When the tree flowered : $b An authentic tale of the old Sioux worldNeihardt, John G.
History
When the tree flowered : $b An authentic tale of the old Sioux world
Neihardt, John G.
Historical fiction; Oglala Indians -- Fiction
“When the old woman and old man talked, High Horse lay flat on his
belly and stopped breathing for a while. But he was very tired and very
weak because he had not slept or eaten much for a long time, he was so
sick about the girl. So all at once he was snoring as hard as the old
man was.
“I waited and waited. The morning star came up. I waited and waited.
There was a thin streak of day. I could not call to High Horse, so I
waited. The hills were beginning to stare. Then I got out of there with
the horse and hid up the creek in the brush where I had tied Whirlwind.
“Pretty soon all at once there was a big noise--screaming and yelling
and barking down there in the village. It was even worse than the other
time. Then I could hear somebody running hard, and it was High Horse,
coming like an antelope. He was coming up the creek towards me, and he
surely looked terrible in the daylight. All at once he dodged into a
big hollow tree by the creek, and I could not go to him or call to him
because I could hear people coming. It was a party of men with axes and
knives and spears and guns. They were looking here and looking there
and being very careful because of the terrible thing they had seen
running. They stopped close to the hollow tree, and when they could
not see any tracks, one said, ‘It was a bad spirit that has gone back
into the water.’ Then they went away, for I think they were glad not to
catch what they had chased.
“This is how it happened in the tepee. When the day began to come in
through the flap, the girl awoke and looked around. The first thing she
saw was that terrible animal sleeping there beside her bed. And that
was when the big noise began and High Horse started running.
“I was lying there in the brush now listening, and afterwhile the big
noise stopped and I could hear tepee poles coming down. The people were
moving camp because of the bad spirit in that place; and when I had
waited some more, there was no sound to hear at all, and I knew the
people were all gone. So I went to High Horse; and when he came out
of his tree he looked so sick and sad and terrible all at once that I
had to laugh. Anyway, they had not caught us, and that was good. But
High Horse did not laugh any; he just groaned. So I quit laughing,
and said, ‘Have a strong heart, brother-friend, and when I have washed
the mud off, I will think up a better plan.’ So we went into the water
and I washed him. And when he was dressed, he said, ‘I know now I
can never have Good Plume, so I shall have to die. I will go on the
war-path alone, and somebody will kill me.’ And I said, ‘I am your
brother-friend and you will not go to war alone, because I am going
with you. We shall see if the old man laughs when we get back with a
hundred ponies and I do not know how many scalps.’”
XII
_The Mysterious Mother-Power_
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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