IT WAS WINDY AND CLOUDY. THEY DROVE THROUGH THE small town of Guernsey, and late in the afternoon they stopped along the highway. Crossing the fence, Jimmy followed his grandpa to the top of a hill. They sat down among some bristly green soap plants. Grandpa Nyles pointed at the river in the valley below them. "That is called the North Platte River," he said. "Our people called it the Shell River. Now, if you look carefully, you can see some deep ruts just this side of the river."
"Yeah," said Jimmy. "I see them. Looks like some big trucks got stuck in the mud."
Grandpa Nyles chuckled. "Well, guess what? Those ruts, those tracks, are over a hundred and fifty years old."
Jimmy was astonished. "For reals?"
"For reals."
"Wow! Who made them?"
"Wagons. Thousands of them."
Jimmy let out a whistle. "Thousands?"
"Ever heard of the Oregon Trail?"
"Yeah, we studied it in school."
"Before it was called the Oregon Trail," Grandpa Nyles explained, "it was known by the Lakota and other tribes as the Shell River Road. And before that, it was a trail used by animals, like buffalo. It's an old, old trail."
He paused for a moment. "So do you know why we're here?"
"Crazy Horse was here?"
"You got it. He was still Light Hair when he first saw wagons on this trail. Hundreds … thousands of them."
Jimmy stared at the deep ruts. He knew about trails. Lots of animals or people or cars traveling made trails. They wore out the grass and made marks on the ground. How many wagons made those deep marks? he wondered. He could not imagine what hundreds and thousands of wagons looked like.
"Imagine," said Grandpa Nyles, "if one day you suddenly saw hundreds of flying saucers in the sky. What would you think? How would you feel?"
"I'd be scared," admitted Jimmy. "And … and I'd wonder who was in them. The flying saucers, I mean."
Grandpa Nyles smiled. "You know, I'd bet that's exactly what Light Hair thought, back in about, oh, 1852."
The way it was—summer 1852
A slow, lazy breeze floated through the grasses. It was a hot summer afternoon. From the top of a hill, young Light Hair looked to the west. The front of the line of covered wagons went out of sight over a far hill. He looked to the east. Wagons at the back of the line were just coming over the horizon.
A few riders were on either side of the wagons. Some people walked, but no one seemed to be in a hurry.
Light Hair was careful to stay down behind the grasses. Beside him was Little Hawk, his uncle, who was just as astonished at the sight of the endless line of wagons. One after another, pulled by oxen. Since warriors always carried their weapons, Uncle Little Hawk had his black powder percussion rifle with him. His bow and arrows were tied on his horse.
"Are they people?" Light Hair whispered.
"I think so," Uncle Little Hawk replied. "But not like us. Their skin is pale, and many of the men have beards. Their clothing is different."
"Where are they going?" the boy wondered.
"Somewhere to the west. They have been doing this for four or five summers now. But I don't remember seeing this many."
Light Hair and his uncle watched in silence. They had seen wagons before. The Long Knives at Fort Laramie used them. Wagons hauled soldiers and other people. They also carried food, flat wood, guns and powder, tools, clothing, and even water. All the things the white people needed and used. But never had the Lakota seen so many at once. Wagons were end to end, from one horizon to the other. And even more people with them.
Light Hair did not know what to think. In a way, he was scared, and he wondered if his uncle was or if his father, Crazy Horse, was.
"As long as they keep going," Little Hawk said, "that will be good. We don't want those people staying here, on our lands. They leave their trash behind and scare away the buffalo. The wagon wheels leave marks—they scar the land."
Jimmy looked at the empty land along the river. Some cattle grazed on the other side. A few antelope could be seen.
"How many wagons went through here?" he asked his grandpa.
"Hard to know, but history says that three hundred and fifty thousand people traveled on the Oregon Trail."
Jimmy was astonished. "Three hundred and fifty thousand? Wow! That's … that's a lot of counting."
"For sure. They started from the state of Missouri, went by here, and ended up in California or Oregon. They did that for twenty years."
"That's older than me," Jimmy declared. "What happened to them all?"
"Well, that's the problem," Grandpa Nyles said with a sigh. "Some of them decided to stay. Later, more came to stay. They farmed and raised cattle and sheep. They forced our people off their own lands."
"Did our people try to stop them?"
"Yes, they did. There were battles. When Light Hair became Crazy Horse, he fought in many of them."
Fort Laramie
Fort Laramie National Historic Site was a group of old buildings. They stood around a yard that seemed very large to Jimmy. People were walking around and looking into the buildings.
Grandpa Nyles drove into the parking lot and stopped. "Remember the ruts back there, along the river?"
"Yeah," Jimmy replied.
"Well, that trail came to this place, and then went on farther to the west. This place is Fort Laramie. It's been here a long time."
Jimmy looked around. There was a wagon beside one of the buildings. Near another wagon stood a group of men in blue uniforms.
"Are those Long Knives?" Jimmy wanted to know.
"In a way," Grandpa Nyles answered. "They are reenactors. They come here and play the part of soldiers. They talk to the tourists."
"Where are the Indians?" Jimmy asked.
"Good question. Come on, let's look around."
"Okay. So Crazy Horse was here?"
"Yeah, he sure was. He was here, as Light Hair and as Crazy Horse."
The way it was—September 1851
Light Hair could not believe the number of people. He could stand in one place, turn in a circle, and there were people, lodges, and horses everywhere he looked. All were camped along Horse Creek, a day's ride east of Fort Laramie, the Long Knives' outpost.
"Where did they come from?" he asked They Are Afraid of Her, one of his mothers.
"All over," she replied as she sliced wild turnips into an iron kettle. "From the south, west, north, and east."
"Why are we here?" he asked.
"Because the white peace talkers invited all of them and us to come," she replied.
"I heard some people talking, but I couldn't understand them," Light Hair told her.
"Yes. Many different people means different languages," she said. "There are our friends the Arapaho and the Cheyenne. Our enemies, too, the Crow. Then the Assiniboine, Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara. Our relatives the Dakota and the Nakota are here, too."
"Why?"
They Are Afraid of Her chuckled. "Because of the white people in the wagons on the Shell River Road. They're afraid we might attack them. So the peace talkers want us to promise to leave them alone."
"Then maybe they should just stay away," said Light Hair.
His mother laughed. "That's what most of the people here think. Now, go find your brother and the two of you stay close to our lodge. I don't want you wandering away. It's easy to get lost."
Light Hair found his little brother, Whirlwind. He was called that because he was always on the move, first going in one direction, then another. "Come here," he said to the younger boy. "Mother wants us to stay close."
"Let's go look at those horses!" begged Whirlwind. "See, over there? They have little black spots all over them."
"All right—but just for a little while," Light Hair said, giving in.
They hurried through the groups of people while avoiding the barking dogs. Light Hair took his little brother by the hand. He had never seen so many people in one place. Men stood in groups together talking. Older boys rode by on horses. Women called out for their children. Others tended to kettles hanging over cooking fires. Smaller children played by the lodges. And everywhere he looked, it seemed there were more horses than people.
He suddenly felt very small.
"That was the Council on Horse Creek," said Grandpa Nyles. "East of here. History calls it the Fort Laramie Treaty Council of 1851. The people came because they were curious about what the white peace talkers wanted. They were told all the Indians were not to bother the people in the wagons on the Oregon Trail. Also because the whites offered gifts. Being asked not to bother those people seemed kind of silly, because it was the wagon people who always started the trouble. Some of them would shoot at Indians. The tribes signed the treaty. But after Light Hair became Crazy Horse, he was here again. Other than that, he stayed away. He didn't like this place."
"Well, why did he come back?" Jimmy wondered.
"Horses," replied Grandpa Nyles. "He led a raid. Crazy Horse and several other Lakota warriors swept through here like a sudden wind. They took the Long Knives' horses. The Long Knives chased them, but they couldn't catch them."
Grandpa Nyles turned and pointed west, beyond a two-story building. "They came from that direction." Then he pointed toward the other side of the large open space. "Most of the Long Knives' horses were picketed there. Pawnee scout horses, too."
"Pawnee?" Jimmy asked.
"The Long Knives used them a lot as scouts, against other Indians."
"Did they take all the horses from here?"
"No, I don't think so. A lot of them, though."
Jimmy looked around, imagining Lakota warriors on horseback. He could see them racing across the open area. He could hear the drumlike pounding of hooves.
"Why did they do that?" he asked his grandfather.
Grandpa Nyles smiled. "Well, because they could. And because Crazy Horse wanted to annoy the Long Knives."
Jimmy smiled broadly. "I think he did that."
Grandpa Nyles was smiling as well. "Yeah, he did, for sure. But there was an incident that happened near here, when he was still Light Hair—something that caused the Long Knives to attack Little Thunder's village."
"You mean when Light Hair helped Yellow Woman? What happened?"
Grandpa Nyles took on his storytelling face again. "Yeah, that was it. Let me tell you what happened."
The way it was—1854
Light Hair and his friend Slow were among the first to see the soldiers coming. The Long Knives were riding in wagons, sitting shoulder to shoulder. Behind the wagons a team of horses pulled a strange-looking object. It looked like a thick, short log, but it was black. A warrior who also saw the Long Knives shouted a warning.
Light Hair and Slow ran and hid in a chokecherry thicket. They knew the Long Knives were coming because of that skinny cow.
Several days earlier, a cow had wandered into the village. A cow from those whites called Mormons. The cow had knocked over meat racks and bumped into an old woman. A Mniconju had killed it. He had been visiting in the Sicangu village. The cow had been butchered and the meat given away to old people.
Then the white man had come, and he wanted his cow back. He had gone to the one in charge of the Long Knives at Fort Laramie and complained. A messenger came from the Long Knives' fort to the Sicangu village's headman, Conquering Bear. The old man offered payment—several mules—for the cow. Foolishly, the Mormon wanted his cow, not the mules. One mule was worth more than that skinny cow.
Conquering Bear had done his best to avoid trouble. Next the Long Knife headman insisted that the man who had killed the cow be put in jail. Conquering Bear refused. So the Long Knives had now come to take the Mniconju.
The soldiers jumped down from the wagons and formed a line, pointing their rifles toward the village. Conquering Bear and two other men bravely walked toward them. The old man spoke with the soldier in charge. The soldier spoke loudly, angrily.
Meanwhile, Light Hair and Slow saw warriors gathering in the village. Long Knives—the soldiers—were not to be trusted.
Conquering Bear offered more mules for the cow. The soldier leader's name was Lieutenant John Grattan, and he was angry. He demanded that the man who had killed the cow be brought to him. Conquering Bear again refused. When the old man saw there was no use talking, he and his two men turned and walked away.
The soldier leader shouted, and the soldier guns fired. The big black thing that looked like a log turned out to be a big gun. It was fired at the village. It boomed like thunder. Conquering Bear was one of the first to fall, severely wounded.
The waiting warriors attacked, charging the Long Knives. Light Hair and Slow watched, too young to join. Warrior guns cracked and boomed; the men swung clubs and thrust lances. The soldiers seemed helpless because the warrior attack was swift. Many soldiers fell, and some ran away. Those fleeing were chased and cut down, except for one. He was sent back to the Long Knives' fort. The soldier leader, Grattan, had been one of the first to fall.
Light Hair and Slow watched some of the warriors ride toward the Long Knives' fort. They heard later that the Long Knives would not come out to fight.
The badly wounded Conquering Bear was taken to his lodge. There Light Hair's father and other medicine men treated his wounds. But their efforts could not save the well-liked old man.
When Conquering Bear died, a man walked through the village shouting the terrible news. Light Hair was very sad when he heard. Without thinking, he found his horse, mounted, and galloped away across the prairie.
He was angry. He understood now why many Lakota did not trust the white people. They were loud and quick to anger, and eager to shoot their weapons at the Lakota.
Light Hair rode aimlessly, his thoughts full of the sounds and images he and Slow had witnessed. Sounds of the Long Knife rifles, and the big gun; images of the brief and furious battle, and of soldiers falling.
He found himself at the base of a hill. Tying his horse to a plum tree, he climbed the hill and took shelter in the shade. Later he took his horse to drink from a small creek nearby. Then he went back up the hill. He could not take his mind off the battle or off the old man who had died. When night came, he fell asleep.
Light Hair had no food. The next morning he awoke hungry, his stomach growling. So he drank water. Very slowly the day passed. He sat in the shade and walked around the hill. He took his horse to water again. Evening gave way to night once more, and he slept. Sometime in the night, the dream came.
It was a strange dream. A warrior on a horse rode across a lake. Mountains and storm clouds rose to the west. There was the sound of thunder, and a red-tailed hawk flew above the man and horse. As the horse galloped, it changed color, from black to blue to white and then red. Bullets and arrows flew at the man but did not hit him. Then the horse and rider reached the dry ground, and other men, who looked like the rider, rose out of the earth. They surrounded the horse and pulled the rider down.
Light Hair could almost feel their hands pulling. Then he awoke. His father and another man were shaking him.
"Wake up!" they said. "What are you doing here alone?"
"What happened then?" Jimmy asked, after his grandfather had paused for several long moments.
"They went home, back to the village," Grandpa Nyles said. "Light Hair's dad scolded him for wandering off without telling anyone."
"Who was the other man?"
"High Back Bone, but he was called Hump," his grandfather replied. "He was Light Hair's teacher. He taught him how to be a hunter and a warrior. The two of them were friends for life, until Hump was killed in a fight against some Shoshone. He was a strong man and a very good teacher."
"What about the dream?" Jimmy asked.
"We all dream when we sleep. Sometimes the dreams don't mean anything. But Light Hair's dream had a very strong meaning. He didn't tell his father until months later. Then his dad and another medicine man told him what it meant."
Jimmy was very curious. "What did it mean?"
Grandpa Nyles smiled and ruffled his grandson's hair. "That I will tell you later," he said.
