Manly Wade Wellman - Novel 1953 (16 page)

           
“But you did not stay in the tree,
my son,” called a voice from the game trail.

           
Out into view limped Chief
Woodpecker, leaning on a staff. With him was one of the members of the council.
Behind showed the faces of other men of the Twilight People.

OODPECKER stood
still beside his companion, and his eyes glowed brightly in his thin face as he
gazed at Sam. The others of the party, a dozen or so, stepped into view and
began a slow, gingerly approach toward the great, prone body of Giluhda.

           
Every warrior poised his bow, or
lifted a spear or a tomahawk in his hand. They spread out as they advanced,
forming a line of tense, carefully moving men. Then they stopped, well away
from the fallen terror of
Twilight
Town
. Nobody took a step forward or back, and
nobody spoke.

           
Then someone ran swiftly from behind
them. Sam saw that it was a slim, brown boy, perhaps eleven years old, dressed
in a breech clout of tanned rabbit skins. In his small fist he carried a
bone-pointed spear, smaller than the one Otter had made for stabbing fish in
the river. One of the
line
of warriors reached out a
hand as though to stop the boy, but the nimble little figure avoided the grasp
and ran straight to Giluhda. Pausing, the lad stooped and gazed at the slack
head and the dull eyes.

           
Then he lifted the spear and thrust
its bone point into Giluhda’s flesh. The slender half stuck up into the air,
like the mightier ash pole of the spear Sam had forged and sent crashing into
his enemy. The boy’s mouth opened and emitted a shrill young war whoop.

           
“He is dead!” the boy cried in
triumph. “Giluhda is surely dead! He does not move when I strike him!”

           
“Is this true?” eagerly demanded the
voices of several grown men in chorus.

           
“I tell no lie!” came back the proud
young declaration, and the warriors closed in on all sides. They stared and
prodded at the conquered monster that for so long had seemed unconquerable.

           
Only Woodpecker did not move to
inspect the carcass of Giluhda. His black eyes grew brighter as they looked at
Sam. Then he limped forward another step.

           
“My son,” he said, “
you
did what you said you would do. You fought him and you
killed him.”

           
“Chief, may I speak?” asked Otter.

           
Woodpecker studied him, and nodded.
“Speak,” he gave permission.

           
“Chief, you said something when you
came out of those trees. You said that my white brother jumped down in some way
when he killed Giluhda. I did not see that. I had fallen down. I do not
understand what you mean.”

           
Several of the older men had turned
back from the triumphant examination of the dead Giluhda. Woodpecker pivoted on
his lame leg and spoke to the nearest of these, the council member.

           
“Tell them what has happened,” said
Woodpecker.

           
The council member drew himself up,
as though for formal recital. “We were at
Twilight
Town
,” he began. “Some of us saw that Eagle Wing was at his house. He made
his weapons ready—a bow, a tomahawk, and a knife. Somebody asked Eagle Wing
what he was going to do. Eagle Wing said that he would go to the forest and
hunt. But somebody else thought he saw Eagle Wing put paint on his face before
he left
Twilight
Town
. We spoke together, saying to each other that men do not paint their
faces to hunt, but only to fight.”

           
“Is this true?” asked Otter, in the
Cherokee manner.

           
“I tell no he. Somebody told Chief
Woodpecker, who thought only a short time. Then he said that we must follow
Eagle Wing. He said that we must learn what Eagle Wing was doing. He said that
he himself would go with us. We came, and we met Eagle Wing a little way from
this place, coming back. Eagle Wing said that the white hunter had made friends
with Giluhda, and would help Giluhda kill more of the Twilight People. He said
that he had tried to stop the white hunter from doing this, but that the white
hunter had taken his weapons from him by a trick.”

           
Sam interrupted with a muttered
exclamation of protest. The council member went on, unheeding.

           
“Eagle Wing said that he had gone in
peace to hunt, and had only happened to learn of the white hunter’s friendship
with Giluhda. We looked at Eagle Wing, and saw that he wore no paint. When we
asked him about it, he said that he had kept a clean face. But the little boy
there—” and the council member gestured. “He is my youngest son. His eyes are
good.

           
He saw paint on Eagle Wing’s hands.
We looked, and it was true. Then we knew that Eagle Wing had worn paint and had
washed it off and told lies about it.”

           
“If he lied about one thing, he
would He about another,” put in Otter harshly.

           
“You say weH. We came along Eagle
Wing’s back trail, to find out the truth. We came carefully, because we knew
that Giluhda might be near. We stopped and Hstened and heard the big noise of
Giluhda’s running. Then we heard his voice when he called out in his hurt. We
came swiftly, and saw his end. By bravery and wisdom, the white hunter killed
him.” The speaker looked at Sam. “It is the white hunter’s word that will tell
how he killed Giluhda.”

           
Sam swallowed hard, but could not
speak. He glanced toward Woodpecker, and saw that the chief looked at him in
sympathetic understanding.

           
“I remember,” said Woodpecker, “when
my son, the white hunter, told of a strange custom of his people. He said that
his people, the Red Coats, did not like to speak of their own brave acts. He
said that they waited for others to speak those things. Now I will speak for my
son, the white hunter.”

           
“Chief, speak for him,” pleaded
Otter. “I ask it.”

           
Woodpecker smiled. “Otter, we saw
that you had fallen down in running before Giluhda. We saw that Giluhda had
stopped between the two trees over there. My son, the white hunter, had dropped
the big spear with all those heavy stones tied to it. But it did not go in the
whole way.” He raised his voice. “Was it not like that?”

           
“It was like that,” seconded the
council member, and others who had come to listen grunted their agreement.

           
“Then,” went on
Woodpecker, “Giluhda was hurt, but he still lived and tried to get out from
between the trees.
He wanted to catch Otter and kill him. But my son,
the white hunter, was brave. He jumped down from the tree and threw his weight
on the spear. He made it go in a long way. It stabbed to the inside of Giluhda,
so that it struck his life. Then Giluhda died.” Again he spoke to them all.
“Was it not like that?”

           
“It was like that,” came back the
deep-voiced assurance.

           
“My son, the white hunter, stood on
top of Giluhda. He jumped down to the ground, and went in front of Giluhda.”
Woodpecker’s voice almost shook with his depth of feeling. “He helped Otter,
his brother, get up and run to a safe place.”

           
Otter heard all this with the utmost
of astonishment. Woodpecker smiled at him again.

           
“You two are brothers indeed,” he
said. “It is good to see two men who are brave for themselves and for each
other.”

           
Otter walked closer to Sam, and put
a hand on his shoulder.
^u
Hai
!”
he said. “Your heart is strong.”

           
“His heart is strong,” agreed
Woodpecker. “Now, what does my son, the white hunter, say?”

           
“I say that my heart took strength
from the heart of Otter, my brother,” said Sam. “And I ask a question. Where is
Eagle Wing, who told lies about me?”

           
“He came with us,” said a warrior.
“We brought him back when we came to look for you.”

           
“Where is he?” repeated Sam. “Back
in
Twilight
Town
, before I went away to kill Giluhda, I said that he was a liar. Then it
was only my word. But now you know, all of you, that my word was good. Where is
Eagle Wing?”

           
“I am here, white man.”

           
The medicine man walked forward
among the gathered warriors. They moved to either side, making way for him.
Eagle Wing swept past Woodpecker, past Otter, and stopped directly in front of
Sam. Folding his arms, he threw back his head and stared with all his old
arrogance.

           
“I am not afraid of the white
hunter,” he said in a voice that all could hear.

           
The whole group had turned away from
the fascination of the dead Giluhda. They drew into a close circle around Sam
and Eagle Wing. Angry, scornful eyes looked at the medicine man, and hands
tightened upon weapons, but Eagle Wing did not flinch.

           
“I have no bow and no tomahawk and
no knife,” he announced. “The white hunter took them away from me by trickery,
not by strength or bravery. Let him show that he is a coward, by striking a man
without weapons.”

           
The words fell from his mouth, as
cold as chunks of ice. He gazed at Sam fixedly and proudly, daring him to do
his worst.

           
“My son,” said Woodpecker to Sam,
“Eagle Wing has told lies about you. He has been your enemy from the first time
he saw you. He has tried to kill you. It is your right to say how he will be
punished.”

           
“Speak,” Eagle Wing urged Sam
coldly. “You can kill me, but you cannot make me afraid.”

           
Sam returned Eagle Wing’s stare for
a long moment. Then he spoke to Woodpecker.

           
“Chief, may I ask somebody here to
do something?”

           
“Ask,” granted Woodpecker.

           
“I will not tell the way for a man
to die when he has no weapons to defend himself. And I will not say a word to
Eagle Wing, who is a liar and a coward.” He addressed the council member.
“Where is the boy, your son, who struck his spear into Giluhda’s body?”

           
The lad stood beside Sam, looking
up. His small, brown face he held as expressionless as the best of them,
waiting for Sam’s words.

           
“What will you do when you are
grown?” Sam asked him.

           
“I will be a good hunter and a brave
man,” was the prompt, stout rejoinder.