_Pete's Story_
Cindy always loved to visit Pete Brent, partly because she liked him,
partly because she liked his horses, and partly because she liked Gramps
and Granny Brent, his father and mother. Besides, Gramps knew the most
wonderful stories, and Granny baked the most marvelous ginger cookies
which she passed out with a very free hand. Cindy had looked forward to
bringing Mindy to their wagon for a visit. Even though Gramps and Granny
were asleep in the wagon and Mindy would not meet them until tomorrow,
it was a lot of fun to be with Pete and to look at his horses.
"We'll have to be very quiet because Gramps and Granny Brent are
sleeping now," Cindy whispered to her twin. "Let's go see the horses."
Two of Pete's four ponies were roan-colored, the third was sorrel, and
the fourth was black and white. The two roans and the sorrel were very
friendly and gentle, but the pinto trusted nobody and even tried to buck
Pete off whenever Pete rode him.
Now the three gentle ponies and Pete's huge draft horses crowded as
close together as they could and thrust their heads over the picket
line, each horse trying to get as much attention as possible for
himself. The pinto pulled as far back as his tie rope would let him go
and snorted suspiciously. Though she had been on the point of warning
her twin to be careful around the pinto, Cindy forgot to do so.
Alec, who had never wanted to be anything except a farmer, liked the
heavy-footed draft horses best. Cindy and Mindy turned naturally to the
fleet ponies. Suddenly the pinto snorted again, softly and gently this
time, and came up to thrust a friendly muzzle at Mindy.
"Mindy!" exclaimed Cindy.
"What's the matter?" asked Mindy, who was happily stroking the pony's
soft nose.
"That's Thunder, and he isn't supposed to like anyone!"
"He likes me," Mindy said. "Oh! Don't they remind you of birds?"
"Yes, they do! But Pete told me that, though they can start at a fast
clip and keep it up long after a race horse would be winded, a race
horse would beat any of them in a short sprint."
"I don't believe it," Mindy said. "I don't believe any other horse could
even keep up with them."
"Except Daddy's Sunshine," Cindy said.
"Yes," Mindy agreed loyally, "Sunshine might."
Except for Thunder, who would let only Mindy touch him, they petted each
pony in turn, stroked the draft horses, petted the ponies again, and
Cindy asked Alec, "Wouldn't you just love to have one?"
"Sure would," Alec agreed, "but I'd rather have this work team. They
could pull a plow for ten hours, then do it again the next day and the
day after, and still come back for more."
"You have the team, and we'll take the ponies," Cindy said. "Let's go
back and see Mr. Brent."
They stole back, remembering to be very quiet in order not to awaken
Gramps and Granny, and sat on the wagon tongue. Pete lighted his pipe,
and when the match flared it illumined his strong face. For the first
time Cindy found herself thinking of it as a young face, even though
Pete must be almost thirty. Cindy said eagerly, "Tell us about
Oklahoma."
"There now, young lady," Pete's grin was felt rather than seen, "I've
already told you at least six times."
"Please!" begged Cindy, who had an almost passionate interest in this
new land that was to be her home. "Mindy hasn't heard the story."
"Do you want to hear it, honey?" Pete asked.
"I'd love to," Mindy said.
Pete sat down with his back against the wagon wheel, rested his head on
his hands, puffed solemnly on his pipe, and after a moment said, "Shall
we begin with the Indians?"
"Yes."
"Well, though there were some ancient peoples in Oklahoma, the first
tribes which we ordinarily think of as Indians were the Kiowas,
Comanches, Arapahoes, and such. They were all warlike and for the most
part depended on hunting. There was very little of any kind of farming.
But there were never so many of these tribes that Oklahoma was what you
might call crowded. It was a vacant land."
The youngsters remained silent, waiting for Pete to go on. After a
moment, he did.
"Oklahoma came to us with the Louisiana Purchase of 1803. But in those
days, to anyone east of the Mississippi, Oklahoma seemed as far away as
the moon seems now. Few people imagined that it would ever be any good,
and almost nobody wanted to go there. In fact, very few people even knew
it existed."
"What's 'Oklahoma' mean, Mr. Brent?" Alec broke in.
"It's a Choctaw Indian word meaning 'red people.' Now there weren't so
many white men west of the Mississippi, but there were a lot of them
east of it. There were also a lot of Indians there. What happened is
what usually happened when red men crowded white; the white men wanted
the land."
"Wasn't that selfish?" Mindy asked.
"Depends on how you look at it, Cindy--or Mindy." Pete grinned. "I don't
know which is who, because I can't see the catsup any more. But if you
mean, was it selfish for white people to grab Indian lands, it certainly
was. On the other hand, it might have been selfish for a few Indians to
think they could stand forever in the path of so many white men. Still
depending on how you look at it, and whether you're white or red, it was
either 'the march of civilization,' or 'conquest.' Anyhow, the five
'civilized' tribes, the Cherokees, Creeks, Chickasaws, Choctaws, and
Seminoles, were told that if they'd give their eastern lands to white
men, the territory later to be known as Oklahoma would be theirs
forever. In the words of the treaty, they were to have it 'for as long
as grass shall grow and waters run.' Moving these tribes took almost
twenty years, from 1828 to 1846, and it wasn't a nice thing, because
some of the uprooted Indians suffered terribly, but finally they were
here."
Alec interrupted again. "If the land was given to the Indians, how can
we take it?" he asked.
"I was coming to that, Alec. The 'civilized' tribes were different. They
knew white men. They saw that white men had a better way of living, and
so they copied it. They had their farms, their schools, their churches,
their stores. They lived much as we do and even owned slaves. Then came
the Civil War, and almost all of them lined up with the South. The
government claimed that by this 'rebellion,' the tribes had violated
their treaty rights. That began it. There were a lot of people west of
the Mississippi by that time, and they wanted to know why they weren't
allowed to have land that no longer belonged to the Indians anyway."
"Be sure to tell about the cattlemen," Cindy murmured.
"Sure thing. Great herds of cattle, gathered in Texas for delivery to
Kansas railheads, were driven across the territory. At first the
cattlemen asked only that their herds be allowed to graze while passing
through. Then they wanted grazing land to fatten cattle, and one way or
another they got a lot of it. So there was something else to fight
about. If homesteaders could have no part of Oklahoma, why were wealthy
cattlemen allowed to take so much of it? Then came the 'Boomers.'"
Alec smiled. Cindy clasped her hands excitedly.
"Somebody," Pete continued, "found out that part of Oklahoma, the
section soon to be opened, had been given up by the Creeks and Seminoles
at the end of the Civil War and had never been assigned to any other
tribe. They became the 'unassigned lands,' and the boom was on. At first
it was unimportant, because only a few people trickled in. Then, just
about ten years ago, a very great man, Captain David L. Payne, saw the
possibilities in Oklahoma and he organized the Boomers. Captain Payne
personally led several expeditions of colonists into the unassigned
lands. Each time the soldiers forced them to leave."
[Illustration]
"Is he here now?" Mindy asked.
"No," said Pete. "He died about five years ago, but Captain William
Couch, and I'm sure he's on the border, took over. He made another
attempt to establish a colony in 1885. When that colony was disbanded by
soldiers, the Boomers decided that no one can fly in the face of the
law. So they tried to have the unassigned lands legally declared open to
homesteaders. There was plenty of opposition. Most of it came from the
cattlemen who did not want to lose their free range, but the Indian
tribes worked against it too. However, the Boomers won, and here we
are."
"Were you a Boomer?" Mindy asked breathlessly.
"I was a Boomer," Pete said. "I've been in there three times, and three
times I've been marched out by soldiers. But though the soldiers did
hold Captain Payne and a few others prisoners for a while, about all
they ever did to the rest was escort us back over the border. Because I
know the country, I know where your dad and I can get ourselves two of
the prettiest claims in Oklahoma if someone doesn't already have them."
"How can anyone already have them?" Alec questioned. "The border isn't
supposed to be opened before high noon on the 22nd of April."
Pete sounded a little grim. "That's right, Alec, and nobody who crosses
before that time is supposed to have legal title to any land he may
stake. But a lot of people have gone in anyhow. They're hiding in the
thickets and along the creek bottoms. They'll stake land, and some of
them will get away with it. There aren't enough soldiers to find all of
them and bring them back."
"What will you do if some of them are on the claims you and Dad want?"
Cindy asked.
"Then there could be an argument," Pete said. "If we lose to somebody
who crosses when he should, well and good. But we won't lose to anyone
who has sneaked across before he should."
"Do you think there'll be trouble?" Alec sounded worried.
"I doubt it, Alec, but we must be ready if it comes."
[Illustration]