II
One day they came again—these fierce, implacable white men—preceded by warriors in blue, who rode big horses—horses ten times as large as a burro, and they were all agrin like wild cats, and they camped near the Iron Khiva, and the war chief sent word to all the men of the hill to assemble, for he intended to speak to them. “Your Little Father is here also, and wishes to see you.”
All night this imperious summons was debated by the fathers, and at last it was agreed that six old men should go down—six gray grandsires—and hear what this war chief had to say.
“We can but die a few days before our time,” they said. “If they carry us into the East to torture us—it will not be for long. Our old bones will soon fall apart.”
So while all the villagers sat on their housetops to watch in silence and dread, the aged ones wrinkled, gray, and half blind, made their sad way down toward the peace grove in which the white lodges of the warriors glittered. With unfaltering steps led by the chief priest of the Antelope Clan, they approached and stood in silence before the war chief of the bluecoats who came to meet them. Speaking through a Tinné interpreter, he said:
“The Great Father, my chief, has sent me to tell you this. You must do as this man says,” and he pointed at the man in black. “He is your teacher. He has come to gather your children into that Iron House and teach them the white man’s ways. If you don’t—if you make war—then I will go up against you with my warriors and my guns that go boom, boom, boom, a hundred times, and I will destroy you. These are the commands of my chief.”
When the old men returned with this direful message, despair seized upon the people. “Evil times are again upon us,” they cried. “Surely these are the iron men more terrible than before.”
They debated voluminously all night long, and at last decided to fight—but in the early morning a terrible noise was heard below on the plain, and when they rushed to see—behold the warriors in blue were rushing to and fro on their horses, shouting, firing off their appalling weapons. It was plain they were doing a war dance out of wanton strength, and so terrible did they seem that the hearts of the small people became as wax. “We can do nothing against such men; they are demons; they hold the thunder in the palms of their hands. Let us submit; perhaps they will grow weary of the heat and sand and go away. Perhaps they will long for their wives and children and leave us. We will wait.”
Others said: “Let us send our children—what will it matter? We can watch over them, they will be near us, and we can see that they do not forget our teachings. Our religion will not vanish out of their minds.”
So the old men went again to the war chief, and, with bowed heads and trembling voices, said: “We yield. You are mighty in necromancy and we are poor and weak. Our children shall go to the Iron Khiva.”
Then the war chief gave them his hand and smiled, and said: “I do not make war with pleasure. I am glad you have submitted to the commands of my great chief. Live in peace!”