Many years ago, say the Inuit, in the times when their grandfathers were young, a white man's Big Canoe, a whaling ship, got caught in the ice just off Point Barrow. The ship was squeezed tighter and tighter, with the great slabs and shelves piling higher and higher around her, giving off flashes of rainbow light in the freezing sunshine. After awhile, with a great cracking groan, her timbers gave way, and she sank swiftly.
Watching from the shore, the Inuit ventured out as close as they dared, across the deadly heaving groaning ice. They wanted to see if they could rescue anyone, or find anything good to use or trade. But they found no white men alive. Nothing remained of the ship but some shattered wood sticking out of the ice, right where it had closed over the ship and black icy water.
Nothing was alive - except a strange little Animal Being that the Inuit found wandering on the ice. It was the strangest Being that any of them had ever seen.
This Being was possibly a relative of the lynxes, and yet it did not look like a lynx at all. It actually walked right up to them, trembling with fright and cold. They scrutinized it a little nervously, weapons
ready to kill it, if necessary. But it did not try to hurt them, and it was also not afraid of them. Instead, it rubbed its side on the legs of their mukluks, with a questioning little cry in its high little voice.
The Inuit knew well the great silent lynx of those lands. They knew that the lynx did not ever do such a thing as rub on a person's mukluk. This Being was much smaller than the lynx, with little round paws
that were not suited to walk easily over snow. It did not have the thick coat or the ear-tufts of the lynx. Nor did it have the same color. Its pelt was painted, with white and red and black, in the same way that the northern Crees painted their faces sometimes.
The People were so amazed at the gentleness of this Being that finally some woman courageously bent and picked it up. The Being nestled into the front of the woman's parka, and made the sound of warm coals glowing that the lynx always makes when she is happy with her kittens. This was a very good sign.
So they took the Being back to their village. They wondered if it was good to eat. But it was so very small, and there was only one of it. It had no fat on it at all. The whole village would have been able to share only one bite of that Being.
Besides, they were curious about it, and they let it live. They had no word for this animal in their Inuit tongue, and so they called it the Gentle Being.
She was an excellent little traveler, staying clear of the dogs, and trotting right along the trail, following this family and that, with her tail straight up in the air. The tip of her tail always quivered gently with the good eager feeling in her. The people always liked seeing her tail standing straight up like that.
Now and then, the Gentle Being angled off into the tundra, and they had the chance to learn what an excellent hunter she was. Their march stirred up mice and birds, and she pounced on a mouse more swiftly than any wolf, stopping to eat it daintily with her delicate fangs, and then racing to catch up with them again. Sometimes she caught songbirds, and ate those as well.
And once in awhile, she brought a mouse as a mother lynx bringing food to her kittens. This touched the People deeply. "She cares for us," they told one another.
All during the summer, as the People lived in their hide shelters and watched the Sun do Her summer dance along the horizon, the Gentle Being went from shelter to shelter.
When the Sun once again sought Her own winter shelter in Her great igloo below the horizon, the People built their shelters of snow once again, and the Gentle Being went indoors with them, and flooded their lives with her warmth. She was a Sun Being of warm light, shaped into fur and fangs.
They wondered how long she would stay, and how long she would live. Every spring and summer, she called loudly for a mate, as the mother lynx does. "What a pity that there is not another of these Gentle Beings with us, a male one," said the chiefs. "If there were, we could have them breeding,
like our dogs. In this way, we would always have these Gentle Beings with us." The chiefs talked about this often. But no other Gentle Beings came their way.
And they were afraid to ask the occasional white trader if there might be a second Gentle Being to trade for, because the whites might want this valuable first one back. And, in the manner of the whites, they would simply steal this Gentle Being - and not even trade for her. This was the way the whites always did things.
With time, the People learned a very interesting and intriguing thing about the Gentle Being. They learned that she knew about healing. When anyone was sick, a child or an adult, the Gentle Being went
to that person right away, and sat close by and comforted that person with her Big Sound. Quickly the Gentle Being learned that it was welcome everywhere in the village.
The sled dogs barked at it furiously from their hide tethers, and it puffed up its hairs like a summer porcupine and spat back at them. If a dog gave chase, the Gentle Being was very smart and raced like the wind into the nearest igloo, where the dogs knew they were not allowed.
Inside, in the warmth of fur rugs and the golden light of the seal-oil lamps, the Gentle Being went from lap to lap. The People had already noticed that the Being was a female, and they never tired of touching her, and studying her, and sharing stories about her curious doings. They showed her off to visitors, because she made the village richer in her way. In fact, they even bragged about her a lot.
The Gentle Being loved to be touched. She would arch her back and make that soft, comforting fire-sound in her throat. The children loved to put their ears against her sides, so that they could listen to this
sound. When everyone curled up to sleep, the Gentle Being always picked someone to sleep next to. She curled up with her paws tucked under her chest in the most amazing way, to keep them warm, and she comforted that person with her Fire Song.
How wonderful her eyes were! Bright and clear yellow they were - but not like the Wolf's eyes. No, no! Her eyes were like the Sun! The pupils opened and closed in a magical way when the light shone into them.
And her fur! How soft it was! With time, it grew thicker from living there. The people were very glad of this, because they had always been afraid that she would freeze to death. During the coldest winter
days, she did not go outside much, or she might have frozen the delicate skin-pads on the bottoms of her feet.
Now and then, when the weather warmed, she would sit at the outer entrance of the igloo, out of the wind, catching the feeble sunlight that came her way. But that was only before or after the long arctic night.
When the People returned from the hunts, she always ventured out then. She sat with great dignity near the butchering work being done with the meat, and they gave her little gifts of tasty bits, fat and flesh. She liked that, and carried these little gifts off to eat them with great care. What a dainty
eater she was! Afterwards she washed herself and washed herself, till they wondered if she would wear her fur out with her tongue.
When summer came, the People left their igloos to melt away behind them, and found trails across the summer tundra to hunt summer meat and gather herbs, and enjoy the Sun and the smells of vegetation. The Gentle Being went with them.
When the Medicine Woman or Medicine Man came to do the doctoring and sang and drummed and worked with feathers and summer herbs, the Gentle Being sat right there, with her big yellow eyes fixed on the sick person. Her eyes brought the Sun's healing into their winter, the People said. "She knows just what to do," the healing women said. "She goes right to the part of the body that needs the work, and there she sits. Sometimes it is at the head. Other times the feet. And she stays till the work is done."
As the years passed, the fame of the Gentle Being spread through that north country. Stories about her were traded through many bands of the Inuit - and to the Crees even. Many were the Cree and Inuit traders who offered fine and valuable things in order to have this Gentle Being go with them to their own people, and do this healing work.
But the Point Barrow Inuit did not want to part with her - not even for valuable things of the white men, not even guns. "She is Good Medicine," they said, "She is healing. Her value cannot be measured in guns. It would be Bad Medicine to trade her away. She has come here to be with us, and
here she can stay."
So it came to pass that, in summer, when people could travel, that other Inuit, even Crees, made long journeys with their sick people across the tundra, and came to find these Point Barrow People in their hide shelters. They asked to have healing ceremonies with the Gentle Being present, doing her doctoring work.
This meant that the Inuit doctors were very busy in the summer. And since the sick people always made give-aways of appreciation, the Inuit were becoming wealthy with the give-away guns and pelts and blankets and metal needles and other wonderful things.
The stories of those healings were yet more stories to tell and be traded stories added to the growing Story-Belt of the Gentle Being. Once some white traders even heard about the Gentle Being, and came far to see her. However, the People were afraid that the white men of the Big Canoes had heard that she was there, and sent these others to take her away. So they hid the Gentle Being. They told the white men that she was visiting another people to do her healing work. The whites were very disappointed, and they left.
Yes, it could be said that the Gentle Being changed their lives.
It could be said.
One summer, she could not keep up with the People along the tundra trails. So one of the women put her in the thrown-back hood of her parka. The Gentle Being rode happily along in the hood, behind the woman's dark head, peering out over the furred edge of the hood. Her golden eyes still opened wide and dark at the sight of the songbirds, but she no longer hunted much, so the People trapped mice and brought them to her.
That winter, she got sick. The Medicine Women and Medicine Men all drummed over her, and sang their most powerful songs, and worked on her with their best feathers and other Medicines. But she was old, and it was her time to journey. So the glow of the Sun faded from her golden eyes. In the morning, they found her small body cold and stiff among the furs.
The people knew that her spirit was speeding into a new life. Perhaps she would be born out there on the tundra somewhere, as a Being of that great land - a lynx kitten, or a white wolf cub, or a polar bear. Or perhaps a musk ox, or one of those little songbirds that hatch in summer, and fly south by
autumn. Or even a seal.
"Perhaps she begins to move into the Human Circle," said one of the old men wisely.
This thought comforted them all.
At the same time, they missed her gentle presence, and they all cried. Then the women discussed what to do. They wanted to keep the warmth of that Gentle Being in their circle for always, and call her spirit to touch their sick ones.
Gently, respectfully, the women tanned that wonderful soft many-painted pelt with the greatest care. From it, they sewed a Medicine Bag, in which to keep all of their most precious healing things - teas, crystals, feathers, whatever was needed.
The most powerful of the Medicine Women became the Keeper of the Gentle Being Bag. This position became an influential one among the people. Only the most honorable and powerful woman could have it.
In this way, the Gentle Being would be with them for always.
The Inuit man who told the story to the Crees had seen that Medicine Bag himself, for his grandmother had been the Keeper of it. By then, the bag had been handled and used for two generations, and the fur was wearing off, just as the Inuit had always feared when she licked herself.
But the Healing Bag was no less loved for being worn, and would surely keep going till it fell apart.
The Montana metis who told me this story confided that his northern Cree cousin had to trade away four of his best stories, in order to get the story of the Gentle Being. The metis himself presented me the story, as a Gift. He gave it to me with all the care of a mother lynx bringing a mouse to her kittens. The End
~
Patricia Nell Warren ~
Note: Patricia Nell Warren has written widely on domestic cats and wild cats for a great many U.S. and foreign magazines. Her fifth novel, One Is the Sun (Ballantine Books) is the true story of a
great woman chief. This story is an "out-take" from that novel. She lives in Malibu, California, USA
