The Kaiser’s joints creaked as he stood. His legs were stiff. He began a slow, rhythmic collision of his palms, which caused his family to exchange glances. Royalty did not applaud. Dona stepped on his ankle, but he paid her no mind. The piston of one arm smacking one good palm against the rotten one, until the rest of the stands joined him, all together, the city, his people, applauding in unison.

The Kaiser had learned something but, more important, felt something, something achingly lovely. There was pleasure in victory, that much he had known, but now he understood the nobility of failure. His Indians had fought magnificently against overwhelming odds.

Later, he would direct his armies to mobilize against Russia. All guilt would be on the Tsar. England would be stripped of India. Let the Americans come. He would turn Mexico against them. He would order the German borders sealed and all foreigners stripped of their assets to serve the war machine. This would begin with the show before him.

As he applauded, he counted the horses he saw, the pistols, the rifles, even the instruments, which would be good for military bands to rehearse. The Indians had survived worse.

On the field, the 7th Cavalry, the pioneer family, the Indians, they all bowed together. The applause was continuing, and, at a loss for how to react, they brought out their children, and coached them in the art of taking a bow. Even the stagehands bowed. Still it did not stop.

At the edges of the racetrack, the Onondagas caught glimpses of soldiers. Three hundred sixty degrees all around, peeking among the broken props and piles of supplies, between the tent posts, German soldiers were advancing across wisps of smoke and rising ash. Each carried a gun, bayonet forward. The uniforms were gray, with many brass buttons, and their smooth, dark helmets did not reflect light.

The crowd was beginning to sing. They were singing hymns together, voices high and almost anonymous in the night sky, syllables as strange and unknowable as anything the Wild West troupe had ever heard. It was the last war that would ever begin with a song.

6

In the first week of August 1914, as the longest fuse the world had ever known finally ignited, Americans were trapped across Europe. Even in England, the banks were closed, the pound rose overnight from $4.50 to $6.00, the stores emptied of all goods, and no officials could give assurances of what kind of war was to come.