With great deliberation and much gesticulation, Rain told his version of the incident in question, and much to our surprise he continued on and related his version of the “Custer Massacre.” Now, since nearly all the officers in the Regular Army, as well as all the agents of the Interior Department, have failed to get him even to speak of this fight (their trying, coaxing, and threatening for years has been in vain), and since Rain gets the credit of being the slayer of Custer, and has been immortalized in verse by Longfellow, it was a pleasant surprise to have this unexpected revelation. I am writing it down as nearly like McLaughlin interpreted it as I can. “Two years before the big fight,” he said, “Gall and Sitting Bull had their camp at Standing Rock. All were hostiles. They were Unkpapa Sioux and fighters who never feared an enemy any more than a buffalo calf. The Yanktonais (friendly Indians) were coffee coolers (cowards) and hung around the agency which was at Lincoln then (Fort Abraham Lincoln on the upper Missouri now). We used to have great times in the hostile camp, dancing, running races, shooting and playing games. Buffalo and deer were plenty, and we had many ponies. I was a great fellow with the girls. They used to tease me to get me mad—when I got mad I knew no reason, I wanted to fight. One night a girl dared me to go up to Fort Lincoln and kill a white man. I told her it was too risky, as the long swords always kept watch. Besides, the Rees (another tribe of Indians, employed by the government as scouts) had their lodges on the hill back of the fort. The wood-choppers were camped between the fort and the river. She said: “’A brave man fears nothing. If you are a coward, don’t go. I’ll ask some other young man who isn’t afraid, if he hasn’t danced in the Sun Dance.’ (This was a torture dance in which Rain-in-the-Face subsequently underwent the most horrible self-torture ever inflicted.[93])