Lyle schooled Jimmy. Lyle had taken several years of French in school, had a natural affinity for the language, and could understand most conversations. He chose not to speak it, though, and advised Jimmy to follow his lead. “In mixed company,” Lyle said, “speak Lakota, not English. It goes over better. If you speak American English, it ruins the illusion,” he said. “The French like to despise Americans. That’s one reason they like us—they think we have a common enemy. We’re pure and natural and the Americans whipped our ancestors and keep us in poverty, you know the drill. So if you open your mouth and that Black Hills State assistant English professor crap starts rolling out, you can kiss the rest of the evening good-bye.”
Lyle was six years older, with a dark, fierce face that was starting to fill into an oval. He wore his hair long, past his shoulder blades, with a bone comb in it. He’d bought the comb from a West African near the Louvre, but it looked authentic, he said. Lyle had once owned a landscaping business and been on the tribal council representing the Porcupine District, but he’d been accused of embezzlement and angrily resigned and drove to Rapid City to meet with the Disney recruiters. Later, Jimmy learned that Lyle probably did steal the money to pay off a new landscaping pickup.
“I don’t know much Lakota,” Jimmy said.
“Then fake it,” Lyle said, “that’s what I do. Remember how Aunt Alice talked? Stiff-like? Just do that. String words together. Who is gonna know?”
Jimmy smiled at the common reference. Aunt Alice used to bake him pies.
“You’ll start picking up the French language soon enough,” Lyle said. “It’s total immersion, so it comes quicker. Until you do, I’ll listen and tell you what they’re saying. It’s my secret weapon — I know what they’re talking about, but they don’t know it.”
Jimmy nodded with appreciation.
“And don’t smile,” Lyle said. “If you smile, they’ll think you’re on to them and they won’t want to screw you. Be inscrutable. Think Fort Apache. Think Dances with Wolves.”
A general invitation arrived for a reception at the American embassy. Luckily, it was on their night off. The Nez Perce complained that the invitations always came on Lyle’s nights off, and accused him of manipulating the schedule. Lyle shrugged. Sometimes the cowboys were invited, but not nearly as often as the Indians. This was a sore point among the cowboys.
Lyle decided on a ponytail held with a leather string and the bone comb. Jimmy braided and, with the help of a questionable Crow who seemed just a little too happy to help, added beaded extensions to his hair. Jimmy had never, in his life, taken so long to get dressed.
It was an hour by train from Disneyland to Paris. Jimmy was nervous and sweated inside his buckskin jacket. He’d never been on a train before, although he’d flown many times. It was one thing to be admired by the tourists at the show, those families wearing the straw cowboy hats with colored bands reading Colorado, Texas, Wyoming, or Montana, but it was another thing to be stared at by people on the train. When one well-dressed man came up to Lyle and handed him a five-euro note and said something in French about “exploitation by the Americans” and “cultural imperialism” and something nasty about the past president, Lyle nodded solemnly and took the money. After the man left, Lyle winked at Jimmy and grinned.
“George Booosh,” Lyle mocked. “He’s still money.”
They emerged from the train at the station on Rue de Rivoli, the Tuileries Garden on their left and beyond them the Seine, behind them the Louvre. Ornate canyon walls of magnificent buildings on their right, the Eiffel Tower in soft focus, the top vanishing into the moist twilight mist. The sidewalks were crowded with tourists, mainly Japanese being shepherded by their tour leaders with little flags held aloft, the street choked with traffic. In the distance, sirens were braying in singsong. Jimmy was astounded, felt pummeled by the impact of the scene.
“Holy shit!” he cried.
Lyle shook his head, admonished, “Remember who you are.”
They walked along the Rue de Rivoli, shouldering past gawkers and tourists, Jimmy feeling the heat of staring eyes on his jacket, both thrilled and embarrassed by the attention. Lyle was easy to follow, with the eagle feather in his hair. The braying of the sirens got louder, and both men stopped to watch a convoy of police vans, blue wigwag lights flashing, weave through the stopped traffic en route to somewhere up ahead of them. It was then that Jimmy saw the black-clad riot police hanging back barely out of view in the alley, more in dark knots within the gardens. The riot police wore helmets, Kevlar vests, shoulder pads, and carried Plexiglas shields.
“They look serious,” Jimmy said.
“They aren’t,” Lyle said.
“What are they doing? What’s going on here?”
Lyle stopped, turned, looked Jimmy in the eye with disdain. “This fucking place is about to blow up, is all I know.”
“Who is rioting?”
Lyle shrugged. “Everybody. I can’t keep track.”
Jimmy looked up to see dozens of police surge from a side street, most back-stepping with their shields up, forming a gauntlet for hundreds of shouting demonstrators who poured through the passage, stopping traffic. The demonstrators were young, exuberant, dressed in grunge-like college clothes — hooded sweatshirts, denim, track shoes. They looked American, Jimmy thought, like students in his classes at Black Hills State. Many waved hand-painted signs.
“Students this time,” Lyle said, “just students. The big stuff won’t happen till later this summer, when all the North Africans in the suburbs get going.”
A small phalanx of boys bull-rushed several policemen, stopping just short of confronting them.
“Why don’t the cops bust their heads?”
“They don’t do that here,” Lyle said, shrugging with his palms up. “They’re tolerant. At least that’s what they call it.”
Two males broke from the demonstration and got past the police, headed straight toward Lyle and Jimmy. The Lakotas stood their ground, although Jimmy felt himself start to pucker up as the boys approached.
“Solidarité! Solidarité!” the scruffier of the two boys said, grasping Jimmy’s hands in his, thrusting his face into Jimmy’s face, shaking his hands as if they were long-lost friends. “Unité!”
“Solidarité,” Lyle said, mangling the word, stepping forward and raising his clenched fist high. “We are rebels!”
“Rebels!” the scruffy boy shouted back, letting go of Jimmy, raising his own fist. Then turning to the demonstrators to show off his two new friends, shouting “Solidarité!” which pleased them all, eliciting cheers so loud even a few of the policemen looked over their shoulders to see what had caused it.
“Ni glasses toki ye he?” (Where are my glasses?) Jimmy said stoically in Lakota, words he recalled clearly from Aunt Alice. “Ni TV Guide toki ya he?” (Where is my TV Guide?)
Both boys turned to Jimmy with reverence, as if they’d heard wisdom from an oracle.
Jimmy said in Lakota, “Tunkasina nite oyuzune ciya!” (Grandfather hurt his hip!)
The boys nodded solemnly and raised their fists.
Jimmy and Lyle stood on the corner with their fists raised also, shouting “Rebels!” until the boys rejoined the demonstrators, who flowed into the gardens surrounded by accommodating policemen. When they were gone, Lyle looked over, said, “That was fucking brilliant, Jimmy. Did you see how they looked at you?”