Another Tribe

Part 5 Reluctant respect

In a kind of self-imposed exile, Julii spent more and more time alone with her pink-red-white man. She told herself it was because she liked learning but it was just easier than making up untruths about her feelings.

Her pink-white man never asked awkward questions that forced her to not tell the truth, not even about his wounded head. He just taught her new words, and with those words, new knowledge. Because of her white man, because of her Robert, Julii now knew things that no one else in her tribe had ever known. Things like the fact the long pieces of wood tied to his legs with hide were called "splints".

Another word in the growing number of words in Julii's new world was "crutch".

And after a while, Robert could use the crutches Julii had made him to leave the wigwam and hobble to the waterhole under his own power.

This was a far better arrangement for Julii because she no longer had to answer all those searching questions as her father and Ringwind carried him.

Now, they could walk slowly together and, once there, they would sit and communicate and. Although Robert had run out of things to point to, Julii was now ready to focusing on conceptual words.

He would say worlds like "boat" while floating a leaf on the water.

Robert would say: "carriage.", then he would draw something in the dirt being pulled by horses on round wooden things called "wheels".

The wheels had things inside them that Robert drew and called "spokes".

Julii already knew what a horse, even two horses, looked like, but she did not imagine they would enjoy being tied to a big wooden structure like a carriage.

Julii asked if he had actually seen one of these things for himself and Robert talked of a place where there were hundreds of carriages and thousands of horses.

Robert also talked of a thing called "house". A house, not a horse, was a wigwam made of rocks and wood, not bent saplings and tree bark, and many houses together made a thing called a "street".

Julii loved hearing about all of these strange and wonderful things but began to wonder if such an extraordinary place could really exist? Sometimes a drawing in the dirt or Robert's descriptions would be too fantastic to believe. She wondered if he was making it all up.

Had she caught the ability to not tell the truth from him? That was very possible because she had never done it before meeting him. She felt gullible and wanted to be cautious but she really liked the fact that Robert admired her ability to learn. She could see it in his face sometimes, and that made her very keen to believe his fantastic claims.

Sometimes he said ridiculous things like: "A thing called a street had big stone or wood houses on both sides for as far as the eye can see."

He said these things as though they were in no way special. Then he would add outrageous statements like: "And in the wide gap between the houses, hundreds of carriages carried tons of cargo and hundreds of people."

Eventually, and without noticing the change, Julii and Robert were having conversations. No longer one word, a drawing, then another word, whole series of words were being exchanged. Within each series there would be another new word, which meant Julii learned another, then another, and another until she became proficient in his tongue. Each new word somehow carried Julii away from her tribe towards an unknown existence which felt a lot like her destiny.

So, when the splints came off and Robert said it was time for him to leave, Julii could not even consider the idea of not leaving with him.