Part 16

When Ndúkis passed Tcoóks’ house, the old man asked: “Where have you been?”

“I have just been walking around,” said Ndúkis. “I met the two sisters. They were scared and ran into the bushes. I don’t like them.”

When Tcoóks told Wískäk that Ndúkis was mad at her daughters, she cried; she thought maybe he had killed them.

On the way home from Mlaiksi, the girls saw people digging roots in places where they had always dug.

When they told their mother, she said: “Stay in the house. I will go and see why they are digging around here.”

She took five steps and was there. The people were scared. They had never seen Wískäk, for she always stayed at home and sent her daughters to dig. When she found that they were getting all the roots, she went home, and said: “Come and help me; we must dig fast and get as many roots as we can.”

Those people lived near Shasta River. When they started, they sent word to all their kin that they were going off to dig roots, but they forgot to tell young man Wámanik, who lived on the north side of the digging place, so he started off alone.

The elder Wískäk girl said to her mother: “You go straight ahead: we will go on the north side, where there are nice long roots.” When they got there, the ground was turned up and all the roots were gone.

Wámanik was there. When he found that the roots had been dug, he was mad. He stood up tall and looked bright. The elder sister didn’t see him. The younger one saw him and ran.

Wámanik fell in love with her right away. He thought she was so nice-looking that he would like her for a wife, and in some way he took hold of her heart, so she wouldn’t get frightened. He followed her to the spring where she went to get water to drink.

Her sister was there. The younger asked: “Did you pass anybody?”

“No.”

“Then your eyes are poor, for I saw a nice-looking young man.”

The elder sister took her cap and was going to drink. Just then Wámanik stood up in the form of a snake. She screamed, dropped her cap, and ran off, when she came to where her mother was digging, she was so scared that her eyes were sticking out, and she couldn’t speak.

Her mother asked: “Why don’t you talk?”

After a while she said: “There is a big snake in the spring.”

“Well, well,” said her mother, “what kind of a man do you want? You can’t live single all your life.”

When the elder sister ran away, Wámanik turned to a nice-looking man. He came up to the younger girl and said: “I can be a great many different things. I am a spirit of this earth; I have seen you often, but I didn’t want to show myself to your sister; I wanted to frighten her. I don’t like her as well as I do you. I have heard you talk, and I want you for a wife, for I like you. I can turn to a snake, but I am a man, and I have lots of nice clothes.” Then he turned to a snake again, for he saw the old woman and her daughter coming.

On the way home the younger girl said to her mother: “Make a bed for us and put on our panther-skin blankets.”

Wámanik was under the ground just where the girls were sitting. In the night when they woke up, they felt somebody between them. At daylight Wámanik went down in the ground right where the bed was. Every night after that the girls changed. If a person saw them one day they didn’t know them the next. Wámanik came each night. In the daytime he was under the ground near where they were digging roots.

There was a Tusasás among the people digging roots, and he said: “I am going to marry those nice-looking girls. They are great workers; they will get me lots to eat.”

People knew now that Wámanik was the husband of old Wískäk’s daughters, and that that was why they looked different each morning, so they said to Tusasás: “If you make Wámanik mad, you won’t be a person long. He is a strong man; he can do anything.”

Tusasás said: “I am stronger than Wámanik. I am not afraid of him.”

Wámanik heard him talk about his wives and right away he was mad. He made Tusasás itch till he scratched the skin and flesh off from his body. People laughed at him, and said: “Maybe Wámanik will kill you; he is a great doctor.”

Wámanik said to Kéwe: “Go and tell Tusasás to stop making fun of my wives and stop talking about me. If he doesn’t, he’ll no longer be a person.”

Wámanik was bright like the sun, and both his wives were bright. He was so bright that people couldn’t go into old woman Wískäk’s house. He was a man at night and when he went to hunt for deer, but if he got mad, or didn’t want people to see him, he turned to a snake and went under the ground. He was a great hunter. There was lots of deer meat in the old woman’s house.

Wískäk’s brother had such a large family that his children were always hungry. Wámanik told his mother-in-law to send for him to come and get meat. The old woman sent a man for him, but the man came back alone, and said: “He won’t come.” That made the old woman cry; she said: “My kin hate us.”

The man said: “They are afraid of your son-in-law; that is why they don’t come here. They don’t want to see him.”

“I won’t hurt them,” said Wámanik; “they are my wives’ kin. I have no people; I belong to the Earth. I live under the mountains and under the water. Go and tell them not to be afraid of me; tell them to come. I am a person. Maybe they don’t know that.”

The man went back and talked nice, but they wouldn’t come. Then he said: “If you don’t come, you will make Wámanik mad.”

They all came. Wámanik gave nice things to the youngest boy. “Are you afraid of me now?” asked Wámanik. “I heard what you said. I can hear what people say when they are far away. I like you and I want you to like me.” The children ate lots. They felt glad.

One day old Wískäk said: “My girls are tired of digging roots, I want to dig sometimes.”

“They’ll never get tired,” said Wámanik, “they’ll always work. You are old and you must rest; you’ll die soon.”

Kékina said to Wámanik: “Your wives don’t love you. There is a young man after them all the time. They wanted to marry Ndúkis.”

That made Wámanik feel badly. In the evening, when he went to his mother-in-law’s house, he asked the elder sister: “Is any one in love with you and your sister?”

“No,” said the woman. “Why do you ask that?”

“I don’t like the way you talk. You don’t tell me the truth,” said Wámanik. “The first time I saw you, your eyes stuck out, as if you had seen somebody; you looked scared. I won’t keep you if somebody else wants you.”

Old Wískäk had been after red bark to color roots; when she came home she found her younger daughter crying. The girl told her what Wámanik had said. The old woman was angry, but she didn’t know what to do.

Kékina went to Ndúkis, and said: “Wámanik is saying bad things about you.”

Ndúkis listened and heard what Wámanik said to his wife. The next morning he went early, before anybody was up in the world, and sat on a rock where he could see old Wískäk’s house; he looked awful ugly. Ygiak, a man who never slept, was out hunting for sticks; when he saw Ndúkis, he was so scared that he dropped his sticks and ran home.

At midday Ndúkis came down from the rocks. Somebody ran into Lok’s house, and said: “There is going to be a great fight. Ndúkis is mad at Wámanik and he will kill him.”

Lok said: “Ndúkis has a big spirit. Wámanik is strong, too. They will scare each other, but they won’t fight.”

Old Wískäk was willing Ndúkis should kill her son-in-law, for she didn’t like him. She said to her daughters: “I am going to leave you; I have lived with you long enough. I don’t like your husband. When he wanted you, why didn’t you say that you couldn’t live under the ground, that you would smother? You should have taken Ndúkis; he is your kind.” As she talked, she turned to a bird, and when she was through talking, she flew off to the mountains. She did it herself; she didn’t want to be a person any longer. But each day she came back and talked to her daughters; she wanted to make them willing to turn to birds and go with her to the mountains, for she could not go far away while they were persons.

People heard Wískäk talk as she flew around. The youngest daughter said: “I wouldn’t talk so much. You wanted us to marry. Wámanik is as good as Ndúkis.”

“Ndúkis doesn’t turn to a snake every time he goes out of the house,” said the old woman.

The elder daughter cried all the time, and didn’t eat anything. She didn’t want to go to the mountains; she didn’t want to stay with Wámanik, and she didn’t want to marry Ndúkis. She said to her mother: “You mustn’t come around where people live; you must hide among the brush and trees.”

Wískäk didn’t like that. She said: “I will turn you into a snake, and when you cross the road in front of people they will throw dirt in your face. You will deceive people; you will pretend to be kind, then you will bite them.”

She turned her daughters into snakes, and then flew off toward the east. As she started, she called out to her son-in-law: “You will never be a man again; you will be a snake, with a body like your panther-skin blanket.”

The old woman kept going east till she came to a place where there were low cedar trees; she made her home there. She talks like a person yet, and that place is full of her kin.

LOK AND HER CHILDREN

CHARACTER

Lok Bear

Lok was a widow with two children; she lived with her mother. The old woman took care of the roots. She put them in a hole and slept with her head near it. When her daughter brought roots home and poured them into the hole, the children wanted some of them to eat, but the old woman said: “First I must give roots to the fire, to the mountains, the trees, the house, and the springs.” (This is the custom.)

The daughter said: “My children are hungry; you must give them some of the roots.”

Lok said: “You don’t know about these things. If they get sick, you will blame me.”

The old woman took roots and talked to the mountains; she said: “You must give us wood that won’t burn us.” To the springs she said: “Old grandmother, you always have water under your care; give us plenty of good water.” To the house she said: “You know us, our house that we built.” She talked to each part of the house. (If people didn’t talk to the posts of the house they would fall. The woman who told this myth said she had known of such cases.) To the posts she said: “Hold up this house; be good to us.”

She packed away all the roots they dug, ten large basketfuls, then she and her daughter brought in wood enough to last till spring.

The old woman said: “Grandchildren, I want you to bring me gum from the cedar trees.” When they brought it, she covered her face with it and stopped up her eyes. Then she lay down with her head over the hole and didn’t go out of the house again all winter. Some mornings she woke up and gave a handful of roots to the children. In the night, when the children were asleep, she ate plenty of roots herself.

One morning her daughter asked: “How is it that rats are always gnawing; why don’t you kill them?”

“I wish you wouldn’t listen to everything,” said the old woman.

One morning she said to the little girl: “I wish you wouldn’t cry in the night.”

The mother said: “You don’t give the children enough to eat; they are hungry.”

“You don’t know about the winter,” said the old woman. “It’s going to be long, and our roots won’t last: the snow will be deep yet.”

The children were hungry, but their mother said: “You mustn’t cry, it makes your grandmother worse.”

The boy said: “Let us kill her; she has no eyes.”

“If we tried to kill her, she would kill us; you are small and I couldn’t run fast enough to get away from her.”

“What are you whispering about?” asked the grandmother.

“The children talk low because they are weak; you are starving them to death.”

One morning old Lok asked: “Which way does the snow come?”

The boy looked out, and said: “It comes from the north.”

“That shows it will be good weather to-morrow.” She gave the children a few roots.

The next day the old woman said: “I wish I had some meat to eat.”

“Stop!” said her daughter. “Don’t talk like that.” She was afraid that her mother wanted to kill the children and eat them.

The next morning the grandmother asked: “How does the sky look?”

The little boy said: “There are clouds.”

“Where are the clouds?”

“They are around Omisna.”

“That means rain,” said the old woman. “It won’t be long till spring comes.” She took out plenty of roots and pounded them for the children. (They were fooling her.)

The next day she sent the little girl to look at Mlaiksi.

The girl said: “Smoke is rising from the top of the mountain, as if someone had made a fire up there.”

The old woman was taking out a few roots, but she poured them back, and said: “There is going to be a great storm.”

The storm came. It put out their fire, and for four days old Lok didn’t move. Five days the children were without anything to eat; then she asked the little boy: “How does it look now?”

“It is raining.”

The old woman said: “If it rains, you can go and dig roots.”

The daughter cried and told her the children were starving. She gave them a few roots. The little boy said to his mother: “Why can’t we dig a hole near the roots and steal some of them?”

“I know what you are talking about,” said the old woman. “I know that it is winter yet.”

One morning she asked: “Is it spring?”

Her daughter said: “I don’t know,” and she told the children not to tell their grandmother anything about the weather. It rained and hailed. Every night the mother and children cried. Each morning they stamped on the ground to find out if it were soft. One day the mother went off, and when she came back she brought a few roots. The children were sitting out of doors, and she heard the old woman ask them: “Where is your mother?”

“She has gone for wood,” said the boy.

The mother put away some of the roots and gave the rest to the children.

The old woman asked: “Does it snow yet?”

The little boy said: “There is so much snow that I can’t see the tops of the trees.”

The grandmother put more gum on her eyes, rolled herself up tight, and lay still.

The mother made two pairs of straw moccasins, and the next morning started for roots. It was spring now, and she found plenty for her children to eat. While she was gone, the old woman asked: “Which way is the wind?”

“From the southwest,” said the boy. His mother had told him to fool his grandmother, and let her lie there all summer. The mother could make the wind blow—the wind was her medicine. Every time she found a fly in the house, she killed it with a porcupine quill, so the old woman wouldn’t know it was spring.

There were a good many of the Lok people around the place where the mother dug roots; she left some roots for them to take care of, and said: “In two days I will come back and bring my children.”

When she got home, she made moccasins for the children, and in the morning, when she was ready to start, she said to her mother: “It snows. I am tired of packing wood; I am going to take the children to the woods and keep a fire there; you never stay by the fire.”

The mother worked all day and dug a great many roots; she had a big basketful to put away. She wondered where she could put them so the old woman couldn’t find them. Then she thought of Keŏnise, a hill where Lok didn’t go. It was a long way off, but she carried the roots there and hid them.

When the children didn’t come back, the grandmother scratched around in the ashes, found live coals and melted the gum out of her eyes; then she tracked her daughter.

As soon as the daughter knew that her mother was coming, she went to the house, took the roots out of the hole, and threw them around everywhere.

When the old woman came back, the daughter said: “We won’t be persons any longer. In later times people will kill and eat us.”

The old woman said: “It is better so.”

They wandered off to the mountains, and from that time only a male bear and female bear live together, and they never have more than two children.

GÄK AND THE KAIUTOIS BROTHERS

CHARACTERS

Gäk Crow Kaiutois Wolf Kaltsik Spider Kéwe Eel Pakol Deer Skóŭks Woodtick Tcûskai Weasel Tciwididik Road Runner Tskel Mink

The eldest of the five Kaiutois brothers was a great man. The brothers were all good hunters; they had plenty to eat and to wear. Gäk lived near them, and when they went to hunt, he followed to find the game that ran off and died.

One day the brothers asked Gäk to go with them to visit Tskel and Tcûskai. They made deerskin moccasins to wear on the journey and told Gäk to make himself a pair out of antelope skin. They wanted to start before daylight. Gäk woke early and called the brothers.

They said: “We are up already,” but they were not.

Gäk said: “That isn’t true; nobody in the world can beat me in getting up.”

The brothers told Gäk to walk behind them. They traveled all day, then camped. That night Gäk’s medicine, slikwis (the fire-drill), woke him, and said: “Swallow me!” The youngest of the Kaiutois brothers thought: “How can Gäk swallow his fire-drill?” That minute the drill stuck in Gäk’s throat and choked him.

The eldest brother said: “Whoever thought this must unthink it, then Gäk will unchoke. If he dies, people will say we killed him. Who thought about his swallowing his slikwis?”

The youngest brother said: “I thought: ‘He can’t swallow such a long stick,’ but I don’t know how to unthink it, or how to talk the slikwis out of his throat.”

For a minute Kaiutois held his head in his hands—Gäk was almost dead—then he said to Gäk: “Since that is your medicine, it must come out of your throat.” The drill came out right away.

Gäk’s mother knew that he was choking, for the little fire-drill, that he had hung up in the smoke hole at home, fell.

The next day they got to Tskel’s house. Tskel was glad to see them; he told Tcûskai not to play tricks with the Kaiutois brothers or Gäk, for they were his kin.

Tskel and Tcûskai got deer meat for their visitors and Skóŭks, Tskel’s wife, cooked it. Tcûskai watched the men.

Gäk was ashamed of his moccasins; he took down Tcûskai’s quiver and his own, and said: “Let’s go and hunt.”

Tcûskai wouldn’t go; he looked at Gäk’s feet, and began to bother him. Gäk tried to hide his feet, then Tcûskai asked one of the five brothers: “Why don’t that old fellow sit still?”

Gäk got mad and wanted to go home. The eldest Kaiutois told him not to feel badly, but to stay; for those men were his kin.

Tskel said: “I am glad you came. My brother is so full of mischief that I can’t go visiting. I hunt, but many deer get away from me and die in the woods.”

“Gäk can track deer,” said Kaiutois; “he always finds ours.”

Tskel said: “I will go and tell him where I killed a deer yesterday; maybe he can find it.”

Tcûskai wanted to go, but Tskel told him to stay at home, that they would come back as soon as they found the deer.

Gäk tracked the deer and found it among brush and fallen trees. He called to Tskel: “Here it is!”

They skinned the deer. It was as fresh as if just killed. They made a fire and cooked some of the meat, then they started for home.

Tskel asked Kaiutois if he would let Gäk stay with him a while.

Kaiutois said: “Your brother is bad; he would tease him. My brothers never meddle with him; your brother might make him mad and he would kill you.”

Tcûskai ran out to meet them. He asked: “Did old Gäk find that deer?”

Tskel scolded him, told him not to talk so much.

At that time people softened deerskins by soaking them in water and then chewing them. Old man Kéwe lived near Tskel’s, and he always chewed skins for him. Tskel gave Gäk the skin for finding the deer, and Kéwe chewed it for him.

The next day Kaiutois said: “We must go home now.” While they were getting ready, Tcûskai stole Gäk’s fire-drill. He took it to a muddy place, stuck it in the ground, and tried to break it.

Gäk fell backwards, blood came out of his mouth, and he died.

The Kaiutois brothers were scared, they didn’t know what to do. They didn’t know what had made Gäk die.

Tskel looked in Gäk’s quiver and saw that the fire-drill was gone; then he went to look for Tcûskai. He found him at the spring, trying to catch fish with Gäk’s fire-drill. Tskel caught hold of his brother, dragged him along, threw him into the house and pounded him till he killed him. Then he asked the brothers how Gäk could be brought to life. They didn’t know.

Tskel said: “If Gäk comes back to life, my brother will live again; but if he stays dead, my brother will stay dead. I never taught him to treat people this way.”

Tskel had red paint that was boiled; he gave it to the youngest brother and told him to paint Gäk’s fire-drill over, make it nice and red. When that was done, he laid the fire-drill on Gäk’s head.

After a long time, the drill brought Gäk to life; then he sang to the earth and wind, and tried to cure himself. When Tskel saw that Gäk was alive, he stepped five times over Tcûskai’s body. Then Tcûskai jumped up, and said: “Oh, I’ve slept a long time.”

The five brothers and Gäk went home, and Tskel took a deerskin to old man Kéwe, to have him chew it soft. When he came back, he said to Tcûskai: “Stay in the house. Don’t go to old man Kéwe and bother him.”

Tcûskai thought: “I wonder why Tskel don’t want me to go to Kéwe’s house.” As soon as he had a chance, he slipped out and went there.

Kéwe was chewing the skin; he had all of it in his mouth except one little end. Tcûskai took hold of that end and pulled the whole skin out of the old man’s mouth. At the same time he pulled out all of Kéwe’s teeth but two.

Kéwe was so mad that he said: “As long as people live, deerskins will be good as far as I have chewed this one, but the end I haven’t chewed will be hard and rough.” And as Kéwe said, so it is. And since that time Kéwe people have but two teeth.

Tcûskai carried the skin home, and said: “I found old Kéwe eating up our deerskin; I got it away from him.” Tskel was mad; he scolded Tcûskai and struck him with a stick.

When the five brothers got home, Gäk’s mother was crying. She said to Gäk: “You must never go away again; I have always told you that some one would find it easy to kill you.”

Old man Wus chewed deerskins for the Kaiutois brothers. One day when a skin was stretched out to dry, a coal fell on it and burned a hole. Wus was scared; he didn’t know what the brothers would do.

When they came home, they found him crying. The elder brother asked: “What are you crying for?”

“A coal fell on the deerskin, and burned it.”

The brothers laughed and made fun of Wus, said: “A man shouldn’t cry for such a thing; you will never be of much account. You will be poor and always be hunting for something to eat. Take the skin and make moccasins for yourself.”

Wus was glad to get the skin, for the brothers didn’t give him much. The next day he said: “I left my mother a long time ago, I must go and see her.”

The brothers gave him dried meat to carry to her, and told him to come back soon, and chew skins for them.

On the way home, Wus forgot about the Kaiutois brothers. His mother was almost starved; the dried meat didn’t last long; Wus and his mother were soon poor and hungry. Wus hunted mice, but he gave only the smallest ones to his mother; sometimes he gave her only the heads.

One day, when Wus was hunting, a Pakol girl came to the house to borrow grass to make a cap.

Old woman Wus said to the house: “Grow small!”

The girl asked: “Why is the house getting small?”