Sam stared at the deer head, hearing Aaron's voice only as a distant murmur. Sam was twenty-six years and twelve hundred miles away on a hill outside of Crow Agency, Montana. The voice he was hearing was that of his first teacher, his mentor, his father's brother, his clan uncle: a single-toothed, self-proclaimed shaman named Pokey Medicine Wing.
CHAPTER 5
The Gift of a Dream
Crow Country — 1967
Sam, then called Samson Hunts Alone, stood over the carcass of the mule deer he had just shot, cradling the heavy Winchester.30–30 in his arms.
"Did you thank the deer for giving its life up for you?" Pokey asked. As Samson's clan uncle, it was Pokey's job to teach the boy the ways of the Crow.
"I thanked him, Pokey."
"You know it is the Crow way to give your first deer away. Do you know who you will give it to?" Pokey grinned around the Salem he held between his lips.
"No, I didn't know. Who should I give it to?"
"It is a good gift for a clan uncle who has said many prayers for your success in finding a spirit helper on your vision quest."
"I should give it to you, then?"
"It is up to you, but a carton of cigarettes is a good gift too, if you have the money."
"I don't have any money. I will give you the deer." Samson Hunts Alone sat down on the ground by the deer carcass and hung his head. He sniffed to fight back tears.
Pokey kneeled beside him. "Are you sad for killing the deer?"
"No, I don't see why I have to give it away. Why can't I take it home and let Grandma cook it for all of us?" Pokey took the rifle from the boy, levered a cartridge into the chamber, then let out a war whoop and fired it into the air. Samson stared at him as if he'd lost his mind.
"You are a hunter now!" Pokey cried. "Samson Hunts Alone has killed his first deer!" he shouted to the sky. "Soon he will be a man!"
Pokey crouched down to the boy again. "You should be happy to give the deer away. You are Crow and it is the Crow way."
Sam looked up, his golden eyes shot with red and brimming with tears. "One of the boys at school says that the Crow are no more than thieves and scavengers. He said that the Crow are cowards because we never fought the white man."
"This boy is Cheyenne?" Pokey said.
"Yes."
"Then he is jealous because he is not Crow. The Crow gave the Cheyenne and the Lakota and the Blackfoot a reason to get up in the morning. They outnumbered us ten to one and we held our land against them for two hundred years before the white man came. Tell this boy that his people should thank the Crow for being such good enemies. Then kick his ass."
"But he is bigger than me."
"If your medicine is strong you will beat him. When you go on your fast next week, pray for warrior medicine."
Samson didn't know what to say. He would go to the Wolf Mountains next week for his first vision quest. He would fast and pray and hope to find a spirit helper to give him medicine, but he wasn't sure he believed, and he didn't know how to tell Pokey.
"Pokey," the boy said finally, very quietly, his voice barely audible over the hot breeze whistling through the prairie grass, "a lot of people say that you don't have no medicine at all, that you are just a crazy drunk."
Pokey put his face so close to Samson's that the boy could smell the cigarette-and-liquor smell coming off him. Then, softly, in a gentle, musical rasp he said, "They're right, I am a crazy drunk. The others are afraid of me 'cause I'm so crazy. You know why?"
Sam sniffed, "Nope."
Pokey reached into his pocket and pulled out a small buckskin bundle tied with a thong. He untied the thong and unfolded the buckskin on the ground before the boy. In it lay an array of sharp teeth, claws, a tuft of tan fur, some loose tobacco, sweet grass, and sage. The largest object was a wooden carving of a coyote about two inches tall. "Do you know what this is, Samson?" Pokey asked.
"Looks like a medicine bundle. Ain't you supposed to sing a song when you open it?"
"Don't have to with this one. Nobody ever had medicine like this. I ain't never showed it to anyone before."
"What are those teeth?"
"Coyote teeth. Coyote claws, coyote fur. I don't tell people about it anymore because they all say I'm crazy, but my spirit helper is Old Man Coyote."
"He's just in stories," Sam said. "There isn't any Old Man Coyote."
"That's what you think," Pokey said. "He came to me on my first fast, when I was about your age. I didn't know it was him. I thought it would be a bear, or an otter, because I was praying for war medicine. But on the fourth day of my fast I looked up and there was this young brave standing there dressed in black buckskins with red woodpecker feathers down his leggings and sleeves. He was wearing a coyote skin as a headdress."
"How did you know it wasn't just somebody from the res?"
"I didn't. I told him to go away and he said that he had been away long enough. He said that when he gave the Crows so many enemies he promised that he would always be with them so they could steal many horses and be fierce warriors. He said it was almost time to come back."
"But where is he?" Samson asked. "That was a long time ago and no one has seen him. If he was here they wouldn't say you were crazy."
"Old Man Coyote is the trickster. I think he gave me this medicine to make me crazy and make me want to drink. Pretty Eagle, who was a powerful medicine man then, told me how to make this bundle and he told me that if I was smart I would give it to someone else or throw it in the river, but I didn't do it."
"But if it is bad medicine, if he is your spirit helper and doesn't help you…"
"Does the sun rise just for you, Samson Hunts Alone?"
"No, it rises all over the world."
"But it passes you and makes you part of its circle, doesn't it?"
"Yeah, I guess so."
"Well maybe this medicine is bigger than me. Maybe I am just part of the circle. If it makes me unhappy then at least I know why I am unhappy. Do you know why you are unhappy?"
"My deer…"
"There will be other deer. You have your family, you are good in school, you have food to eat, you have water to drink. You can even speak Crow. When I was a boy they sent me off to a BIA school where they beat us if we spoke Crow. Next week, if your heart is pure, you will get a spirit helper and have strong medicine. You can be a great warrior, a chief."
"There aren't any chiefs anymore."
"It will be a long time before you are old enough to be a chief. You are too little to be unhappy about the future."
"But I am. I don't want to be Crow. I don't want to be like you."
"Then be like you." Pokey turned away from the boy and lit another cigarette. "You make me angry. Give me your knife and I will show you how to dress this deer. We will throw the entrails in the river as a gift to the Earth and the water monsters." Pokey looked at Samson, as if waiting for the boy to doubt him.
"I'm sorry, Pokey." The boy unsnapped the sheath on his belt and drew a wickedly curved skinning knife. He held it out to the man, who took the knife and began to field-dress the deer.
As he drew the blade down the deer's stomach he said, "I am going to give you a dream, Samson."
Samson looked away from the deer into Pokey's face. There were always gifts among the Crow — gifts for names, Sun Dance ceremony gifts, powwow gifts at Crow Fair, naming ceremony gifts, gifts for medicine, gifts to clan uncles and aunts, gifts for prayers: tobacco and sweet grass and shirts and blankets, horses and trucks — so many gifts that no one could ever really be poor and no one ever really got rich. But the gift of a dream was very pure, very special, and could never be repaid. Samson had never heard anyone give a dream before.