Then Sacajawea asked, “What are we going to do about the collar?”
“That is easy,” said Rosebud. “We will bring it back to Grasshopper and tell her what happened. What is not easy is how we are to finish our work! We must be ready to return home with Fast Arrow and Redpipe in the morning.” She began stuffing the wet leaves into the meat-smoking fire, and soon Sacajawea was too busy cutting buffalo meat to worry further about Broken Tooth and the weasel collar, which she had tucked into a pouch for safekeeping.
In the morning they prepared to leave the village of the Mandans. It had been a successful buffalo hunt, and Sacajawea and Rosebud were pleased that they would return with Redpipe and Fast Arrow in one month, for the ceremony of the Okeepa.
CHAPTER
9
The Okeepa
All the mysticism, religious devotion, and endeavor to be in the good graces of the Great Spirit, found its ultimate expression in what the Mandans called O-kee-pa. Among the rituals of the peoples of the earth it would be difficult to find any practice of self-imposed penance more excruciating. Sacrifice was an important part of the Plains Indians’ religion. It was widely practiced and took many forms, from the simple offering of a bit of meat cast into the fire before eating, or the burning of the first ear of corn before the harvest, to the inflicting of pain approaching the brink of death. But nothing equaled the ordeal of the O-kee-pa.1
Harold mc cracken, George Catlin and the Old Frontier. New York: Crown Publishers Inc., 1959, p. 101.
The women of Redpipe’s lodge chatted excitedly as they erected a small buffalo-hide tent. They were preparing for Fast Arrow’s steam bath, which was part of the formalities to be undergone before offering oneself to the Mandan chiefs for the Okeepa Ceremony. Grasshopper waddled off to the Council Lodge of her village for the wicker bathtub that was used for the men’s steam baths. Rosebud had pushed several large stones into the center of a hot fire near the hide tent. Sacajawea gathered sticks for the fire. Redpipe sat nearby smoking and letting his grandchildren climb in and out of his arms. Several villagers walked past, but using the steam bath was a common thing—they did not stop to talk.
Naked, Fast Arrow solemnly climbed into the tub and sat on fresh-crushed sage leaves with his arms wrapped around his knees. Rosebud rolled the hot stones by means of a long stick into the tent, and Sacajawea sprinkled more crushed sage and other medicinal leaves on the hot stones, at the same time dousing them with cold water. Thick clouds of steam rose, extracting the exhilarating aromatics from the sage and feathery green anise shoots. The women left while Fast Arrow inhaled deeply into his lungs, purifying his body so that he would be ready to take his part in the upcoming Poh-khong rites, the torture of the Okeepa. Fast Arrow thought of his great honor in becoming the adopted son of Chief Four Bears.
Before the steam cooled down and completely condensed, he dashed out and plunged into the cold water of the Knife River. Rosebud followed Fast Arrow with a buffalo robe and wrapped him in it for warmth on the way back to the lodge. A few curious eyes watched from the doors of the lodges, but no one was so curious as to come out and ask why he was using the steam bath this particular day. Rosebud rubbed him vigorously with bear grease, while Sacajawea and Grasshopper served him a meal of simmered anise and hard-boiled duck eggs.
After a pleasant nap, Fast Arrow dressed in his finestgarments and paraded himself around the village, stopping once in a while to gossip with passersby.
The following day, Grasshopper fussed over Fast Arrow as though he were her own son, instead of the man of her daughter. She took great care in painting his face and shoulders. “My son should be the finest-looking brave at the Okeepa,” she said, drawing up her mouth and studying the designs she’d just finished painting on his chest. “My daughters will tell me everything, so that I will not miss a thing by staying home with the babies.”
“Ai,” agreed Sacajawea, climbing over Sucks His Thumb as she hunted her moccasins for the trip. The little boy pulled out his clean thumb from his mouth and offered it to his father. Fast Arrow swatted the child and sent him scampering and laughing to the other side of the lodge.
“You are not afraid, are you?” whispered Grasshopper to Fast Arrow.
He looked at her in disbelief, shaking his head no. Certainly Fast Arrow was not frightened—this was going to be the greatest experience he had ever had or expected to have. Attending the Mandan Okeepa Festival and then actually taking part in the holy torture rites was what every brave dreamed of to show his strength and prove he was worthy of being a member of the nation.
They were seated on the ponies, Fast Arrow and Redpipe each on their own and Rosebud and Sacajawea together on a little tricolor, when Grasshopper thought of something she had forgotten.
“Take my good wishes to the wives of Four Bears,” she called, “especially to the one with the silver hair, Sahkoka, the Mint, and the youngest, Sun Woman. Tell them that your sister Sweet Clover is in good health and my grandchildren drive me crazy as a loon. Let’s see how well you can remember to give my greeting.”
They were soon out of sight, and Grasshopper shooed the children back into the lodge and ordered them to sit quietly around the fire.
Chickadee, who was too small to keep her legs tucked under, extended them out front at full length and smiled at Grasshopper, who was now busy sprinkling cornmealat the edge of the lodge fire. Sweet Clover came shyly to the fire to sit with the little ones. She smiled and sat with her legs crossed, not understanding why she did this.
Grasshopper mumbled a prayer to the Great Spirit. Her mind was joyous, yet there was something held back as she thought of Fast Arrow going through the torture rite. It was a ceremony, a ritual to show a man’s bravery to everyone. It had been used for ages beyond remembering. But a man’s spirit came close to that of the Great Spirit at that time, and afterward he was different, never the same as before. Grasshopper pondered this thought: A man comes home wiser, more understanding, if he is fortunate, but a man can become haughty and cruel, then everyone suffers from his change. Good men die. Brave men die. No one will stop the torture, so it must go on each year until one day in the unknown dawn it will wear itself out. Sacred things wear out, just like a pair of leggings that have been worn overlong and seen much abuse.
That wayward something in her mind continued the argument: That is what the Great Spirit is—a faith in something unseen, as a tent peg under the earth. But it is ceremonies and rituals also. That is why men offered smoke in six directions for a successful hunt, or a woman set out a prayer stick for the recovery of a sick child. That is why she was now dancing a prayer into the earth for the safe return of Fast Arrow’s soul. It depended on what was believed.
She shuffled around the fire. The terror that possessed her now was immeasurably greater than that which she had felt as, smiling, she had sent her beloved ones toward the Mandans asking if Fast Arrow was afraid. That night, it was she, not Fast Arrow, who had a monster to wrestle with. The monster was her inborn mother-love that needed to protect her family from any harm or unpleasantness.
It was midmorning on the way to the Rooptahee village when the sign appeared to them. And according to the nature of such events, it came while everything seemed safe and serene and the thought of such a thing was far away.
Engrossed in talk, the little party did not see the squall line come up over the hill ahead of them. The wind began to blow and the rain beat in their faces. The four of them climbed from the horses and stood beneath a tall pine until the rain stopped. Wet sage filled their noses, and they felt an anticipation of excitement as they mounted to cross the river. The sun was not yet out from behind the clouds, but the sky was pink. Suddenly Sacajawea pointed in awe to the rainbow hanging in the sky. It was suspended with neither foot touching Mother Earth, and the center was filled with crimson-colored clouds.
“My people believed that to be a symbol of strength and peace,” said Sacajawea, breaking the silence.
“You have no people but us,” said
Redpipe sharply. “Look, my daughter, this is not usual. The colors do not touch the earth. The Great Spirit cannot touch his feet to the ground when he rides in such a canoe.” Now his face wore a forbidding look and his voice became hard as flint. “It is a sign to us.”
“The sky shows that one of us will rise to great heights,” offered Fast Arrow in a hushed, confidential tone.
“Ai”—Redpipe’s words sounded cold and distant— “that must be the meaning, and it must be you, my son. You are beginning your rise to power with the Okeepa Ceremony. My life is going downhill; it surely is not I.” He deliberately did not mention the women, as they were of no concern in such great events as a sign from the heavens. However, he thought of his friend Four Bears and then remembered how they had agreed that his adopted daughter was unusual. And now this omen. Was it all something that should be put together, connected?
The suspended rainbow began fading. The horses shuffled their feet, anxious to be moving. “Come,” said Fast Arrow. “We can think on this sign another day. We must get to Rooptahee before the sun is under the earth.”
Toward midafternoon they reached the village of Rooptahee. They saw two men dressed only in breech-clouts come plodding up a hill with a log between themon their shoulders. Then two more men brought up another the same size. They disappeared into the Medicine Lodge. Sacajawea heard thumps as the logs were dropped, and then the chuk of bone axes and the noise of digging. She saw in front of the Medicine Lodge three sacrifices offered in behalf of the village for the Okeepa Ceremony. There were long swathes of blue and black cloth, each purchased by the white man, Jussome. The cloth had been folded to resemble human figures, with eagle feathers on their heads and masks on their faces. According to Four Bears, this was the first time Jus-some had made any contribution to the ceremony, although he had lived among them for many winters. “I think he is after something,” said Four Bears to Red-pipe.
Hanging beside these figures, which had been erected about thirty feet over the door of the Medicine Lodge, was the skin of a white buffalo. It was the first white buffalo Sacajawea had ever seen. She stood quite still, looking at it.
“The white buffalo is extremely valuable. In all the herds there is maybe one in five million,” Four Bears explained to her, making the count by sifting earth through his fingers to show thousands upon thousands. “The hide is so scarce that it is possessed only as tribal medicine.”
Nothing seemed to absorb the Mandans’ interest so deeply as the legendry of the past, which was interwoven with the Okeepa rites.
No one but the medicine man knew the exact date when the ceremony was to commence. It was the day when the willow leaves became full-grown, for according to tradition, the twig that the bird brought in across the Great Flood was a willow bough and it had full-grown leaves upon it. In the Mandans’ version of the story of the Great Flood, the bird was the mourning dove, and this bird was never disturbed or harmed in any way by these people.
The four of them slept in the lodge of Four Bears. The women rose at dawn to work. Sacajawea took an immediate liking to Sahkoka, the Mint, who was short and stocky with gray eyes and graying hair, and Sun
Woman, mother of the papoose Earth Woman, whom she was holding.
“She is named so that as she grows she will remember to see the rocks and trees and mountains and flowers and plains,” Sun Woman said.
“We should let her see the Okeepa for something to remember,” said the Mint with a twinkle in her eye. “Four Bears gives all of his attention to this small one, pretending she is a son.”
On the other side of the lodge, amid the smoke from his pipe, Four Bears gave a loud chuckle. His hands were long and slender. The skin was burned a rich brown, and his hands looked very strong.
His voice came easily to the women’s side of the lodge. “The rocks you can count on to be the same. You can always count on the things of the earth. You know what to expect of them. You can count on the wild dogs. But people are not the same. You can’t count on them.” He glanced up, and the corner of his mouth flickered with a grim little smile as he added, “I went to visit the Hidatsa monument built of bones to honor the spirit of a dog.”
Sacajawea felt one hand closing on the clay floor. Her other hand clasped the cooing papoose more tightly.
“I know what you are talking about!” said Fast Arrow, recalling something the man Charbonneau had said to him about a girl and a dog.
Four Bears stood and smoothed over his breechclout front and back, then stepped up beside Sacajawea. “We all know—but it will not go beyond this lodge door.”
Sacajawea pulled at the soft doeskin blanket that wrapped Earth Woman’s feet. She said in a low voice, “I think I should be angry. You were checking into something that did not concern you.”
“It did concern me,” said Four Bears. “You did not act in the manner that women do. You peered into the sacred ark and asked what the objects were. No woman is that curious. No woman questions a chief, even a subchief. I supposed that day that you had used the name of my old friend Redpipe in some kind of spell, for the story being told is that the Dog Girl is some kind of Shaman.”
“Oh, no!” said Sacajawea, aghast.
“It was something of a joke on me when I found you the true daughter of Redpipe, and only an ordinary woman.” He spread his hand to indicate his lodge. “With women I am at ease.”
Sacajawea was moved by his words.
Fast Arrow addressed himself to Four Bears. ‘The white trader called Charbonneau suspects my sister is the Dog Girl. I told him his words were like birds chirping in the wind. But it is true?”
“True.”
“Well, so. That is gone now, and she is one of us. He cannot bother her. He is only one of those poor white traders. My woman treats her like a sister. She works hard in our lodge. She was unhappy and sickly when she came to us. Now she is singing and her arms are plump. Ai, if I am ever asked, I will not know anything about a Dog Girl.” Fast Arrow’s face puckered in concern.
Sacajawea shut her eyes and covered them with her hands. She did not wish either man to see the emotion there. The feeling ran deep.
The Mint came to fuss with Earth Woman while Sacajawea composed herself. She was smiling and not at all embarrassed by the display of emotion.
Sacajawea raised her eyes to meet Four Bears’s. To her surprise she found she could speak steadily.
“What did you find when you visited the Hidatsas?”
“No one knows what has become of the girl. She has disappeared into the air.” His powerful hands swirled about him, and he chuckled. “They would kill her if she came back because she is more valuable as something to talk about. They have forgotten she was like themselves. They speak mostly of the spirit of the great dog. It is remarkable. So—you can’t foretell the ways of people.” Four Bears’s still face lighted; unsmiling, it seemed to smile.
Sacajawea thought she had never seen a man who gave out such a feeling of quiet strength. He put his arm around the oiled shoulder of Fast Arrow. “Now we shall never refer to this matter again unless one of your family tells me they want to talk about it. It is washed away. That is all.” He smiled briefly at Sacajawea and said as he turned to go with Fast Arrow, “I have respectfor you, but men do not show that they think about women more than they think about a piece of property. So, this talk is ended. That Hidatsa girl is gone.”
Sacajawea sat still. She looked around at the seven wives of Four Bears, busy with their girl-children and smoothing out the sleeping couches, preparing for a new day. She pulled off her headband, made from grasses with a raven’s feather woven into it for good fortune, and tied the headband to Earth Woman’s cradleboard.
Sun Woman’s eyes shone. “Thank you. It is baby boys who are given gifts. Now 1 can see why Redpipe’s family has such a strong feeling about you. Earth Woman is greatly honored.”
Early the next morning, the sound of a single drum came from the council area.
“So, this is the
day,” announced Four Bears. “Are you ready, my son?”
“Ai.” Fast Arrow’s hand poked out and caught Rosebud by the elbow. “Please make my face paint bright today,” he said.
By afternoon the Mandans had assembled at the Council Lodge, their hair combed neatly, their clothing elegant.
Redpipe and Fast Arrow sat next to Four Bears in the council circle, each painted and dressed magnificently. They were next to Chief Black Cat, who was elegant in his beaded shirt and leggings and headdress of snow-white eagle feathers. Fast Arrow was the son of Black Cat. When Fast Arrow took the woman Rosebud, he left his own family to live with the mother and father of his woman. This was the custom. His woman’s parents were now his parents.
Rosebud and Sacajawea sat in the women’s circle with Sun Woman and the Mint. Suddenly someone yelled, and all eyes were turned to the prairies in the west, where a lone figure made his way toward the village. Sacajawea joined in the excitement, waving her arms and pointing. Along the clear shoulder of the hill, the lone figure climbed the lower slopes, coming toward them now with swift, purposeful strides. Soon all were standing, gazing at the figure and expressing a pretended great alarm. The men strung their bows andtested their elasticity. Horses were caught by the young boys and run into the village. Warriors were blackening their faces, and every preparation was being made, as if for a fight. During all this confusion the lone figure came on. His long legs moved with their knees bent, with the smooth, slouching glide of a woods-runner used to husbanding his strength. He moved as if his legs were circles, and his body rode on them erectly. Easily, effortlessly, his body held itself as straight as a young sapling. His shoulders had a squareness to them, a lean confidence, that gave an air of grace to his loose-fitting white wolfskin robe. In his left hand was a long-stemmed clay pipe, the long diagonal rising behind his head, covered with raven’s wings.
His features were still unclear, but his face was white, almost the color of birchbark, and painted with river clay. The crowd parted as he came into the council circle and touched the hands of the chiefs and men of importance.