Legend of the Dreamer: Book Two of the Wyakin Trilogy

over.

Men who dream dreams gain in wisdom. (Smowhala, Smokeller prophet—Wanapum Tribe)

Dreamers were perceived to live with connections to a spirit world. Some had animal spirit guides (wyakins). The Sahaptin-speaking Free Native Americans called Dreamers tiwet-timt tiwet or tooats. The prophet Smowhala claimed to have visited the spirit world and taught that others could do the same by putting themselves in trance-like states, dancing the Washat, and living by the old ways. Nineteenth-century Christians called them heathens. White settlers feared them. The United States government treated them as savages.

Dos Manos, Cortez Modrables had decided, would be the perfect name for the pony he had just received from his new adoptive father, Spotted Horse. The fine young pinto was a gift of gratitude to the Spanish-born white boy from Spotted Horse for bringing his wounded son, Samuel, safely back to him. Cortez explained to the two New Perce Indians, who were standing with him appraising the pony, Dos Manos is Spanish for Two Hands. Spotted Horse and Samuel looked puzzled. Cortez savored the moment before motioning to them to take a look at the pony’s rump.

Cortez raised his hands palms forward as he repeated Dos Manos, and then placed a hand over each of the two brown markings on the pinto’s rump. See, he said, the prints of two hands that pushed the pony up out of a mud hole!

Spotted Horse and his son both laughed. You have named your pony well, little brother, exclaimed Samuel, and then laughed again. He was enjoying having a brother.

Dos Manos, Dos Manos, the older Nez Perce said the name and chuckled.

Dos Manos spun swiftly to face the three examining his rump, as if indignant over the attention. He faced Cortez as if asking, What’s going on here?

Please accept the name that I have given you, my new friend. It is not meant to ridicule you. I’m sure I’ll never need to push you out of a mud hole.

Dos Manos is an Indian pony, Samuel told Cortez. He knows that we often name our ponies after their coloring and markings.

The boys had led their ponies into the hunting camp using short lengths of hemp rope. Spotted Horse realized that Cortez would need a bridle to ride his pony, so he ducked into his lodge and brought out a brand new braided horsehair bridle. This he handed to Cortez and signed for him to put it on Dos Manos.

Cortez fumbled with the new bridle as he approached the pony’s head. Dos Manos was equally uncertain about the process and jerked his head away. Ven, amigo mio.

(Come, my friend.) I would never cause you pain. Dos Manos then seemed to understand what was happening and dropped his head so that Cortez could slip the loop of the bridle over his lower jaw.

Samuel, also remembering something, ducked into the lodge. He returned shortly with the leather English saddle that the Pend d’Oreille scouts had provided for Cortez when they escorted the boys on the last leg of the trip to the Musselshell Valley camp. The scouts left this here when they rode out so quickly after El Oso frightened their horses. You should use it, Cortez. You haven’t ridden much.

Cortez didn’t appreciate all of Samuel’s comment, but he accepted that his new brother was right about the saddle. It would take him some time to learn the kind of horsemanship that Nez Perce children acquired even as they learned to walk. Alright, but I want to learn to ride bareback like you and the other boys.

Why would you want to do that? asked Samuel. You look like a dignified philosopher when you ride in that saddle. He then laughed at his own quip.

Spotted Horse looked puzzled by the English banter between Cortez and Samuel, but Cortez didn’t try to explain. He wanted to forget the conversation in which he had told Samuel that he didn’t want to be a warrior, but a philosopher. Samuel had then questioned his brother’s manhood. That conversation had hurt Cortez’s feelings to the point where he had considered returning to the white world.

Samuel had also found a saddle blanket so that they could ready Dos Manos for Cortez’s first ride. The pony was as nervous about the saddle as the boy was nervous about the adventure. Cortez had ridden a horse only part of the way from the Missouri River Breaks, where he had first met Samuel, to the Nez Perce hunting camp in the Musselshell Valley in Montana Territory. He had walked most of the two hundred-mile trek so that the wounded Samuel could ride. The Pend d’Oreille scouts who had found the boys had given Cortez an old, slow horse that just followed the others. He didn’t have to be controlled.

Now, however, Cortez needed to learn to ride a spirited pony so he would not shame himself in the eyes of Samuel and his father, or the other Nez Perce members of the hunting band. It was even more important that he earn the pony’s trust. Dos Manos liked him—Cortez knew that. But he also knew that, in the world of the nomadic Nez Perce, the bonding of horse and rider was essential.

Cortez grabbed the leather saddle to pull himself up the pony’s right side (not the left side, as most white riders did) and onto his back without help. Samuel, of course, simply leapt onto his pony’s bare back. Spotted Horse waved the boys off for their ride.

As they passed through the camp, several of the young hunters pointed to Cortez and laughed at the white boy in the English saddle. Cortez felt a little embarrassed, but Dos Manos didn’t let the laughter bother him. In fact, he danced about in front of them, seemingly to boast that his rider was someone special, and the leather English saddle was special too.

Cortez leaned forward in the saddle where he could feel the pony’s shoulders working as they climbed the low hills at an easy gait. Heads popped up from the grazing horse herd as the boys rode by. Several ponies started to trot alongside, as if they wanted to go with the boys, but then thought better of it and returned to the rich, green grass.

The foothills leveled off as the ponies approached a line of trees. Samuel held his pony to a walk as he gazed out over the valley. I’m looking for buffalo herds, Cortez. My father told me to scout the valley while we rode. The hunting has not been good this summer. We may be leaving the Musselshell Valley soon. The buffalo usually move into these mountain valleys in the heat of summer, where the grass is better, the stream water tastes sweet, and the air is cool.

Does Spotted Horse know why the buffalo haven’t come into this valley?

He doesn’t know, but he has heard from other hunting bands that there are many people on the prairie. The buffalo might have gone north to get away from them. Then he added, Let’s race, Cortez, and turned his pony westward. When we find buffalo, our ponies need to run hard for long distances. You and Dos Manos need some practice.

Cortez was apprehensive, but he sensed that Dos Manos would know what to do. So he nudged the pony with his knees, urging him to run hard after Samuel.

The rough ground seemed to smooth out as Dos Manos galloped in long strides, his small hooves magically finding the best places to hit the ground. He missed all the rocks, sailed over logs, and skirted the prairie dog holes.

The wind tugged the boy’s hair loose from his braids, and it streamed out behind him. The rhythm of galloping excited Cortez as Dos Manos came even with Samuel’s pony and then surged ahead. It was the ponies who were racing, more than the boys. Cortez hadn’t felt any desire to race Samuel, but Dos Manos was having fun, and Cortez felt his own heart pounding with the pony’s exhilaration. The race gave the boy even greater pride in his pony, as well as in his own growing horsemanship.

Cortez glanced back over his shoulder at Samuel and saw pain on his brother’s face. Pulling back on the reins, he slowed Dos Manos to a trot. Did your wound open up, Samuel? he asked.

No, but my shoulder couldn’t take the pounding jar of my pony’s gallop. I’ll be alright, but we should just walk our ponies back to the camp—let them cool down.

Your bullet wound damaged some muscles. They may need more time to heal, Cortez offered. Culculshensah or Willow Woman might have poultices that would help.

Samuel, wanting to change the subject, exclaimed Dos Manos runs really well. He almost beat my pony.

Cortez was about to say that he thought Dos Manos was ahead, but decided not to, and instead replied, Dos Manos likes to run. I need to learn to race too. He is a very fine pony. Culculshensah tells me that a shaman should not have a fine horse. As his student, I probably shouldn’t race my pony and be prideful.

On the slow ride back to the hunting camp the boys were quiet—each lost in his own thoughts. Cortez recalled some of the things that he had learned from and about his adoptive people.

As a shaman/healer’s student, I will have a place with the Nez Perce tribe. Samuel told me that the Nez Perce call themselves the Ni-mi-pu, which means the Real People.

Culculshensah, the shaman/healer, had already told the hunting band that the spirit people had come to him in a dream, telling him that the next shaman/healer would be a strange boy from a very different tribe. He had no people but he did have a great animal spirit guide, or wyakin. The boy would demonstrate that he had the gift of healing, and he would learn the ways of the Ni-mi-pu as the next shaman/healer. When Culculshensah recognized Cortez as that boy, he had asked Cortez to share his lodge with him and his wife, Willow Woman. They had no children.

A Nez Perce shaman is called a tiwet, and both men and women can be tiwets. Typical of shamans is that they have some deformity, or they have suffered some terrible experience, as Cortez had in losing his parents. Culculshensah was born with a twisted foot, which made it impossible for him to be a hunter or warrior. Willow Woman was captured as a girl by a Blackfoot band. She had been abused, but she survived to become a tiwet, sharing her life and her healing work with Culculshensah.

When the boys arrived back at the camp site, Samuel was still quiet, possibly dealing with his painful shoulder, or remembering how he got the bullet wound from the Indian Killer. Also, he may have been remembering the long painful ride back to his father’s hunting camp here in the Musselshell River Valley. He knew that Cortez had probably saved his life with his medical skill and his caring spirit. Whatever the case, Samuel didn’t feel like talking anymore and walked off with his pony to release it into the herd, leaving Cortez to unsaddle and wipe down Dos Manos—now the boy’s responsibility. Cortez spoke to himself as well as his new pony-friend, Dos Manos. "Mucho me ha ocurrido" (A lot has happened to me), the boy said to Dos Manos in Spanish. While there was no reason to believe that the Indian pony would understand Spanish better than English, Cortez felt like continuing his remembrances in his native tongue—and he felt he needed to explain to his pony-friend why they were standing there, at that moment, in the Musselshell Valley of Montana Territory, United States of America.

Life was not good in Spain in the 1860s for Jews, he began. Well, it hadn’t been for many generations. While my father was a brilliant physician, he and my mother were discriminated against, as was I. Father could not give medical treatment to non-Jews. My grandfather was one of my favorite people, whom I trusted, and it was he who encouraged my father to take us to America, where his medical skill would be appreciated by people of all religions, and where I could grow up to be a doctor too.

With that statement, Cortez finished wiping down Dos Manos with a cloth that had once been part of his trousers. Willow Woman and Cut Nose had made him a set of buckskin clothes when they saw how worn and small his trousers were. Cortez was grateful for the new clothes, and the buckskins were far more appropriate for his new lifestyle.

Dos Manos looked back at Cortez and nodded his head, as if asking the boy to continue. Cortez laughed at this and resumed talking, while combing his fingers through the pony’s long mane.

We landed in New York City on my thirteenth birthday, so we had a short bar mitzvah ceremony at a little temple near the docks. The rabbi told me that I was now a man and needed to take on the responsibilities of a man. I didn’t feel any different then, but sooner than I could have imagined, that is exactly what I had to do.

Cortez removed the horsehair bridle from the pony’s mouth and shook the saliva off it before he hung it over his shoulder. Dos Manos gave the boy a gentle head bump, as Cortez pondered his thoughts before resuming his story—still in Spanish.

"We traveled by train to St Louis, where we boarded a riverboat called the Jupiter. We traveled for weeks up the Missouri River into Montana Territory, guided by a Captain La Mar. When the boat was going through a deep canyon called The Breaks, some of the crew and passengers became very sick with what my father said was cholera. Father, who was a Jewish doctor, started treating the sick people with tea made of herbs that he had brought from Spain. Those who accepted treatment from Father got better, but others called Father a sorcerer and refused his treatment. A Catholic priest on board hated Jews and threw my father’s jars of herbs overboard, so when more people kept getting sick, even Mother and then Father, there was no medicine." He paused a minute.

"At Father’s advice, Captain La Mar decided to pull ashore and have everyone on board disembark. He quarantined the sick people (by now, only Father and Mother, though of course I remained with them) in a separate camp site, and had the crew clean the boat thoroughly with lye to rid it of cholera. Mother died, and we buried her there by a large boulder to mark her grave. Father remained sick. The well passengers, mostly gold miners, were mad with gold fever. They wanted to keep going upriver to Fort Benton. When they threatened to burn the Jupiter, Captain La Mar agreed to break the quarantine and leave Father and me camped on shore until he could return. Just before the Jupiter left, a crewman snuck back to our camp to rob Father, but when Father awoke, the man killed him. I had to bury Father all by myself, next to Mother."

The boy’s grief surfaced with this telling. He buried his face against the pony’s withers and let the tears flow. Dos Manos held steady.

I must tell you about how Samuel found me and became my brother, and how he was gravely injured by a mountain man the Indians called Tito’-qan Waptamawn (the Indian Killer). I must tell also tell you about Modrables, El Oso, and how that great grizzly bear killed my father’s murderer, who had returned and was trying to kill me. The two walked toward the horse herd grazing area. "I will tell you these things another day, Manos. You must also learn about how a grizzly bear like El Oso became my wyakin." With that, Cortez patted the handprints on Dos Manos’s rump, sending the pony trotting off to the herd.

Everybody seemed to know what to do except Cortez Modrables, even though he had learned a little of the Sahaptin language and even more of Nez Perce signing. The hunting camp was moving from the Musselshell Valley to the Yellowstone River Valley, but Cortez didn’t understand why they were moving. He could only assume that the lead warrior, Spotted Horse, and the other hunters must have a good reason. The young Jewish boy wasn’t used to this frenetic activity in the community. Finding his Ni-mi-pu brother excitedly trotting about the camp, he stopped Samuel. What’s happening? Is there some kind of trouble?

No trouble, little brother, Samuel hurriedly spoke in good English. My father and the scouts have learned that the buffalo hunting will be better this time of year in the Yellowstone Valley. Hunting is always best in the autumn. The buffalo are fat and their hides will make better robes for trading. Samuel then hurried off on some errand.

Cortez then went in search of his mentor, the old shaman/healer, Culculshensah.

It is good to move camps often, the old shaman made the boy understand with signs and some Sahaptin words that Cortez understood. Fresh places are healthier for the people, and the horse herd needs new grazing ground. Any new camp site would smell much better than this old one, Cortez reasoned.

Culculshensah had told him in an earlier conversation that the Yellowstone Valley was the hunting grounds of the Absaroka Tribe (usually called the Crow Tribe by white people), although the Absaroka sometimes fought with the Lakota people, who claimed the lower part of the huge valley for their hunting. The Absaroka Tribe had always been friendly with the Nez Perce, so the warriors expect to be welcomed. The Absarokas liked to trade for Nez Perce horses, especially the multicolored ones that only the Nez Perce seemed to have.

Cortez decided that he should help Culculshensah pack up his medicines and personal items, as he didn’t have many things of his own to pack. Sharing the lodge with Culculshensah and Willow Woman had become comfortable for him, and feeling wanted by this old couple had helped dissipate the loneliness he had felt since both his parents died, leaving him an orphan, all alone, in the Missouri River Breaks. Seeing that Willow Woman was bringing their horses to the lodge, Cortez assumed that he should go get his own pony, so he quickly dug through his parfleche for the horsehair bridle that Spotted Horse had given him.

When Cortez reached the main horse herd, he nervously walked among the milling horses. The ponies were agitated and jittery, sensing that something was going on. Anticipation caused the closely crowded herd to surge one direction and then another, like a flock of crows.

Cortez tried to squeeze between the pinto bodies without being knocked down or having his feet trampled. Catching a glimpse of Dos Manos on the far side of the herd, the boy tried to work his way in that direction, but the milling herd paid little attention to his attempt to pass between them. Not tall enough to see over the ponies’ backs and not strong enough to force his way past their shoulders, the boy became frightened and confused. He lost his sense of the direction toward Dos Manos. He had never tried whistling for his pony, like the other boys and braves often did, so he just stood in the crush of horses. A big gray stallion ran right at him tossing his head from side to side as if telling the boy to get out of the way. There was nowhere for him to go, so Cortez waved his arms in fear and indecision. The stallion turned