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He first experienced Randy's legendary temper a few weeks later when Ms Phillips passed back their term papers in Contemporary American Civilization. She handed Brant his paper with a smile. "You did very well in tracing the settlement of the Scots in the state. I'm delighted that you distinguished between the Scots-Irish who settled in the coastal areas and the Highlanders, many of whom moved further inland."

She held out Randy's paper. "Randy, as consistently high as your test grades have been, I can't understand how you could turn in a paper like this."

Randy snatched the paper from her hand, looked at the mass of red ink spread across the pages, then threw it to the floor, screaming, "Tla-hv, tla-hv."

"Stop that, Randy!"

The other students watched warily as Brant jumped up and grabbed him by the arm. "Randy, stop!" He shook him. "Stop, damn it!"

Randy shrieked on until Brant hit him. Suddenly sobered, he looked at Brant in surprise just as the headmaster raced through the door. "Both of you come with me," he ordered.

Once in his office, he looked at an unsettled Brant, a sullen Randy. "Randy, I've tolerated all of this nonsense I'm going to. You're suspended for a week. Brant, I'm shocked that you're involved. What happened?"

"I was trying to calm Randy down. It was his term paper. Ms Phillips wrote something all over it, but I didn't get a chance to see what."

"Go get it. I want to see what was so terrible."

Brant slipped out to pick up the paper. On the way back to the office, he read what she had written across the top: 'You have obviously used a lot of fictional material. Most of this is pure supposition.' With a grade of F, Randy would fail a course required for graduation.

He handed the paper to the headmaster and waited while he read the comments then directed a questioning look at Randy before he spoke. "Sir, Ms Phillips is wrong. Randy deserves an A."

The headmaster arched an eyebrow. "Do you know more about Civilization than she does?"

"No, sir, but I know Randy did a lot more work on his paper than I did on mine and I got an A."

"Well, Randy?"

When Randy glowered at him without speaking, the headmaster turned to Brant. "Go ask Ms Phillips to come to the office."

The teacher was standing in the outer office talking to the secretary. "I thought he might want to see me," she said to Brant.

"Explain yourself to Ms Phillips." The headmaster demanded of Randy.

"Why should I when she doesn't believe anything I say?"

"Let me." Brant interrupted.

"What do you know about it?" Ms Phillips asked impatiently.

"Randy and I worked together on our papers. I mean he worked on his and I worked on mine, but we did them on his computer. I know his paper can't be that bad, because I proof read it for him while he read mine, and he did lots of research in his father's collection."

"Ms Phillips?" The headmaster asked.

"It differs markedly in several areas from the authorities quoted in our text. Since they are authorities, I must assume Randy is wrong, especially since several of the facts he presented to support his position are not in any source that I've studied. They contradict much of what is generally known and accepted, yet he wrote it in the first person as if he'd actually been on the Trail of Tears."

"But he was, Ms Phillips." Brant said.

"Impossible! How could Randy personally know so much about an event that took place nearly two hundred years ago?"

"The text has only the observations of the white soldiers and a few others. it doesn't have much from the Indians. Randy's dad collected a lot of information about it from the Old-ones. One or two of them actually on the march were still alive back then, while others heard about it from their parents and family who survived it. Randy spent hours listening to the tapes and translating them into English to use in his paper."

"You speak the Cherokee language, Randy?" The headmaster seemed surprised.

"I'm Cherokee. What else would I speak." He mumbled.

"And Dutch and Spanish, too," Brant added.

"But how?" Ms Phillips asked.

"We speak them all at home," Randy grudgingly admitted.

"Where did you get the tapes? You identified them in the bibliography as from a private collection."

Randy retreated into his sullen silence, so Brant continued. "The tapes are in his dad's collection. A lot about the Trail of Tears came from Randy's great great great grandfather."

He looked at Randy. "Did I get that right?"

When Randy nodded, Brant continued. "He was old enough to remember what happened on the march. He told his son and Randy's father recorded what he knew about it before he died. Dr. von den Acker made all of the tapes Randy used in his research."

"You seem to know more about Randy and his family than he does," the headmaster remarked.

"Randy and I talk a lot about things, and Doctor von den Acker tells us a lot about his studies of the Eastern Cherokee and the Cherokee Nation. It must be great to be real part of American history like Randy's family is."

The headmaster stared at Brant. "You're very persuasive." He lifted the torn smudged paper from his desk and flipped through it. "Do you have another copy, Randy?"

Randy shrugged. "I can print one out."

"Bring it to me tomorrow morning. I was a social studies major, too, Ms Phillips, but I learned very little about Indians. I doubt you did, either, so I wonder if either one of us is really capable of grading this paper. I'll send the copy to the university for evaluation, if that meets with your approval."

"If you feel it's necessary."

"I do." He turned his gaze back to Randy. "If you apologize to Ms Phillips for your behavior, I'll try to see that your work is properly evaluated, and I'll forego the suspension."

Randy still glowered, but managed a half-civil apology.

"Brant, as it's near the end of fourth hour and you seem to have some influence on Randy, you're excused from the rest of the period. Take Randy somewhere quiet and try to talk some sense into him."

Randy started to growl but Brant grabbed his arm and snapped, "Shut up!" He dragged Randy to a quiet corner of the library but when Randy refused to talk, they sat in silence until the bell rang. Randy refused to eat lunch, so Brant walked with him around the school's track until time for fifth hour class.

During the drive home after school, Randy growled under his breath until he stopped the car under the porte cochere, then looked at Brant in disgust. "Now maybe you know what I mean about unakas treating Indians like shit. Phillips doesn't give a damn about what really happened, so my paper's worthless because I tried to give our view of how things actually were instead of what her so-called experts thought. It's for sure she's never even heard of the old man, much less read one of his books."

"She can't help it if she doesn't know any better, and the headmaster's at least going to send your paper to the U to make sure you get a fair grade. He didn't have to, you know."

"I guess."

Suddenly aware, Randy grabbed Brant in a bear hug. Finally letting him go, he stared into his eyes. "You saved my ass, you know? I'll get a good grade because everybody in the department knows the old man's work, but if you hadn't argued Watson into it, I'd of got the F. The old man would kill me if I didn't graduate." He gave Brant a weak grin. "Be funny as hell if the department secretary gives it to him to grade. You remember the time I helped you with your leg and you said you wished you could do something for me? Well, you just did and double. God, I love you."

Saturday morning Randy slept in, not going down for breakfast until after nine. He was surprised to see his father still sitting at the table reading a student's paper over a second cup of coffee.

He waited until Randy had gotten his grapefruit, toasted English muffin, and coffee, and had taken the other chair before holding out the paper Randy had written with a large A+ scrawled across the top.

"Oh, my God! They did give it to you to grade."

His father shook his head. "Mark Ahrens graded it and passed it on to me because he found it so interesting. You did an excellent job in your translation of the tapes. I found only two minor errors, and both happen to be words no longer in common usage. I'm very pleased with your work, Sequoyah. In fact, you have picked up on a number of items in your translation that I missed, because my interest at that time was elsewhere. With your permission, I'd like to excerpt several sections of your paper for inclusion in my new book."

"You're kidding!"

"Not at all, son. Your research is superb and your writing excellent. Of course I'll give you full credit for your translation and work."

"Damn! I'm still in high school and I'm getting research published."

His father smiled. "I don't know why you should be surprised. Your overall knowledge of the subtleties of the Cherokee language is greater than mine and you were a big help to me over the past two summers. But where did you learn such excellent research skills?"

"You taught me."

"I?"

"Sure. Remember last summer and the one before when you sent me home with all those notes and lists of references to look up? That's how I learned."

"Good heavens! I was delighted with the way you had all that material organized; it saved me hours of work. But I had no idea that you would learn so much from the experience. If you continue to use what you have learned in such an outstanding way, you will make a superb scholar. How did it happen that your paper came to my department for grading?"

"Ms Phillips said I made most of it up and gave me an F."

"And you started cursing her in Cherokee and got sent to the office, I've no doubt."

Randy winced. "How'd you know?"

"Though you may think I know little of you, son, I've observed you in varying circumstances, so I have a fair expectation of your reactions to situations. Despite the fact that you were graded unfairly by your teacher in this instance, how did your paper come to the department?"

"It was Brant. He argued with Watson that Ms Phillips didn't know anything about us, so he sent it."

"You were fortunate to have Brant to stand up for you. Considering his retiring nature, I'm as surprised that he would openly disagree with one of his teachers and the headmaster as I was over the fight. Remind me to send your teacher a copy of my main work on Native American cultures. Perhaps she will use it to her benefit. Now, have you anything in particular that you wanted to do this morning?"

"No, sir."

"Excellent. I've been wanting to talk to you."

"About what?"

"Your behavior. Over the past year or so, I've noticed that with the exception of Brant, you are abusive to everyone your own age and with older people who tend to reject your heritage."

"I told you I'm sick of 'em throwing off on me because I'm Indian." Randy interjected.

"I know, and in a subtle way your dear mother endured far more prejudice than you have been subjected to. I've watched you grow in your Cherokee heritage when it would have been far easier if you had chosen to pass and live as a white man. Knowing, too, that you've had to straddle both worlds with being educated and living in a white dominated society unless you're on the reservation."

"Should I have gone against what mother and grandfather taught me?"

"Of course not; you couldn't. I'm proud of you, and I won't deny that watching you try to cope has made some of my study of current Native American problems much clearer. But your aggressiveness in trying to impose your heritage on others, rather than treating it as natural and trying to find common interests, has turned those your own age against you. I regret not having been more attentive to your needs, son, for I might have been able to ease some of the isolation you've felt. Yet, I thought it wise to let you to decide which path you wanted to follow, just as you have in your relationship with Brant. Now, I think, you must begin to pay attention to how you're going to function in a white culture."

"But being Indian is the only way I can understand the old ways and preserve them. You know the younger ones are learning the language again, and maybe someday they'll want to know about the old ways, too."

His father looked at him thoughtfully then nodded. "You already know things which I never shall and perhaps I was wrong in not letting you continue your studies with the shaman. But you needed to be educated in the white man's world, because that is where you live and will work. Your knowing what he taught you as one of the People gives you greater knowledge than I can have. But you must remember that as an anthropologist you'll be trying to communicate these things to those of differing cultures. It's been easy with Brant because of his eagerness to learn about you as a Cherokee, but that won't be the case with anyone else. You must learn to respect those who don't feel as you do, either in terms of your heritage or your relationship with Brant. Right or wrong, they are as entitled to their opinions as you, but it won't be easy for either you or Brant."

"Why the hell won't people mind their own business and let us mind ours?"

"Partly because you force them to acknowledge things they'd rather not." His father looked at him sadly. "Oh, son, son, haven't you realized by now that you are as nearly complete in your Indian persona as you will ever be? You've tried to preserve what your mother and your grandparents have taught you, but it's only a remnant of the real culture. The rest has been lost through acculturation. I've spent my professional life searching and, as you have seen, only some of the traditional stories and a few artifacts remain. Willingly or not, Native Americans of all the nations have had to assimilate much from the European cultures just to survive. Can you even imagine living without the things you have?"

"No." Randy shook his head mournfully. "I guess I've known it, because I told Brant I could never go back completely to the old ways because there's too much of the unaka's world I enjoy."

"I'm delighted that you have come to understand this at your age. I'm also proud of what you represent, of what you'd like to be. I've watched you struggle to preserve that which you believe in so strongly, but you can no more go back to old ways that no longer exist than I can go back into the culture of my own family. It's evolution. The old is discarded, the new taken up, a process as old as history itself.

"Remember our trip to Pennsylvania, how you wondered about the Amish? It's the same. They won't be able to preserve their way of life forever, no matter how they try. Their group gets smaller each year. Nothing in life is a constant. The new eventually overcomes the old and the old becomes a curiosity. You know that by the end of the eighteenth century the Cherokee had turned from a warrior nation into an agrarian society by emulating the European settlers." He paused at Randy's stricken look. "Perhaps I let you try to live by the old ways a little too long, son, but surely this must have crossed your mind many times."

Randy gave him a rueful look. "I guess. But I kept hoping ..."

"I want you to keep on hoping, son, if you're going to be a cultural anthropologist like myself. It's hope that keeps us searching for clues to the past. Some of the shamans, your grandparents, and a few families who live in the remoter areas of the reservation and have little to do with outsiders represent as much as remains of the old way. Certainly you don't seriously believe in things like the night walkers, do you?"

Randy grew reflective. He did miss sitting at the feet of the old shaman in the respectful way, learning the history of his people and the sacred ways, even magic. And there was magic, for after his vision quest and study he could do things no one not a shaman could. His answer came with difficulty.

"Not really, I guess. I know witches are simply an extension of believing there's an evil power, just like believing angels represent good."

"That's very astute of you. You've struggled to separate the two cultures in which you live and, at the same time, fuse the old religion with your Christian faith. I'm especially proud of your success in that regard, the way you have shown a desire to live within the constraints of the Cherokee prayer I love."

"Which one is that?"

"Oh Great Spirit, help me always to speak the truth quietly, to listen with an open mind when others speak, and to remember the peace that may be found in silence." His father smiled. "Well, perhaps you don't always speak quietly or listen to others too well."

Randy looked shamefaced. "I guess not."

"But as I was saying, you must realize that you have to blend the other elements of your duality into one in order to be your real self. To continue to try to maintain them as separate entities and move back and forth between them will result in your being a failure and miserable. That's why so many Indian men have turned to drink."

"I know. I told Brant about it. I guess I just didn't want to admit it to myself."

"Now that you have, I hope things will be easier for you. When you and Brant can take my classes, I think you'll find some of my lectures a real help in working this out." He smiled. "You have something to teach me and my students, too. I'd like to ask for your help with my current class of graduates quite soon."

"How?"

"In much the same way you were a help on the dig last summer. I'll talk to you about it in a week or two, if you're willing."

Randy smiled. "I'd like that."