Michael Blake - Dances With Wolves

Smiles A Lot could predict to within hours the foaling time for mares. He had a knack for controlling unruly stallions. And when it came to doctoring, he knew as much or more about tending to equine ailments as any grown man in the band. The horses just seemed to fare better when he was around.

All of this was second nature to Smiles A Lot . . . second nature and secondary. What he liked most about being with the horses was that they grazed away from camp, sometimes as far as a mile, and this placed Smiles A Lot far away, too; away from the omnipotent eyes of his father, away from the potential chore of minding his little brothers and sisters, and away from the never-ending work of maintaining camp.

Usually there were other boys and girls lolling around the herd, but unless something special came up, Smiles A Lot rarely joined their games and socializing.

He much preferred climbing onto the back of some calm gelding, stretching out along the horse’s spine, and dreaming, sometimes for hours, as the ever-changing sky drifted by.

He’d been dreaming like this most of the afternoon, happy to be away from the village, which was still reeling from the tragic return of the party that had gone against the Utes. Smiles A Lot knew that, though he had little interest in fighting, sooner or later he would have to take up the warpath, and already he’d made a mental note to watch out for parties going against the Utes.

For the last hour he’d been enjoying the uncommon luxury of being alone with the herd. The other children had been called back for one reason or another, but no one had come for Smiles A Lot, and this made him the happiest of dreamers. With luck, he wouldn’t have to go back until dark, and sunset was still several hours off.

He was smack in the middle of the big herd, daydreaming about being the owner of a herd all his own, one that would be like a great assembly of warriors whom no one would dare to challenge, when he picked up a movement on the ground.

It was a large, yellow gopher snake. Somehow he’d managed to get himself lost in the midst of all these shifting hooves and was slithering along at a desperate clip, looking for a way out.

Smiles A Lot was fond of snakes, and this one was surely big enough and old enough to be a grandfather. A grandfather in trouble. He spilled off his horsey couch with the idea of catching the old fellow and carrying him away from this dangerous place.

The big snake was not easy to run down. He was moving very fast, and Smiles A Lot kept getting hemmed in by the tightly bunched ponies. The boy was constantly ducking under necks and bellies, and it was only through the dogged determination of a Good Samaritan that he was able to keep the yellow body twisting along the ground in sight.

It ended well. Near the edge of the herd the big snake finally found a hole to crawl into, and the only thing Smiles A Lot caught was a last glimpse of the tail as it disappeared underground.

Then, while he was standing over the hole, several of the horses whinnied and Smiles A Lot saw their ears go up. He saw all the heads around him suddenly arch in the same direction.

They’d seen something coming.

A shiver ran through the boy, and the buoyancy of being alone turned against him in a single stroke. He was afraid, but he moved forward stealthily, staying low amongst the ponies, hoping to see before being seen.

When he could see empty patches of prairie opening in front of him, Smiles A Lot dropped down and duck-walked alongside the horses’ legs. They hadn’t panicked and that made him feel a little less scared. But they were still watching with as much curiosity as ever, and the boy was careful not to make a sound.

He stopped when the horse flashed by, twenty or thirty yards away. He couldn’t get a good look because his view was blocked, but he was sure he’d seen legs, too.

Slowly he rose up and peeked over a pony’s back. Every hair on Smiles A Lot’s head tingled. A racket went off in his head like buzzing bees. The boy’s mouth froze, and so did his eyes. He didn’t blink. He’d never seen one before, but he knew exactly what he was looking at.

It was a white man. A white soldier man with blood on his face.

And he had somebody. He had that strange one, that Stands With A Fist woman.

The white soldier’s horse started into a trot as he passed. They were headed straight for the village. It was too late to run ahead and raise the alarm. Smiles A Lot shrank back into the herd and started to work his way back to the center. He would get into trouble for this. What could he possibly do?

The boy couldn’t think clearly; everything was tumbling in his head, like seeds in a rattle. If he’d been a little steadier, he would have known from the look on his face that the white soldier could not be on a hostile mission. Nothing in his bearing said so. But the only words banging around in Smiles A Lot’s brain were “White soldier, white soldier.”

Suddenly he thought, Maybe there are more. Maybe there is an army of hair mouths out on the prairie. Maybe they’re close by.

Thinking only of atoning for his carelessness, Smiles A Lot pulled off the willow bridle he kept around his neck, slipped it onto the face of a strong-looking pony, and led it as quietly as he could out of the herd.

Then he jumped up and whipped the pony into a run, racing away in the opposite direction of the village, anxiously squinting at the horizon for any sign of white soldiers.

Lieutenant Dunbar’s adrenaline was running. That pony herd . . . At first he’d thought the prairie was moving. Never had he seen horses in such numbers. Six, maybe seven hundred of them. It was so awe-inspiring he’d been tempted to stop and watch. But of course he couldn’t.

There was a woman in his arms.

She’d held up fairly well. Her breathing was regular and she hadn’t bled much. She’d been very quiet, too, but tiny as she was, the woman was breaking his back. He’d carried her for more than an hour, and now that he was close, the lieutenant wanted more than ever to get there. His fate would be decided shortly, and that kept his adrenaline running, but more than anything, he thought of the monstrous ache between his shoulder blades. It was killing him.

The land up ahead was dropping away, and as he drew closer, he could see pieces of the stream cutting across the prairie, then the tips of something; and then, as he reached the brow of the slope, the encampment rose into view before his eyes, rising as the moon had done the night before.

Unconsciously, the lieutenant squeezed the reins. He had to stop now. He was gazing on a sight for all time.

There were fifty or sixty conical, hide-covered houses pitched along the stream. They looked warm and peaceful in the late afternoon sun, but the shadows they cast also made them look larger than life, like ancient, still-living monuments.

He could see people working around the houses. He could hear some of their voices as they walked along the tamped-down avenues between lodges. He heard laughter, and somehow that surprised him. There were more people up and down the stream. Some of them were in the water.

Lieutenant Dunbar sat on Cisco, holding the woman he had found, his senses crushed by the power of the ageless tableau spread out before him, spread out like the unraveling of a living canvas. A primal, completely untouched civilization.

And he was there.

It was beyond the reach of his imagination, and at the same time he knew that this was why he’d come, this was at the core of his urge to be posted on the frontier. This, without his knowing it before, was what he had yearned to see.

These fast-moving moments on the brow of the slope would never come again in his mortal life. For these fleeting moments he became part of something so large that he ceased to be a lieutenant or a man or even a body of working parts. For these moments he was a spirit, hovering in the timeless, empty space of the universe. For these precious few seconds he knew the feeling of eternity.