20 Western Novels You Should Read

Chapter 2

Chapter 1

GERONIMO GOES OUTTHE silver light of Klego-na-ay, the full moon, shone down from

out the star-lit heavens of an Arizona night upon the camp of the

Be-don-ko-he Apaches; shone upon sleek copper shoulders; shone upon

high cheek bones; softened the cruel lines of swart, savage

faces—faces as inscrutable as is the face of Klego-na-ay

herself.

Shone the silver moonlight upon Nan-ta-do-tash, the izze- nantan

of his people, as he led them in the dance, as he prayed for rain

to save their parched crops. As he danced, Nan-ta-do-tash twirled

his. tzi-ditinidi about his head, twirled it rapidly from front to

rear, producing the sound of a gust of rain-laden wind; and the

warriors and the women, dancing with Nan-ta-do-tash, listened to

the tzi- ditinidi, saw the medicine man cast hoddentin to the four

winds, and knew that these things would compel the wind and the

rain to come to the aid of their crops.

A little to one side, watching the dancers, sat Shoz- Dijiji,

the Black Bear, with Gian-nah-tah, friend of boyhood days,

companion of the war trail and the raid. Little more than a youth

was Shoz-Dijiji, yet already a war chief of the Be-don-ko-he,

proven in many battles with the soldiers of the pindah-lickoyee;

terror of many a scattered hacienda of Sonora and Chihuahua—the

dread Apache Devil. The old men beat upon the es-a-da-ded, the

primitive drum of buckskin stretched across a hoop; and to their

cadence Nan-ta-do-tash led the dancers, his n***d body painted a

greenish brown with a yellow snake upon each arm; upon his breast,

in yellow, a bear; and upon his back the zig-zag lines of

lightning.

His sacred izze-kloth, passing across his right shoulder, fell

over his left hip. Of a potency almost equal to this four strand

medicine cord of twisted antelope skin was the buckskin medicine

hat of Nan-ta-do-tash by meanS of which he was able to peer into

the future, to foresee the approach of an enemy, cure the sick, or

tell who had stolen ponies from other people.

The downy feathers and black-tipped plumes of the eagle added to

the eflicacy and decoration of this potent head- dress, the value

of which was further enhanced by pieces of abalone shell, by

duklij, and a snake's rattle which surmounted the apex, while in

brownish yellow and dirty blue there were depicted upon the body of

the hat clouds, a rainbow, hail, the morning star, the God of Wind,

with his lungs, the black Kan, and the great suns.

"You do not dance with the warriors and the women, Shoz-

Dijiji," said Gian-nah-tah. "Why is it?"

"Why should I?" demanded the Black Bear. "Usen has forsaken the

Shis-Inday. No longer does He hear the prayers of His people. He

has gone over to the side of the pindah- lickoyee, who have more

warriors and better weapons.

"Many times went Shoz-Dijiji to the high places and made big

medicine and prayed to Usen; but He let Juh steal my little

Ish-kay-nay, and He let the bullet of the pindah- lickoyee slay

her. Why should I dance to the Kans if they are blind and

deaf?"

"But did not Usen help you to find Juh and slay him?" urged

Gian-nah-tah.

"Usen!" The tone of the Black Bear was contemptuous. "No one

helped Shoz-Dijiji find Juh. No one helped Shoz-Dijiji slay him.

Alone he found Juh—alone, with his own hands, he killed him. It was

Shoz-Dijiji, not Usen, who avenged Ish- kay-nay!"

"But Usen healed the wound of your sorrow," persisted Gian-

nah-tah. "He placed in your heart a new love to take the place of

the old that was become but a sad memory."

"If Usen did that it was but to add to the sorrows of Shoz-

Dijiji," said the Black Bear. "I have not told you, Gian-

nah-tah."

"You have not spoken of the white girl since you took her from

our camp to her home after you had saved her from Tats-ah-das-ay-go

and the other Chi-e-a-hen,!" replied Gian-nah-tah; "but while she

was with us I saw the look in your eyes, Shoz-Dijiji, and it told

me what your lips did not tell me."

"Then my eyes must have known what my heart did not know," said

Shoz-Dijiji. "It would have been better had my heart not learned,

but it did.

"Long time have we been friends, Gian-nah-tah. Our tsochs,

swinging from the branches of the trees, swayed to the same

breezes, or, bound to the backs of our mothers, we followed the

same trails across deserts and mountains; together we learned to

use the bow and the arrow and the lance; and together we went upon

the war trail the first time. To me you are as a brother. You will

not laugh at me, Gian-nah- tah; and so I shall tell you what

happened that time that I took the white-eyed girl, Wichita, back

to the hogan of her father that you may know why I am unhappy and

why I know that Usen no longer cares what becomes of me."

"Gian-nah-tah does not laugh at the sorrow of his best friend,"

said the other.

"It was not in my heart to love the white-eyed girl," continued

the Black Bear. "To Shoz-Dijiji she was as a sister. She was kind

to me. When the soldiers of the pindah-lickoyee were all about, she

brought me food and water and gave me a horse to carry me back to

my people.I knew that she did that because I had once saved her

from a white-eyed man who would have harmed her. No thought of love

was in my mind. How could it have been? How could I think that

Shoz-Dijiji, an Apache, a war chief of the Be- don-ko-he, could

love a girl of the pindah-lickoyee!

"But Usen deserted me. He let me look upon the face of the

white-eyed girl for many days, and every day He made her more

beautiful in my eyes. I tried not to think of love. I put it from

my mind. I turned my thoughts to other things, but I could not keep

my eyes from the face of the pindah- lickoyee girl.

"At last we came close to the hogan of her father; and there I

stopped and told her to go on, but she wanted me to come with her

that her father might thank me. I would not go. I dared not go. I,

The Apache Devil, was afraid of this white-eyed daughter of the

pindah-lickoyee!

"She came close to me and urged me. She laid her two hands upon

my breast. The touch of those soft, white hands, Gian- nah-tah, was

more powerful than the will of Shoz-Dijiji; beneath it crumbled all

the pride and hate that are of the heritage of the Apaches. A flame

burst forth within me—the signal fire of love.

"I seized her and pressed her close; I put my mouth upon her

mouth. And then she struck at me and tried to push me away, and I

saw fear in her eyes; and something more terrible than

fear—loathing—as though I were unclean.

"Then I let her go; and I came away, but I left my heart and

happiness behind. Shoz-Dijiji has left to him only his pride and

his hate—his hate of the pindah-lickoyee."

"If you hate the white-eyed girl now, it is well," said

Gian-nah.tah. "The pindah-lickoyee are low born and fools. They are

not fit for an Apache!"

"I do not hate the white-eyed girl, Wichita," said Shoz- Dijiji,

sadly. "If I did I should not be unhappy. I love her."

Gian-nah-tah shook his head. "There are many pretty girls of the

Shis-Inday," he said presently, "who look with bright eyes upon

Shoz-Dijiji."

"I do not love them," replied the Black Bear. "Let us talk no

more of these things. Gian-nah-tah is my friend. I have spoken. Let

us go and listen to the talk of Geronimo and the other old

warriors."

"That is better talk for men," agreed Gian-nah-tah.

Together they strolled over and joined the group of warriors

that surrounded the old war chief of the Apaches. White Horse,

Geronimo's brother, was speaking.

"There is much talk," he said, "among the Indians at San Carlos

that the chiefs of the white-eyed soldiers are going to put

Geronimo and many other of our leaders in prison."

"They put me in prison once before and kept me there for four

months," said Geronimo. "They never told me why they kept me there

or why they let me out."

"They put you in prison to kill you as they did Mangas

Colorado," said Na-tanh; "but their hearts turned to water, so that

they were afraid."

"They will never get Geronimo in prison again," said the old war

chief. "I am getting old; and I should like to have peace, but

rather would I take the war trail tor the rest of my life than be

again chained in the prison of the pindah-lickoyee.

"We do not want to fight any more. We came in as Nan-tan-

des-la-par-en ("Captain-with-the-brown-clothes"—Major- General

George Crook, U. S. A.)asked us to. We planted crops, but the rain

will not come. Usen is angry with us; and The Great White Chief

cannot feed us because his Agent steals the beef that is meant for

us, and lets us starve. He will not let us hunt for food if we live

at San Carlos."

"Who is this white-eyed thief that he may say where an Apache

warrior may make his kunh-gan-hay or where he shall hunt?" demanded

Shoz-Dijiji. "The Black Bear makes his camp where he will, hunts

where he will!"

"Those are the big words of a young man, my son," said Geronimo.

"It is fine to make big talk; but when we would do these things the

soldiers come and kill us; every white- eyed man who meets our

hunters upon the trails shoots at them. To them we are as coyotes.

Not content with stealing the land that Usen gave to our

fore-fathers, not content with slaughtering the game that Usen put

here to feed us, they lie to us, they cheat us, they hunt us down

like wild beasts."

"And yet you, Geronimo, War Chief of the Apaches, hesitate to

take the war trail against them!" Shoz-Dijiji reproached him. 'It

is not because you are afraid. No man may say that Geronimo is

afraid. Then why is it?"

"The son of Geronimo speaks true words," replied the old chief.

"Go-yat-thlay (Geronimo), the son of Tah-clish-un, is not afraid to

take the war trail against the pindah- lickoyee even though he

knows that it is hopeless to fight against their soldiers, who are

as many as the needles upon the cedars, because Go-yat-thlay is not

afraid to die; but he does not like to see the warriors and the

women and the children slain needlessly, and so he waits and

hopes—hopes that the pindah-lickoyee will some day keep the words

of the treaties they have made with the Shis-Inday—the treaties

that they have always been the first to break.

"If that day should come, the Shis-Inday could live in peace

with the pindah-lickoyee; our women and children would have food to

eat; we should have land to till and land to hunt upon; we might

live as brothers with the white-eyed men, nor everagain go upon the

war trail."

"I do not wish to live with the white-eyed men in peace or

otherwise," cried the Black Bear. "I am an Apache! I was born to

the war trail. From my mother's breasts I drew the strong milk that

makes warriors. You, my father, taught me to string a bow, to hurl

a lance; from your lips my childish ears heard the proud deeds of

my ancestors, the great warriors from whose loins I sprung; you

taught me to hate the pindah-lickoyee, you saw me take my first

scalp, you have seen me kill many of the warriors of the enemy, and

always you approved and were proud. How then may I believe that the

words you have just spoken are true words from your heart?"

"Youth speaks from the heart, Shoz-Dijiji, as you speak and as I

spoke to you when you were a child; but old age speaks from the

head.My heart would go upon the war trail, my son; my heart would

kill the white-eyed men wherever it found them, but my head tells

me to suffer and be sad a little longer in the hope of peace and

justice for my people."

For a time after Geronimo had spoken there was silence, broken

only by the beating of the es-a-da-ded and the mumbling of the

medicine man, as he led the dancers. Presently a figure stepped

into the outer rim of the circle of firelight from the darkness

beyond and halted. He gave the sign and spoke the words of peace,

and at the command of Geronimo approached the group of squatting

braves.