After his departure, the shy girl looked cautiously around, before starting one of the two remaining stones towards the sweat house, to be added to its fellows in a rounded, cone-like heap within the pit. Carefully she turned the stone over and over, as though something she wished was of grave importance. As the rock reached the entrance without mishap, a low, musical laugh escaped the grandmother, who spoke to her in their native tongue. Mary looked abashed, dropped her pole and joined in the laughter.
Stemteemä disrobed and slowly stepped into the cold river for a bath before entering the lodge of the Spirit. When consulting Him, the body must be clean. There was a special favor to be asked today.
With this preliminary dip, the grandmother crawled into the mind and body-cleaning sanctuary. Mary closed the door-curtain and sat undecided whether to enter also, when a song pealed from within. Sung in the Okanogan, it vibrates—now high, now low—swelling a mournful dirge on the passing breeze. The listening girl understands!
It is the Song of the Mountain Herb!
It is the Song of the Love Herb.
It is the Chant of mystic creation!
Growing on the highest mountain peaks,
It embodies the soul of the Love Goddess!
It is the Song to soften the warrior’s heart
When sung by his dusky love at the sun’s setting.
It is the Spirit Chant! locked in the Red bosom
To burst anew on the morning trail of a future life.
It is Enchantment!—to the Shoyahpee unfathomable—
But Magic sacred to the comprehending Indian mind.
An Herb, or of this element likewise, the sweat house can understand the love-plea of either maiden or warrior; that the heart may become as the melting snow.
Mary sat gazing out over the stream in abstraction. A face of the “silvery hue” seemed to be forming in vision, when she was disturbed by the under-rustling of twigs. She saw her sister part the willows and come silently to the embered fire. Cogewea stood listening to the plaintive, dirge-like invocation of the venerable petitioner, from within the now steaming sweat house. It was a plea to the Great Spirit—through the Mountain Herb—to change the heart of the Indian maiden, then being lured to a shadowy trail of sorrow by the deceiving Shoyahpee. The voice quavered to a sobbing sigh and then rose in a wailing cadence of wilder supplication.
The girl of the range was visibly affected. Reaching for the same pole that Jim had used in moving his boulder so successfully, she drew the last remaining stone from the coals. Very slowly and carefully she rolled it towards the blanketed doorway of the mystic sanctuary. Whatever her emotions, her face was imperturbable. One more turn and the entrance would be reached, when, with an audible detonation, the boulder flew in many directions leaving a visible vapor-puff. The eyes of the sisters met. With no word from either, Cogewea turned towards the house, haunted by the ill-omened sign. A spirit voice the while seemed to whisper just at her side:
“Beware! beware!”
“Can it be true!” she murmured. “It can not be true this old Indian belief in the sweat house.”
The weird chant of the Stemteemä again pierced the girl’s ear as she made her fearful way to escape the agonizing plaint. She half regretted having tempted the fire-rock sign. Why had it burst at the very last? If it only had reached the goal! But surely! there could be nothing in such an age-old superstition? He could not be false!
Cogewea entered the living room where she found Densmore awaiting her. Julia remained in the kitchen that the lovers might have more privacy. She favored the Shoyahpee, despite the innumerable warnings of the grandmother. To these she had been indifferent, attributing the opposition to extreme old age prejudices, and an unswerving tribal custom of formerly housing the maidens and watching over their every movement until married off—always young—in conformity with ancient racial pride. It was considered a reflection on the parents, should a daughter remain single for any length of time after reaching maturity.
Stoically hiding her agitation, Cogewea returned Densmore’s greeting and the two were engaged in low, earnest conversation. It was briefly arranged that on the following evening they would jointly visit the Stemteemä, and endeavor to gain her consent to their marriage; since the girl would not agree to a clandestine union, so vehemently urged by her companion.
XXVII
The Forked Tongue of the Shoyahpee
Listen not to what he tells you;
Hiawatha
Lie not down upon the meadow.
The last rays of the sun had faded on the western horizon when the two supplicants drew near the firelit teepee. Cogewea raised a finger to her lips for silence. For a moment they stood before she stooped to the low curtained entrance. The aged occupant welcomed her grandchild in Indian silence, but when her gaze met the grey one of the hated Shoyahpee, her own kindled and a frown knit her brow. This did not escape Cogewea, who, pointing across the fire to the familiar buffalo robe, addressed Densmore:
“Signs are unfavorable. Be seated and have patience. It means a lot of humoring to accomplish our object.”
She smiled in an attempt at cheerfulness, despite the manifest displeasure of the Stemteemä. Her heart was too full of confiding love to note the latent gleam of contempt which lit the face of her companion. Seating herself by the side of the grandmother, Cogewea took the wrinkled hand in her own warm clasp and remained in silence for a time. When she spoke, it was in their native tongue, and there was a slight tremor in her voice.
“Many snows have left with the Stemteemä their wisdom, and her mind, like the mountain water is clear. Once young, she will understand, for
