Chapter 26
The bond of nature draws me to my own,
My own in thee, for what thou all is mine.
—JOHN MILTON
The air was crisp and fresh as a sweet breeze swept down over the pine-covered hills. Dancing Cloud led the way up the steep incline on his white stallion, his other horse straying behind on a rope, Lauralee following. They had left the meadowland below them some time ago and had entered the enchantment of cool, green pines where a film of haze hung low over them.
Having entered into an existence that was beyond her wildest imagination, Lauralee clung to her reins as she took everything in. “The Great Smoky Mountains,” she whispered to herself as she continued studying the quiet landscape.
The path led upward, winding through trees and around rushing streams and beautiful waterfalls. She had read books about these mountains and their sheer majestic beauty and mystique. They were a range of the southern Appalachian highlands that stretched from North Carolina into Tennessee.
She was witnessing this grandeur today, the mountainside containing spectacular scenery. The summits and ridges were crowned with giant forests of red spruces.
At the lower elevations Lauralee had seen many flowering dogwood, redbud, and the serviceberry. She had felt that she might have died and gone to heaven when she had ridden past dense stands of mountain laurel, white-blossomed rhododendron and azaleas, which had formed almost impenetrable thickets.
She tensed when through a break in the trees she saw a black bear standing on a ledge far to the right side of where she was traveling. In only the short time she had been riding up the mountainside she had seen much wild life. Not only black bears, but also white-tailed deer, foxes, bobcats, raccoons, ruffed grouse, turkeys, and a variety of beautifully colored songbirds.
Dancing Cloud looked over his shoulder at Lauralee. “Do you not see now what, besides my people, has drawn me back to these mountains?” he asked, his voice echoing into many voices as it spun into the clear, quiet air around them.
The path was wide enough for him to edge over slightly, to give Lauralee room to catch up with him. When she reached him, she sidled her horse beside his.
“Is not my mountain paradise, my o-ge-ye?” he said thickly.
“I’ve never seen anything as beautiful,” Lauralee said softly. “When I was a small girl in Tennessee I could see this stretch of mountains from my bedroom. I often gazed upon the mystical haze that hung over them, wondering what lay beneath it. I always thought that the mountains were smoking. I am so thrilled now to finally know what truly lies here breathlessly beautiful beneath the haze.”
“Your father traveled this path often when you were a child,” Dancing Cloud said. “He was an Indian agent who cared for those he served. That is why, at eight winters of age, I grew so fond of, and so admired, your father. He and my father became as close as any brothers who share their lives.”
“And now both of our fathers are gone,” Lauralee said, a sob catching in her throat. “Wouldn’t it have been wonderful for them to have seen the depths of our love for each other? And to see that their bonding continues on now, even though they have passed on to the other side?”
“They are with us now,” Dancing Cloud said. He reached a hand heavenward, then swung it slowly from one side to the other, encompassing everything around him. “Do you not feel their presence in the breeze and in the warm touch of the sun upon your flesh? Do you not see them in the flowers? Their spirit path will always be ours to follow. They embrace us as we move into our future as one heart and soul, my o-ge-ye.”
“You always have such a beautiful way of expressing yourself,” she said, sighing.
“You bring forth from deeply within me feelings that normally I would not express aloud,” Dancing Cloud said. “With you, I feel such inner peace and happiness.”
“As I feel the same because of you.” She paused and enjoyed the call of the birds and the hum of the bees. She inhaled the sweet fragrance of the flowers that clung to the mountainside. She again absorbed the glories of her surroundings.
“How long now until we reach your village?” she finally blurted, anxious, yet afraid, to arrive there. If it were possible, she would postpone ever leaving this beautiful place where it seemed no other people existed except for herself and her beloved.
She could not stop being afraid of Dancing Cloud’s people’s reaction to her. Her heart thumped wildly at the thought of moving among them, their eyes intent on her, perhaps hating her. . . .
“My village lays beyond that rise yonder,” Dancing Cloud said, pointing. “Long ago my Wolf Clan of Cherokee settled in a valley where they were sheltered from the worst harshness of winter and the intrusion of those who might be our enemy.”
“Yet even that did not stop the damn Yankees as they wreaked their treachery during the war,” Lauralee said solemnly. “No one could escape their plundering it seems. Both of our lives were altered because of the Yankees’ hunger for blood and power.”
She hung her head as thoughts of her Uncle Abner swam through her consciousness. He had been a Yankee and he and Nancy were precious to her. It seemed impossible that she could separate her feelings for them from those she had always felt for anyone who lived in the Union states, yet she had.
And she could not help but recall the kindness of Noah Brown and his son Paul, nor the doctor who had saved Dancing Cloud’s life. They were all Yankees and she had warm feelings for them all.
The war, she despaired to herself.
The Civil War had not only left confusion in its wake all those years ago.
It did so even now.
A sound, like the small, faint cry of a child, drew Lauralee’s head up. She looked quickly over at Dancing Cloud. She could tell by his guarded expression and wandering eyes as he peered slowly around him that he had also heard the sound.
“Dancing Cloud, could that . . .”
She got no more words out. Suddenly before them was a small child stumbling in a drunken stupor toward them. Although his skin was copper, it was ashen in color, and his eyes were sunken. He was gaunt and thin, as though he hadn’t eaten for days.
Lauralee and Dancing Cloud slid quickly from their saddles. Lauralee took the horse’s reins and secured them beneath a boulder on the graveled path, then ran to Dancing Cloud and knelt down with him before the boy.
Dancing Cloud gently steadied the small child between his strong hands as he clasped them onto his frail shoulders.
Brian Brave Walker blinked his eyes as he stared up at Dancing Cloud, then over at his white stallion. This warrior! This horse! He had seen them both in his dreams!
Then he looked questionably at the white woman. This was not the way it was supposed to be. She had never appeared to him in his dreams. She was not supposed to be with the noble warrior on the white stallion.
For sure this was not a dream.
This was real!
Brian Brave Walker’s dark eyes widened with fear. Again he looked quickly from Lauralee to Dancing Cloud, then tried to wrench himself free.
Lauralee wanted so badly to go and draw the child into her arms and comfort him. It was plain to see that he perhaps trusted no one.
“We are friends,” Dancing Cloud reassured, releasing one of his hands to talk in sign language with the boy in case he could not understand English. He pointed to himself with his right thumb, then pointed to Lauralee in the same way, meaning “we.” He then clasped his hands together and shook them, meaning “friends. “
“My name is Chief Dancing Cloud.” He motioned toward himself with a hand. Then he gestured toward Lauralee. “Her name is Lauralee. What is your name?”
Deep inside himself Brian Brave Walker was glad to have finally found someone who might give him directions to any Indian village. He had given up hoping that he would find the one in which his mother had lived as a child before the Civil War. As he had wandered, searching, he seemed to have gone in circles.
Until now, until he had come across these two people, he had begun to think that he might die on this mountain. He had fled from more than one bear. Now he was too weak to flee from anything, or anyone.
He was glad to know that this brave whose skin color matched his own was declaring himself a friend.
He looked guardedly over at the woman. She was most beautiful! Yet her skin was white. He hated all whites. In them he always saw his father! He could not look at a white-skinned person and at the same time think “friend.” His very own father was his enemy and he was white-skinned!
“My name is Brian Brave Walker. I speak English well,” he said, giving Lauralee another insolent stare. Then he gazed up at Dancing Cloud. “But I also speak in Cherokee. Do you know the Cherokee language?”
Dancing Cloud’s eyes lit up. “I am Cherokee,” he said proudly. “You are also Cherokee?”
“Partly,” Brian Brave Walker said, lowering his eyes with shame to ever have to admit to being part white. His little, thin legs gave way beneath him. He sucked in a quavering breath when Dancing Cloud caught him, preventing the fall.
“How long has it been since you have eaten?” Lauralee asked, reaching a hand to the child’s face to smooth a fallen lock of coal-black hair back from his eyes.
She gasped when he flinched at her touch, wondering how he could hate her so quickly?
“I have fed off berries,” Brian Brave Walker said, looking up at Dancing Cloud as though he had asked the question. He wanted to ignore Lauralee as though she were not there. “My stomach hurts from the berries. I . . . I . . .”
He jerked himself away from Dancing Cloud and stumbled behind some bushes.
Dancing Cloud and Lauralee exchanged quick glances when they realized what the child was doing in private. The single diet of berries had caused him to have a bad bout of dysentery.
Lauralee’s heart went out to the child when she heard him groan with pain as he continued to stay behind the bushes.
Dancing Cloud was torn with what to do. He wanted to go to the boy and comfort him. Yet he did not want to embarrass him while he was in such a terrible state.
Then they heard no more noises. Everything had become stone quiet. The boy no longer groaned and moaned. There was no more sounds of his overactive bowels. There was a sudden strained silence.
“Child?” Lauralee said, trying to get the boy’s response. “Are you all right, child?”
When he did not respond nor reappear, Dancing Cloud and Lauralee ran behind the bushes.
Lauralee felt faint at what she saw.
Dancing Cloud saw the danger of the boy’s condition.
“He’s unconscious,” Lauralee cried, placing her hands to her throat at the sight of the small child lying in the filthy mess, his breeches wrapped around his ankles.
“We must see to him quickly,” Dancing Cloud said, grabbing the boy up into his arms. He looked around, searching with his eyes. Through a break in the trees a short distance away the shine of a rushing stream caught his quick attention.
“O-ge-ye, get one of my shirts from my saddlebag,” he said in a rush of words. “The child will wear that once he is bathed. You will bathe him while I search the forest for the skullcap herbal plant that can be used to better his condition.”
“Dancing Cloud, I’m afraid that he is already too dehydrated to . . . to . . . possibly survive,” Lauralee cried.
Breathless and fear gripping her heart for the child, she ran to Dancing Cloud’s stallion and grabbed a shirt from the saddlebag. She also yanked a blanket out of the bag.
Then she ran and caught up with Dancing Cloud just as he broke through the denseness of the trees and reached the stream. She was glad that the ground leveled off somewhat beside the water. She would be able to minister to the child more easily.
Dancing Cloud lay Brian Brave Walker beside the stream, then turned and left without saying another word.
Lauralee removed the child’s soiled clothes and pitched them into the weeds. She recalled the inner strength that she had learned to grasp onto when she had taken care of the men at the veterans hospital, and drew from it today as she bathed the child and dressed him.
She scooted away from Brian Brave Walker when Dancing Cloud returned and managed to force some of the herbs that he had smashed into a fine powder down the boy’s throat. He followed that with small trickles of water, stopping when the child coughed or sputtered.
Lauralee’s heart skipped a beat when Brian Brave Walker began coughing more earnestly, his arms flailing wildly in the air. “Oh, Lord, he’s choking,” she cried.
She went to him and lay him over her lap and hit his back with the palm of her hand. When he began crying and speaking incoherently to her, she knew that at least he was finally awake and that the herbal mixture had made its way on down to his stomach.
“Help,” Brian Brave Walker cried weakly, dizzying even more as he tried to open his eyes. “Help me.”
Dancing Cloud placed his hands beneath the young brave’s arms and drew him over onto his lap. “You are going to be all right,” he said, slowly rocking Brian Brave Walker back and forth. “We will make you well. Then you can tell us where you came from and where your parents are.”
Lauralee jumped with a start when the mention of his parents caused the child’s eyes to open wide and wild.
“No,” Brian Brave Walker cried. “I do not talk . . . about . . . parents . . . ever to you.”
Brian Brave Walker was still afraid to draw any attention to his mother. He always had to remember that her life was in danger so long as the threat of his father was there.
He glowered over at Lauralee. “Especially to her,” he said, his voice weak, yet noticeably filled with a venomous hate. “She . . . is . . . white. I . . . trust . . . no whites.”
“Her skin is white, yes,” Dancing Cloud said, glancing over at Lauralee. “But never equate her with those who are evil. Lauralee’s heart is pure and sweet. She is loved by me, a Cherokee chief. So, Brian Brave Walker, you must see that she is deserving of more than hate. And know this, young brave. She is to be my wife.”
Brian Brave Walker’s lips parted in a disbelieving gasp.
Then he drifted off again, finding peace in the black void of sleep.
“Let us move onward and get him to my village,” Dancing Cloud said, rising to his feet. “I will carry him in my arms.”
When Lauralee said nothing back to him, Dancing Cloud kissed her softly. “Do not fret over this young brave’s misguided feelings for you. Once he is awake and lucid for clear thinking, he will learn quickly the sweetness of your heart.”
“I wonder what has happened in his past that makes him hate white people so quickly and easily?” Lauralee said, walking beside Dancing Cloud back to their horses. “His hate seems to run way deeper than anyone else I have ever known.”
She stopped and paused, then looked quickly up at Dancing Cloud. “Except for the hate I feel for a man, I should say, I have never witnessed such total hate,” she said, her voice drawn. “Clint McCloud. The Yankee with the red hair and blue eyes.”
“And wooden leg,” Dancing Cloud said, proud to be the one who caused the man such discomfort for the rest of his life.
“Yes, and wooden leg.” Lauralee nodded.
She shoved the rock aside that had kept the horse’s reins in place. She waited for Dancing Cloud to get secure in his saddle with Brian Brave Walker on his lap, then handed his reins to him.
Watching the child, to see if he was still asleep, Lauralee swung herself into her saddle.
They resumed their journey up the mountainside. Brian Brave Walker awakened for a while, then would drift off to sleep again.
“Once we get him to my cabin he can eat proper foods that will make his strength return,” Dancing Cloud said, gazing over at Lauralee.
“It must be done slowly, though. He apparently has been without solid food for quite a while now. He has to adjust to it gradually or his body will continue to rebel against it.”
Dancing Cloud nodded. “You bring your teachings of the white man’s hospital to my mountains?” he said, smiling over at her. “That is good. Like your father you will share with the Wolf Clan Cherokee.”
“I only hope that your people will accept me as they did my father,” Lauralee said warily. “You see, Dancing Cloud, I am arriving to your village in a much different capacity than my father. I will remain among your people as one with them. My father came to your people, brought them supplies, smoked their peace pipe and shared talk and knowledge with them, then he left. He returned to his own life, leaving your people to live theirs apart from his.”
“The difference also is that you are coming to my village as my future wife,” Dancing Cloud quickly interjected. “Who dares question that since I am their chief, their spokesperson?”
Lauralee smiled, yet did not share his confidence.
She looked straight ahead again, her spine stiff, her heart pounding when the first signs of the village came in sight as the ground leveled off into a wide valley beyond.
As they came closer to the village, Lauralee was stunned to see that it was so nearly like the smaller white communities in their manner of living, that a stranger could rarely distinguish an Indian’s cabin or little cove farm from that of a white man. The cabins were made of logs and roofed with the bark of chestnut trees. Each cabin had its own garden, corn, and various other vegetables maturing in them.
She looked past the village at the many orchards, manure evenly spread around the fruit trees. She could tell by the trunk and leaves of the trees that during the harvest season the Cherokee had an abundance of apples, peaches, and plums.
She looked elsewhere. Although there were some cows grazing in small plots behind the cabins, it seemed that pork was highly esteemed by the Cherokee. A considerable amount of hogs were fenced in beside the cabins, as well as some that ran wild and untended throughout the village.
As they came closer to the village and Lauralee could see some of the people outside their lodges doing various chores, she could tell that the primitive costumes had most certainly been long obsolete. Just like Dancing Cloud had told her, she saw that his people’s dress was like that of the white people, except that for the most part moccasins took the place of shoes.
And noticeably also were the men who still wore buckskins along with those who wore the breeches and shirts of the white man.
Her gaze was drawn to women sitting outside their cabins at spinning wheels and looms. It was obvious they manufactured their own clothes.
Dancing Cloud was observing, himself, things of his people and village. The Great Spirit had given them the land. And what a beautiful land it was. The sky was dark blue, the trees casting shadows. The arched backs of the hills beyond served as a sturdy backdrop for the thriving village.
He saw that the horses and ponies of his people were tethered in their usual places. Many dugout canoes, hollowed out of poplar logs with ax and fire, were beached along the banks of the river. Toddlers were busy at games that he had once played. Some women were fleshing yesterday’s kill for tonight’s dinner. Fresh meat hung from drying rocks, blood red; white sheets of buck fat were spread out to dry beneath the hot rays of the sun.
Dancing Cloud’s gaze stopped on one woman in particular. Susan Sweet Bird, his father’s sister. She was sitting solemnly outside his father’s lodge on a buffalo robe. She stared blindly ahead as she poked a steel needle into a newly cured skin.
Dancing Cloud could see her frustration as she continued to jab at the buffalo skin with her needle, her eyesight not there to assist in this chore that she was determined to do for herself.
Blind since birth, she had learned well to live with her affliction. Her senses guided her into her every movement.
And for the most part she functioned as well as one whose eyes were bright and alive.
But today it seemed that something was keeping her from her skills of sewing. He did not have to be told what. She was still mourning the death of her beloved chieftain brother.
And she surely wondered when her nephew was going to return to assume the duties of chief.
Suddenly Susan Sweet Bird jerked her sightless eyes in Dancing Cloud’s direction. She stiffened and leaned her ear toward the sound of the approaching horses. She dropped her sewing and pushed herself up from the buffalo robe. Her hands groping before her, she came toward Dancing Cloud, a soft smile quavering on her lips.
“Dancing Cloud?” she shouted. She broke into a run. “It is you, isn’t it, Dancing Cloud? You have come home to us.”
Her reaction to the sounds that she had heard at the far edge of the village caused everyone else to respond and see what had caused Susan Sweet Bird’s sudden anxiousness. Gasps wafted through the crowd when they caught their first sight of Dancing Cloud.
Then everyone broke into a run. Two women went to Susan Sweet Bird and gently led her onward toward her nephew.
“It is Dancing Cloud,” they told Susan Sweet Bird. “He is home.”
Susan Sweet Bird listened again, her senses telling her that three horses were arriving instead of one. “Who is with my nephew?” she asked the women.
“A white woman and it seems that Chief Dancing Cloud carries a child in his arms,” one of them replied.
“A white woman and a . . . baby . . . child?” Susan Sweet Bird said, her voice drawn. “Does it appear to be a child that could belong to my nephew . . . and . . . the white woman?”
“The child appears to be nine or ten winters of age,” one of them told her back.
Susan Sweet Bird sucked in a breath of relief. “That is good,” she murmured. “I did not think my nephew would have brought home a white wife and child.”
“The child is not white from what I can tell from this distance,” one of the other women said, stretching her neck to get a better look as Dancing Cloud still approached on his horse. “It is a young man and he is as copper-skinned as you and I.”
“Truly?” Susan Sweet Bird said, then frowned. “Then who is the woman?”
There was a strained silence. Susan Sweet Bird stopped when she realized that the horses were near enough for her to wait for Dancing Cloud to dismount and come to her.
When strong arms suddenly enveloped her, she clung to Dancing Cloud and sobbed out his father’s name. “I-go-no-tli, is gone. My brother is gone.”
“Ii, yes, my e-do-da is gone from this earth,” Dancing Cloud said, caressing her back through her buckskin dress. “But never gone from the a-qua-do-no-do, heart. His spirit is here even now as my arms and voice give you comfort. In part, I am my e-do-da, father.”
Susan Sweet Bird leaned away from him and placed her hands on each side of his face. “You speak and act as if you knew of your father’s passing before I told you,” she said softly. “How is it that you knew? We sent no messenger to tell you. Saint Louis is far from our mountains. We knew you would return soon to us to hear of your father’s passing.”
“In a vision I saw my father in the spirit world,” Dancing Cloud began explaining, drawing a quiet gasp deeply from within Susan Sweet Bird’s soul.
Touched deeply by Dancing Cloud’s gentleness with his aunt, Lauralee placed a hand over her mouth and stifled a sob. Time and time again she realized just how lucky she was to be loved by this man!