camped across the valley. Upon one side the bluff fell sheer to the
river; upon the other lingered a cruel and patient foe. So it happened
that after many days, moans of suffering arose from the lodges on the
bluff; and the Omahas laughed in their tepees, for the sound of an
enemy’s wailing is sweet. The sweltering suns of the prairie September
beat upon the bare summit where the village pined, and the lips of the
Poncas burned with thirst, while their eyes drank of the copious floods
far below them.
So it chanced one day, when a cry went up through the village: “Our
children are dying of thirst; let us beg mercy of our enemies!” that an
unarmed brave passed out of the village and across the valley toward
the camp of his foes. With tottering step he approached the tepee
before which Big Axe waited. His lips were swollen and cracked; his
eyes were bleared and sunken, yet they glared as the eyes of a wolf
from the darkness of a cavern.
In a hoarse, inarticulate whisper he spoke to the chief: “Pity my
people, for they are dying of thirst!”
There was lightning in the eyes of Muzape Tunga. “Badger!” he hissed;
and he struck the suppliant down before him.
The sun burned down the glaring blue of the west. A continuous wail
arose from the suffering village like the cry of pines in a gentle
wind; while from the tepees of the besiegers came the sound of merry
laughter that mocked like the babble of inaccessible waters.
But when the red sun touched the tops of the far hills, another form
left the enclosure of the village and took its way down the hillside.
As it came nearer, a hush of awe fell upon the Omahas. The form was
that of a squaw! With an unfaltering movement she approached, seeming
to hover through the mist that arose from the valley. Slowly she
climbed the hillside. Not a sound passed the lips of the beholders.
They seemed the figures of one dream gazing at the central idea of
another. The form emerged from the mist and stood, swathed in the
chromatic radiance of the evening before the motionless figure of
Muzape Tunga. The eyes of the woman and the chief met in unwavering
stare. Had the glance of the former become vocal, it would have been
a song with the softness of the mother’s lullaby, but with a meaning
terrible as the battle cry of a brave.
With a langorous movement the woman raised her arms, thus allowing
the many-coloured skin that hung about her shoulders to slip to the
ground, exposing all the dumb eloquence of her brown breasts. Out of
the silence her voice broke like the voice of a sudden wind that rises
in the night.
“Nunda Nu [Man-Heart] fears not Muzape Tunga!”
The chief saw the lithe young form, heard the soft, caressing voice and
shivered with great passion.
A swift smile crossed the face of the young woman, soft as a last ray
of sunlight on a hill. Again the voice grew out of the hush.
“The heart of Muzape Tunga is strong like his arm and kind like his
eye; he will spare my people.”
The chief’s great breast heaved with the pleasure of his eye and ear.
“Nunda Nu has the heart of a man and the eye of a woman,” he said; “her
voice is soft like the song of a forest stream; Muzape Tunga spares her
people.”
Nunda Nu turned her face to her village and made a signal with her
uplifted hands. Soon an unarmed Ponca, manifestly a chief by his
garments, was seen taking his way down the hillside.
“Come!” said Nunda Nu, turning to Big Axe; “my father bears the pipe of
peace; let us meet him in the valley.”
Without a word the chief followed the young woman, while his warriors
stared after in wonderment. In the valley, midway between the village
and the camp, the chiefs met. Then both sitting cross-legged upon the
grass, the Ponca lit the pipe of peace, and having puffed silently for
a while, handed it to his conqueror. The sweet smoke of the red willow
arose slowly over the silent three, and Big Axe stared abstractedly
into the mounting vapour. The evening grew old. The sunlight left the
summits of the hills and the shadows deepened. Still Big Axe did not
speak, but gazed with wide eyes into the ascending cloud of smoke. The
heart of the terrible warrior had grown tender; a light softer than the
twilight was in his eye. It seemed that he could hear the slumberous,
singing voice of a squaw and the prattle of children about the door of
his lodge. There were pictures for him in the rising smoke.
Suddenly he took the pipe from his mouth and returned it to the Ponca
chief.
“We will bury the tomahawk,” he said; “our ponies shall sweat no more
in the battle, but in the paths of the bison. No more shall our faces
be cruel with warpaint.”
Again there was silence but for the rhythmic puffing of the Ponca’s
pipe. Again Muzape Tunga spoke, and his voice was sonorous with passion.
“The eyes of Nunda Nu are deep and dark as a mountain lake; her voice
is a song that the slow winds sing in the willows. Give me Nunda Nu
that my lodge may be filled with laughter; give her to Muzape Tunga
that peace may be everlasting between us!”
There was a silence. The Ponca forgot his pipe; he puffed deliberately
and at long intervals. The ascending smoke dwindled to a thin grey
thread. With steadfast gaze the smoker looked before him into the
darkness, for his thoughts were deep.
At length he laid the pipe upon the grass and arose to his feet,
extending his hand to Big Axe. His voice was tremulous as he spoke.
“Muzape Tunga asks a great thing of his conquered brother; had he asked
for a hundred ponies, with feet fleet as the winds in winter, his
brother would have laughed at the little gift. Nunda Nu is my life; I
give my life to my brother.”
Already the night had spread into the west and the darkness hid their
parting.
* * * * *
Some days afterward at sunset, an Omaha maiden stood upon a hill near
her village. With hand at brow she peered into the blue distance.
Suddenly a cry of delight trembled on her lips. A cloud of dust had
grown far away upon the verge of a hill to the northeast, slowly
resolving itself into a long line of warriors approaching at a gallop.
The column drew nearer. The face of the watching maiden grew darker
with anxiety, as a brilliant cloud darkens when the twilight fails. She
beheld the masterful form of Big Axe mounted upon a black pony, riding
in advance of the band; yet her face darkened. Her brows lowered with
the strain of her intense gaze. Was it a squaw that rode upon a pony
white as a summer cloud beside her warrior?
A shout went up from the village below. The speed of the ponies was
increased to a fast gallop; the band swept up the valley. A strange
low cry fell from the lips of the maiden; a stifled cry like that of
a sleeping brave who feels the knife of the treacherous foeman at his
heart.
In the village was the sound of many glad voices; but in the darkness
of the hill above, a frail form buried its face in the dry bunch grass
and uttered a moan that no one heard.
* * * * *
The autumn passed: the cold winds came down from the north, shaking the
snow from their black wings, and the people of the village began to
look upon Shadow Flower with awe. For never a word had she spoken to
anyone since the returning of the band in the fall. With a dull light
in her eyes she wandered about muttering to herself: “It was summer
when they left; now the prairie is so cold and white, so cold and
white.”
Absent-mindedly she would dwell upon the bitter words, gazing beneath
an arched hand into the cold, white glare of the horizon. Then her
eyes, at times, would blaze with gladness. “Shonga saba! Shonga saba!”
(a black pony) she would cry ecstatically; and for one intense moment
her frail form would be erect and quivering with joy. Then the light
in her eye would fade as the fires fade in a camp that is deserted; a
cry of anguish would fall from her lips, her hand would drop lifelessly
from her brow. “No,” she would sigh languidly; “no, it is only a cloud!
O, the prairie is so cold and white, so cold and white!”
And the old people shook their heads and whispered to each other:
“The soul of Pazha Hu has followed the summer, for her soul loved the
flowers; can you not hear her body crying for her soul?”
When the warm winds came again and the hills were green, the crying of
a young child was heard in the lodge of Muzape Tunga. The simple heart
of the stern warrior throbbed with gladness as a cold seed throbs with
the blowing of the south wind.
But the sound of the infant’s voice brought no summer to the heart of
Nunda Nu. The touch of its little brown hands stung her breasts, and as
she looked upon its face, placid or expressive as its dreams took form
or slept, a cold shudder ran through her veins as when one gazes on a
snake, for it was the child of an enemy.
All through the long winter a slow hate had sapped the kindness
from the heart of the future mother; and when she felt the new life
throbbing into form, her thoughts grew bitter. So now the unforgotten
moaning of the children of her people, dying with thirst upon the
barren summit, was loud enough to drown the prattle of her enemy’s
child, which should have wrought enchantment in her blood.
One night a noiseless shadow passed among the tepees hushed in slumber
beneath the moonlight. It crept up to the tepee of Muzape Tunga and
crouched beside it in an attitude of listening. The bugs chirped and
hummed, the frogs croaked, the wolves howled far away; save these and a
sleeper’s heavy breathing, there was silence.
Suddenly there was a faint sound as of someone moving in the tepee;
the shadow outside arose and the moonlight fell upon its haggard face,
the face of Shadow Flower. She placed her eye to a small opening in
the skins that covered the poles. Now she would gaze upon the child of
Muzape Tunga!
Through the opening at the top of the tepee the moonlight entered with
intense brilliance and fell upon three faces. One was the face of her
once sweet dream and the face that trembled through the visions of her
madness, Muzape Tunga’s. One was the beautiful, cruel face of her who
came upon a pony white as a summer cloud that autumn evening when the
sunlight left the prairie. One was a face that she had not seen before,
yet her poor heart ached as she looked upon it. It was the face of his
child, her child. Ah, it should have been the child of Shadow Flower,
she thought, and her brain reeled with sudden madness.
As she looked, the woman in the tepee raised herself upon her elbow.
She gazed upon the peaceful face of Big Axe. The moon lit up her
features in clear relief. Her eyes were terrible with hate; the lids
drawn closely about them until they had the small beady appearance of
the snake’s. Her lips were drawn closely cross her white teeth in a
cold grin. Her form trembled as with a chill, yet the night was warm.
Then she arose, and with a noiseless step, sought for something that
hung upon the side of the tepee. She returned clutching a tomahawk. The
light caught her whole form, making it stand out, clear-cut like a
statue, the statue of a prairie Judith.
Then she bent over the sleeping Muzape Tunga for one moment. There was
a dull sound as the weapon entered the sleeper’s skull; but more than
this there was no sound, no groan. And the one who stood like a shadow
without the tepee was stricken dumb with fright.
The woman within turned to the sleeping child and raised the dripping
tomahawk; but her arm seemed to freeze in act to strike, and the blow
did not fall. A strange soft light crept over the face of the woman.
She lowered her arm and laid the weapon aside. Then with the step of a
wild-cat she crept to the entrance of the tepee and, gazing cautiously
about for a moment, slipped silently into the haze of the moonlight,
and was engulfed in the darkness of the valley.
As the dim outline of the fleeing squaw mixed itself with the uncertain
haze and vanished, a great happiness leaped into the stagnant veins of
Shadow Flower, and her blood rushed like a stream when the ice melts
with the breath of the south wind.
Even the thought that Big Axe lay dead within the tepee did not quell
her happiness, for she said to herself: “Now Pazha Hu shall have her
warrior; he shall be all hers.”
She crept into the tepee and, kneeling, put her lips to the chilling
lips of Big Axe. He did not breathe. She placed her arms about his
body, her face against his breast, yet he did not move. He lay quietly
with the intense moonlight upon his face. She did not sob, she was
almost happy; for did she not at last possess that for which she had
pined?
Her musings were broken by the crying of the child. She took it in her
arms and held it to her breast, humming a low lullaby, half-persuaded
that the child was her own. But the child was frightened by the strange
voice and cried piteously. Then Shadow Flower thought, “It cries for
its father, yet its father has gone.” “Hush!” she said to the child;
“we will go and find the soul of Muzape Tunga; it cannot be far away.”
She wrapped a blanket about the infant, muffling its cries, and tied
it about her shoulders. Then she went silently through the village and
out into the open prairie, weird with the blue haze of the moon and the
lonesome cries of the wolves.
A rabbit hopped past and stopped near her as if gazing at the maiden.
“O Rabbit!” cried Shadow Flower, “tell me, have you seen the soul of
Muzape Tunga?”
The rabbit, awed by the strangeness of the voice, moved its long ears;
then it hopped away into the shades. The maiden followed and was
swallowed in the moonlit mist.
* * * * *
When the sun looked into the village, the women were stricken with
terror and the men with anger. The wise people shook their heads by
which to say: “Ah, yes; we thought such things of Nunda Nu.”
The days passed; the moons came and went; yet Shadow Flower did not
return. There was a common thought concerning her disappearance which
was never spoken aloud; but when the fires burned low and the night
grew late, it was often whispered with awe:
“She has gone in search of her soul; it fled last year with the
summer.”
VI
THE ART OF HATE
MANY tales have been told of noble sacrifice for love, and I have seen
such in my time; but I have in mind an instance in which a man reached
a sublime height through the least exalted of human passions—hate.
There are some who argue that love is born at first sight. However that
be, I am certain that it is often thus with hate. I have seen men in my
time the first sight of whom was an insult to me—sudden, stinging like
a slap on the cheek. It is a strange thing, and I have never heard it
explained satisfactorily. Sometimes in my own case I have attributed
it to even so slight a thing as a certain turn of the nose, a curve
of the lip, a droop of the eye. And again I have felt that it was due
to nothing visible about the man, but rather to some subtle emanation
from the very soul of him, that maddened me as though I had inhaled the
fumes of some devilish drug. Have you ever felt this?
Well, I am telling you about Zephyr Recontre.
He was a little, wiry half-breed, with a French father and a woman of
the Blackfeet tribe for a mother. Quite a promising combination, if you
think it over! I came across him ’way up at Fort Union in the early
’30’s, when I was in charge of a keel boat of the American Fur Company.
He was employed at the Fort as interpreter, being a fluent speaker of
several Indian tongues as well as English and French.
His forehead was a narrow strip of brown between his wiry black hair
and the continuous streak of black that was his eyebrows. His eyes were
large and black and quiet. His cheek bones were prominent and his jaw
was so heavy as to throw his whole face out of balance, as you might
say. The face of a stayer, you know. Never said much except as his
duties demanded, and then he went straight to the point with a quiet
directness that left little need for a question.
Superb little animal he was, too; had the maximum strength with the
minimum weight, and a cool head to run it with. I never saw him
impelled by sudden anger except once, and that is where the story
begins.
In the spring of ’39 I took charge of the steamboat _Yellowstone_, as
captain. We were loaded with supplies for the American Fur Company’s
posts on the upper Missouri, and carried a number of _engagés_ of the
Company, and a certain Frenchman, Jules Latour, who had been appointed
_bourgeois_ of the old Fort Union, and was going up to take charge.
If there ever was an emperor in this country it was J. J. Astor, the
head of the Company at that time, and his empire was spread pretty
much all over the white space on the map of the West as it stood then.
The _bourgeois_, masters of the trading posts, were the proconsuls, and
they acted the part.
The _engagés_, humble servants of the empire, were as dogs about the
feet of these Western princes, who stalked through their provinces,
mountain-high in aristocratic aloofness.
Latour outprinced princeliness. He felt his dignity and dressed it; his
presence on the boat was like a continual blowing of trumpets going
before a conqueror. A capital “I” swaggering in broadcloth—that was
Latour!
Recontre was going back with us, having dropped down to St. Louis the
fall before on Company business. I happened to be near when master and
man first met on the forward deck. They stared upon each other for only
a moment; but there were years of hate condensed in that bit of time,
the master casting a contemptuous glance from beneath lids scornfully
drooped, and the servant meeting this with a sudden glare of black fire.
Not a word was passed; Recontre made no sign of obeisance, passing on
with a sullen swing, his jaws set firmly, his eyes brilliant as with a
smouldering fire blown by a gusty wind into a baleful glow.
It was a plain case of hate at first sight. A week later, after we
had passed St. Mary’s, I was standing on the hurricane deck, gazing
downstream where the colours of a quiet sunset swept the waters. I
heard an angry snarl below me, and looking down, I saw Recontre lift
the struggling Latour in his arms and hurl him into the river.
I immediately stopped the boat and ordered a crew to man the yawl and
rescue Latour, at the same time having Recontre seized.
Latour came aboard coughing and spitting, a most ludicrous object.
But to my surprise, he immediately commanded that Recontre should be
released. I wondered much at this at the time; but ten years later I
had a talk with Recontre, which threw some light on the subject. He was
leaving the country, and, as we had become close friends, he did not
hesitate to tell me what he had kept a close secret for years.
We were taking a friendly glass together at a St. Louis bar, when I
purposely brought up the name of Jules Latour, who had starved to death
some years before in a mackinaw boat that got caught in the ice far up
the river. I had heard stories of how Recontre, who was with Latour on
the trip, had shown a faithfulness to his master equalled only by the
faithfulness of a dog to a man. This had always seemed strange to me,
and so I brought up Jules Latour.
At the sound of the name I saw the black fire grow up in my companion’s
eyes, just as I had seen it ten years before on the forward deck of the
_Yellowstone_.
“You got that story, too, did you?” he said dreamily, staring straight
ahead of him as into a great distance. “Well, it’s all over now, and
for the first time, I am going to tell the truth about the death of
Latour and my great faithfulness. When I first saw that man, I felt as
though he had struck me between the eyes with his white fist. I hated
him as I had never hated before, and as I hope never to hate again. It
hurts to hate; it eats into a man like some incurable blood disease.
“You saw me throw him into the water. I can hardly explain why I did
that; only, the man spoke to me in a way that insulted me more than
if he had blackguarded my mother. It wasn’t in the words, for I have
forgotten what he said.
“We hated each other. I knew how much I hated, but I did not know how
great was his hate until he smilingly ordered my release. I knew then
that his hate was a great hate—stronger than love can be. And also I
knew that this hate would grow until one of us was killed. And it did.”
“What!” said I; “did _you_ kill Latour?”
Recontre smiled one of his enigmatic smiles and said quietly: “_Nature_
killed Latour; _I_ merely helped Nature!”
And then he laughed softly, while the black fire grew again in his eyes.
Recontre led the way to a table in the back of the room and we sat
down, when he began talking rapidly, never hesitating in his story, and
seeming, at times, wholly unconscious of my presence.
“When we arrived at Fort Union,” said he, “no one could have guessed
the hate that we nursed for each other. Being a new man in the country,
Latour consulted me upon many phases of the business, and we were much
together. The whole post considered me a most favoured person; little
knowing, as I did, that hate can bind two persons as closely as love.
“My hatred for the man made his a most fascinating personality to me;
and I often found him studying my face with a diabolical fondness.
“Latour heaped favours upon me, and I received them with a strange
gladness of heart that even now I cannot explain. One day in November
he sent for me to come to his office. I found him in a mood seemingly
most agreeable. His face beamed with a light that any other would have
taken for kindness. I saw in it only the ecstatic anticipation of
triumph. And when he spoke I knew that I was right.
“‘My dear Recontre,’ said he, ‘it seems that I am forced to fall back
upon you for everything. I have a difficult task on hand, and you are
the one man to perform it; I know of no other so peculiarly fitted
for it. I shall carefully lay before you the dangers of the mission I
have in mind, leaving you free to consent or refuse just as you see
fit. Perhaps the undertaking is impossible. It may be that no man is
sufficiently equipped with strength and daring to do what I wish. You
shall decide.’
“You see he imagined that he was wheedling me through my vanity. He
then stated that he wished to open trade with the Blackfeet tribe.
He drew strongly upon his imagination to explain the great dangers in
store for him who should undertake the task. The Blackfeet were at that
time deadly enemies of the whites. They had killed and mutilated a
number of traders. I would of course stand a poor chance of coming back
alive. He was convinced of that.
“‘Will you go, Recontre?’ said he, staring steadily into my eyes.
“I was dumbfounded at the audacity of the man. I saw the light of doubt
wavering in his eyes; but I did not wish to flinch before my enemy.
“‘Certainly,’ said I; ‘and I will go alone!’
“I saw the triumph glisten in his eye.
“‘Very well,’ said he; ‘you may start in the morning. Make your own
arrangements. I give you full power to transact the business in hand as
your wisdom may dictate.’
“And I started in the morning. Two weeks later I returned, successful
beyond all hope. I not only brought back a band of the leading men of
the tribe for a council, but I brought also a young woman for my wife.
I called her Pelagie after one of my sisters.
“As I think of it now it seems miraculous that I succeeded. I am half
convinced that I was inspired from out the profundity of my hate to do
and say the right things.
“Latour played skilfully the part of gratitude and joy, but I saw,
nevertheless, the deep, devilish disappointment that he felt. And I was
very glad, for I had conquered in this first combat; and also Pelagie
was a pleasant woman.
“As the winter deepened, Latour and I became more and more inseparable.
We outdid each other in acts of seeming kindness, until all the post
was jealous of my intimacy with the master.
“They little guessed how we played a ghastly game that would be
finished only when one of us could smirk and flatter no more.
“The winter grew bitter; heavy snows fell. And I wondered much what
great honour Latour would heap upon me next, seeing that I was so
capable and willing. Near Christmas Latour called me to his office, and
the light of anticipated triumph was upon his face.
“‘My friend,’ said he; ‘I do not wish to impose upon you, but I have
in mind a great service that you may render me, as a friend, mind you,
Recontre. I am sure that you will succeed unless you freeze to death or
get killed by the Indians. None but a brave man would attempt what I
shall mention. I have a very important communication to forward to the
office at St. Louis. It must be there before the middle of March or the
Company will suffer heavy losses. If you can get this there at the time
stated, you shall be advanced considerably, with a raise of wages. Now
how would you like being my private clerk?’
“I stared into Latour’s eyes and saw all hell deep down in them.