The Pirates of the Prairies Part 27

Sunbeam shook her head sadly, and, making a last sign of farewell to her companion, she bounded like a startled fawn, rushed to the door, and disappeared.

The young Mexican remained for a long time pensive after Sunbeam's departure; the Indian's veiled words and embarra.s.sed countenance had excited her curiosity to the highest degree. On the other hand, the interest she could not forbear taking in this extraordinary woman, who had rendered her a signal service, or, to speak more correctly, a gloomy presentiment warned her that Sunbeam was leaving her to undertake one of those dangerous expeditions which the Indians like to carry out without help of any soul.

About two hours elapsed. The maiden, with her head bowed on her bosom, went over in her mind the strange events which had led her, incident by incident, to the spot where she now was. All at once a stifled sigh reached her ear; she raised her head with surprise, and saw a man standing before her, humbly leaning against a beam of the calli, and gazing on her with a strange meaning in his glance. It was Shaw, Red Cedar's son.

Dona Clara blushed and looked down in confusion; Shaw remained silent, with his eyes fixed on her, intoxicating himself with the happiness of seeing and contemplating her at his ease. The girl, seated alone in this wretched Indian hut, before the man who so many times had n.o.bly risked his life for her, fell into profound and serious thought.

A strange trouble seized upon her--her breast heaved under the pressure of her emotion. She did not at all comprehend the delicious sensations which at times made her quiver. Her eye, veiled with a soft languor, rested involuntarily on this man, handsome as an ancient Antinous, who with his haughty glance, his indomitable character, whom a frown from her made tremble--the wild son of the desert, who had hitherto known no will but his own!

On seeing him, so handsome and so brave, she felt herself attracted to him by all the strength of her soul. Though she was ignorant of the word love, for some time an unconscious revolution had taken place in her mind: she now began to understand that divine union of two souls, which are commingled in one, in an eternal communion of thoughts of joy and suffering.

In a word, she was about to love!

"What do you want with me, Shaw?" she asked, timidly.

"I wish to tell you, senorita," he answered, in a rough voice, marked, however, with extraordinary tenderness, "that, whatever may happen, whenever you have need of a man to die for you, you will have no occasion to seek him for I will be there."

"Thanks," she answered, smiling, in spite of herself, at the strangeness of the offer and the way in which it was made; "but here we have nothing to fear."

"Perhaps," he went on. "No one knows what the morrow has in store."

Women have a decided taste for taming ferocious animals: like all natures essentially nervous, woman is a creature of feeling, whose pa.s.sion dwells in her head rather than in her heart. Love with a woman is only an affair of pride or a struggle to endure: as she is weak, she always wishes to conquer, and above all dominates at the outset, in order to become presently more completely the slave of the man she loves, when she has proved her strength, by holding him panting at her feet.

Owing to that eternal law of contrasts which governs the world, a woman will never love any man but him who, for some reason or another, flatters her pride. At any rate, it is so in the desert. I do not pretend to speak for our charming European ladies, who are a composite of grace and attraction, and who, like the angels, only belong to humanity, by the tip of their little wing, which scarce grazes the earth.

Dona Clara was a Mexican. Her exceptional position among Indians, the dangers to which she had been exposed, the weariness that undermined her--all these causes combined must dispose her in favour of the young savage, whose ardent pa.s.sion she divined, with that intuition peculiar to all women.

She yielded so far as to answer him, and encourage him to speak. Was it sport, or did she act in good; faith? No one could say: woman's heart is a book, in which man has never yet been able to construe a word.

One of those long and pleasant conversations now begun between the two young people, during which, though the word "love" is not once uttered, it is expressed at every instant on the lips, and causes the heart to palpitate, which it plunges into those divine ecstacies, forgotten by ripe age, but which render those who experience them so happy.

Shaw, placed at his ease by the complacent kindness of Dona Clara, was no longer the same man. He found in his heart expressions which, in spite of herself made the maiden quiver, and put her into a confusion she could not understand.

At the hour indicated by Pethonista, a Comanche warrior appeared at the door of the calli, and broke off the conversation. He was ordered to lead the strangers to the meal prepared for them in the chief's lodge.

Dona Clara went out at once, followed by Shaw, whose heart was ready to burst with joy.

And yet what had Dona Clara said to him? Nothing. But she had let him speak, and listened to him with interest, and at times smiled at his remarks. The poor young man asked no more to be happy, and he was so, more than he had ever been before.

Valentine, Don Pablo, and the two Indians were awaiting Dona Clara. So soon as she appeared, all proceeded to the calli of the chief, preceded by the Comanche warrior, who served as guide.

CHAPTER XIX.

THE DANCE OF THE OLD DOGS.

Pethonista received his guests with all the refinements of Indian courtesy, obliging them to eat when he fancied he noticed that what was placed before them pleased their taste.

It is not always agreeable to a white man to be invited to an Indian dinner; for, among the redskins, etiquette prescribes that you should eat everything offered you without leaving a mouthful. Acting otherwise would greatly offend the Anfitrion. Hence the position of small eaters is very disagreeable at times: owing to the vast capacity of Indian stomachs, they find themselves under the harsh necessity of undergoing an attack of indigestion, or attract on themselves a quarrel which must have serious consequences.

Fortunately nothing of this sort occurred on the present occasion, and the repast terminated satisfactorily to all. When dinner was over, Valentine rose, and bowing thrice to the company, said to the chief--

"I thank my brother, in the name of my comrades and myself, for his gracious reception. In a thousand moons the recollection of it will not be effaced from my mind. But warriors have something else to do than to eat, when serious interests claim their attention. Will my brother Pethonista hear the news I have to impart to him?"

"Has my brother a secret communication to make to me, or does his message interest the whole tribe?"

"My message concerns all."

"Wah! my brother must be patient, then. Tomorrow--perhaps in a few hours--Unicorn, our great sachem, will have returned, and my brother can then speak with him."

"If Unicorn were here," Valentine said quickly, "two words would suffice; but he is absent, and time presses. For a second time I ask my brother to listen to me."

"Good; as my brother wishes it, in an instant all the chiefs shall be a.s.sembled in the great audience lodge, above the vault in which burns the fire of Montecuhzoma."

Valentine bowed in acquiescence.

We will say something here about the fire of Montecuhzoma, which is not without interest to the reader.

This singular custom has been handed down from age to age, especially among the Comanches. They state that, at the period of the conquest, and a few days prior to his death, Montecuhzoma,[1] having a presentiment of the fate that surely awaited him, lit a sacred fire and ordered their ancestors to keep it up, never allowing it to expire until the day when he returned to deliver his people from the Spanish yoke.

The guard of this sacred fire was confided to picked warriors; it was placed in a vault, in a copper basin, on a species of small altar, where it constantly smoulders under a dense layer of ashes.

Montecuhzoma announced at the same time that he would return with the Sun, his father; hence, at the first hour of day, many Indians mount on the roof of their callis, in the hope of seeing their well-beloved sovereign reappear, accompanied by the day planet. These poor Indians, who constantly maintain in their hearts the hope of their future regeneration, are convinced that this event, will be accomplished, unless the fire go out, through some reason impossible to foresee.

Scarce fifty years ago, the persons appointed to maintain the secret fire were relieved every two days, thus pa.s.sing eight-and-forty hours without eating, drinking or sleeping. It frequently happened that these poor wretches, asphyxiated by the carbonic gas in the narrow s.p.a.ce where they stopped, and weakened by the long fast, succ.u.mbed to their religious devotion. Then, according to the Indians, the bodies were thrown into the den of a monstrous serpent, which devoured them.

At the present day this strange belief is beginning to die out, although the fire of Montecuhzoma may be found in nearly all the pueblos; but the old custom is not kept up so vigorously, and the serpent is obliged to obtain his food in a different fas.h.i.+on.

I knew at the Paso del Norte a rich hacendero of Indian origin, who, though he would not confess it, and a.s.serted a very advanced degree of belief, preciously kept up the fire of Montecuhzoma, in a vault he made for this express purpose, at a considerable expense.

The Comanches are divided into a number of small tribes, all placed under the orders of a special chief. When this chief is old or infirm, he surrenders the military command to the one of his sons most distinguished by his bravery, only retaining the civil jurisdiction; on the father's death, the son attains the complete sovereignty.

The chief summoned an old Indian who was leaning against the wall of the lodge, and bade him a.s.semble the council. In the Comanche villages the old men incapable for active service, and whom their merits have not raised to the rank of chief, perform the office of crier. They undertake to announce the news to the population, transmit the orders of the sachem, organise the ceremonies, and convene the council. They are all men gifted with powerful voices; they mount on the roof of a calli, and from this improvised pulpit perform those duties, with an extraordinary quant.i.ty of shouts and gestures.

When the chiefs were a.s.sembled, Pethonista humbly led his guests to the council lodge, called the great medicine lodge. It was a large cabin, completely without furniture, in the midst of which an enormous fire burned. Some twenty chiefs were a.s.sembled, and gravely crouched in a circle; they maintained the most profound silence.

Ordinarily, no stranger is admitted to the council; but on this occasion this was departed from, owing to Valentine's quality as an adopted son of the tribe. The newcomers took their place. A chair of sculptured nopal was placed in a corner for Dona Clara, who, by a privilege unprecedented in Indian manners, and through her double quality of white woman and stranger, was present at the council, which is never permitted a squaw, except in the rare instance when she holds the rank of warrior.

So soon as each was comfortably settled, the pipe bearer entered the circle, holding the calumet, which he presented ready-lighted to Pethonista. The chief pointed it to the four cardinal points, and smoked for a few seconds; then, holding the bowl in his hand, he offered the stem to all present in turn, who imitated him. When all had smoked, the chief returned the pipe to the bearer, who emptied it into the fire, while p.r.o.nouncing some mysterious words addressed to the Sun, that great dispenser of all the good things of this world, and walked backward out of the circle.

"Our ears are open, my brother; the great pale hunter can take the word.

We have removed the skin from our heart, and the words his bosom breathes will be carefully received by us. We impatiently await the communications which he has to make us," the chief said, bowing courteously to Valentine.

"What I have to say will not take long," the hunter answered. "Are my brothers still the faithful allies of the palefaces?"

"Why should we not be so?" the chief sharply interrupted him. "The great pale hearts have been constantly good to us; they buy of our beaver skins and buffalo robes, giving us in exchange gunpowder, bullets, and scalping knives. When we are ill, our pale friends nurse us, and give us all we need. When the winter is severe--when the buffaloes are gone, and famine is felt in the villages--the whites come to our help. Why, then, shall we no longer be their allies? The Comanches are not ungrateful; they have a n.o.ble and generous heart; they never forget a kindness. We shall be the friend of the whites so long as the sun lights the universe."