When the tree flowered

by John G. Neihardt

The old man ceased and began fumbling in his long tobacco sack. When he had prepared the pipe with more than necessary attention to detail, he lit it and blew a cloud.

“Three suns, three sleeps my heart sang there,” he continued, handing me the pipe. “My heart sang and I thought she would go back with me and be my woman always. We would go to Grandmother’s Land where I could kill plenty of good meat for her, and she would learn to tan buckskin very soft, and make clothing and moccasins beautiful with beads and porcupine quills. Also, there would be children and grandchildren. This is what I thought when my heart was singing, but I could not tell her, for my tongue was strange to her and hers was strange to me.

“It was in the fourth sleep that she came back to me, all the way across the dark hills of water.”

“Who came?” I asked.

“Plenty White Cows came back while I slept,” he said, “the same way she came before I left Grandmother’s Land. Plums were red in the brush behind her and plums were red in a fold of her blanket. She was looking at me and her eyes were sad. Then a wind came moaning through the brush and she drew her blanket over her face, and there was a shadow that hid her. But when the shadow passed, the blanket was open about her face, and it was Tashina, and she was crying. I could see tears on her face and hear her crying like a little girl far away, but she did not look at me.

“Then all at once it was dark and I was awake in that strange place. I was afraid of something and my heart was sick. I do not know what I was afraid of. I could hear the woman sleeping, and the dark was still. I listened and listened, and there was nothing. In battle my heart sang, and I was not afraid. But in that still dark place I feared more and more and I could not stay.

“So I got up without making a noise, and walked softly. I felt for the little handle that turned. It clicked loud when I turned it, but nothing heard. I went out where a thin little fire was burning on a stick, and I went down and down, walking softly. There was another little handle that turned to let me out. When I was in the road outside, where the lights flickered in their cages, I ran. Some people came out of the shadows and yelled at me, but I did not stop.

“Then four akichitas came running out of the shadows and took hold of my arms. These men were not big and they were not angry. They patted me on the back and made soft sounds and kept saying, ‘Bufflo Beel, Bufflo Beel.’ And I said ‘Ah, kola, it is so,’ for I knew they meant Pahuska.

“I was glad to go with these Wasichu friends, for I was lost in that village of many roads. They took me to a place and two of them stayed with me. They made soft sounds and wagged their heads up and down and said, ‘Bufflo Beel, Bufflo Beel,’ and I knew they were friends. We stayed in that place until it was morning, and then they took me to Pahuska.

“He was not angry. He slapped me on the back and laughed like a big wind. I do not know why he did this, for my heart was sick. My heart was sick for home.