IN HIS EYES, SHE FOUND no understanding. There was no condemnation, no contrition or desire for absolution. What she saw was the impassive glare of a man who saw himself standing higher than she ever could, from eyes of sapphire blue. He showed no disgust and put on no airs of superiority. Instead, he simply stood, listening to her impassioned words, his eyebrow raised ever so slightly.
This was not the eyes of a guilty fellow begging forgiveness for the sins committed by those before them. Nor were these the eyes of a man who saw himself superior to her. No, this were eyes of a man who saw no wrong in the events that preceded this moment. Was it heartlessness? Or his hot-blooded patriotism? It was hard to say.
When she was finished, there was but a moment of silence, before Funny Valentine spoke.
“I can sense there is much hunger in you. A hunger for truth. A hunger for justice. A hunger for vengeance. Vengeance against the White Man you so direly vilify. I understand. It is commendable, for you to speak such words boldly.” To hunger was to strive for something much greater than she was, than what she stood for. Ordinarily his security would have taken her away without a second thought, but he found it curious to see what the young lady would say to the most powerful man in America.
“However. Where is the justice for the Homesteaders who sought a new life, far from the persecution whom you slaughtered, scalped for sport? And what of the women whom you raped and the children you carelessly tortured? Where is the justice for the Pawnee, the Omaha or the Kiowa, whom your tribe senselessly slaughtered after being expelled from the Minnesota, driving them from these lands in a manner no different from the Chippewa who chased you from your true homeland? You speak of Justice, yet you fundamentally do not understand it. You speak of contrition, yet you desire nothing but vengeance.”
Not once did Flynn flinch when he spoke. “However, the death of those Homesteaders, the White Settlers, the Omaha, the Ponca and the Pawnee,what would you say they are to the Lakota? In a word, they are your Justice.” Flynn spoke these words without a beat, his eyes of blue staring without flinching into her own silver eyes. “Those children you murdered were your Justice. Those women you stole away, beat and raped no differently than the children taken away were your Justice. Because Justice belongs to the strong, as they have belonged to the Tribes who expelled your people from the lands beyond the Minnesota river and to you, who expelled the Native Tribes who called your land their own. And the White Man’s justice came no differently, won by Rifle and Disease no differently than you won these lands prior from those other Native tribes with Tomahawk and atrocity.”
“Only exception is, you yet live in these lands, you yet stand without the prospect of punishment. Do you know why, Young lady?” He asked, drawing closer without hesitation. “Because our Justice stopped ended Mercy. This Mercy trumped their Justice no matter how hotly the memory of your atrocities burned. Could you say the same about the tribes you expelled, or the innocents your tribe slaughtered?” His voice rose in tone, if only in the passion that came with his words. “Strength is Justice. Victory is Justice.”
“I will not apologize for my people’s Justice. I will not apologize for what came during or after no differently than I will not ask for you to apologize for your people’s atrocities. I care little that you hate me for it. Because America’s Justice goes beyond what the White Man’s justice or the Native’s own Justice. This Justice, a Justice I will bring to this world, will be the true freedom that comes from a person’s Hunger, or Struggle. I intend for all Americans, even you, to benefit from this.” Paradoxically, there was neither a sense of superiority nor condescension that befell her. No, there was only conviction.
