Shades of Splinter Run

I WAS FORBIDDEN TO go alone to Splinter Run, but the rain that fell overnight tempted me to ignore my father’s order. Meadowlark calls pulled me over the dips and rolls of the Oklahoma prairie. A quarter mile away I could see the Washita River, trailing coffee-colored ripples through the freshly washed prairie green.

Splinter Run had been named by my father when he first came to this land years before. He said the creek split the prairie like a splinter split your skin. I gazed across the foaming water to my favorite thinking spot on the opposite bank. The rising sun behind me highlighted something I had not seen there before. Curious, I leaped the narrow run and bent over the object. It took only a couple of seconds to recognize what it was.

It was a bone.

Sunk in the soil between tree roots, the end of the bone stuck out from the imprisoning soil only a halfinch or so. It must have been freshly uncovered by the recent runoff. I dug around it with my fingers until I could get a grip on it and pull it free. It was slightly curved, slender, about six inches long with knobby ends. “Probably a coyote,” I said to myself. But I had seen many coyote bones and this bone wasn’t quite the same shape. Pa would know. I tucked the bone inside my apron pocket and started for home.

That evening after supper, Pa sat outside relaxing. I slipped out, sat at his feet and pulled the bone from my pocket. “Pa? I found this beside Splinter Run today. It’s not a coyote bone is it?”

He frowned at my admitted disobedience but took the bone in his calloused fingers. The last lingering daylight was settling over the land in liquid pools. There was just enough light to see.

He looked at the bone, turned it over, and laid it beside his foot. “This isn’t from a coyote or a fox. Could you find the spot again?”

I could tell he wanted to say more. His lips were pressed tightly together to keep the words imprisoned. I didn’t remark on his expression, only answered his question. “Sure. It was stuck between two roots of the cottonwood at the run.”

“I want you to show me where you found this. And Zephyr, you know I don’t want you to go near that creek without telling someone where you are.

I’ve told you before. The banks could crumble, and you could drown. Why did you disobey me?”

Hanging my head, I mumbled something about the beautiful dawn. Pa didn’t say anything for a long time. Then I heard his low chuckle. “I understand how the day can beckon you, but Daughter, if I hear of you disobeying me again there will be consequences. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” I murmured. I looked up and caught the twinkle in his eyes. He knew me so well! He held out his hand, took mine and pulled me to my feet.

After breakfast the next morning we set out for the run. Pa carried his spade. It took only a few minutes to reach the creek. I pointed out the exact spot where I had found the bone. Pa leaped the run and stared at the spot, measuring with his eyes. Then he started to dig. The bones weren’t buried deep, only a couple of inches under the earth. Most of them were tangled in the remains of what had once been bright red calico. The soil had stained it so much it was now colored a bloody brown. From each shoulder of the dress hung three small bells knotted at the ends of blue ribbons. By them we knew the bones had belonged to an Indian.

Even to my inexperienced eye I could recognize ribs, some vertebra, the pelvic bone, an arm bone, and a leg bone. The bone I had found was the left collar bone. Nearly all the bones from the right side were gone, probably carried away long ago by varmints.

Pa stopped digging once he found the skull. He left it mostly hidden. I saw him frown, lean over, pluck something from the dirt near the small bones of the spine and slip it into his pocket.

He shot me a troubled glance. Then he walked a short distance and sat down with his back against one of the willow trees. I sat beside him. “Pa?”

He didn’t turn his head or tear his gaze away from the western horizon. “Yes?”

“These bones... they aren’t very big, are they?”

“No.” He sighed heavily. “They are the bones of a child.”

“Way out here?” I gasped. I loved the prairie, the endless space, the wildness. But I was alive to feel the wind. I was alive to marvel at the stars. These bones nestled between the cottonwood roots on the bank of Splinter Run were deserted, alone, lonely. They

were dead. A heavy and unexpected weight of sadness settled onto my shoulders.

Pa turned to gaze into my face. “You know what happened here a long time ago?”

“No. What?”

Dropping his head, Pa stared at the moist earth between his boots. “There was a lot of killing.”

“You mean a battle? Like in the war?”

“Not the war you’re thinking of, not the Civil War. This was a few years after. People fleeing the destruction of that war flooded out west here. There were already people claiming this land.”

“You mean the Indians,” I remarked smugly.

“Yes, the Indians. Mostly the Southern Cheyenne and the Arapaho. They’re all on reservations now. You know that.”

I nodded.

“Well, in the time I’m talking about, they roamed over this land freely. It was theirs, claimed by their ancestors for generations. But to the people flooding in here from Virginia and Tennessee these were vacant acres, vacant miles, unused by anyone. Whenever two such different ideas hit head-on there’s bound to be trouble. And trouble there was.”

“What trouble?” I asked, my curiosity aroused.

“Threats. Fighting. Killing. Death on both sides.”

“Oh,” I breathed. Out on the prairie the courting meadowlarks lifted into the sunlight, glided, and settled back into the grass. How many more bones did this thick mat hide? I shuddered before I asked my next question. “Pa? The fighting wasn’t right here was it?”

“I don’t know. I do know the worst of it was over on the Washita River.”

“Then how did this little girl get here?”

My father turned to me again. He didn’t speak, but I saw he knew the answer. I waited breathlessly while the meadowlarks continued to court only yards from where I sat. Pa did something he’d never done before. He reached for my hand and held it tightly. “I’m going to tell you because I think you’re mature enough to hear. You’ve always been the one to search for answers.”

I hung my head. Pa let me stew a minute, then squeezed my hand and chuckled lightly.

“Tell me, Pa. Tell me how this girl got way out here,” I pleaded. “Zephyr, sometimes, like now, I wish you were distractable.” My father sighed, a long, shuddering sigh. “I think she escaped from the fight on the Washita. I think she was wounded, and this is as far as she was able to go.” “Why do you think that?” I asked. Pa pulled the object he’d found from his pocket. Wordlessly, he dropped it into my palm. It was heavy. It was a bullet. “Oh, no!” I choked. “But—but her mother was with her, or her aunt, or her sister. Weren’t they? They wouldn’t leave her lying on top of the ground! They wouldn’t let her suffer alone.”

“I don’t know. You’ve got to remember that a battle was going on. People get confused during a battle. They run without thinking. Children get lost.” Pa’s eyes returned to staring toward the far horizon.

My mind wrapped around his words and built a complete picture. From the size of the bones I knew that this child hadn’t been much older than my little sister Ella. I couldn’t stop the image forming in my mind. I imagined Ella hurt, alone, panting with fear and pain, collapsing on the bank of this little slip of a creek to die. From the position of the bones I knew she had curled into a tight ball of misery. To my embarrassment I began to cry. Pa pulled me close and let me sob into his chest. Finally, he spoke. “I’ll come out here after supper and gather this child’s bones. If you want, you can come with me. We’ll give her a proper place to rest. Would you like that?”

“Yes,” I managed to whisper.

My father didn’t say anything else. He got to his feet and pulled me to stand beside him. I dropped the lead ball between the cottonwood roots. We leaped Splinter Run and together walked back to our soddy outlined against the prairie-blue sky.

Twilight was beginning to soften the low hills when Pa and I arrived at the cottonwood again. We spent two hours carefully pulling the bones from the soil and laying them together in the old pillowcase my mother had given me. I tore the brass bells from the dress and put them in my pocket. After Pa reverently laid the skull with the rest of the skeleton, he gathered the ends of the material together and tied the bundle securely.

He climbed the cottonwood, pulling the bundle with him. There he wedged it between two branches. Carefully he wound rope around the branches to secure the bones. Then in silence my father and I walked home in the silver moonlight.

I mourned for that Indian child. I’m sure I didn’t help myself by keeping the bells in my apron pocket. I pressed the story of that little girl so deeply into my mind that I could call her forth, complete, any time of the day or night. I even gave her a name to call her by—Willow Shade.

Sometimes, with Pa’s permission, I’d spend hours with Willow Shade beside Splinter Run. I had never been curious about Indians before I found the bones. I didn’t really know much about their lives. Still, Willow Shade had been a child and I knew about children. In my mind I watched her as she played, running through the fragrant grass chasing the prairie chickens or following the bright butterflies. She carried water from the Washita to her family and helped her mother dig wild turnips just like I had done. She played with her doll. I made her into a child very like my own sister. I didn’t realize the folly of this until I began dreaming.

I didn’t dream every night, but I dreamed often. I’d badgered Pa into telling me all he knew about the battle thirty years before. As a consequence, my dreams were filled with details from that time. I could feel the winter wind and hear it howl above me as I lay beside the frozen run. One night I dreamed the thudding of horses’ hooves pounding the ground around me.

During the day I thought about my dreams, turning them over and over in my mind. There didn’t seem any way to keep Willow Shade from haunting me. I lost weight, I grew impatient and distracted. My family eyed me and kept their distance. Finally, I went to my father for advice. He listened while I explained my dreams and the connection I felt to Willow Shade.

When I finished he stroked my cheek. “I think you are bothered that this burial is so anonymous. Can you think of some way to mark this child’s resting place?”

I fidgeted on the sack of feed I was perched upon. I felt the bells in my apron pocket resting against my leg. An idea flashed through my brain. I searched my father’s concerned face and nodded. “I think I can, Pa. I think I know exactly what to do!”

Back inside the soddy I pulled one of my hair ribbons from my bandbox. Carefully I threaded the bells onto the red satin, tying each one in place. Once I had all six of them strung, I ran outside, found my father tightening the wire fence around the chicken yard and asked permission to go back to Splinter Run. He didn’t question me. He did give me an understanding smile with his nod.

I dashed over the prairie, scattering the meadowlarks. Minutes later I stood looking through the large green leaves at the lonely bundle wedged in the cottonwood. I climbed the tree and tied the ribbon to the branch above Willow Shade’s bones. Back on the ground I felt a breeze tickle my body. High in the branches the small brass bells sent forth their music. I laughed in delight.

I sat beneath the tree until the summer sun slipped over the western horizon. With a final word of farewell to Willow Shade I leaped over the creek and headed home. I met my father coming for me. Together we walked toward our lamplit home. Someday, maybe I would know why people found it necessary to fight each other. Perhaps then I would understand how a child’s violent death could be celebrated by anyone. But I knew I would never feel any joy about little Willow Shade dying alone on the frozen, wind-swept prairie with no one to comfort her.

I pushed the door open. My family looked up from the laden table. It was our time now to live on this spot of prairie. Pa closed the door behind me, shutting us all in tight. Above the soddy, the summer stars began to shine. In the cottonwood beside Splinter Run they lit the bells that marked the lonely remains of an Indian child. The stars shone on us all without prejudice, without judgment, white and Indian alike. Somehow, they gave me hope.

Neala Ames

Neala Ames is a retired teacher who has loved to write since she was five years old. While on a family vacation she saw the Washita Massacre site in Oklahoma, and it affected her deeply. Growing up in the late 1950’s and early 1960’s, Ms. Ames enjoyed all the television westerns and the American West captured her mind. She loves writing stories about the American experience. Now a resident of Arizona, she is surrounded by the history she loves so well. She lives in the central highlands with her husband and her three dogs.

Ms. Ames maintains a Facebook page where she keeps her followers updated on the short stories that find a home. She has recently placed stories with Soteira Press, Ariel Chart, Scarlet Leaf, and Wild Violet. Work on more short stories as well as a full-length novel occupies much of her time. She welcomes all new readers to join her established base.

“Shades of Splinter Run” is her first short story to be featured in Saddlebag Dispatches.