The Missionary and the Half-Breed

"Heavenly Father, we thank You for Fredrick's life here on this earth, and we recognize that the body that lies before us is not Fredrick, but rather the house in which he lived. We acknowledge that Fredrick is rejoicing, even now, in Your very presence, enjoying the blessings of Heaven.

"Father, we commit his body to the earth, from which our bodies were originally created, and we rejoice in the fact that his spirit is even now with You, the Father of spirits. Amen."

When she finished, Running Elk asked Rebecca if that was what was said over all graves. She smiled.

"No, there is always more, but it is always said by a preacher. I thought Fredrick would understand since a woman can not be a preacher. Why do you ask?"

Running Elk looked at the ground.

"It is nearly the same as what a holy man says at the grave of a Lakota. Do you believe men were brought to life from the Earth like you said, and that when you die, you go to the Great Spirit?"

Rebecca nodded.

"Yes, I believe that."

Running Elk smiled then.

"You believe the same things the Lakota believe."

Rebecca considered this while Running Elk put the shovel back with his trade goods. How was it possible that savages believed the same thing as Christians? She had been taught that all Indians were bloodthirsty heathens who lived unknowingly in continual sin. Surely they did not have the same beliefs.

When Running Elk came back to where Rebecca stood, he asked her what she would do now. Rebecca had been thinking about that since Fredrick had been bitten by the snake, and she'd made the decision that morning.

"I came this far to teach the Lakota how to speak English and to help them. I wish to continue to do that even though Fredrick will not be there to save their souls. At least I will be doing God's work."

Running Elk smiled. This woman was strong in her convictions just as were Lakota women. If she had been a Lakota woman...but she was white and he knew from experience that white people did not like the Lakota and liked half-breeds like himself even less.

"I will take you to my people and I will explain what you want to do. I can not say they will accept you. What will you do if they do not?"

Rebecca lifted her head to look Running Elk in the eyes.

"Fredrick always said God would provide. God will find a way to make the Lakota accept me."

It was nearly noon by then, so Running Elk caught two more fish in the stream for their noon meal. They started out soon after with Rebecca carrying her things as well as all the things Fredrick had carried except his extra clothing. She left those in a canvas bag tied to the stake that was his only grave marker.

Running Elk looked back at Rebecca as they made their way, and he gained a new respect for the red-haired woman. She was struggling with the added weight of her dead husband's belongings but hadn't said anything. Her face was always the same, her mouth in a firm line as she put one foot in front of the other and kept walking. It was the same face he'd seen on most Lakota women when they were faced with an arduous task like cutting up an entire buffalo into strips they dried in the sun and smoked over a fire or the process of tanning buffalo hides.

He decided she was a much better person than her dead husband had been. His opinion of Fredrick had been that the man would never survive amongst the Lakota. The Lakota valued strength and wisdom in men. Only medicine men and holy men were exempted from the expectation that boys would become hunters or warriors or both. Fredrick was not strong and even a boy of five winters would have had the wisdom to watch the ground for rattlesnakes.

Running Elk did not believe Fredrick was brave at all. In the short time they had been together at Fort Tecumseh, Running Elk had heard the comments the other trappers had made about Rebecca. Had they made those same comments about a Lakota man's wife, they would have found themselves either nursing a sore body or possibly dead. Running Elk knew Fredrick had heard the same comments, yet he seemed to ignore them.

Fredrick claimed to be a holy man, but holy men did not treat their wives like he treated Rebecca. Fredrick seemed to think of Rebecca as just a woman he traveled with. Holy men did not put themselves and their wants before their wives. A woman like Rebecca deserved better than a husband like Fredrick.

As Rebecca trudged on, she watched the man on his horse ahead of her and to her left side. He didn't seem like the savage Indian she had heard about back in Louisville. Maybe that was because he was only half Indian, she couldn't be sure. What she was certain about is that she felt safer traveling with him.

The anger she'd felt when Running Elk seemed to not care about Fredrick had ebbed away when he helped her bury the man. He had been quiet and solemn when she read from her Bible, and had told her the Lakota had much the same beliefs about creation and death.

The other thing that impressed her was the way he now seemed to care about her feelings. He could have just told her that Fredrick was going to die, an outcome which she was sure Running Elk knew would be the case. Instead, he had tried to help her with Fredrick by finding plants he said would help. When Fredrick had finally died, Running Elk had seemed sad.

What would he do with her once they reached the Lakota? He had said he would explain to them her purpose but that they might not accept her. If they did not, what would he do? Would God make him help her? No, that wasn't right. God helps those who help themselves.

Rebecca was still mulling over the possible ways things could turn out when Running Elk stopped beside a small creek and began unsaddling the horses.

"We are about half a day from my people, so we will stop here for the night and go on tomorrow. I will see if I can find a rabbit for supper while you gather wood for a fire."

He smiled at her, then said, "Take a stick and tap the ground in front of you when you walk. Rattlesnakes will feel the tapping and go away. Look before you pick up anything off the ground too. Rattlesnakes hide behind things and they blend into the ground and are hard to see."

With that, Running Elk took a bow and arrows from his packsaddle and strode off through the trees.

The rabbit Running Elk shot and cooked over the fire was a good meal that quickly had Rebecca yawning. She took both blankets from the sack she had carried all day, spread one on the ground and covered herself with the other. She fell asleep wondering what the next day would bring.

The next day, they set off as on the other days, Running Elk riding and leading his pack horse, and Rebecca carrying everything she had in the world in one canvas bag. As on the other days, Running Elk didn't say anything to her, and for this she was happy. She was excited that she would finally meet the Lakota, but also fearful of what might happen. She didn't want to show him either emotion.

Those emotions intensified when Running Elk stopped at the top of a low rise and pointed to a creek not far away. Beside that creek were a dozen tipis, and she could see people walking around. This was what she had decided her fate would be. She hoped her decision was sound.

Their approach to the village created a stir of people. Children came running to see who it was. Women of all ages stopped what they were doing to watch as the two came into the village. The few men Rebecca saw were obviously older, and they too stopped what they were doing and shaded their eyes with one hand to see who was coming into their village.

When Running Elk stopped, he said something to one of the older men. The older man nodded and then smiled and said something back. Running Elk turned to Rebecca then.

"For now, the people will be happy to have you with them. For how long depends upon what you do."

Rebecca was still fearful.

"What do I have to do?"

Running Elk grinned because of what he was going to tell her.

"Last night, I was thinking there is only one way my people would welcome you to our village and only one way they would listen to what you have to say. I told them you are the wife I took at Fort Tecumseh. What you have to do is act like a Lakota wife.

Rebecca stood there with her mouth open for a few seconds before she could speak.

"I didn't marry you. Don't the Lakota have some sort of wedding ceremony you have to go through before you're considered married?"

Running Elk grinned.

"Yes, there is a wedding ceremony, but my people know white men sometimes take a woman to live with without being married to her. I told them that is our agreement -- that you will be my wife and I will be your husband.

"I told them you do not know the ways of Lakota women, but that you want to learn. The older women will teach you what you need to know. All you have to do is watch what they show you and then do it."

So, thought Rebecca, for the second time in my life, I'm wife to a man only because it is a way to do what I want to do. She was wondering just how much Running Elk would expect from her when they were alone when he chuckled.

"Your face tells me what you are thinking. I will not force you to do anything. The Lakota respect privacy so no one will know we do not share a bed at night. They will wonder when you are not with child, but things happen as they will, so they will not question me or you. They will also give us a place to live."

There was a woman in the village whose husband had died earlier that year. She had become the second wife of one of the village warriors and when Running Elk brought her four trade blankets, she said he and Rebecca could live in her tipi until Rebecca could make one of her own. Rebecca told Running Elk she thought this was odd.

"Don't the Lakota men own everything?"

Running Elk smiled.

"The Lakota are not like the whites. Lakota men own their horses and weapons, but nothing else. They hunt and protect the village. Lakota women own everything in the village and decide how things are done in the village. No Lakota man would ever question his wife's decision about where to put her tipi or what to put inside it."

That afternoon, two of the women demonstrated to Rebecca how to set up the tipi and then carried in what items she would need as Running Elk's wife. They constantly tittered as they worked, but Rebecca couldn't understand a word. That night, she asked Running Elk why they laughed so much. He smiled.

"They said they will treat you like a two-year old girl because you know nothing about being a Lakota wife. They also gave you a name. They will call you "paha sa". That means red hair. That is all they will call you until they give you a new name, so listen for it and come when they call to you."

The next weeks were a dizzying, but exciting experience for Rebecca. Several times a day, she would hear a woman calling "paha sa", look up, and see the woman waving at her. What would follow was a lesson in how to do something, and those lessons included teaching her the Lakota names for things and actions. By late September, Rebecca could make herself understood, though any conversation was filled with giggles and then corrections by the women of the village.

Every night after Rebecca had prepared an evening meal, Running Elk would ask her what she had learned that day. Rebecca would tell him she learned how to tan a deer hide or how to cook some food item or whatever else she had been taught. Running Elk would smile.

"The women of the village are impressed by how fast you learn. They say you know almost as much as a ten-year old girl now. What do you think of Lakota life now that you are living it?

Rebecca had thought about that and she had thought about it a lot. Back in Louisville, she'd been taught that all Indians were stupid, uncivilized savages. What she had seen was just the opposite. True, the Lakota were backward in some ways, but they were intelligent and efficient in how they did things. Each person in the village had skills the village depended upon. The owner of those skills willingly used them for the good of all the village.

She couldn't say the same for the white people in Louisville. A blacksmith in Louisville never made anything for free. A doctor in Louisville expected to be paid for prescribing medicine or for sewing up a bad cut.

She had always thought civilized people lived in permanent houses and owned the land those houses sat on. The Lakota lived in tipis that were easily moved from place to place and they did not own any land. To the Lakota, everything, including the land, was created by The Great Spirit, Wankan Tanka. All things created by Wankan Tanka were in reality, the same Wankan Tanka, and therefore could not be owned. The Lakota had areas they claimed as their hunting and living spaces and they defended them against raiding tribes, but they did not own them.

Rebecca's brow tightened as she answered Running Elk.

"I have learned that Lakota women are the same as white women in what matters to them and how they think. Magaskawee is much like my mother. The other women sometimes feel like my aunts and the young girls feel like my cousins.

"I was taught that Indian women worked very hard because Indian men made them work hard. What I have seen is that Lakota women do work hard, but they are happy doing it because that work makes a home for their husband and family. That is the same reason white women do what they do."

Rebecca didn't tell him the other thing she had thought about. As the weeks passed and Running Elk explained more about Lakota beliefs, she began to understand more about their religion. As she listened to the stories told by the holy man of the village, she was stunned by the parallels to Biblical stories.

According to the Lakota, there was an Earth before this one where the people were bad. Wankan Tanka caused a flood that drowned everyone, then sent animals to bring mud up from the bottom of the water. Turtle brought up the mud and Wankan Tanka made a new Earth, then put all the animals on the dry land. The last thing Wankan Tanka did was to make men and women. That story was very close to the Creation described in the Bible.

Rebecca had been taught from birth to be generous toward other people, to love all people, and to help those who need help. Those were things she had intended to teach the Lakota. What she had found is that the Lakota routinely gave away their possessions to others who needed them, and that every Lakota belonged to an extended family. That extended family would care for a woman and her children should a hunter not return from a hunt or a warrior not return from a battle. That extended family cared for the elderly when they were too old to hunt or take care of a household.

Children were taught from birth to respect their elders and those with skills they did not have. Rebecca had been taught the same things at home and at church.

When Rebecca thought about that, she wondered what she and Fredrick could have taught the Lakota to do that they weren't already doing. She had decided she couldn't until she had a thorough understanding of Lakota ways and was working hard to learn to do things like a good Lakota woman.

She couldn't admit to herself the other reason she was trying to learn how to be a Lakota wife. That reason lay on his own sleeping mat every night while she lay on hers.

Running Elk had at first been a means to the end of reaching the Lakota. When Fredrick died, Running Elk had become the only human in this part of the world she thought she could trust. Now, after living with him for the summer, she began to see a different man.

When he brought her to the Lakota village, he had introduced her as his wife because he said that was the only way the village would accept her. Rebecca was a little shocked to find out she was married again, but more shocked that the man who didn't seem to care had cared enough to give her a way to live in the village.

She had assumed that if she was Running Elk's wife, he would expect her to have sex with him, but he didn't. She had learned that sex was another thing the women of the village controlled, but he could have easily forced her and no one would have been the wiser.

Running Elk asked her every day what she had learned, and usually told her what the other women of the village said about her. Rebecca didn't think he would do that if he didn't care about her.

Rebecca also found that she was beginning to care about Running Elk too. She worried when he went hunting that he might not return. That worry was not about what would happen to her. It was that she had fallen easily into the role of his wife and knew she would miss him and miss taking care of him.

It was late September when Running Elk came from talking with the other men in the tipi of the village leader. Rebecca had prepared their evening meal, and as usual, Running Elk didn't talk while he was eating. When they both finished, he smiled.

"Mankah, the holy man, had a dream yesterday where he saw the buffalo herd. That means we will begin the hunt soon. Already scouts are on their way to find the herd. I have been asked to be the hunt leader.

"What this means is when the scouts have found the herd, the village will move close to that place and wait for the hunt to be over. The men will ride ahead. The women of the village will take care of the move. You will have to pack everything on a travois and use my packhorse to take it to the new place. I have spoken to two of the older women and they will help you. In return, I have promised them meat from the hunt.

"Once the hunt is over, your work will begin along with all the men and women of the village. All the buffalo will be skinned and cut up and we will have a feast, but that is only the beginning. The women will slice the buffalo into strips for drying, and when it is dry, they will make wasna. That is why you gathered chokecherries and dried them when we first got here. The hides must also be tanned. All the women will do this together, so you will not have to do ours alone.

"I have faith that you will do as you have before and do what is required of you. The other women of the village believe that too."

Three days later, one of the scouts appeared on the horizon at mid-morning and dropped the wolf skin he wore to the ground -- the signal the herd had been found. In minutes, every man in the village not too old to hunt and every boy ten years old or older was mounted and riding toward the scout. Each carried two bows and many, many arrows sheathed in leather quivers.

As soon as they left, two older women walked up to Rebecca and smiled. Rebecca understood the Lakota words for tipi and move, and began taking everything out of the tipi while the older women began pulling the stakes that held the tipi to the ground. In two hours, everything Rebecca and Running Elk owned was wrapped in the tipi and two of the poles lashed into a travois. The other poles and their belongings were then lashed to the travois.

Rebecca caught Running Elk's packhorse and fixed the travois harness to the horse as she'd been taught. She then went from tipi to tipi to see if anyone needed help. By the time the sun was overhead, the women of the camp, each leading a horse with a travois, started following the trail left by the men of the camp. Most of the travois carried children and older men and women too weak to keep up with the pace.

Two days later, the village women topped a low rise in the ground and Rebecca caught her breath at the site. Buffalo were spread out on the grassland for as far as she could see. They lumbered along, grazing as they went, and once in a while she heard the bellow of a bull. Half-grown calves scampered beside their shaggy mothers.

She saw the men and boys of the village on their horses, bent over and lying against the horse's neck. Running Elk had explained that buffalo do not have good eyesight and if a hunter laid flat on his horse, the buffalo would think the horses were just other buffalo.