David Rogers, who had taken the class because of a specific sense of guilt and a vague curiosity, was fascinated by Marie. She seemed exotic and impossibly bold, speaking to a college professor with such disdain and disrespect. He had never known any woman who behaved in such a manner. David’s mother had died when he was five years old, so he had only vague and completely pleasant memories of her. And most of the white girls in his hometown had been quietly conservative and unfailingly polite. David had not bothered to approach those few hometown white girls who had been even slightly rebellious. And he had never spoken to an Indian woman.
David had grown up on a farm near Marie’s reservation. Throughout his life, his only real contact with Indians happened in the middle of the night when reservation Spokanes crept onto his family’s farm to steal camas root, the spongy, pungent bulbs of indigenous lilies that had been a traditional and sacred food of the local Indians for thousands of years. The Spokanes arrived in the middle of the night because David’s father, Buck, refused to allow them to gather camas, even though it grew on a few acres of their otherwise useless land.
On one particular night when he was twelve years old, David Rogers had been sitting for hours in the family hunting blind with his older brother Aaron and their father, Buck. Twenty feet off the ground, the blind, camouflaged by leaves and sod, had stretched between trees in a stand of windbreak pines. Ordinarily, the blind was used to hunt for the deer that often wandered through the open fields of the Rogers family farm. That night, however, Buck Rogers and his sons had been waiting for the Indians who came to steal camas root.
“Is that weapon clean?” Buck Rogers had asked Aaron.
“Yes, sir,” Aaron had said and had given a smart salute. Though only a year older than David, Aaron had been much more experienced with weapons and held a vintage AK-47, semi-automatic, a full clip.
“How about yours?” Buck had asked David.
David had looked down at the small twenty-two-caliber rifle in his hands. Wood stock, metal trigger, smell of gunpowder. He’d looked back at his father and older brother.
“It’s ready, sir,” David had said, his voice breaking a little. He’d been scared.
Buck had heard the fear in his youngest son’s voice. David had always been a strange one, and if left to himself, would have spent all of his time reading. Buck loved David, but thought he was probably queer. Buck had always known that Aaron Rogers was a whole different animal. He had been staring out into the camas fields, waiting for the Indians to appear. Wanting the Indians to appear.
“You see anything?” Buck had asked.
“No, sir,” Aaron had said.
David had peered out of the blind. The fields brightly illuminated by the moon. Fallow fields reaching north to south. To the west, a dirt access road. David had swallowed hard when he saw the car, without headlights, appear over the horizon.
“There,” Aaron had said, surprised by his own giddiness. He’d wondered if this was how the great Indian-fighters, like Custer, Sheridan, and Wright, had felt just before battle.
“Oh, we got them now,” Buck had said. “We got them good.”
The car had rattled down the access road and stopped beside a camas field. The engine had idled for a few moments before shuddering to a stop. Slowly and quietly, five, six, seven Indians had crawled out of the car. David had not understood how seven people could have fit into that small car. Four children, David saw, and a man and woman, perhaps the mother and father of the children, and, following behind them, an elderly woman.
“Tell me when, tell me when,” Aaron had whispered to his father.
“Patience, patience.”
The Indians had walked across the field until they were standing less than fifty feet away from the hunting blind. With his finger lightly feathering the trigger, Aaron had stared down the barrel of his rifle and sighted in on the Indian father.
“When? When?” Aaron had asked.
David had watched as the Indians, even the children, pulled out strange curved tools and began digging in the earth. Digging for camas root. David had wondered why the Indians loved the root so much. Why had they come in the middle of the night? After Buck had threatened them with physical violence? Even the Indian children, who David had always seen as wild and uncontrollable, quietly and respectfully dug for those roots. David had no idea the Indians had been root digging for thousands of years.
“Get ready,” Buck had whispered. David, knowing what was expected of him, had reluctantly raised his rifle.
“They’re just kids,” David had whispered.
“Lice make nits,” Buck had whispered as he raised his rifle.
The Indians dug for roots. As the old woman dug, she’d remembered when she had come here with her grandmother.
“Remember,” Buck had whispered. “Shoot over their heads.”
David had aimed his rifle at the moon, not wanting to even see the Indians as they ran away. He’d heard the soft laughter of the Indian mother. David had wondered if she was beautiful.
“Now,” Buck had said and pulled the trigger. David had squeezed off a bullet and then had turned to look at his brother, who had not yet fired. David had seen the look in his older brother’s eyes and had known Aaron was sighting in on the Indian father. Not above his head, but at his head.
“No!” David had shouted as Aaron pulled the trigger. The Indian man had fallen to the ground. He didn’t move for a brief moment, long enough for David to cry out, but then the Indian man had jumped to his feet and, apparently unharmed, raced to the car. As the Indians drove away, Aaron and Buck had laughed and whooped loudly.
“You tried to shoot him,” David had accused his brother.
“What are you talking about?” Aaron had asked.
“You aimed at him. You tried to kill him.”
Buck had stared at his sons with recognition and love. Aaron, who had always wanted so much to be like his father that he wore the same shirts. And David, who had been scared of everything, but would fight Aaron for the slightest transgression.
“David,” Buck had said. “Aaron wouldn’t do something like that. We were just trying to scare them. Right, Aaron?”
“Right, Dad.”
David had thought his big brother was lying.
“Did you see them Indians run?” Aaron had asked his father.
“I saw it,” Buck had said.
“Just like the old days must have been, huh?” Aaron had asked. “Just like the old days!”
David had looked down at the rifle in his hands. He’d felt like crying.
“Hey,” Buck had said to David. “What’s wrong with you?”
David had looked at his father.
“Oh, Jesus,” Buck had said. “You ain’t going to cry?”
David had ducked his head.
“You look at me when I’m talking to you,” Buck had said impatiently. He hated it when his son avoided eye contact. It showed fear. Buck had always hated fear.
“Yes, sir,” David had whispered. With great effort, he’d looked into his father’s blue eyes. David and Aaron had inherited the same color and shape of their father’s eyes. Buck had seen a shadow of his face in his youngest son’s. More important, he had also seen his late wife’s fine features in David’s face.