The mysterious disappearance of Oowikapun from the village of his
friends caused a good deal of excitement and innocent gossip. That he
was deeply in love with Astumastao was evident to all, and while she did
not allow even her most intimate friends to hear her say that she
intended to marry him, yet her conduct very plainly indicated that he
stood higher than anyone else in her esteem. That she had positively
rejected him none of them could believe. Why then had he thus shown the
white feather, and so ignominiously and so suddenly left the field when
it seemed so evident that a little more perseverance would have surely
resulted in his success. In this way the young men and maidens of the
village talked, while the old men gravely smoked the calumets and
mourned that the times were so changed that a young brave should have so
much trouble in capturing a squaw.
When Astumastao was informed of the sudden disappearance of Oowikapun
she was troubled and perplexed. Not the slightest hint had he given her
of his intended movements when, like a flash, there had come to him the
great resolve to be the one who should go on the long journey to find
the missionary. She was a maiden, not beautiful, but she was a comely
Indian girl, attractive and clever in her way, and she well knew that
many a young hunter had sat down beside her wigwam door or had dropped
the shining, white pebble before her in the path, thus plainly
intimating his desire to win her notice and esteem. But to all of them
she had turned a deaf ear, and had treated them, without exception, with
perfect indifference. As shy and timid as a young fawn of the forest,
she had lived under the watchful and somewhat jealous care of her uncle
and aunt, until Oowikapun had appeared in the village.
His coming, however, and his reference to Memotas had strangely broken
the quiet monotony of years. Then what she had done for him in the
wigwam, their conversation in the trail, and above all, his gallant
rescue of her from the terrible catamount, had aroused new emotions
within her and opened up her mind to a wider vision, until now she saw
that she was no longer the young free Indian girl with no thoughts but
those of her childhood, but a woman who must now act and decide for
herself. But with the characteristic reserve of her people she kept all
the newborn emotions and aspirations hid in her heart.
The power to control the feelings and passions among the Indians is not
confined to the sterner sex. Schooled in a life of hardship, the women
as well as the men can put on the mask of apparent indifference, while
at the same time the heart is racked by intensest feeling, or the body
is suffering most horrid torture. Death in its most dreadful form may
be staring them in the face, and yet the outsider may look in vain for
the blanching of the cheek, or the quivering of a muscle. Very early in
life does this stern education begin.
"That is my best child," said an Indian father, as he pointed out an
apparently happy little girl seven or eight years old, in his wigwam.
"Why should she be your favourite child?" was asked him.
"Why? Because she, of all my children, will go the longest without
food, without crying," was his answer.
To suffer, but to show no sign, is the proverb of the true Indian. And
yet Astumastao would not admit even to herself that she was deeply in
love with Oowikapun. She had treasured the fond conceit in her heart
that the one all-absorbing passion with her was that which she had
freely revealed to him, and she in her simplicity had honestly believed
that no other love could take its place, or even share the room in her
heart.
But here was a rude awakening. She was a mystery to herself. Why these
sighs and tears when she was alone and unwatched by her bright-eyed,
alert young associates? Why did the image of this one young Indian
hunter intrude itself so persistently before her in her waking hours?
It is true he came not frequently to her in her dreams, for we dream but
little of those we love the most, and who are in our memories and on our
hearts continually during the waking hours of active life.
Untaught in the schools and free from all the guiles of heartless
coquetry, an orphan girl in an Indian village, with neither prudery on
the one hand, nor hothouse teachings on the other, which turn the heads
of so many girls, Astumastao was to herself a riddle which she could not
solve--a problem the most difficult of any she had tried to understand.
Her maidenly modesty seemed first to tell her to banish his image from
her heart, and his name from her lips. To accomplish this she threw
herself with renewed diligence into the duties incident to her simple
yet laborious life, and by her very activities endeavoured to bring
herself back to the sweet simplicities of her earlier days. But
fruitless were all her efforts. The heart transfixed, was too strong
for her head, and the new love which had so unconsciously come to her
would not be stilled or banished.
A true daughter of Eve was this forest maiden, even if she did live in a
wigwam, and had never read a novel or a romance, and because she had
these feelings and was passing through these hours of disquietude and
conflicting emotions we think none the less of her. Our only regret is
that she had no judicious friend of her own sex to whom in her
perplexity she could have gone for wise and prudent counsel. Happy are
those daughters in civilised lands who have their precious mothers or
other safe counsellors to whom they can go in these critical hours of
their history, when their future weal or woe may turn upon the decisions
then made. And happy are those fair maidens who, instead of impulsively
and recklessly rejecting all counsel and warning from their truest
friends, listen to the voice of experience and parental love, and above
all, seek aid from the infinitely loving One who has said: "If any of
you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally,
and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him."
Astumastao unfortunately had no one to whom she could go in her
perplexity. Her feeble aunt had been a purchased wife, bought in the
long ago by her husband whom she had never seen until the day when he
had come from a distant village, and being impressed with her
appearance, for she was then a fine-looking young woman, had quickly
spread out at her father's feet all the gifts he demanded for her. His
first words to her were to inform her that she was his wife, and that
very shortly they would set out for his distant home. Crushed, out of
her heart were some feelings of affection for a handsome young hunter
who had several times met her on the trail, as she was accustomed to go
to the bubbling spring in the shady dell for water for her father's
wigwam. Few indeed had been his words, but his looks had been bright
and full of meaning, and he had let her know that he was gathering up
the gifts that would purchase her from her stern, avaricious father.
But, alas! her dreams and hopes had been blasted, and her heart crushed
by this old pagan custom, and so for long years she had lived the
dreary, monotonous life to which we have referred. Such a woman could
give no advice that would be of much service to such an alert,
thoughtful girl as Astumastao, and so, unaided and undisciplined, she
let her thoughts drift and her heart become the seat of emotions and
feelings most diverse. Sometimes she bitterly upbraided herself for her
coldness and indifference to Oowikapun as she thought of his many noble
qualities. Then again she would marshal before her his weaknesses and
defects, and would vainly try to persuade herself to believe that the
man who had been in the tent of Memotas and had heard him pray, and had
then gone into the devil dance and had voluntarily suffered the tortures
of _hock-e-a-yum_, was unworthy of her notice. Then suddenly, as the
memory of what he must have suffered in those terrible ordeals came
before her, her bright eyes would fill with tears, and she found herself
impulsively longing for the opportunity to drive the recollection of
such suffering from her mind and heart, and to be the one to save him
from their repetition. Amid these conflicting emotions there was one
thought that kept coming up in her mind and giving her much trouble, and
that was, "Why had he left so abruptly? Why did he not at least come
and say `Good-bye?' or why had he not left at least some little message
for her?"
Over these queries she pondered, and they were more than once thrown at
her by the young Indian maidens, as with them she was skillfully
decorating with beads some snow-white moccasins she had made.
Thus pondered Astumastao through the long weeks that were passing by
since Oowikapun left her, while he, brave fellow, little dreaming that
such conflicting feelings were in her heart, was putting his life in
jeopardy, and enduring hardships innumerable, to save and benefit the
one who had become dearer to him than life itself.
Thus the time rolled on, and all her efforts to banish him from her mind
proved failures, and it came to pass that, like the true, noble girl
that she was, she could only think of that which was brave and good
about him, and so when some startling rumours of a delightful character
began to be circulated among the wigwams, our heroine, Astumastao,
without knowing the reason why, at once associated them with Oowikapun.
News travels rapidly sometimes, even in the lands where telegraphs and
express trains are unknown. It does not always require the
well-appointed mail service to carry the news rapidly through the land.
During the terrible civil war in the United States there was among the
Negroes of the South what was known as the grapevine telegraphy, by
which the coloured people in remote sections often had news of success
or disaster to the army of "Uncle Abraham," as they loved to call
President Lincoln, long before the whites had any knowledge of what had
occurred.
So it was among the Indian tribes. In some mysterious, and to the
whites, most unaccountable way, the news of success or disaster was
carried hundreds of miles in a marvellously short period of time. For
example, the defeat and death of General Custer at the battle of the
Rosebud was known among the Sioux Indians, near Saint Paul, for several
hours before the military authorities at the same place had any
knowledge of it, although the whites were able to communicate more than
half of the way with each other by telegraph. An interesting subject
this might prove for some one who had time and patience to give it a
thorough investigation.
The rumours of coming blessings to the people kept increasing. At
length they assumed a form so tangible, that the people began to
understand what was meant. It seemed that some hunters met some other
hunters in their far-off wanderings, who had come across a party of
Norway House Christian Indians, who informed them that a visit might be
soon expected from the white man with the great book, about which there
had been so many strange things circulating for such a long time. When
Astumastao heard these rumours she was excited and perplexed. While
hoping most sincerely that they were true, and would speedily be
fulfilled, yet she could not but feel that she would have rejoiced to
have been able to have made the long journey, for which she had been so
industriously preparing, and have had something to do in bringing the
missionary and the book among her own people. And then she let her
thoughts go to some one else, and she said to herself, "I will rejoice
if it turns out to be the work of Oowikapun."