Gardens in the Dunes (7 page)

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Indigo wanted to search for Grandma Fleet at once, but Sister Salt reminded her the moon would set soon and they'd be left out on the trail in the dark.

“She just got a late start and decided to sleep under a bush.” Sister Salt's voice sounded tired. She went to her bed. Indigo lay on her bed and listened to her sister's breathing. What would become of them without Grandma Fleet? Indigo started to cry softly for their mother.

The next morning, when the sky was light enough for them to see, they set out down the trail to find Grandma Fleet. They both wore big gourd canteens around their waists in case Grandma lost or spilled her canteen and needed water. Sister Salt dropped a handful of dried dates in both canteens so they'd have something to eat. They were not far past the first turn in the dry wash when they found her. She was sitting up with her back and head resting against the clay bank; her shawl was wrapped around her. At first Indigo thought she was dead, but then her eyelids fluttered open and she smiled, still reclining against the clay bank. Sister Salt ran over and flung herself down beside her.

“Oh Grandma, what's wrong?”

“Now, now, dear, don't be so upset. I'm just tired. I'm getting too old to walk all the way to the river and back in two days. Next time, I'll take a week.” Grandma didn't stand up but she hugged both of them close to her. They shared the softened dates and water in silence though they both wanted so much to ask if she had learned the whereabouts of their mother. They could see Grandma wasn't quite her old self yet. Sister Salt expected Grandma to ask where they got the dried dates, but she sat silently stroking both girls on the head with her eyes closed. They sat side by side and watched the sun climb higher until the shade was gone.

The girls knelt down so Grandma could steady herself by leaning on their shoulders and backs as she stood up.

“Ohhhh! I'm so stiff I can hardly stand up!” she said as she steadied one hand on Sister Salt and one on Indigo. “I got a late start, but I didn't want to worry you girls. I must have hurried myself a bit too much.”

Grandma Fleet managed to stand up but she was unsteady on her feet, so it took a long time for the three of them to make their way home. Indigo wanted to ask right away what she found out about Mama, but Grandma had to save her energy for the walk.

Grandma slept all afternoon. Sister Salt and Indigo sat on their blankets nearby and watched her sleep when they were not napping themselves. The weather was much warmer than it had been when Grandma set out. No
wonder she had been so exhausted when they found her. She only needed a rest and she would be fine, Sister Salt said, but Indigo could tell she was worried by the way she watched intently, each time Grandma exhaled, for her next breath.

Grandma Fleet recovered slowly over the days that followed. She joked that she brought the hot weather with her from the river; she hoped the rain clouds followed her too. The first morning she felt well enough to walk without assistance, she told them to sit down; she had something to tell them.

“Girls, your mama was not among the prisoners taken to prison at Fort Yuma. That's all poor Mrs. Van Wagnen was able to find out.” Grandma Fleet took a corner of her skirt to wipe the tears from her eyes.

“Why are you crying?” Indigo demanded. Sister Salt frowned and shook her head at Indigo to be quiet.

“I won't be quiet!” she said and burst into tears. Grandma Fleet held her close to her chest and patted her gently on the back.

“There, there,” Grandma said, “don't cry. Our Paiute friends saw your mother slip away from the Indian police.”

Indigo stopped crying, and Sister Salt watched Grandma's serious expression and knew there was something more.

“The last time they saw her, she was running up the big sandhill beyond the river. She was following the tracks in the sand made by the Messiah and his family.”

The three of them sat quietly. “At least she's not dead and the Indian police don't have her,” Sister Salt commented. Indigo imagined Mama running and half crawling up the towering dune beyond the river; just over the crest of the dune the Messiah and his family waited for her and the other dancers who managed to escape.

Indigo wanted to know when Jesus would let their mother come home. Grandma Fleet sighed and shook her head. Jesus and his holy family disappeared into the high mountains to avoid the soldiers and Indian police, who were everywhere. The Mormons were fighting one another too. Poor Mrs. Van Wagnen! She learned her husband was killed by other Mormons, who took him from the soldiers at Fort Yuma. The old Mormon Church and the new Mormon Church could not agree on the number of wives a man might have. The U.S. government had been after the old Mormons for a long time, killing their men and burning their farms wherever they went until they escaped to the west.

The old Mormons believed they were related to the Indians, and the
U.S. government feared the old Mormons and Indians might band together against the government. The old Mormons who answered the call of Wovoka were hated most of all. How dare these Mormons take an Indian to be the Messiah? Federal officials feared the dancers were a secret army in disguise, ready to attack Needles.

From the looks of things, the Messiah and his family might have to stay in hiding a long time, so Mama might be gone a long while too. They would just have to learn to get along without her, Grandma Fleet told them as she began to show them the things they would need to know. They walked through the dry stalks and old debris of the dune gardens, and she told them where to plant the beans, corn, and squash seed and how deep. Plant in late July or early August after the rain came.

The days became longer and the desert heat gathered in the earth, day after day, swelling larger, filling her lungs with heat until there was no space for oxygen. Suddenly Sister Salt felt as if she could not breathe. She was alone at the spring when it happened. She took deep breaths over and over to reassure herself the sensation was only an illusion of the heated air.

Grandma Fleet instructed the girls to do as she did: They got up before dawn and worked until it got too hot; then they rested in the coolness of the dugout house until the sun was low in the sky. As the moon grew full, they worked all night; on the moonless nights they worked until it was too dark to see.

The delicate sand food plants disappeared as the days became warmer and longer. They ate the last of the dried dates. Now Grandma Fleet rationed the dry meat and the dry apples; she had not yet discovered the storage jar with the empty muslin sacks. They knew they had to tell Grandma what they'd done before she discovered the missing food. They waited for the right time to tell her—maybe one hot, drowsy afternoon when Grandma was telling them stories she'd heard when she was a girl. Tonight she was going to show them an old trick: how to get fresh meat.

After dark they filled their gourd canteens at the spring and sat outside with Grandma; they watched the stars and the half-moon as they listened and waited for the coyotes. On three previous nights, the coyotes hunted in the dunes not far from the spring. They listened as the coyotes began their hunt, using yips and barks to signal one another and to drive any small game, rabbits or roosting birds, into their ambush. She taught the girls to distinguish the coyotes' language of barks and howls so they would know when the coyotes got lucky. That was the signal for the girls to take off running as fast as they could, Sister Salt with the old flint knife in one hand
and a gunnysack in the other, and Indigo with a long stick. Grandma said to be careful to leave the coyotes plenty of bones; otherwise next time they might not call out an invitation to share their feast.

Sister Salt ran in the direction of the cries and barks; the cries were high pitched and the barks excited. They had to get there fast before the coyotes ate everything. The light of the moon reflected off the sand so it was easy to see. Indigo fell behind, but she did not dare call out; she ran as fast as she could, but the long stick was almost as tall as she was and it kept getting in the way of her feet. Grandma said the coyotes would drop everything and run at the sight of humans, but they mustn't risk a coyote bite.

As she neared Sister Salt, Indigo saw the last two coyotes disappear behind a sand dune; when Indigo reached Sister Salt she was kneeling on the ground gathering little wiggling pink creatures scattered over the sand by the plundered rabbits' nest. They brought home enough newborn rabbits for a fine stew with the dried roots Grandma tossed in and a little moss gathered from the spring. Grandma Fleet told the girls how proud she was they had come home with such good meat the very first time they ran to the coyotes' prey. They were lucky the baby rabbits were scattered all over; otherwise the coyotes might have eaten all of them before Sister Salt got there.

While they ate the stew, Grandma Fleet told them hunting stories from years ago—about the whitetail deer the coyotes chased down and killed so all Grandma Fleet had to do was take her sharp knife and prepare the meat for the journey home. She told them about the golden eagle that circled high above and watched her hunt the washes and dunes. All day Grandma Fleet crept through the rice grass and weeds between the dunes without result while the eagle dived successfully four times; each time the eagle mother flew away with a rabbit to her nest. It was late and Grandma was ready to give up for the day; she thought the eagle had already gone home for the night. But as Grandma made her way down the canyon toward home, the eagle reappeared, circling high overhead. Grandma was so tired and discouraged she didn't pay much attention to the eagle. She kept walking and for a time she didn't see the eagle and thought it had gone. Then she saw the eagle overhead with a big cottontail rabbit in its claws; the rabbit was still kicking but it was no problem for an eagle. Grandma looked up at the eagle and complimented her on being such a great hunter when suddenly the eagle dropped the rabbit for Grandma Fleet!

As the driest, hottest months approached, Grandma Fleet seemed to slow her pace; she still rose before dawn but now her midday naps lasted
longer, sometimes until sundown or the rise of the moon. They had plenty of food stored to take them to the summer rains, but Grandma insisted they go out and gather a few roots and seeds each day.

“You never know,” she said; “some years the rains will come late but other years the summer rains will not come at all.” The girls gathered moss and watercress from around the pool at the spring. Grandma Fleet showed them how to set bird snares woven from their own hair to trap birds as they landed by the pool. She instructed them to be careful whenever they broke into the pack rat's nest to raid the stores of seeds and mesquite beans.

“Old Ratty does all the work for you, so don't harm her!” Grandma Fleet showed them how to close up the rat's nest after they took what they wanted. Years before, when the refugees flocked to the old gardens, hunger drove the people to eat the pack rats; but the hunger was far worse afterward because there were no pack rats left to gather and store seeds.

Grandma Fleet sorted her collection of seeds while she talked. She wanted to have everything prepared by the time the rains came so they could get the seeds into the damp earth promptly. Every day they watched the sky for the clouds that might signal the arrival of the summer rains. Early one morning coveys of round puffy clouds drifted across the sky out of the southwest, and Grandma became her lively old self as she sang out a welcome to the clouds. Sister Salt was relieved to see she felt well enough to walk up to the old gardens.

Grandma Fleet explained the differences in the moisture of the sand between the dunes as they slowly made their way up the sandy path between the dunes. Grandma steadied herself with a hand on each girl's shoulder; they made their way slowly past the bare terraces where the sweet black corn, muskmelons, and speckled beans used to grow. Grandma explained each of the dunes and the little valleys between them had different flows of runoff; some of the smaller dunes were too dry along their edges and it was difficult to grow anything there; in marginal areas like these it was better to let the wild plants grow.

Grandma Fleet explained which floodplain terraces were well drained enough to grow sweet black corn and speckled beans. The squashes and melons were water lovers, so they had to be planted in the bowl-shaped area below the big dune where the runoff soaked deep into the sand. Wild gourds, sunflowers, and datura seeded themselves wherever they found moisture.

The following afternoon, big rain clouds gathered along the southwest horizon. Grandma Fleet greeted the clouds with tears in her eyes; their
beloved ancestors returned to them as precious rain. The morning after the rain, Grandma was up before dawn to unpack her jars of seeds; Indigo and Sister Salt woke to her singing.

“The dampness is sweet on the earth, smell the rain!” Grandma Fleet sang in the old Sand Lizard language, but the girls understood some of the words and got the meaning of the song from Grandma's voice. She was so excited by the arrival of the rain, she told the girls they would eat later; she wanted to be planting the first seeds as the sun appeared. The coolness of the breeze across the damp earth surprised Indigo; she shivered, then broke into a run up the path past the first dune.

Grandma Fleet walked, with only the aid of her cane, at an energetic pace; she seemed to be her old self again. Sister smiled; she had been worried about Grandma's health, but all the old woman needed was a good rain. Grandma Fleet knelt in the damp sand with her digging stick and showed the girls how deep and how closely to plant the seeds. They planted all morning and part of the afternoon with only water from the spring and a few handfuls of dried pumpkin seeds to eat.

Again the swollen blue-violet clouds gathered in the afternoon, and as the rain fell, Grandma told the girls truly they were blessed.

“We are the last remnants of the Sand Lizard clan,” Grandma Fleet explained. “So many of us have died it's no wonder clusters of rain clouds gather over the old gardens.” The Sand Lizard people of the old gardens were never as numerous as their cousins who lived and farmed along the river before the reservations were made. When Indigo asked why the Sand Lizard people stayed there, if it was easier to grow plants close to the big river, Grandma Fleet laughed. Sand Lizards did things differently than other people. Sand Lizards didn't mind if others found them odd; that's how they distinguished themselves from others. Farming was easy along the river but getting along with the authorities was not.