Tempered Magazine December 2013 // January 2014 // Issue 01 | Page 14
Happy Anderson’s popliteal artery
freely somewhere beneath the
had been severed just below the
skin. In its day it had been an
knee by a branch as he broke
adept appendage, one of the few
through the canopy on his way
the nation had to offer that could
down. His heartbeat reverberated
fully capture Roosevelt’s concern
through his forehead like the report
as he pondered the Africans. Ape-
from a Hotchkiss as it pumped
like. Naked savages. Living in the
the blood out to mix with Sitting
woods preying on creatures not
Bull’s and the dirt. Half a century
much wilder than themselves.
back twenty Medals of Honor were
given to soldiers for irrigating Pine
Ridge with what they could get
shooting holes in the Lakota, but
unfortunately Happy Anderson
would receive no awards.
Happy Anderson died broken and
alone on the forest floor. That night,
the stony men on the mountain
watched the lights of the search
party return to Keystone and go
dark, the body not yet recovered.
His right shoulder, already strained
Now more than ever, they needed
from a long day of etching the
comfort, but it would be a lie to tell
furrows into Teddy Roosevelt’s
them that it wasn’t their fault. The
brow, had lost its moorings as
Black Hills needed more blood and
he’d struggled with the tram’s
it was their turn to give it.
emergency brake. It now floated
14