Part 15
“‘I think you do not want any of these things now; but maybe this is what you are thinking: I am young and I will look to the old who are worthy. They have seen their days and proven themselves. With the help of Wakon Tonka, they have grown ripe for the world of spirit, and they can see what eyes do not show. What will be, but is not yet, they can tell it; and what comes out of their mouths, it is so, because it is not with their eyes that they see. If I give them of my strength, being young, their power to live will come back to me and my family. So shall we come in our time to where the cane is; so shall we wear the white war bonnet and be ripe for the world of spirit; so we too shall see our children’s children.
“‘I thought all the while, grandsons, that there must be something you wanted for this food; and now you have told me what it is. It is good, and so shall it be.
“‘And now as we sit here together in a sacred manner, smelling all this good meat, we can hear the Food talking. It is talking to you, grandsons, and it says: “I come first, and I am sacred, for without me there is nothing. The Grandfather, Wakon Tonka, has given me to Maka, the mother of all living things, and she has shown mercy to her children that they may live. On her thousand breasts I am grass; in her thousand laps I am meat; and again on her thousand breasts I am grass. The bison’s strength is mine. The great warrior, I have made him strong for his deeds. The greedy-for-me, their days shall be easy to count; but those who are liberal with me, upon me shall they uproot their teeth [grow very old]. Unless the great warrior gives me with his deeds, they shall be as a coward’s. Let any try without me, I will always win. It is I who am the greatest warrior. If I had weapons, who could count my prisoners by now?”
“‘Grandsons, so it is the Food talks, and you have heard. Surely we must thank this sacred one, and how can we do that? _Plama yelo_ is a breath in the mouth; it is easy to say, and no one is the fatter for it. The Food itself has told us how to thank it. We shall give it to the needy and the old.’
“When Blue Spotted Horse was through talking, the old man at his left smiled at us boys and said, ‘_Ho_, Grandsons! _How!_’ Then the next and the next spoke to us in the same way, until all the old men and old women had spoken. And when the voices had gone around the hoop from left to right, which is the sacred manner, and come back to Blue Spotted Horse, he said, ‘I am sending the food neither down nor up. The people are hungry and ready, so put it out.’
“Then we boys went around the hoop, left to right, beginning with the first old man who had spoken, and filled all the cups of the old people, Blue Spotted Horse’s last, with soup and tender meat. And this we kept on doing, until no more cups were emptied. Then we ate, and when we had eaten, the meat that was left we divided among the old people, and they went away with it, making songs about the brave young men who had fed them.”
Eagle Voice sat silent for a while, his eyes closed, his hands on his knees. Emerging from his reverie at length, he fixed his crinkled gaze on me and smiled. “You can see,” he said, “that the Food was right when it talked, for I have come to where the cane is. Most of my teeth are uprooted, and I am wearing the wrinkled buckskin and the white war bonnet. When I was young and my head was full of brave deeds and horses and coups and scalps, I have heard old men say, ‘It is good to be young and die on the prairie for the people. It is not good to grow old.’ Maybe they wanted to make us braver. Maybe the black road made them tired where it steepens. When I am all alone, I think and think; and it is about going to visit my relatives in the world of spirit that I think most; but it is good to look back and remember.”
“When you look back, Grandfather,” I said, “you see a girl’s road that you did not walk because you did not see it then. Do you wish you had seen it and walked it?”
“There are many roads, Grandson,” he answered. “They all come together, and at that place there stands a three-legged old horse always looking for the grass that used to be.” The picture of himself, drawn once before, amused him, and he chuckled over it. “_Dho!_” he continued. “It was the road Tashina Wanblee walked that time, and I did not see it until I had walked across the world.
“When the feasting was over, the bands that had come together for the sun dance were getting ready to scatter and go their own ways. Boys and men would be catching horses. Tepee poles would be clattering. Women would be scolding because the horses would not stand still while the drags were loaded. People would be visiting each other because maybe they would not meet again until next grass, or never. Maybe boys would be sneaking off into the brush to meet their girls, and maybe some boy would run away that night and follow the trail of a girl so that he could talk to her under the blanket once more.
“High Horse was a Miniconjou and Kicking Bear was a Hunkpapa. They were going to Pa Sapa [the Black Hills] with their people. But we had big plans. When the fall hunt was over, they would come back again and find our village somewhere on the Greasy Grass [Little Big Horn] or the Powder or the Tongue. Then the three of us and Charging Cat, and maybe some others, would make war against the Shoshonis or the Crows, or maybe both of them. It was harder to make war in the winter than in the summer, and if we got back with horses and scalps we would be great warriors and everybody would be talking about us again. Maybe we would all be chiefs sometime. We had been together most of the time after the sun dance and thanking the food, and we talked and talked about our plan. We would ride out into the hills alone and talk about how we would do. So we were not thinking about girls. Even High Horse had not been sick, since getting all those horses cured him.
“I was out helping to catch horses, and I was riding back leading three of them. At the creek I stopped to let them drink, and there was some brush there. I was leaning on my horse’s neck, and I heard something moving in the brush. When I looked, it was Tashina. Maybe she saw me going after horses, and came down there to see me before she went away. She was just standing there outside the brush with a pretty trader’s shawl over her shoulders and up over her head. She was holding it close about her face, and when I looked at her, she pulled it closer and looked down at the ground. I was glad to see her, and I spoke to her the same as to a boy. I joked and said, ‘If you are out looking for a horse again, here are three real ones.’ I was thinking of when she caught me for a horse and made me pull her drag. She just kept on looking at the ground with the shawl tight about her face. And when I stopped joking, I could hear her saying, ‘_Shonka ’kan, Shonka ’kan_, you made me proud.’ She said it so low that I could just hear her. Maybe I would have jumped off my horse then; but the three horses were full of grass and water and felt good, so when they saw some other horses coming, they neighed and reared. Two of them broke away, dragging their lariats, bucking and kicking and breaking wind. So I said, ‘Hold this horse for me while I catch the others.’ It was an old horse and it did not feel so good as the others. Then I rode off on the run. The horses were hard to catch again; and when I came back, the other horse was tied by his lariat to the brush, and Tashina was not there.”
After a silence, the old man looked up at me and continued: “The bands moved off that day, and I rode awhile with High Horse and Kicking Bear. The people were all strung out, and we would ride up and down, talking to people we knew. I saw Tashina. She was riding an old mare, and when I came up to her, I thought I would joke with her again so I thanked her for holding my horse. She did not say anything and did not look up at me. When the sun was halfway down, I turned back towards our village with others who had come along.
“We had a big bison hunt that fall, the Oglalas and Sans Arcs together, and I was not looking for calves any more. When the advisers chose the young warriors who should kill meat for the old and needy, I was one they chose. It was a big honor for a young man. We went up to Elk River [Yellowstone] first. I was out with a scouting party up there, and we found some stakes driven into the ground. It was where the Wasichus were going to make another iron road. People had talked much about this, but I saw the stakes, and we pulled up all we saw and threw them away. People had talked much about the other iron road too, the one along the Shell [Platte]. It stopped the bison and cut the herd in two. Now the Wasichus would build an iron road on the other side of us also. It was what Wooden Cup told the people long ago. Sometimes when I heard this talk I was afraid.
“We found a big herd and followed it slowly, killing only what we wanted. It was a happy time. Before the snow came we were back on Powder River with more _papa_ and _wasna_ than we could eat. There was feasting and we were happy. I wish I had some of that meat now. It had strength in it. If somebody could thank the food, maybe I would be invited to help.”
“I am not worthy to thank the food, Grandfather,” I said; “but let us have a feast tomorrow anyway. We can invite two or three of your friends. I will bring the feast and maybe your daughter will cook it for us.”
“_Hi-yay!_” the old man exclaimed; “_Washtay!_ Let us have a feast. It will be good.”
XVII
_The Woman Four Times Widowed_
And so, next day, we feasted--Eagle Voice, No Water, Moves Walking, and I. It was well past noon when we began, for after delivering the makings of the feast to the daughter in the little gray log house, I had gone in search of the guests, taking the son-in-law with me as a guide. Drifted by-roads, that had ceased to be even the desultory trails they were at best, led at last to lonely shacks some miles up the creek valley where the old men lived, or, rather, waited, in apathetic squalor for nothing in particular. Curiosity, chronic loneliness and the immemorial lure of a feast, which is more than eating, assured a ready acceptance of the invitation.
So the four of us were sitting in a close circle with a steaming pot of veal in the center. _Pae zhuta sapa_ [black medicine] bubbled in the battered coffee pot on the sheet-iron stove, and there was plenty of _chun humpi_ [juice of the tree, sugar] to sweeten it. Bread, cookies, and canned peaches were close at hand. As giver of the feast and the youngest of the party, I had filled the tin cups with meat and broth, passed the bread around, and filled other tin cups with coffee liberally dosed with sugar. I had been greeted by each in turn, “_Ho!_ Grandson, _how_!” To this greeting, Eagle Voice had added: “This is indeed my grandson. See! He has given me these fine warm moccasins. Now my toes do not smart when I get wood in the snow.” When the moccasins had been examined and generously approved, No Water, the older of the guests, both of whom were younger than Eagle Voice, had a little speech to make. It was to the effect that I could not help being a Wasichu any more than he could be other than a Lakota. And, indeed, a little brown paint on my face and a blanket--“Could not tell the difference,” he said; “could be Ta Shunka Witko [Crazy Horse].” I thanked him for the too generous compliment, and his round, bulbous-nosed countenance, that normally bore a vaguely grieved, apprehensive look, glowed with good humor. “Maybe Wakon Tonka gave him a Lakota heart,” Moves Walking added. “Maybe if all Wasichus were so, things would be better.” Wiry and smallish for a Sioux, a cast in his left eye gave to his sharp, shriveled face an air of angry intensity; but now even the recalcitrant off-eye softened a bit with good will.
Having first offered choice morsels of meat to the _wahnagi_, we fell to serious eating with fingers and sharp knives, the latter for cutting off the bite. Eagle Voice broke the silence with a remark to the effect that the meat was tender. “Even I can chew it, and most of my teeth are uprooted. I might be eating the first young calf I killed when I was a boy. I think this will make me stronger.”
When it was unanimously agreed that the meat was tender and _washtay_, we resumed the serious business of eating in silence. At last, the peaches and cakes having been sampled and approved, the pipe went round and Eagle Voice spoke: “Our grandson likes to hear stories, and I have told him many already. There is a story about a dog. I have heard No Water tell it.”
“_Dho_,” assented No Water; “it is a true story [_woya kapi_]. I can prove it by a Hunkpapa, much older than I am, who told it to me.”
He searched our faces with his vaguely grieved apprehensive look. There being no denials, he proceeded: “Sometimes the four-leggeds are wiser than we two-leggeds. A horse will take his man home in the darkest night when the man is lost. If you try to lose a dog, he will find you, even if there is no trail to smell. I do not know how this is, but it is so. I think they are closer relatives to the spirits than we are. Sometimes they can talk too, but not many can understand them. This dog could talk, but only a very little girl could understand, as you will hear.
“This man’s name was Sitting Hawk. He was not a noted warrior, but he was a good hunter and took good care of his family, so that they always had plenty to eat. I did not hear his woman’s name, and I am telling only what I know. He had two daughters, one of them not quite a woman yet and the other just a little girl--maybe three winters. They had a little dog, and the little dog had four pups.
“The scouts had been out looking everywhere, and there were no enemies; so Sitting Hawk thought he would go hunting and take his family along to have a good time. He liked to do that. There were horses for all the family to ride, and the little dog rode on the pony-drag with her pups when she was not running around smelling things. Afterwhile they came to a place of green grass with plenty of water and wood, and there they made a camp. It was good weather, so they were happy there. Sitting Hawk would go hunting, and his woman and older daughter would stay at home and dry the meat. The very little girl would play with the four pups. That is the way it was, for I do not know how many days.
“One day Sitting Hawk came home early and he was very tired. So he ate and lay down in the tepee to sleep awhile. It was not yet dark, so the others were all up. The woman and her older daughter were scraping a deerskin they had staked out on the ground. They did not notice the little girl much, and the dog was letting the four pups eat. Afterwhile the little girl came and asked for something to eat. So the older daughter gave it to her. Soon the little girl came back and asked again for something to eat. The sister gave her some more meat and said, “This is all you can have. You will make yourself sick eating so much.’
“So the little girl went away; and this is what she was doing. There were four men hiding out there in the brush, and one of them could speak our tongue. Perhaps they were kind to the little girl. It must have been so, for she was not afraid. When they told her to get them something to eat and not to tell, that is what she did. Maybe it was like a game she liked to play all by herself.
“The four men were so hungry that what the little girl brought only made them hungrier. So they got bolder and came to the tepee where Sitting Hawk was sleeping, and the mother and older daughter were scraping the deerskin, and the dog was feeding her pups. When the woman and daughter saw the four men all at once, they just stared. When the little dog saw them, she made whimpering noises to the little girl that said, ‘Why did you feed these men? They are enemies!’ And that scared the little girl. When Sitting Hawk sat up and saw them, he knew they were Blackfeet, although one of them spoke our tongue and asked for food. Sitting Hawk could do nothing, so he said to his woman, ‘Feed them.’ And she did. When they had eaten, the four lay down inside the tepee with their bows and arrows beside them. I think they were only waiting until it got darker. The woman had fed them, and she thought, I will treat them like relatives. So she took off their moccasins and rubbed the bottoms of their feet with warm tallow, the way she would do with her own man when he was tired. This made the men drowsy, and they fell sound asleep around the fire, being full of meat and weary. They were _maka mani_ [afoot] and maybe they had walked far.
“Now the little dog began yawning and making strange noises like talking. The little girl listened, and understood. The dog was saying, ‘Hurry! Take my little ones and run away from here as fast as you can or you will be killed. These are bad men and enemies.’ This scared the little girl more than ever, and she whispered to her mother what the dog said. This scared the woman and she whispered it to Sitting Hawk, so that he was scared too, for he knew these were Blackfeet. And this is what he did. He whispered to his family to follow him with what they could carry. The little girl put the pups inside her dress, and the dog followed her. When the horses were all ready, Sitting Hawk went back to the tepee without making any noise. There were some big pieces of tallow on the ground, and these he put into the red ashes of the fire, with the men sleeping around it. The tallow sputtered. Then a big flame leaped up, and Sitting Hawk ran to his horse where the others were all ready to go. They rode fast, and when they came to the top of a hill they could see the tepee burning and men running here and there. Maybe the Blackfeet got burned with hot grease; I do not know. But Sitting Hawk and his family and the little dog and the pups were safe.”
“_Ho, ho!_” exclaimed Moves Walking and Eagle Voice together by way of applause.
“It is a true story,” resumed No Water, “and the very old man who told me--much older than I am--told me more about a dog just to prove it.
“The way I got the story, this man’s wife was well known among the Lakota. Her name was Loud Woman. Her man, I cannot give his name, for I have forgotten--but I will call him Good Buffalo. He had two sons and these had wives. Also he had a daughter and a sister. The daughter was just a little girl--maybe four or five winters--and she had a little dog. So it was a family of eight, if you do not count the dog.
“This family was on a hunting party, for the scouts had been looking around and no enemies were seen. So the councilors allowed small parties to go out. They were having a good time, and they were moving back slowly towards the village, which was not far away now and not very close either.
“One day Good Buffalo told his wife, Loud Woman, to camp in a certain place with his sister, his little daughter and his two daughters-in-law. It was a grassy place with plenty of good water and wood. So there were four women and a little girl in that camp, if you do not count the little dog. Then Good Buffalo and his two sons went hunting.
“It was getting to be evening, but it was early yet. The little dog had been running around here and there, smelling everything to learn all about the new camping place. This one was a mother dog too, but she did not have any pups yet. You see, they were all women in that camp. Afterwhile the little dog was sitting on top of a hill near the camp, and she was barking. Soon she raised her nose to the sky and began howling in a queer way. The little girl listened, and all at once she knew her dog was talking, and this is what the dog was saying: ‘_Wahoo--oo-oo!_ It is going to be terrible! We should run away! It is going to be terrible! We should run away! _Wahoo-oo-oo!_’
“The little girl ran to her mother and told what she heard the dog say; but her mother was very busy doing something--and she kept on doing it--so that she did not hear the little girl very well. Then the little dog came running down the hill with her tongue hanging and all out of breath. She leaped up on each one in the camp, wagging her tail, and yawning with queer noises in her throat. Then she would whine and yelp. And the mother said, ‘What is the matter with that dog? She acts crazy!’ And the little girl said, ‘Mother, she is talking. I told you she was talking. She says it is going to be terrible and we must run away.’
“While the mother was looking hard at her little daughter and wondering if she might be making it up, the little dog ran back to the hilltop as though she might be chasing a rabbit.
“They were all looking up at the little dog, and she was howling that queer way again, with her nose to the sky. The little girl understood again, and she began to cry, because she was scared and nobody could understand. Then the mother said, ‘Why are you crying like this?’ And the little girl answered, ‘The dog is telling us it is going to be terrible. My father and brothers are coming and enemies are coming too. It is going to be terrible. We must run away now, for it is going to be terrible. My dog is saying it!’ Then she cried harder than ever. And the mother said, ‘You must stop crying. We must wait until your father and brothers come back and they will know what to do.’ So they waited. And the little girl cried, and the little dog mourned on the hill.
“It was just before dark, and the three men came back. Loud Woman told Good Buffalo about the little girl and what the dog said. But Good Buffalo was tired from hunting all day, also he was hungry, and he said: ‘Of course we will go away from here when we are ready. We are camping here now.’
“Just then the little girl heard the dog talking up there again, and the dog said, ‘They are here! _Wahoo-oo-oo!_ They are here! You have no ears, so I am running away! _Wahoo-oo-oo!_’ Then the dog was gone from the hill, and her howling was getting dimmer.
“Now the little girl was crying so hard she could hardly talk, and she said, ‘They are here! Enemies are here! My dog said it and she has run away!’
“So Good Buffalo said to his sons, ‘Let us go and see what all this is about. We can eat when we get back.’ But they did not go, for just then there were shots from out in the dark. The camp was surrounded. The women raised the tremolo. Good Buffalo began a death-song, and the sons sang with him as they ran out to meet the enemies. They did not sing long, for they were killed. Then Loud Woman beat her breast and grasped a butcher knife and went out yelling after the men. And after her the sons’ wives ran with butcher knives to help their men. Soon there was only a galloping of horses, and then it was still out in the night.
“Good Buffalo’s sister and her little niece hid under a buffalo robe inside the tepee. They thought soon they would be killed and scalped. But nothing more happened. All the enemies wanted was the horses, and maybe they thought a big camp was near.
“When it was morning, Good Buffalo’s sister and her little niece went to find the others. It was terrible--the way the dog said it was going to be. The three men and the three women were scattered around, all dead. The sister was shot in the leg--but it was not in the bone, so she was strong enough to drag the six dead people into the tepee and to place them side by side. She thought, the enemies may come back and it will be just as well to lie dead here with the others. And there she mourned, waiting for death, and the little girl cried and cried.