'There will be none to dance with you,' I said, 'none to share the loneliness, the pain.'
'I will dance alone,' said Cuwignaka.
'Today,' I said, 'the Kaiila do not dance.'
'One will,' said Cuwignaka.
'The lodge of the dance has been rent,' I said. 'The pole itself had been defaced and profaned, its trappings stripped away. Your body would not be properly painted. You would not have bursh at your waist and ankles. You could not dare to blow upon the Herlit-bone whistle.'
'Do you really think such things are necessary?' asked Cuwignaka, smiling.
'I do not know,' I said.
'Little is acutally needed for the truth of the dance,' said Cuwignkaka. 'I will have the pole, myself and my manhood. It will be enough.'
'It takes some two or three days to free themselves from the pole,' I said.
'I do not have that much time,' said Cuwignaka. 'I will free myself by morning.'
'You will kill yourself,' I said.
'I do not think that is likely,' said Cuwignaka.
'Do not dance,' I said.
'At one time or another in his life,' said Cuwignaka, 'every man, in one way or another, must dance. Otherwise he is not a man.'
'There are many ways to dance,' I said.
'I will dance in the way of my people, the Kaiila,' said Cuwignaka.
'You do not even believe in the medicine world,' I said.
'I believe in the dance,' he said.
I was silent.
'I may need some help,' said Cuwignaka, 'in attaching the ropes, in placing the skewers in my flesh. Will you help me?'
'Yes,' I said.
'Then, when I am finished with the dance,' said Cuwignaka, 'and have rested a little, we will be on our way. We will rig a travois for Hci. We will leave the camp before dawn. I know a small arroyo nearby. We will hide ther and then, perhaps tomorrow evening, take our leave.'
'Where will we go?' I asked.
'Hci needs care,' said Cuwignaka.
'I understand,' I said. 'Look,' I said, gesturing to the broad, firelit spaces below us.
'The Yellow Knives prepare to dance,' said Cuwignaka.
We saw Yellow-Knife warriors setting up small poles, some five to six feet in height, attaching grisly trophies to the tops of the poles.
'They will celebrate their victory,' said Cuwignaka. 'Those are trophy poles. They will dance trophy dances.'
'I do not care to watch,' I said.
'Let them dance,' said Cuwignaka. 'Another, in another place, will also dance.'
'You are determined?' I asked.
'Yes,' said Cuwignaka.
'You will dance?' I asked.
'Yes,' said Cuwignaka. 'I will dance.'
Chapter 33
MIRA
We heard the rattling and beating, the clanging, from a distance.
Fleer circled the sky.
We then, the grass to our waist, dragging the travois on which Hci lay, and other articles, surmounted a rise, surveying the maize fields below us, the buildings and palasade of the compound beyond them.
The fact that we did not have kaiila had, it seemed, worked to our advantage. Several times in the past few days we had seen solitary Kinyanpi scouts in the sky. Each time we had hidden in the deep grass.
We then, graeful for the slope, drew the travois downward, toward the valley below.
At the edge of the field a crude wooden platform had been erected, some seven or eight feet high, its surface reached by a ladder. Above the platform, on poles, a cloth canopy had been stretched. It was being moved by the wind. Beneath the canopy, one with a string of pans and cups tied together, the other with a wooden spoon and a flat, metal pan, were two Waniyanpi women. One was shouting and gesticultating, shaking the pans and cups; the other was shouting and pounding on the flat, metal pan with the wooden spoon.
The fleer, then, the members of a common flock, as the fleer usually flies, departed. They would probably return at a later time.
One of the women on the platform seized the arm of the other and pointed in our direction. She who had first seen us then put down her string of mans and cups and, hastily, descended from the platform. She began to run toward the lapisade in the distance. The other woman, shading her ees, watched us approach. As we came closer she seemed suddenly to react. She put down her pan and spoon and, like the other, hastily descended from the platform. She, however, unlike the other, began to run towards us.
'Go away,' she cried to us, coming towards us, through the grass. 'There is danger here!'
I scanned the skies. 'Let us get out of the open,' I said. 'Let us go to the maize, near the platform.'
'There is danger here,' she said, hurrying then along beside us.
'There is danger here, what?' I asked.
'There is danger here-Masters,' she said.
In a few moments we had reached the edge of the maize field, near the platform.
'You may kneel,' I told her.
'I may kneel?' she asked.
'Yes,' I said.
'Yes, Master,' she said, graefully, and knelt before us.
'What is the danger here?' asked Cuwignaka. 'Are there Kinyanpi about, Yellow Knives, soldiers?'
'There are no soldiers nor Yellow Knives,' she said. 'Kinyanpi occasionally fly past, but fewer now than before. I think they are bringing their serches to a close.'
'What, then, is the danger?' asked Cuwignaka.
'You will not be welcome here,' she said. 'They are turning everyone away.'
'This man is wounded, grievously,' I said, indicating Hci.
'They are turning everyone away,' she said, 'even the wounded. They have turned away even women and children.'
'This man needs help,' I said.
'It does not matter,' she said. 'I am sorry.'
'He may die,' I said.
'I am sorry,' she said.
'Is this not Garden Eleven, a Waniyanpi compound owned by the Kaiila,' demanded Cuwignaka.
'Now we are owned by Yellow Knives,' she said. 'Soldiers have told us.'
'You are still owned by the Kaiila,' said Cuwignaka, angrily. 'You will provide us with food and shelter.'
'We are afraid,' she said. 'We do not know who owns us.'
'Someone is coming,' I said.
Approaching, along the side of the maize field, coming from the direction of the palisade and buildings in the distance was a group of Waniyanpi. In their lead was the woman I had met, briefly, at the Kaiila camp, Radish. Near her was the woman who had run to fetch them, she who had earlier had the pans and cups on the platform. Behind Radish came Pumpkin, large and ungainly, as usual, in the drab, rude dress that was the uniform of the
