Free Killing Custer by Margaret Coel Page A

cleared. Already in the office, Father John thought. Waiting for the onslaught of calls begging the priests—the white priests—to talk to the white cops in Lander. He could imagine the pleas. Just because the warriors were there didn’t mean they were guilty of murder. Guilty of being there was all.
    Elena was swishing dishes at the sink, her back to him. He shook a little more dried food into the dog’s dish in the corner and poured himself a cup of coffee. He was about to help himself to a bowl of the hot oatmeal on the stove when Elena said, “I’ll get it, Father.” She still didn’t turn around. Somewhere in her seventies; he had no idea how old she was. Ageless, really. Keeping house and cooking for the priests at St. Francis Mission for more years than anyone remembered. But she remembered everything. Pastors whose portraits now lined the front corridor of the administration building, watching him every day past rimless glasses, sometimes smiling, he had imagined, often frowning. Oh, Elena remembered the stories. How Father Peter quoted Shakespeare. A Shakespearean quote for everything. How Father Michael had run straight for Eagle Hall when he thought AIM had occupied the building. How Father Barry had kept the elderly Father Benson at the mission after he lost his eyesight.
    Father John sat down at the table and sipped at the coffee, watching the old woman dry her hands, toss aside the towel, and ladle scoops of oatmeal into a bowl before she faced him. Eyes red-rimmed and sunken, as if she’d spent the night crying. Red blotches dotted her neck and cheeks.
    â€œSit down and tell me what’s going on,” he said as she set a bowl of oatmeal in front of him.
    Elena filled a coffee mug, slid onto the chair, and patted a strand of gray hair into place. “I should have stopped the killing,” she said.
    The statement took him by surprise. He was about to take a spoonful of oatmeal, but he set the spoon down and waited.
    â€œIt’s still going on.” Her voice cracked. She blinked hard against the tears shining in her eyes. “The killing and hatred. God help me. I could have stopped it.”
    â€œElena.” He reached over and took her hand. It felt small inside his own, her palm warm and smoothed with age. “Is this about yesterday?”
    She stared at him a moment before she nodded. “I had a dream vision Saturday night.”
    Father John understood. Men went off by themselves, fasted and prayed for three days for a vision, but women received visions in their dreams. “Do you want to tell me about it?”
    â€œA lot of horses circling around soldiers. Around and around, the warriors shouting and yelling. I saw the white chief with the big hat fall off his horse. I knew he was dead.” She took in a gulp of air. “I thought I should go and find him, tell him not to march in the parade. Tell him to leave our land.”
    â€œDo you think it would have done any good? Do you think he would have left?”
    â€œYes.” Elena bent her head into her hands. “I heard my grandfather’s stories running through my head. How his father was camped with Chief Black Kettle at the Washita River. It was 1868, four years after the fool soldiers killed the people at Sand Creek. Killed both Cheyennes and Arapahos, women, children, old people. Everyone they could shoot. After that, Black Kettle kept leading the people around the plains, trying to stay out of the way of the soldiers, waiting for the government to tell them where they should go and live. Then Custer brought more soldiers to the village, and it happened again. Killed Black Kettle and his wife, Woman To Be Hereafter. Left their bodies floating in the river. So many people lying on the ground, crying with pain. They shot my great-grandfather in the hip and left him for dead. Grandfather said he never walked right after that. Custer took his hostages. Children and old