The Key to the Indian (15 page)

T
he men couldn’t believe their eyes when they saw this old, old woman, half-hidden by smoke, with her long white hair and glittering, squinting eyes, walking slowly, with her arms stretched ahead of her like a blind person, marching into the muzzles of their guns. Blocking the way to their murderous purpose.

They stopped in their tracks. The grins fell off their bearded faces. Their gun arms slackened uncertainly. Then the one with the pistol raised it and pointed it at her.

“Keep back, ye crazy old heathen!” he barked. But his voice shook.

She kept coming, and the other man shrank and backed away.

And suddenly she emerged from the wreathing smoke into the circle of bright light from the flaming torch. Now they could see clearly what was in the hands she was holding out in front of her.

Omri, half-paralysed with terror though he was, realised what she was doing.

The Indians might believe in and accept little people. But not these men. Clan Mother had seen enough of white men to know that.

In a split-second memory, Omri recalled Mr Johnson, his old headmaster, who had once seen Omri’s own little people and had thought he had lost his mind. He remembered Patrick’s story about the saloon bar in old Texas – the drunks who had seen him, a tiny human, and run away in terror.

But one of them had shot at him first. Now Omri – and his dad – were in the firing line.

He never knew afterwards if it was abject terror or cleverness that made him begin to shout and scream, imitating the Indians’ war cries. Whether his wild gestures were struggles to escape, or what the men perceived – threats and defiance from some tiny supernatural being.

Omri was almost level with the men’s faces – he saw them freeze into masks of terror. As the old woman kept relentlessly shuffling closer, they backed, and backed… The one who had not spoken suddenly let out an inarticulate shout. His musket
dropped from his nerveless hands, and he turned, and fled into the night.

The other one was left alone. He tensed, crouched, caught between two impulses. He looked wild, terrified, like a cornered animal. His pistol, recently re-loaded, was still aimed. His hand was shaking wildly, but at this range he couldn’t miss.

The old woman thrust her hands even farther forward and shook them almost into the settler’s face. Omri could smell the mustiness of his beard, whisky on his breath, the sour sweat of fear coming off him. Omri’s throat seized up. He couldn’t force out another sound. In one more second he would be looking straight into the barrel of that enormous death-dealing weapon.

But Old Clan Mother had a last tactic up her sleeve.

She dropped the arm that held Omri. The gun, pointed at her face, was level. It steadied. And then that withered arm made one last, heroic, wholly unlooked-for effort. It jerked straight up, and Omri felt the barrel of the pistol strike his shoulder sharp and hard. The gun, as it was struck, fired, nearly deafening him. Sparks of burning powder flashed past his face, but the bullet went high, into the roof.

The man’s nerve broke, and he ran, dropping his pistol.
They’ve gone, we’re safe!
flashed through Omri’s fear-drenched brain. But the man bent and scooped up the musket. As he was about to disappear through the doorway, he paused for one moment

“Go back to hell, ye red devil!” he yelled hoarsely and, turning, fired one last shot.

The old woman stiffened. Her grasp on Omri loosened. Instinctively he wrapped his arms around one of her gnarled fingers. Then he was arcing through the air as she crashed backwards to the ground.

What happened in the next few minutes was all chaos and confusion to Omri. The women and children came crowding round, and it was like being trapped in a forest of living trees. There were wails and cries of grief. The old woman, who was now a huge motionless mountain in whose flickering shadow Omri and his father crouched, was lifted and carried away.

They should have stayed in the open, where they could be seen and perhaps rescued, but their instincts were too strong. Like exposed mice they fled from the trampling moccasins and the smoke and noise and danger into the nearest compartment. Scrambling over a heap of furs and other objects, they mounted the sleeping platform, still smelling sweetly and innocently of its sage mattress.

They only spoke a few brief, panting words to each other.

“That wasn’t Twin Stars, before – the one who—?”

“No.”

“Where did she go?”

“Out with the men. Don’t talk. Help me make a hole in one of these slabs of bark.”

His dad stared around the football field of a bed, and saw something glint. It was a knife, almost as big as himself. Omri watched as he ran to it, stumbling and tripping over the huge folds of hide, picked it up, dragged it back, and began
struggling to pierce one of the bark shingles in the outer wall. In the end he got Omri to help him and they used it like a battering-ram. Between them they pierced and twisted a hole in the bark, big enough to enable them to squeeze through and climb down the three metres or so to the ground. Omri would have fallen if his father had not been below to catch him.

“Come on, we can’t stay here. We’ve got to get away from the longhouse.”

They ran through the flickering darkness, but after about two hundred metres, they were brought up short by a huge barrier. It was the stockade.

“The fire hasn’t got to this part yet! We’ve got to get through!”

They examined it as well as they could in the dark. It had been all too well constructed, the stripped tree trunks so close together that a beetle couldn’t have squeezed between them, and above them the sharpened tops were invisible – twice as high as the longhouse roof, and now lost in smoke and darkness. It stretched interminably away on either side.

Which way to run? Neither of them had the least idea, and both were disoriented by fear and exhaustion. They had both been hurt, and their injuries, though not serious themselves, had begun to stiffen and give real pain. The numbness where Omri’s shoulder had struck the pistol barrel now began to feel red-hot, and he saw his dad rubbing his knee and grimacing.

“Dad – couldn’t we just – sit here and wait – wait for Patrick? I don’t think I can run any more.”

“I don’t know what else we can do… But if the longhouse collapses on us…”

They sank down, breathing heavily, at the foot of one of the poles. They could feel the heat, and hear the sound of burning, getting closer.

“How do you think those awful men got in?”

“They must have been in already, before the fire was started.”

“I suppose Little Bull’s forgotten about us,” Omri said.

“I wouldn’t blame him. I just hope he’s all right. Do you think the Indians managed to drive the raiders off? I heard shots – I mean from outside.”

“That must have been the raiders. Little Bull said the Indians had no more bullets.”

“They had their bows and arrows. I hope they got those swine! They purposely set out to trap the women inside the stockade.”

After a few moments, Omri sat up straight. “Dad!”

“What?”

“They were! They are – they’re trapped! The women I mean. The opening to the stockade was the part that was burning! I think the people who ran out first, jumped through when it was just starting, but the rest of the women and kids must still be caught inside the stockade, the same as us!”

“Where?”

“They must be at this end, near the other door!”

Suddenly, through the roaring noise of the fire, came another sound.

Thwock-thwock-thwock
.

“What’s that?”

“I know! Quick – run towards it!”

They ran to their right. And
now Omri could identify the sound, too
, – the most welcome sound possible, at that dire moment.

The thudding of axes against wood.

“It’s them! It’s the men outside the stockade! They’re using their trade axes to chop a hole to let everyone out!”

They ran, keeping close to the poles, around a bend near the corner of the longhouse. There, sure enough, they saw the crowd of women and children, huddled together. The sound of the chopping became frenzied – there didn’t seem to be any time between blows. They could see which poles were being attacked because they quivered and shook. And very soon the first of them swayed and screeched and fell outward, leaving a narrow, tree-trunk-shaped oblong through which they could see the night and a section of a man’s figure, wielding a large axe with a metal blade.

Two minutes later the adjacent pole fell, and then the next. It was enough. The children could now be handed out, the women squeezing through after them. There was no panic now; the evacuation happened in a calm, orderly way. Bundles and baskets were pushed through – some women were still running to and from the doomed longhouse, rescuing possessions and supplies.

At last the bodies were passed through – three of them. Men’s arms received them, and there was a stunned silence broken by muted cries of anguish, sorrow and rage.

Then, quite abruptly, everyone was through and Omri and his father were alone.

“Okay, come on. We have to get ourselves out now.”

The posts had been cut at about twice Omri’s father’s height. It was still no easy matter for them to climb out, especially weakened and weary as they were.

“You go first, bub.” And his father made Omri clamber on to his shoulders. Then, when he still couldn’t reach, his dad took his feet in his hands and, straining, heaved him up to half the length of his arms, till Omri could get a good grip on the shattered top of the stump and haul himself up with the soles of his moccasins pressed against the pole. His shoulder gave him hell, but he did it because he had to. But how was his dad to follow?

Omri stood on the top of the stump, surveying the scene beyond. It had seemed very dark at first beyond the stockade, where the light of the fire couldn’t reach, but now he could see quite well, and he realised there was a brilliant three-quarters moon; it had only seemed dark before because they had been in the stockade’s shadow.

Omri could see the whole group of Indians at a distance. He couldn’t make out exactly what they were doing. Suddenly he saw a man on horseback and his spirits swooped up.

“Dad! Dad! I can see Little Bull!” he called to his father, still down below, above the increasing roar of the flames. “He’ll see me, he’ll get you out! And – wow! – Twin Stars is with him! They’ve got Tall Bear, they’re all safe! Little Bull!”
he shouted at the top of his voice. “Little Bull! We’re here! Help!”

And he waved his arms and danced on the stump.

But Little Bull took no notice. He couldn’t hear him. He was at the far side of the group. Omri could see him, gesturing, calling, neck-reining the pony in and out of the crowd. He seemed to be organising them. He had a couple of muskets slung across his back and Omri knew he must have taken them off dead raiders. He wondered fleetingly if he’d had time to take any more scalps.

From the pony’s back, he could probably have seen Omri, silhouetted against the flame-lit smoke, if only he would look in the right direction. But now he jumped down and was lost among the crowd, and then in the moonlight Omri saw an old woman being heaved on to the pony’s back, followed by an old man who straddled the horse’s flanks behind her. Then a bundle… And with a sudden sickening of the heart, Omri realised.

They were leaving.

Now, tonight. Of course, what else? Their home was burning; most of their possessions, and what little safety they had had, were gone. What else could they do but to start their long, dangerous journey north tonight?

In fact they were moving off. Omri could just make out Twin Stars, with the baby on her back, leading the pony at the head of a straggling column. They were going… leaving Omri’s dad trapped below and both of them stranded.

But that wasn’t the worst. They were going without saying
goodbye. Omri felt suddenly absolutely certain that he would never see his Indian – his friend, his blood-brother – again, if Little Bull didn’t see him now.

And how could he see him, when his back must be turned like everyone else’s and he was heading away from the longhouse, up the hill and into the dark wood?

A
s Omri stood on the stump, the fire hot on his back, feeling absolutely gutted, something came between him and the heat.

He swung round toward the longhouse, and saw a vast black looming figure. The next second it had seized him.

“Gotcha, ya varmint!”

Omri nearly passed out. It was one of the men who had tried to murder the women and children! He too must have been trapped. He had hidden while the Indians were there, while the women were escaping, and now he – and the other, Omri could see him, too – were going to creep away through the only way out.

“Where’s th’other of ’em?”

A slight pause, then: “There! Where ya feet is! Watch out, he’s a-tryin’ to run!”

“Oh no ya don’t!”

In another moment, Omri’s dad had been pounced on and lifted in a coarse and filthy fist. The men stared at their captives, then at each other. There faces wore wolfish grins. The one who held Omri squeezed him so hard he screamed.

“They’s real as you or me! They ain’t nothin’ to be scared of! Try how yours squeaks when ya pinches him!” The other one twisted Omri’s father’s arm and gave a shout of glee.

“Stop! Don’t!” shouted Omri.

The men burst out laughing. “Stop! Don’t!” they cried in high, mocking voices. “They ain’t nuthin’! They’re more scareder’n we was!”

“They stopped us shootin’ them Injun sows! Let’s kill ’em. I c’d bite the head off of mine an’ spit it half a mile!”

“Half a mile? Let’s see ya!”

“Watch me.” And he opened his cavernous whisky-stinking mouth and made to put Omri’s head in.

It was the end. Omri was sure of it. He was too exhausted to fight and there was no hope at all. In that split second, he gave himself up to a horrible death.

Something huge and heavy whistled past Omri and buried itself in the man’s head.

He dropped like a stone and Omri with him, but he had a soft landing on the man’s stomach. A moment later his father dropped out of nowhere and landed beside him.

They looked up, and saw the second man take a flying leap over the cut ends of the poles, and then they heard a faint, brief whistle. The arrow caught him in the chest and he seemed to pause in mid-air before crashing to the ground beyond the palisade.

Little Bull came straight to the gap in the poles. He saw Omri and his father on the chest of the dead man, and they saw him smile a little. He stepped over the stumps, picked them both up, stuck them into his belt – then, without a word, he charged –
straight into the burning longhouse
.

Omri and his father, already half-stunned with shock, could only cover their noses and mouths with their hands, but it didn’t help much. They choked and coughed and their eyes ran.

Omri tried not to breathe. His eyes were tightly closed. He didn’t see where Little Bull was going. He felt the heat getting worse. He saw bright red through his eyelids. He smelt hair singeing – was it his? He cowered down in remembered terror – the fire! The fire!

He felt Little Bull stoop, half squashing them at his waist, then straighten, turn and run – run – then the cold night air, blissfully smoke-free, caressed their faces and enabled them to open their smarting eyes.

They were at the palisade, where the two dead men lay, one inside, one out. The one whose skull had been split by the tomahawk was staring up at them through a veil of his own blood. The other lay on his face, the arrow broken under
him. Little Bull put his foot on the first man’s chest and wrenched out his weapon.

And then they heard the crash as the rooftree of the longhouse broke and the blazing building, from which they had just emerged, collapsed in a mighty surge of smoke and sparks that topped even the sharpened spikes on the stockade posts.

Little Bull leapt the stumps and ran a little way up hill, stopped, turned and looked back.

“Little Bull?”

The Indian’s hand closed round Omri and lifted him level with his face. He was breathing hard. “Forgive me,” he said in his deep voice. “I forget you at time I fight. I forget you at time we leave. But our women tell me your action. You are no boy. You are warrior. You are my blood brother. Little Bull will not forget you again.”

He set them on the ground and knelt before them. He laid something wrapped in skins between them.

“You will go back soon?” he asked.

“Tomorrow morning.”

Little Bull hesitated, then took off one of his moccasins and laid it on the ground near them. It formed a sort of cave.

“No, Little Bull! You can’t march barefoot!” exclaimed Omri’s dad.

“Cold can kill
you
, not me,” the Indian said. “You must not die. Twin Stars will make another moccasin, on journey.” Then he said, “Now you will know why I came back.”

He put his hands on the thing he had been carrying. It
was flat and wrapped in buckskin, on which Omri could see beautiful decorations, colourless in the moonlight. But one whole corner was blackened by fire.

Little Bull was very still. He looked as if he were praying. “This is holy,” he said.

Reverently, he unwrapped something oval and flat, and held it before his face. Omri gasped. It changed him – made him into another being, awesome, grotesque – an other-worldly stranger.

“False face holds the spirit of ancestor,” Little Bull said from behind the mask. “His voice called to me from the fire.”

Omri’s father was astonished. “Why are you showing it to us, Little Bull? Isn’t it only for your
sachems
– your holy people?”

Little Bull said, “Little Bull show you this because you helped to save our women. You came with me to save
him
from great danger. You are not like other white men. Spirit in false face wishes you to have this great honour. Old Clan Mother—” He paused, but only for a split second, and his face showed no emotion. “She asks that I do this to show respect for little people of her dream.”

He put the mask back into the buckskin bag. “He goes with us. Without him, no hope. No—” He clasped his hands, one set of fingers holding the other.

“Link—”

“Yes. Chain. Like Covenant Chain of Iroquois that holds tribes together, holds my people to the time before. Where we
must go now, we will be new, like babies, but born from nothing. Our ancestors must come with us.”

“Yes,” said Omri’s father. “They’re your history.”

Omri was suddenly choked with feeling. He had the strangest impulse. He wanted to say words he knew in his heart he didn’t mean, but the need was so strong he could hardly resist. He wanted to say, to beg: “Little Bull, take us with you!” At that moment he could have said goodbye to his whole life, so as not to have to say goodbye to him.

But he kept silent. He put out his hand and Little Bull bent and touched it with his finger where once their blood had mingled. They looked into each other’s eyes and Omri knew, without knowing how he knew, that it was for the last time.

“We are of one mind,” the Indian said.

And he rose, and turned, and ran, swift as a deer, up the hill and into the forest after his people.

Omri and his father lay out in the open all night.

Even huddled in the moccasin, it was bitterly cold and they felt they might not survive. They could hear wolves howling up in the woods. Once an owl swooped low over them, its white underparts flickering in the moonlight. They clung together, shivering and scared and almost unbearably lonely, now Little Bull had gone.

Ironically, it was probably only the fact that the rest of the stockade – the part nearest to them – suddenly blazed up
some time after midnight, that saved them from the effects of the frost and from marauding animals.

In the deepest, darkest part of the night, when his dad was dozing, Omri cried. He put head and shoulders out of the moccasin cave, and looked down the hill at the longhouse. There was little left. Each time small gusts of wind blew on it, its embers glowed fitfully like some dying thing drawing its last painful breaths. Omri cried bitter silent tears of sadness for his Indian and what he had left behind, and for Omri’s loss of him.

Just as the sky was paling and Omri could see the streaks of clouds to the east, showing the blackened, still smoking ashes of the longhouse and the abandoned fields beyond, it all ended.

Omri didn’t even have time to savour one final second. Only, as he travelled faster than light through the layers of time, the smell of the smoked hide and the burnt wood and the unsullied earth they were lying on – and a strange, vagrant whiff of sweetgrass – stayed with him in his nostrils even after he got home.