made him lenient. He had to fight
himself--not to forget, for that was impossible--but to keep rational
and sane when a white flower-like face haunted him and a voice called.
The cracking of hard hoofs on stones caused him to turn toward camp,
and as he emerged from the cedar grove he saw three Indian horsemen ride
into the cleared space before the hogans. They were superbly mounted and
well armed, and impressed him as being different from Navajos. Perhaps
they were Piutes. They dismounted and led the mustangs down to the pool
below the spring. Shefford saw another mustang, standing bridle down
and carrying a pack behind the saddle. Some squaws with children hanging
behind their skirts were standing at the door of Hosteen Doetin's hogan.
Shefford glanced in to see Glen Naspa, pale, quiet, almost sullen.
Willetts stood with his hands spread. The old Navajo's seamed face
worked convulsively as he tried to lift his bent form to some semblance
of dignity, and his voice rolled out, sonorously: “Me no savvy Jesus
Christ! Me hungry! ... Me no eat Jesus Christ!”
Shefford drew back as if he had received a blow. That had been Hosteen
Doetin's reply to the importunities of the missionary. The old Navajo
could work no longer. His sons were gone. His squaw was worn out. He
had no one save Glen Naspa to help him. She was young, strong. He was
hungry. What was the white man's religion to him?
With long, swift stride Shefford entered the hogan. Willetts, seeing
him, did not look so mild as Shefford had him pictured in memory, nor
did he appear surprised. Shefford touched Hosteen Doetin's shoulder and
said, “Tell me.”
The aged Navajo lifted a shaking hand.
“Me no savvy Jesus Christ! Me hungry!... Me no eat Jesus Christ!”
Shefford then made signs that indicated the missionary's intention to
take the girl away. “Him come--big talk--Jesus--all Jesus.... Me no want
Glen Naspa go,” replied the Indian.
Shefford turned to the missionary.
“Willetts, is he a relative of the girl?”
“There's some blood tie, I don't know what. But it's not close,” replied
Willetts.
“Then don't you think you'd better wait till Nas Ta Bega returns? He's
her brother.”
“What for?” demanded Willetts. “That Indian may be gone a week. She's
willing to accompany the missionary.”
Shefford looked at the girl.
“Glen Naspa, do you want to go?”
She was shy, ashamed, and silent, but manifestly willing to accompany
the missionary. Shefford pondered a moment. How he hoped Nas Ta Bega
would come back! It was thought of the Indian that made Shefford
stubborn. What his stand ought to be was hard to define, unless he
answered to impulse; and here in the wilds he had become imbued with the
idea that his impulses and instincts were no longer false.
“Willetts, what do you want with the girl?” queried Shefford, coolly,
and at the question he seemed to find himself. He peered deliberately
and searchingly into the other's face. The missionary's gaze shifted and
a tinge of red crept up from under his collar.
“Absurd thing to ask a missionary!” he burst out, impatiently.
“Do you care for Glen Naspa?”
“I care as God's disciple--who cares to save the soul of heathen,” he
replied, with the lofty tone of prayer.
“Has Glen Naspa no--no other interest in you--except to be taught
religion?”
The missionary's face flamed, and his violent tremor showed that under
his exterior there was a different man.
“What right have you to question me?” he demanded. “You're an
adventurer--an outcast. I've my duty here. I'm a missionary with Church
and state and government behind me.”
“Yes, I'm an outcast,” replied Shefford, bitterly. “And you may be all
you say. But we're alone now out here on the desert. And this girl's
brother is absent. You haven't answered me yet.... Is there anything
between you and Glen Naspa except religion?”
“No, you insulting beggar?”
Shefford had forced the reply that he had expected and which damned the
missionary beyond any consideration.
“Willetts, you are a liar!” said Shefford, steadily.
“And what are you?” cried Willetts, in shrill fury. “I've heard all
about you. Heretic! Atheist! Driven from your Church! Hated and scorned
for your blasphemy!”
Then he gave way to ungovernable rage, and cursed Shefford as a
religious fanatic might have cursed the most debased sinners. Shefford
heard with the blood beating, strangling the pulse in his ears. Somehow
this missionary had learned his secret--most likely from the Mormons
in Stonebridge. And the terms of disgrace were coals of fire upon
Shefford's head. Strangely, however, he did not bow to them, as had
been his humble act in the past, when his calumniators had arraigned and
flayed him. Passion burned in him now, for the first time in his life,
made a tiger of him. And these raw emotions, new to him, were difficult
to control.
“You can't take the girl,” he replied, when the other had ceased. “Not
without her brother's consent.”
“I will take her!”
Shefford threw him out of the hogan and strode after him. Willetts had
stumbled. When he straightened up he was white and shaken. He groped for
the bridle of his horse while keeping his eyes upon Shefford, and when
he found it he whirled quickly, mounted, and rode off. Shefford saw him
halt a moment under the cedars to speak with the three strange Indians,
and then he galloped away. It came to Shefford then that he had been
unconscious of the last strained moment of that encounter. He seemed all
cold, tight, locked, and was amazed to find his hand on his gun. Verily
the wild environment had liberated strange instincts and impulses, which
he had answered. That he had no regrets proved how he had changed.
Shefford heard the old woman scolding. Peering into the hogan, he saw
Glen Naspa flounce sullenly down, for all the world like any other
thwarted girl. Hosteen Doetin came out and pointed down the slope at the
departing missionary.
“Heap talk Jesus--all talk--all Jesus!” he exclaimed, contemptuously.
Then he gave Shefford a hard rap on the chest. “Small talk--heap man!”
The matter appeared to be adjusted for the present. But Shefford felt
that he had made a bitter enemy, and perhaps a powerful one.