Michael Blake - Dances With Wolves

But the glimpse was enough. It told her he was a white soldier.

She didn’t jump or run. There was something spellbinding about the image of the solitary horse soldier. The great colored flag and the shining pony and the sun blinking off the ornaments on his clothes. And now the face again as the flag unfurled: a hard, young face with shining eyes. Stands With A Fist blinked several times, unsure if she was seeing a vision or a person. Nothing had moved but the flag.

Then the soldier shifted his seat on the horse. He was real. She rolled to her knees and started to draw away down the slope. She didn’t make a sound, nor did she rush. Stands With A Fist had woken from one nightmare to find herself in another, one that was real. She moved slowly because she was too horrified to run.

Dunbar was shocked when he saw her face. He didn’t say the words, not even in his head, but if he had, the lieutenant would have said something like, “What kind of woman is this?”

The sharp little face, the tangled cherry hair, and the intelligent eyes, wild enough to love or hate with equal intensity, had thrown him completely. It didn’t occur to him then that she might not be an Indian. Only one thing was on his mind at the moment.

He had never seen a woman who looked so original.

Before he could move or speak, she rolled to her knees, and he saw that she was covered with blood.

“Oh my God,” he gasped.

It wasn’t until she’d backed all the way down the slope that he raised his hand and called out softly.

“Wait.”

At the sound of the word, Stands With A Fist broke into a stumbling run. Lieutenant Dunbar trotted after her, pleading for her to stop. When he had closed to within a few yards, Stands With A Fist glanced back, lost her footing, and went down in the high grass.

When he got to her she was crawling, and every time he tried to reach down he had to pull away, as if afraid to touch a wounded animal. When he finally took her around the shoulders, she flipped onto her back and clawed out at his face.

“You’re hurt,” he said, batting away her hands. “You’re hurt.”

For a few seconds she fought hard, but the steam went out of her fast and he had her by the wrists in no time. With the last of her strength she bucked and kicked under him. And when she did, something bizarre happened.

In the delirium of her struggle an old English word, one she hadn’t spoken for many years, came to her. It slipped out of her mouth before she could stop it.

“Don’t,” she said.

It gave them both pause. Lieutenant Dunbar couldn’t believe he’d heard it, and Stands With A Fist couldn’t believe she’d said it.

She threw her head back and let her body sag against the ground. It was too much for her. She moaned a few Comanche words and passed out.

The woman in the grass continued to breathe. Most of her wounds were superficial, but the one on her thigh was dangerous. Blood was still seeping steadily from it, and the lieutenant kicked himself for having thrown away the red sash a mile or two back. It would have made a perfect tourniquet.

He’d been ready to throw away more. The longer he’d ridden and the less he’d seen, the more ridiculous his plan had seemed. He’d thrown the sash away as something useless, silly really, and was ready to fold up the flag (which also seemed silly) and return to Fort Sedgewick when he saw the rise and the solitary tree.

His belt was new and too stiff, so with the woman’s knife, he cut a strip out of the flag and tied it high on her thigh. The flow of blood diminished right away, but he still needed a compress. He stripped off his uniform, wriggled out of his long johns, and cut the underwear in half. Then he wadded up the top and pressed it against the deep gash.

For ten terrible minutes Lieutenant Dunbar knelt next to her, naked in the grass, both hands pushing hard against the compress. Once during that time he thought she may have died. He placed a tentative ear on her breast and listened. Her heart was still thumping.

Working there by himself was difficult and nerve-racking, not knowing who the woman was, not knowing whether she would live or die. It was hot in the grass at the base of the slope, and every time he brushed at the sweat dripping into his eyes, he left a streak of her blood on his face. Off and on he would lift the compress and take a look. And each time he would stare in frustration at the blood that refused to stop. Then he would replace the compress.

But he stayed with it.

Finally, when the blood had slowed to a trickle, he went into action. The thigh wound needed to be sewn shut, but that was impossible. He cut a leg off the long underwear, folded it into a dressing, and laid it flat on the wound. Then, working as fast as he could, the lieutenant cut another strip from the flag and tied it securely around the bandage. He repeated this process with the lesser arm wounds.

As he worked, Stands With A Fist began to groan. She opened her eyes a few times but was too weak to make a fuss, even when he took up his canteen and poured a sip or two of water into her mouth.

After he had done all he could as a doctor, Dunbar put his uniform back on, wondering what to do as he buttoned his trousers and tunic.

He saw her pony out on the prairie and thought of catching it. But when he looked at the woman in the grass, it didn’t make sense. She might be able to ride, but she would need help.

Dunbar glanced at the western sky. The smoky cloud was nearly gone. Only a few wisps remained. If he hurried, he could point himself in that direction before the cloud vanished.

He slipped his arms under Stands With A Fist, picked her up, and piled her as smoothly as he could onto Cisco’s back, intending to lead while she rode. But the girl was semiconscious and started to keel over as soon as she was on.

With one hand holding her in place, he managed to jump up behind. Then he turned her around, and looking like a father cradling his stricken daughter, Dunbar steered his horse in the direction of the smoky cloud.

As Cisco carried them across the prairie, the lieutenant thought about his plan to impress the wild Indians. He didn’t look very mighty or very official now. There was blood on his tunic and his hands. The girl was bandaged with his underwear and a United States flag.

It had to be better this way. When he thought about what he had done, cavorting stupidly around the countryside with polished boots and a silly red sash and, of all things, a flag flying at his side, the lieutenant smiled sheepishly.

I must be an idiot, he thought.

He looked at the cherry hair under his chin and wondered what this poor woman must have thought when she saw him in his dandy getup.

Stands With A Fist wasn’t thinking at all. She was in twilight. She was only feeling. She felt the horse swaying under her, she felt the arm across her back, and she felt the strange fabric against her face. Most of all Stands With A Fist felt safe, and all the way back she kept her eyes closed, afraid that if she opened them, the feeling would be gone.

Smiles A Lot was not a reliable boy.

No one would have characterized him as a troublemaker, but Smiles A Lot disliked work, and unlike most Indian boys, the idea of shouldering responsibility left him cold.

He was a dreamer, and as a dreamer often does, Smiles A Lot had learned that one of the better stratagems for avoiding the boredom of work was to keep to himself.

It followed, then, that the shiftless boy spent as much time as possible with the band’s large pony herd. He drew the assignment regularly, in part because he was always ready to go and in part because he had, at the age of twelve, become an expert with horses.