Tales of Trail and Town. Bret Harte
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horse in the dust of the prairie—far beyond the seas! It was only when he saw her cheek flush and pale, when he saw her staring at him with helpless, frightened, but fascinated eyes—the eyes of the fluttering bird under the spell of the rattlesnake—that he drew his breath and turned bewildered away. “And do you know, dear,” she said with naive simplicity to her sister that evening, “that although he was an American, and everybody says that they don't care at all for those poor Indians, he was so magnanimous in his indignation that I fancied he looked like one of Cooper's heroes himself rather than an Atherly. It was such a stupid thing for me to show him that tomb of Major Atherly, you know, who fought the Americans—didn't he?—or was it later?—but I quite forgot he was an American.” And with this belief in her mind, and in the high expiation of a noble nature, she forbore her characteristic raillery, and followed him meekly, manacled in spirit like the allegorical figure, to the church porch, where they separated, to meet on the morrow. But that morrow never came.
For late in the afternoon a cable message reached him from California asking him to return to accept a nomination to Congress from his own district. It determined his resolution, which for a moment at the church porch had wavered under the bright eyes of Lady Elfrida. He telegraphed his acceptance, hurriedly took leave of his honestly lamenting kinsman, followed his dispatch to London, and in a few days was on the Atlantic.
How he was received in California, how he found his sister married to the blond lawyer, how he recovered his popularity and won his election, are details that do not belong to this chronicle of his quest. And that quest seems to have terminated forever with his appearance at Washington to take his seat as Congressman.
It was the night of a levee at the White House. The East Room was crowded with smartly dressed men and women of the capital, quaintly simple legislators from remote States in bygone fashions, officers in uniform, and the diplomatic circle blazing with orders. The invoker of this brilliant assembly stood in simple evening dress near the door—unattended and hedged by no formality. He shook the hand of the new Congressman heartily, congratulated him by name, and turned smilingly to the next comer. Presently there was a slight stir at one of the opposite doors, the crowd fell back, and five figures stalked majestically into the centre of the room. They were the leading chiefs of an Indian reservation coming to pay their respects to their “Great Father,” the President. Their costumes were a mingling of the picturesque with the grotesque; of tawdriness with magnificence; of artificial tinsel and glitter with the regal spoils of the chase; of childlike vanity with barbaric pride. Yet before these the glittering orders and ribbons of the diplomats became dull and meaningless, the uniforms of the officers mere servile livery. Their painted, immobile faces and plumed heads towered with grave dignity above the meaner crowd; their inscrutable eyes returned no response to the timid glances directed towards them. They stood by themselves, alone and impassive—yet their presence filled the room with the sense of kings. The unostentatious, simple republican court suddenly seemed to have become royal. Even the interpreter who stood between their remote dignity and the nearer civilized world acquired the status of a court chamberlain.
When their “Great Father,” apparently the less important personage, had smilingly received them, a political colleague approached Peter and took his arm. “Gray Eagle would like to speak with you. Come on! Here's your chance! You may be put on the Committee on Indian Relations, and pick up a few facts. Remember we want a firm policy; no more palaver about the 'Great Father' and no more blankets and guns! You know what we used to say out West, 'The only “Good Indian” is a dead one.' So wade in, and hear what the old plug hat has to say.”
Peter permitted himself to be led to the group. Even at that moment he remembered the figure of the Indian on the tomb at Ashley Grange, and felt a slight flash of satisfaction over the superior height and bearing of Gray Eagle.
“How!” said Gray Eagle. “How!” said the other four chiefs. “How!” repeated Peter instinctively. At a gesture from Gray Eagle the interpreter said: “Let your friend stand back; Gray Eagle has nothing to say to him. He wishes to speak only with you.”
Peter's friend reluctantly withdrew, but threw a cautioning glance towards him. “Ugh!” said Gray Eagle. “Ugh!” said the other chiefs. A few guttural words followed to the interpreter, who turned, and facing Peter with the monotonous impassiveness which he had caught from the chiefs, said: “He says he knew your father. He was a great chief—with many horses and many squaws. He is dead.”
“My father was an Englishman—Philip Atherly!” said Peter, with an odd nervousness creeping over him.
The interpreter repeated the words to Grey Eagle, who, after a guttural “Ugh!” answered in his own tongue.
“He says,” continued the interpreter with a slight shrug, yet relapsing into his former impassiveness, “that your father was a great chief, and your mother a pale face, or white woman. She was captured with an Englishman, but she became the wife of the chief while in captivity. She was only released before the birth of her children, but a year or two afterwards she brought them as infants to see their father—the Great Chief—and to get the mark of their tribe. He says you and your sister are each marked on the left arm.”
Then Gray Eagle opened his mouth and uttered his first English sentence. “His father, big Injin, take common white squaw! Papoose no good—too much white squaw mother, not enough big Injin father! Look! He big man, but no can bear pain! Ugh!”
The interpreter turned in time to catch Peter. He had fainted.
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