[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
Son mi familia, she said simply. Mi esposo y mis hijos. Then she repeated it in English: my husband and my sons.
Yeah, he said, hesitating. Well he searched for the right words we want to make a deal with you. You've exhausted us
Page 76
with all your sadness. We're all tired~ we're at our wit's end. We've talked this over, and we're ready to make a bargain.
SheMourns did not understand the word.
Bargain. Deal. It's sort of like a treaty. You work harder at trying to fit in, you try to learn English again, you make a better effort to conform to our ways, he paused,
as if checking in his mind that he had got it all. And, in the Summer, when it's easier to travel.& In the Summer, I'll take you & I'll get up a party and we'll take you&
back to the high plains and see if we can't find your Comanche friends.
SheMourns could hardly believe she understood correctly. She dared not let herself get excited. Tentatively, she asked in Spanish, You'll let me go back to my
husband and sons?
Yeah, well I'll, we'll take you. We'll take you out there and see if we can make contact.
SheMourns put the coffee cup down so fast it overturned. She fell on her knees and hugged Isaac's legs. Grácias, grácias, tio mio. Then she caught herself and tried
to speak English. Oh, thank oncle. Thank. I try. I try. Yo probaría.
Yeah, well, you see, these are troubled times. The Yankees are making more and more trouble. Everybody is talking about war. If we have to go to war, we'll& have
to go to war. And that may change everything.
SheMourns did not understand. I try, she repeated. I try English. But then her English would not let her say how much she wanted to go back to Peta Nocona and
her sons.
This I'll promise, said Isaac. If you'll make a better effort to learn English again and conform, I'll do my best to help you visit your Comanche friends.
But the time of their departure was always in the future. One week, they couldn't go because the Comanches were raiding, right up to the edge of Weatherford.
Another week, it had rained in the west and the Brazos River was flooding. Another week, Isaac was
Page 77
busy supervising his Negroes as they planted the cotton, corn, gardens and horsefeed. There was always someone's birthday, or someone's visit. Or the Yankees had
cut off some supply route. Maybe we can go next week.
And often her response was, I lie down. Sleep. Every time they broke another promise, she seemed to need sleep.
SheMourns wore their funny clothes and repeated words from their picture books. More cousins and people who were married to cousins came by. They all gazed at
her and smiled. She tried to repeat their phrases in English~ that was, after all, part of the agreement.
But Uncle Isaac did not seem to understand her desperation. If he had been her clansman, she could have told him what was in her heart. If he were her mother's
brother, she could have shared her secrets with him and have known that they were safe.
She grew progressively more and more despondent, but she could not weep~ she seemed to have cried out all her tears. She began to see that they had no intention of
keeping their part of the bargain. It was another broken promise. No one was going to take her to the high plains of the Comanchería. She felt terribly tired. She felt
empty. She was so exhausted and depressed that she didn't even notice that she felt no great anger.
She needed a good Eagle Doctor more than ever. Oh, why hadn't she listened more closely when the shaman sang over her? Why hadn't she learned the songs? But,
she realized with a sinking heart, that to know the songs without having been chosen by the Power behind the songs would be useless. It was the Puha, the Medicine
Power, that did the work, not the songs or the herbs that went with them.
Each night, Náudah lay awake in the dark, remembering what a Comanche night sounded like: the faroff howl of a coyote or a wolf~ the screech of a night owl~ the
gurgling of the stream nearby~ the snuffling of the horses in the remuda~ the quiet sounds of the sentinels tending the night fires. Here at Birdville, she heard only the
crickets calling to their mates and the scurrying of mice. Grandmother Moon seemed to sigh like a stick drawn across a rough rock.
Page 78
When the moon came full again, EscapesNow had not collected nearly all the supplies she and TohTseeAh would need for a successful flight, but she determined to
go anyway. She could not stand another day, here in the whiteman's love among a family that could not comprehend her sorrow.
When she was sure the family was asleep, she dressed herself and TohTseeAh in their Comanche clothes. With the iron poker from the fireplace, she broke the latch
on the back door of their cabin and crept out. TohTseeAh did not even have to be told to be quiet~ her training as a Comanche had long since taught her that children
should not make noise in times of stealth or attack.
A short distance from the Isaac Parker cabin, EscapesNow whispered to TohTseeAh, We will not take one of their horses. Maybe they will think we are still in this
area. We will find a horse along the way. Maybe at one of the neighbors' houses. She knew there was no profit in telling her daughter what they were doing, but the
sound of the Comanche words reassured her. It slowed her heartbeat. The words made her feel that escape was possible. We are out of their camp, little one~ now if
only we can keep them from tracking us in the moonlight.
At the first neighbor's farm, EscapesNow crept along the doublerail fence toward the barn. She could hear horses stamping in their stalls. But when she opened the
gate a big cur dog began barking and growling with bared teeth. Almost at once, a man came to the door and looked out. She crouched low behind weeds growing in
the fence row.
In a moment, the man returned with a lantern. Whatcha got, Fritz? Luckily for EscapesNow, the lantern blinded him so he couldn't see in the bright moonlight. The
dog stopped barking and began wagging its tail when his master approached. You got a spooky imagination, Fritz, the man concluded, and he went back to the
house.
After a while, EscapesNow crept out of hiding and left, for the dog was growling again and she was afraid he would bark if she tried to get closer to the barn.
Page 79
At the next farm, she got to the barn without being detected~ no dog barked, but there were no horses in the shed~ they were all out in a pasture. She went out into the
meadow, walking slowly, but the horses snorted and bolted away. She put TohTseeAh under a tree, and, running after them, tried to catch one. Maybe one would
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
© 2009 Nie chcÄ™ już wiÄ™cej kochać, cierpieć, czekać ani wierzyć w rzeczy, których nie potwierdza życie. - Ceske - Sjezdovky .cz. Design downloaded from free website templates