The white-bearded general lowered his arm. There beneath the marquee, he had not changed his position even slightly during the charge. A brave warrior, Stone Dreamer decided.
After an evening's feast the Cheyennes encamped near the much larger band of Arapahoes. In the morning the Cheyenne and Arapahoe chiefs seated themselves in a wide semicircle just in front of the Commission's main marquee. Stone Dreamer and his fellow chiefs faced the white chiefs, who were attended by strange men scribbling on tablets, and surrounded by a much larger body of soldiers whose brass buttons winked as brightly as their carbines and revolvers.
Through an interpreter the white chiefs presented their message: a very reasonable message, Stone Dreamer thought:
"We have among us wicked men who wish to profit by the calamities of both sides, and these bad men continually seek war. We now think these bad men told wicked lies to General Hancock last spring."
The smooth words of the white chiefs held bitter truths:
"Perhaps some of your young braves with more blood than brains will oppose your making peace with us. Such men must be cast away. Their councils are death. A war long continued will only end in the total destruction of the Indian because his numbers are less."
Stone Dreamer remembered the picture of the white village, which to this day burned in his nightmares, and he nodded to Black Kettle, who nodded back.
The white chiefs wisely addressed the most galling issue:
"As long as the buffalo ranges on the Plains, we are willing that you should hunt him provided you keep the treaties made at the Little Arkansas. But the herds of buffalo are becoming fewer and thinner every year ..."
Angered, Stone Dreamer interrupted. "I ask the white chiefs who is to blame for that? Our young men say the buffalo are now hunted for sport, not merely to sustain life. You do not need the buffalo to sustain life, as we do. What are we to do if you rob us of them?"
The white chiefs had a saddening answer:
"In lieu of buffalo you must have herds of oxen, flocks of sheep, droves of hogs, like the white man."
Buffalo Chief of the Cheyennes arose with a hot reply:
"We are not farmers. We spring from the prairie. We live by it. You think that you are doing a great deal for us by giving presents, yet I say if you gave us all the goods you could give, we would still prefer our own life, to live as free as we have always done."
And when the white chiefs raised the issue of raids on homesteads and the rail line, Little Raven of the Arapahoe was prepared.
"It is you who should instruct your young men at the forts as to their duty. They are mostly children. You must stop them from running wild. That provokes war."
The blue-coated soldiers disliked the speech, and some made menacing motions with their weapons. The white chiefs calmed them, and as the day wore on the pugnacity of the Indians wore away, while the hunger for the gifts and guns increased. To tempt them, the white chiefs put forth their terms:
The Arapahoes and the Cheyennes must withdraw from Kansas, and settle with the other three Southern tribes on a special reserve of forty-eight thousand square miles to be set aside in the Indian Territory. On this land, with special Indian agents to mediate for them, the five tribes would live. Buildings would be put up to house a doctor, an agriculturist, a miller, a schoolteacher, a blacksmith, and any other white persons necessary for converting a race of nomads to farmers. There would be an annual dole from the White Father besides.
In return, the Indians must promise to stop their war on the wagon and rail traffic on the Santa Fe, Smoky Hill, and Platte River routes. They must promise to stay out of Kansas, although they would be permitted to hunt buffalo on open land below the Arkansas for as long as the herds lasted. When hunting, they were never to venture nearer than ten miles to any road or fort.
Again Stone Dreamer sighed. How could so few agree to such sweeping terms on behalf of so many? Many important chiefs — Tall Bull, Medicine Arrows, Big Head, Roman Nose — and hundreds of the People were not here.
Yet ultimately it was done, agreed to by a few chiefs who mingled their regret with a sad realism. They touched the pen to a document never read and translated for them.
Not all of the signers of the treaty paper were cheerful about it. Bull Bear roared. "Well, as you are so earnest, so shall I be." Instead of merely touching the pen, he drove it down on the document so hard the point snapped.
The day-long conference was nearly over, and Stone Dreamer was starting to hear an excited buzzing about the gifts. Suddenly, the white chief Terry leaped up and pointed.
A dust trail in the west signaled a rider speeding to the encampment beside the creek. Soon they saw him. A lone man, at the gallop. Stone Dreamer's heart fell. He recognized Man-Ready-for-War.
He came in full regalia, in one hand his eight-foot lance with its glittering head of trade steel, in the other his snake rattle with clicking antelope dewclaws. He had painted his face with red pigment mixed with buffalo fat, leaving only the long hooking scar uncolored.
While blue-garbed soldiers raised their weapons around the central marquee, Scar leaped from his pony and marched to the treaty table. Stone Dreamer clasped his hands. His hair blew like a gray curtain across his anxious eyes. The sunset wind seemed cold as deep winter.
Scar gazed with contempt at the other men from his society, who huddled together, shame-faced. Then he flung a look at the seated Cheyenne chiefs. It was clear what he thought of them.
He surveyed the spread-out parchments, the assortment of fine quills and silver inkstands. Through the interpreter, he spoke swiftly and with passion:
"This paper is the work of devils who betray the People. What good is the white man's promise? The only promise he keeps is the promise to steal our land. And what good are the marks of toothless old weaklings such as those seated here? How can they presume to give away land the Spirit gave to all the People? They can't, and we Dog Men won't allow it. We will carry on the war until all of you white devils and your white women and your white infants are dead."
The commissioners leaped up and exclaimed. Scar laughed, exuberant over the reaction. Before they could stop him, he shot the tip of his lance beneath the treaty table and heaved upward.
Parchment flew. Pens dropped. Ink spilled. Someone fired a shot, and an elderly Arapahoe cringed. Laughing heartily, Man-Ready-for-War walked back to his pony with a slow, haughty stride. He scrambled up, flung the commissioners another look scorning them for lacking the courage to retaliate, and rode away into the nimbus of light on the western hills.
Black Kettle brought both hands over his face, shamed and angry. Stone Dreamer felt tears he didn't bother to hide. Their brother chiefs looked unhappy, anxious. One of the white chiefs, Taylor, snarled at the men scribbling on tablets.
"Strike that speech from your notes," he told them. "Any man whose paper prints it will no longer have credentials west of the Mississippi. This is a successful conference. Report it that way."
It was a season of changes. The Southern Cheyennes withdrew to their villages on the Cimarron, there to winter peacefully with their trade goods and guns while awaiting removal to their new reservation. Charles heard about Scar's oration when the contingent of the Seventh returned to Fort Harker. He also heard that a mere four hundred or five hundred Cheyennes had represented three thousand members of the tribe. That almost amounted to no representation. "Well," he said, tiny glints showing in his eyes, bright like the point of a polished knife. His mouth lifted slightly at the corners.