High on a Mountain (31 page)

____________

Each day when Ailean strolled through the
village and sat by the river, he garnered the attention of young
women.
Tsalagi
men were tall and handsome, but Ailean was
taller.
Tsalagi
men were strong, but Ailean looked
stronger.

He had been tall since his teens, but his
farming work on the croft and his work herding cattle had not built
the broad, muscular physique that was now his. The years of heavy
labor on the plantation, coupled with ample food, had added hard
muscles to his tall frame, and Ailean was now a powerful man.

The exuberance, impatience and optimism of
his youth had been crushed and beaten from him by the ordeal he
lived through, exposing a quiet dignity and strength of spirit at
his core. And like a rock on the shore from which the weaker
particles have been eroded by the ceaseless pounding of the waves,
but which has not been destroyed, he stood firm and unbowed. He
carried himself with an air of unsullied dignity and solemnity.
Which made him attractive to some of the unmarried
Tsalagi
women.

On his fifth day in the village, Ailean sat
at his accustomed place on the river bank. Two young men he’d not
seen before approached him and made it clear they didn’t want him
to sit there. He couldn’t understand their words, but their angry
gestures were unmistakable.

He merely stared at them, which brought an
even more irritable response. Their protest became louder and more
vehement, and Ailean lost patience with them. He stood, crossed his
arms and planted his feet. He towered over both of them.

“I’ll stay here as long as I want,” he said.
“Now leave me be.”

The two left off their loud protest and
backed away. Ailean sat down again, returned to his pastime of
watching the swirling, rippling water and ignored them until they
left.

His walks through the village had other
observers as well, men who monitored his movements, and who, he
felt sure, would not allow him to leave the village. Ailean looked
longingly at the nearer peaks, wishing he could sit on those
heights, enjoying the view, to think about the life that stretched
ahead of him now that he had decided he wanted to live. But he
suspected if he tried to climb one of them, he would be stopped by
the unobtrusive watchers who made their presence known each time he
reached the fringe of the settlement.

Ailean sat by the fire each night and talked
with Gòrdan. Sometimes they talked about their homeland, sometimes
Gòrdan told him about
Ani-Tsalagi
and their way of life. He
felt comfortable with Gòrdan and a friendship began to grow between
the two men.

“You have to understand that
Ani-Tsalagi
are a proud people,” Gòrdan said. “The way you
say you stared at those two young men at the river, I’m surprised
you didn’t have a fight on your hands. They don’t like to be stared
at. Makes them nervous, makes them feel you have no respect for
them. And they don’t like to look you in the eye when they talk to
you. As though it somehow makes them subservient to you. Keep that
in mind, or you might get into trouble.”

“I will. But they have to keep in mind that I
won’t tolerate their ill will and threats when my intentions are
peaceable.”

“You’d better rethink your attitude. You
don’t know what you’d be up against if you made enemies among the
people,” Gòrdan said. “And I won’t tolerate you making trouble. My
livelihood depends on the good will of
Ani-Tsalagi.
”

____________

“What is that mound of earth beside your
house?” Ailean asked one night.

“That’s our
asi
, our hot house,”
Gòrdan said. “It’s where we live during the winter. To keep warm.
We’d never be able to burn enough wood to stay warm here in the
house.”

“Oh. So, is that big mound a hot house for
the whole village?”

Gòrdan laughed. “No. That’s the town house,
where everyone gathers when there’s something important to discuss,
when there’s a council meeting. Or when there’s some kind of
ceremony.”

Ailean nodded, and the two men sat in silence
for a while.

Gòrdan looked into Ailean’s eyes and asked,
“What happened there on the moor? I see something in you, I can
tell you’re troubled, and, well, I just think that sometimes it
does your soul good if you can unburden yourself.”

“It’s hard to talk about it. But I’ll try.”
Ailean swallowed, cleared his throat and began. He told Gòrdan
about the battle and its aftermath, pausing many times to allow the
throes of grief to pass when it became too difficult to talk.

He spoke of witnessing the murders of the
wounded Highlanders by redcoat soldiers on the battlefield. And he
described the journey through Lochaber and the horrors he saw
there. But when he mentioned Mùirne’s name, he couldn’t continue,
couldn’t talk about Mùirne, about Coinneach-òg, about Ma.

They sat in silence for a while.

“So you were captured and shipped to the
colonies as a prisoner?”

“Aye. And sold as a slave. I’ve been a slave
for the past two years.”

Gòrdan grimaced and shook his head. Without a
word, he rose and stalked outside.

____________

“Ailean, you’ve been here almost two weeks
now. Have you decided what you’re going to do?” Gòrdan asked one
afternoon.

“No. My mind is…it’s a jumble of thoughts. If
they would let me climb to the top of one of the peaks so I could
sit and think everything over, maybe I could clear my mind enough
to decide what I want to do.”

“They won’t. You’re here on sufferance,
allowed to be here unharmed because of the goodwill they bear
toward me, but, well, just don’t try anything like that right
now.”

Neither spoke for a few minutes.

“You must decide something soon. I’ve been
hearing talk. Some of the young men are unhappy with the attention
you’ve been receiving from the young women.”

“I’m not inviting it.” Ailean smiled and
said, “I suppose I’m just too handsome for my own good.”

That’s something Coinneach would have
said
, he thought, and his smile disappeared.

“Handsome or not, they’re unhappy. And some
have pointed out that you’re not contributing. You’re not hunting
and providing meat, you’re not doing much of anything—”

A man came to the door of the house, said a
few words and left. Gòrdan and his wife, Tayeni, both rose, and
Tayeni headed out the door.

Gòrdan followed but paused and turned to
Ailean. “Stay here. Stay inside. They’ve called a village meeting.
We’ll be back when it’s over.”

And he left. When he and Tayeni returned
later, his face wore an uneasy expression.

“What is it?” Ailean asked. “Is anything
wrong?”

Gòrdan put a small piece of wood on the fire
and sat before he answered. “Each year, our village plays
anetsa
with a rival village, but this year, they can’t find
enough young men willing to play. And they’re unhappy. I don’t feel
comfortable when they’re unhappy.”

“What’s
anetsa?
” Ailean asked.

“It’s a ball game. They play it with sticks
that have a small basket on the end. They pick up the ball with
their sticks and try to make a goal. The first team to make twelve
goals wins.”

“Sounds like
camanachd
.”

“Not exactly. In
camanachd,
you hit
the ball to the goal with your stick. In
anetsa
, you pick it
up with your stick and carry it or throw it to the goal.”

“In a village this size, there surely ought
to be enough men to make up a team.”

“There are. There just aren’t enough who are
willing to play this year. The village lost games each of the last
five years. There have to be at least twelve men on a team, and so
far only eleven have agreed to play. Nobody wants to be part of a
further disgrace.”

The mention of
camanachd
transported
Ailean to another time and place, a time when he’d been honored and
celebrated by his clan. A time when his prowess as a camanachd
player brought him the respect he craved.

A thought occurred to him. If he played
anetsa
, could he evoke the same respect and honor from
Ani-Tsalagi?
He had no doubt he could play the game.
Throughout his life, he’d always excelled at any physical activity.
If he won the ballgame for Gulahiyi village, as he’d won every
camanachd
game for his clan, would the villagers consider it
a contribution?

“Do you think they’d let me play?” he asked.
“I was good at
camanachd
. Our clan never lost a game after I
was old enough to play.”

“I don’t know if they’d let a stranger play.
And even if they would…” Gòrdan shook his head. “You don’t know
what you’d be getting yourself into. It’s a rough game. More
violent than
camanachd
. Men get hurt and even killed playing
anetsa
. A man of this village died during the last
game.”

“But if I played, and if we won, wouldn’t
they consider that a contribution?”

“Maybe.” Gòrdan was silent for a few minutes.
“I’ll tell them you’re willing, but I don’t know if they’ll accept
you.”

Gòrdan delivered the message, and the village
elders called a meeting to discuss the proposal. Some villagers
raised vehement objections to allowing the white man to play on the
Gulahiyi village team, while others considered it the only way out
of an untenable situation.

After much discussion, they decided accepting
Ailean as a player was their only option. They chose a date for the
game and dispatched a runner to the rival village to make the
proposal. The people of Kanugulayi accepted, and Ailean entered
four weeks of rigorous training with the other players.

They practiced grabbing the ball with their
sticks, throwing it, tackling other players, and they learned other
tactics of playing the game. They adhered to rigid dietary and
behavior restrictions throughout the training period. The trainers
allowed Gòrdan to stay with Ailean to translate their
instructions.

Two of the other players were the young men
who had tried to make Ailean leave his seat by the river, and they
made no secret of the fact they didn’t like Ailean and resented his
playing. Ustahli, the taller and heavier of the two, seemed to
harbor an especially virulent animosity toward Ailean. Also among
the players was Tenahwosi, one of the two men who had captured
Ailean.

Once during practice, Ustahli used an
opportunity to tackle Ailean from behind with unnecessary force,
and tried to hold him down while his companion beat Ailean with his
sticks. Tenahwosi pushed away the man wielding the sticks while
Ailean knocked Ustahli down and got to his feet. Tenahwosi spoke to
the pair angrily. Ustahli glared at Tenahwosi and stalked away with
his companion. Afterward, Tenahwosi stayed close to Ailean.

THIRTY-NINE

The evening before the game, people of the
village gathered around a fire built on the flat ground in front of
the town house. The players danced to the monotonous drum beat,
encircling the fire, while women sang and danced in an outer circle
around them. The dancing continued until daybreak. Ailean was tired
from the night’s activity, but there was no time for rest. Other
ceremonies had to be performed before the game could be played.

On the way to the ball ground, situated
halfway between the villages, a shaman performed a series of
purification rituals, one of which was a scratching of each
player’s body with sharpened turkey bones. The scratching was
painful, but Ailean endured the pain stoically while the other
players watched for signs of cowardice in the white man.

They rubbed their bodies with grease and
decorated themselves with paint. All the players were dressed in
loin cloths and all wore moccasins, except for Ailean, who was
barefoot. He had no moccasins and didn’t want any. He had always
played
camanachd
barefoot, and he believed it gave him some
measure of surefootedness that players who used footwear
lacked.

Some of the men wore feathers and other
decorations which they believed lent them special powers and gifts
for the grueling game ahead. Ailean’s one talisman was the tattered
piece of his tunic he’d saved. He fingered it gently, kissed it and
tucked it next to his skin at his waist behind the loin cloth.

The upright posts of the goals were already
set in place at each end of the ball ground when people of both
villages gathered. Betting on the game began in earnest, with
blankets, weapons, trinkets and other items being wagered on the
outcome. The players came onto the field at midday.

Ailean soon learned why the game was called
anetsa
, “little brother of war.” The play was vigorous and
at times became vicious, with players tackling, hitting, kicking
and using their sticks on one another as they went after the
ball.

A man from the rival team scooped the ball
from the ground with his ball stick and ran toward his team’s goal.
One of Ailean’s teammates tackled the man. The two men apparently
forgot the ball as they fought each other, and a player from
Gulahiyi village recovered the ball. Game officials stopped play
momentarily to break up the fight.

An official put the ball into play again, and
Tenahwosi secured the ball with his stick. He came running past
Ailean toward the goal, followed by three opposing players. Ailean
dived toward the three pursuers, blocking their progress so
Tenahwosi could make it to the goal. Ailean and the men fell in a
pile, and as they extricated themselves, each of the three glowered
at Ailean. One of them said something Ailean assumed was a
threat.

Tenahwosi scored and the ball was put back
into play, but two of the men Ailean had tackled didn’t go after
the ball. They came after Ailean, crashed into him with their
bodies and sticks. They knocked him to the ground, kicked and
stomped him as he struggled to get up. One of them swung his stick
and hit Ailean on top of the head. The hard blow cut his scalp, and
blood flowed. The clout awakened Ailean’s anger and imparted the
strength he needed to rise and rejoin the fray.