CHAPTER IV.
THE WHITE BOW.
Wahneenah had lived so entirely within the seclusion of her own lodgethat she had become almost a stranger in the village. It was longsince she had travelled so far as the isolated hut into which theyouth, Osceolo, had seen the Sun Maid disappear, and as she approachedit her womanly heart smote her with pain and self-reproach, while shereflected thus:
"Has it come to this? Spotted Adder, the Mighty, whose wigwam was oncethe richest of all my father's tribe. I remember that its curtains offine skins were painted by the Man-Of-Visions himself, and told thehistory of the Pottawatomies since the beginning of the world. Many aheap of furs and peltries went in payment for their adornment,but--where are they now! While I have sat in darkness with my sorrownew things have become old. Yet he is accursed. Else the trouble wouldnot have befallen him. I have heard the women talking, through mydreams. He has lain down and cannot again arise. And the White Papooseis with him! Will she be accursed, too? Fool! Why do I fear? Is shenot a child of the sky, and forever safe, as Katasha said? But thetouch of her arms was warm, like the clasp of the son I bore, and----"
The mother's reverie ended in a very human distress. There was a rumoramong her people that whoever came near the Spotted Adder wouldinstantly be infected by whatever was the dread disease from which hesuffered. That the Sun Maid's wonderful loveliness should receive ablemish seemed a thing intolerable and, in another instant, regardlessof her own danger, Wahneenah had crept beneath the broken flap ofbark, into a scene of squalor indescribable. Even this squaw, who knewquite well how wretched the tepees of her poorer tribesmen often were,was appalled now; and though the torn skins and strips of bark whichcovered the hut admitted plenty of light and air, she gasped forbreath before she could speak.
"My Girl-Child! My Sun Maid! Come away. Wrong, wrong to have enteredhere, to have made me so anxious. Come."
"No, no, Other Mother! Kitty cannot come. Kitty must stay. See thepoor gray squirrel? It has broked its leg. It went so--hoppety-pat,hoppety-pat, as fast as fast. I thought it was playing and justrunning away. So Kitty runned too. Kitty always runs away when Kittycan."
"Ugh! I believe you. Come."
"No, Kitty must stay. Poor sick man needs Kitty. I did give him a nicedrink. Berries, too. Kitty putted them in his mouth all the time. Poorman!"
Wahneenah's anger rose. Was she, a chief's daughter, to be thusflouted by a baby, a pale-face at that? Surely, there was nothingwhatever spiritual now about this self-willed, spoiled creature, whoman unkind fate had imposed upon her. She stooped to lift the littleone and compel obedience, but was met by a smile so fearless and happythat her arms fell to her sides.
"That's a good Other Mother. Poor sick man has wanted to turn himover, and he couldn't. Kitty tried and tried, and Kitty couldn't. Nowmy Other Mother's come. She can. She is so beau'ful strong and kind!"
There was a grunt, which might have been a groan, from the corner ofthe hut where the Spotted Adder lay; and a convulsive movement of thecontorted limbs as he vainly strove to change his uncomfortableposition. Wahneenah watched him, with the contempt which the women ofher race feel for any masculine weakness, and did not offer to assist.His poverty she pitied, and would have relieved, though his physicalinfirmity was repugnant to her. She would not touch him.
But the Sun Maid was on her feet at once, tenderly laying upon theground the wounded squirrel which she had held upon her lap. The wildthing had, apparently, lost all its timidity and now fully trusted thechild who had caressed its fur and murmured soft, pitying sounds, inthat low voice of hers, which the Fort people had sometimes felt wasan unknown language. Certainly, she had had a strange power, always,over any animal that came near her and this case was no exception. Herwhite friends would not have been surprised by the incident, butWahneenah was, and it brought back her belief that this was a child ofsupernatural gifts. She even began to feel ashamed of her treatment ofSpotted Adder, though she waited to see what his small nurse would do.
"Poor sick Feather-man! Is you hurted now? Does your face ache you tomake it screw itself all this way?" and she made a comical grimace,imitative of the sufferer's expression.
"Ugh! Ugh!"
"Yes; Kitty hears. Other Mother, that is all the word he says. All thetime it is just 'Ugh! Ugh!' I wish he would talk Kitty's talk. Makehim do it, Other Mother. Please!"
"That I cannot do. He knows it not. But he has a speech I understand.What need you, Spotted Adder?" she concluded, in his own dialect.
"Ugh! It is the voice of Wahneenah, the Happy. What does she here, inthe lodge of the outcast? It is many a moon since the footfall of awoman sounded on my floor. Why does one come now?"
"In pursuit of this child, the adopted daughter of our tribe, whom theBlack Partridge himself has given me. It was ill of you, accursed, towile her hither with your unholy spells."
"I wiled her not. It was the gray squirrel. Broken in his life, as amI, the once Mighty. Many wounded creatures seek shelter here. It is asanctuary. They alone fear not the miserable one."
"Does not the tribe see to it that you have food and drink set withinyour wigwam, once during each journey of the sun? I have so heard."
"Ugh! Food and drink. Sometimes I cannot reach them. They are not evenpushed beyond the door flap, or what is left of it. They are allafraid. All. Yet they are fools. That which has befallen me may happento each when his time comes. It is the sickness of the bones. There isno contagion in it. But it twists the straight limbs into torturingcurves and it rends the body with agony. One would be glad to die, butdeath--like friendship--holds itself aloof. Ugh! The drink! Thedrink!"
The Sun Maid could understand the language of the eyes, if not thelips, and she followed their wistful gaze toward the clay bowl fromwhich she had before given him the water. But it was empty now, andseizing it with all her strength, for it was heavy and awkward inshape, she sped out of the wigwam toward a spring she had discovered.
"Four, ten, lots of times Kitty has broughted the nice water, andevery time the poor, sick Feather-man has drinked it up. He must beterrible thirsty, and so is Kitty. I guess I will drink first, thistime."
Filling the utensil, she struggled to lift it to her own lips, but itwas rudely pushed away.
"Papoose! Would you drink to your own death? The thing is accursed, Itell you!"
"Why, Other Mother! It is just as clean as clean. Kitty did wash andwash it long ago. It was all dirty, worse than my new necklace, but itis clean now. Do you want a drink, Other Mother? Is you thirsty, too,like the sick one and Kitty?"
"If I were, it would be long before I touched my lips to that cup."
"Would it? Now I will fill it again. Then you must take it, OtherMother, and quick, quick, back to that raggedy house. Kitty is tired,she has come here and there so many, many times."
"Is it here you have spent this long day, papoose?"
"I did come here when the gray squirrel runned away. I did stay eversince."
Wahneenah's heart sank. But to her credit it was that, for the timebeing, she forgot the stories she had heard, and remembered only thatthere was suffering which she must relieve. It might be that alreadythe soul of Spotted Adder was winged for its long flight, and couldcarry for her to that wide Unknown, where her own dead tarried, somemessage from her, the bereft. As this thought flashed through herbrain she seized the bowl and hastened with it to the lodge.
This time, also, she forgot everything but the possibility that hadcome to her, and kneeling beside the old Indian she held the dish tohis mouth.
"It is the fever, the fever! A little while and the awful chill willcome again. The racking pain, the thirst! Ugh! Wahneenah, the Happy,is braver than her sisters. Her courage shall prove her blessing. Thelips of the dying speak truth."
"And the ears of the dying? Can they still hear and remember? Will theSpotted Adder take my message to the men I have lost? Sire and son,there was no Pottawatomie ever born so brave as they. Tell them I havebeen faithful. I have been the Wom
an-Who-Mourns. I have kept to mydarkened wigwam and remembered only them, till she came, this childyou have seen. She is a gift from the sky. She has come to comfortand sustain. She was born a pale-face, but she has a red man's heart.She is all brave and true and dauntless. None fear her, and she fearsnone. I believe that they have sent her to me. I believe that in herthey both live. Ask them if this is so."
"There is no need to ask, Wahneenah, the Happy. Happy, indeed, who hasbeen blessed with a gift so gracious. She is the Merciful. TheUnafraid. She will pass in safety through many perils. All day she hassat beside me whom all others shun. She has moistened my lips, she haskept the gnats from stinging, she has sung in her unknown tongue ofthat land whither I go, and soon,--the land of the sky from whence shecame. The light of the morning is on her hair and the dusk of eveningin her eyes. As she has ministered to me, the deserted, the solitary,so she will minister unto multitudes. I can see them crowding,crowding; the generations yet unborn. The vision of the dying istrue."
On the floor beside them the Sun Maid sat, caressing the woundedsquirrel. Through the torn curtains the waning sunlight slanted andlighted the bleak interior. It seemed to rest most brilliantly uponthe child, and in the eyes of the Spotted Adder she was like a lampset to illumine his path through the dark valley, an unexpectedmessenger from the Great Father, showing him beforehand a glimpse ofthe beauty and tenderness of the Land Beyond. Yet even if a spirit,she wore a human shape, and she would have human needs. She would beoften in danger against which she must be guarded.
"Wahneenah, fetch me the bow and quiver."
"Which?" she asked, in surprise, though in reality she knew.
"Is there one that should be named with mine? The White Bow from theland of eternal snow; the arrows winged with feathers from the whiteeagle's wing,--light as thistle down, strong as love, invincible asdeath."
The Spotted Adder had been the orator of his tribe. Men had listenedto his words in admiration, wondering whence he obtained the eloquencewhich moved them; and at that moment it was as if all the power of hisearlier manhood had returned.
The White Bow was well known among all the Pottawatomie tribes. Eventhe Sacs and Foxes had heard of it and feared it. It was older thanthe Giver's historic necklace, and tradition said that it had beenhurled to earth on the breath of a mighty snowstorm. It had fallenbefore the wigwam of the Spotted Adder's ancestor and had been handeddown from father to son, as fair and sound as on the day of its firstbestowal. None knew the wood of which it was fashioned, which manycould bend and twist but none could break. The string which firstbound it had never worn nor wasted, and not a feather had ever fallenfrom the arrows in the quiver, nor had their number ever diminished,no matter how often sped. It was the one possession left to theneglected warrior and had been protected by its own reputed origin.There were daring thieves in many a tribe, but never a thief so boldhe would risk his soul in the seizure of the White Bow.
Wahneenah felt no choice but to comply with the Indian's command. Shetook the bow and its accoutrements from the sheltered niche in thetepee where it hung; the only spot, it seemed, that had not beensubjected to the destruction of the elements. She had never held it inher hand before, and she wondered at its lightness as she carried itto its owner, and placed it in the gnarled fingers which would neverstring it again.
"Good! Call the child to stand here."
With awe, Wahneenah motioned the little one within the red man'sreach. The last vestige of fear or repulsion had vanished from her ownmind before the majesty of this hour.
"Does the poor, sick Feather-man want another drink? Shall Kitty fetchit now?"
"Hush, papoose!"
He would have opened the small white hand and clasped it about thebow, which reached full three times the height of the child, and alongwhose beautiful length she gazed in wonder, but he could not.
"Take it, Girl-Child. It is a gift. It is more magical than thenecklace. Take it, hold it tight--that will please him--and say whatis in your heart."
"Oh, the beau'ful bow! Is it for Kitty? To keep, forever and ever?Why, it is bigger than that one of the Sauganash, and far prettierthan Winnemeg's. It cannot be for Kitty, just little Kitty girl."
"Yes; it is."
Then the Sun Maid laid it reverently down, and catching hold her scanttunic made the old-fashioned curtsey which her Fort friends had taughther.
"Thank you, poor Feather-man. I will take care of it very nice. Iwon't break it, not once."
"Ugh!" grunted the Indian, with satisfaction. Then he closed his eyesas if he would sleep.
"Good-night, Spotted Adder, the Mighty. I thank you, also, on thechild's behalf. It is the second gift this day of talismans that mustprotect. Surely, she will be clothed in safety. Hearken to me. I mustgo home. The Sun Maid must be fed and put to sleep. But I will return.I am no longer afraid. You were my father's friend. All that a woman'shand can now do for your comfort shall be done."
THE GIFT OF THE WHITE BOW. _Page 48._]
But the Spotted Adder made no sign, and whether he did or did not hearher, Wahneenah never knew. She walked swiftly homeward, bearing theWhite Papoose upon one strong arm and the White Bow upon the other.Yet she noticed, with a smile, that the child still clung tenderly toher own burden of the injured squirrel, and that she was infinitelymore careful of it and its suffering than of the wonderful gift shehad received.
Long before her own tepee was reached the Sun Maid was fast asleep;and as the small head rested more and more heavily upon Wahneenah'sshoulder, and the soft breath of childhood fanned her throat, thewoman again doubted the spiritual origin of the foundling, and feltfresh gratitude for its simple humanity.
"Well, whoever and whatever she is, she is already thrice protected.By her Indian dress, by her White Bow, and by Lahnowenah's WhiteNecklace. She is quite safe from every enemy now."
"Not quite," said a voice at Wahneenah's elbow.
But it was only Osceolo, the Simple. Nobody minded him or his words.