I Will Not Weep: A Novel of the Navajo Long Walk and Exile

By Janet Sabina

Author Janet Sabina says of her fictional Navajo characters: When the U.S.Army forces hundreds of Native American Navajo families from their homes to an internment camp in what is now New Mexico in 1864, I want readers to see the confusion, the blood, the despair.
When my young protagonist is unable to protect his mother and newborn brother as he promised his father he would, I want readers to fight tears as he promises himself, I will not weep. When he lies beside a meager fire suffering from small pox and wondering what death is like, I want readers to wonder too.
I want them to feel the humiliation of a young girl who has been sold as a slave when her owner rips a dress from her body. When she escapes with a young man of her people and builds a marriage ceremony with what she remembers from home, I want readers to celebrate with her.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Oct 5, 2012
• ISBN: 9781479722167

Janet Sabina

A retired church youth worker and curriculum writer, Janet Sabina was inspired to research and write “I Will Not Weep” by a trip to Canyon deChelly, Arizona. Author of the nonfiction book, “Can’t We DO Something? Story of Resistance to a Four Lane Highway” when she lived in Sedona, Arizona, Janet now lives with her husband in Boulder, Colorado where they cope with aging and take delight in three sons, three daughters-in-law and ten grandchildren.

Book preview

Copyright © 2012 by Janet Sabina.

Library of Congress Control Number:       2012917700

ISBN:         Hardcover                               978-1-4797-2215-0

                   Softcover                                 978-1-4797-2214-3

                   Ebook                                      978-1-4797-2216-7

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

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121272

For refugees forced from home in all times, including our own

And for those who find it possible not merely to survive great tragedy but to become what they might never have become without it.

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Contents

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER 1      FIVE YEARS LATER: THE WARNING

CHAPTER 2      YOUNGER BROTHER: THE CAVE

CHAPTER 3      MORNING LAUGHTER: THE SIEGE

CHAPTER 4      YOUNGER BROTHER: THE LONG WALK

CHAPTER 5      MORNING LAUGHTER: FLIGHT

CHAPTER 6      YOUNGER BROTHER: THE CAMP

CHAPTER 7      MORNING LAUGHTER: CAPTURE

CHAPTER 8      YOUNGER BROTHER: GRIEF

CHAPTER 9      MORNING LAUGHTER: WISDOM

CHAPTER 10      YOUNGER BROTHER: THE CITY WASHINGTON

CHAPTER 11      MORNING LAUGHTER: ESCAPE

CHAPTER 12      YOUNGER BROTHER: TREATY

CHAPTER 13      BRAVE WIFE: SEARCH

CHAPTER 14      BRAVE WIFE AND YOUNGER BROTHER: HOME

BIBLIOGRAPHY

AUTHOR’S NOTE

The boy and girl of this book are from my imagination, but the canyon they love is real and what happens around them is true. Living in the canyon now are descendants of those who survived the years of the story, l864 to l868. They tell their children of the time when soldiers forced their ancestors to leave home. They tell of the marvelous days when some of them returned. They are the Navajo people, the Dineh, of Canyon deChelly, Arizona.

PROLOGUE

Ared tailed hawk scanned the desert floor below, wings spread wide, beak and talons ready. When no lizard, snake or rodent presented itself for dinner, it flew on into a nearby canyon. Banking along smooth walls of orange stone, disappearing into bands of blackest shadow, rocketing up through shafts of golden light, the fierce bird searched for prey.

On the canyon floor two children herded sheep. Why do we have bald skins? asked a half-grown boy of the elder sister who walked beside him. If we had wool, we would not need sheep. There would be no taking them to grass, no guarding them from coyotes and bringing them home as the day ends.

He looked down at his woven shirt and the deerskin strips he had wrapped around his legs that morning. The strips were loose now. His sturdy brown legs showed through in several places. If we had wool like sheep, the mothers and grandmothers would not have to spin and weave to cover us with cloth. He laughed to think of his straight black hair grown to a curling thickness over all of him except his eyes and nose.

Elder Sister ran her hand over the dress she wore, a dress made with wool from the same sheep whose hooves clattered on the rocks ahead. A smile pushed her cheeks toward the eyes she turned toward her brother. You must take your questions to the Holy Ones who made all creatures, she said. Perhaps they were not pleased with the skin of snakes and lizards. Perhaps they grew tired of the fur of deer and mice. She walked on, placing her feet in Younger Brother’s dusty tracks for the joy of careful balance.

As cool air flowed down into the canyon from the rim above, the children followed the sheep toward the homeplace where Mother worked at her loom and Father added branches to the fence around the cornfield.

Besides, she said.

Besides what? asked the boy, his thoughts now far from his question.

Besides, I love sheep. I will never live without them.

Horses are better, insisted Younger Brother. They are fast. They let us ride them. Imagine sitting on a sheep with your feet dragging in the dust. Satisfied with his argument, the boy walked on until a new sight took his eyes and thoughts. Look, Elder Sister, baby quail."

Neither child spoke as they stopped to watch six tiny birds being taught to bathe. You scratch the dust aside like this, the bird parents seemed to say. Settle down in the place you have made – then flap your wings and throw the dust over your back. Quick now, try it.,

The human children stood stone-still, smiling at the young birds’ awkward imitation of their elders until a shadow passed over them. It’s a hawk! cried Elder Sister. Run, babies, run!

Stay together, shouted Younger Brother as the birds ran under a low bush to hide. He turned to Elder Sister. Two ran the other way. Will they be found? Will they be safe?

Yes, she said. The mother and father quail will find them. Of course they will.

CHAPTER 1

FIVE YEARS LATER: THE WARNING

On the last day when almost everything was as it should be, Younger Brother sat under a peach tree near the small stream beside his home. The peaches had been picked and dried long ago, but still he threw small stones toward imaginary targets to keep his skill for guarding the delicious fruit from crows and porcupines.

Mother sat at her loom in the brush shelter in these last days before cold weather would force the family to move inside the hogan. She wove a narrow stripe of red into a gray and white design while Elder Sister spun wool from last spring’s shearing of their sheep. Younger Brother was close enough to hear their words.

It is time for me to have a new name, said Elder Sister. My name is too small for a girl of fourteen winters."

But you are twice an elder sister now that our little one is born. Is it not so? Mother smiled down at the baby sleeping on a bed of blankets at her side.

Elder Sister leaned forward to touch the scrap of new life, born three days before. The baby’s birth was the most important miracle of her life so far, but it did not change the restlessness she felt as her own body grew and changed. I feel more important than my childhood name, she insisted.

Younger Brother snorted. He saw no reason to call his sister by a new name just because she was like a snake ready to shed a tight skin. Still, it might be good not to call her ‘Elder,’ a term of respect. He waited for Mother’s answer.

"You are coming to the beginning of your life as a woman, daughter. Perhaps the time has come to give you a larger name. ‘Big Feet’? she teased. Or ‘Dreams She is All Grown?’ "

Elder Sister examined her extended foot, then raised her gaze to Mother’s smiling eyes. ‘Laughter,’ she said. "I want ‘Laughter’ in my name.

Mother’s chin fell to her chest in a puzzling moment of sadness, but she soon raised it and looked at Elder Sister with steady eyes. Good. And I will choose a word to go with it. A flower perhaps? A skill? A time of day? She stopped her work to frown in concentration. Morning, she said. Of all who are in this family, you are the most happy as the day begins. ‘Morning Laughter’ comes to my mind and heart. Do you agree?

I do, answered Elder Sister. Thank you, Mother.

Rising now, she walked toward the horse corral, empty since the day when blue coat soldiers came with guns and took the ponies of her family for themselves. Younger Brother grieved for the loss of his favorite, Swift Wind. Father often leaned against the corral fence, head down, fists clenched. She saw him there now and hurried forward. Telling him her new name might bring a smile