It knocked Two-Legs over, till he rolled along the ground and fell into the brook. It tore three great deer-skins from the tent and woke all those who were lying asleep inside. They started up and screamed and did not know what was happening. The dog howled at the top of his voice, with his tail between his legs. Two-Legs crawled out of the brook, dripping wet.
The moment he tried to rise to his feet, another gust came ... and another ... and another.
Two-Legs crept along the ground on all fours. The whole tent was blown down and the people inside ran and fell over one another and shouted and wailed so that it was horrible to hear.
But no one heard it, for each had enough to do to think of saving his own life. The cows and the goats and the sheep lowed and bleated with fright and ran up against one another and trampled on one another. Many of them fell down the slope and broke their legs. The horses galloped off over the meadow and ran till they dropped from exhaustion far away inland. The big tree above Two-Legs’ tent snapped in two like a stalk of grass.
3
When day broke, Two-Legs sat and wept at all the destruction which he saw around him. He let the family drive the cattle together and set up the tent again. He himself sat huddled in his cloak and brooded and stared before him. Then he said:
“You bad Wind!”
And he raised his clenched fist in the direction from which it was still blowing violently.
“You destroyed my property last night,” he cried, “and might easily have killed me and mine. Now, we are setting up the tent and collecting the cattle; but you may come back, to-night or to-morrow night, and ruin everything once more.”