“When we went down there, the five bulls were dead, and they were all so torn up and full of holes that we could not use their hides for boats. Also, the old men said we should not eat any of their meat, because they had murdered each other. But the young cow was fat and tender; and when we had killed and skinned enough bison for the boats, we had a big feast.”
X
The Boys Who Had Sister Trouble
When I had returned from the woodpile and fed the stove, Eagle Voice continued eagerly:
“There is no meat like that any more, and I can taste it now. It is hard to chew the meat they have these days; but sometimes I get a tender piece from a calf, and it always makes me think of a story I heard for the first time while we were eating that cow. Also, whenever I think of the story, it makes me hungry like a boy, although it is not about eating.
“We feasted and listened to stories most of the night, while the horse-guards took turns. Sometimes I would fall asleep, being stuffed with meat, then I would be wide awake again and everybody would be laughing at some funny tale, or saying, ‘how! how!’ around the circle, cheering a good story just ended. Then I would eat some more, and listen to the next one.
“Charger told this one, and I can see him yet, although he fed the wolves somewhere, I do not know how many snows ago. I thought he was an old man then, but now I think that he was almost young. He was always joking, but I cannot remember him laughing, for he had a face that made him look always sorry and surprised. He could never tell a story sitting down, because he could not tell it all with his mouth. He told it mostly with his face and his hands and his whole body; so he had to tell it on his feet, and if you did not see the story he was telling, you could not hear it all. Sometimes when he got a tale started he would go right on telling it without a word for a while, and everybody would look and look and not move. There was one about a wild young fellow who played ghost, and people would coax him to tell it again, although they knew it as well as he did. They wanted to see him telling it with looks and motions.
“This wild young fellow liked tobacco very much and he never had enough of it. He was always wondering how he could get some more. So one day he was traveling with his father and his mother, his grandfather and his grandmother. They had been away somewhere and they were going back to camp. There was some fresh meat on the pony-drag so that they could eat on the way, and with the meat there was a fresh cow’s bladder packed full of wasna, made of meat and tallow and buffalo berries pounded up together.
“They were all traveling along on their horses with the pony-drag; and they got to talking about tobacco. Maybe the wild young man started it. There was none at all in their iglaka “When the sun was getting low they saw an iglaka coming towards them. It was an old man and an old woman, and they were mourning. So when the two iglakas met they stopped to talk awhile and tell each other what they had heard. Then the grandfather of the first iglaka asked the old man of the second iglaka for some tobacco. And the second old man said he had not any; but his son was lying dead in a tepee back there, and in the tepee was an offering of five plugs of tobacco. These old people had stayed all night with their dead son and now they had started to wander and mourn. The old woman was crying all the time they were talking. And the old man said: ‘He was a very generous son, and now he is dead back there. I think if you ask him for one of the plugs he will let you have it. He always liked to give to old people.’ When he said this, they both wept hard. “While the old people were all feeling bad together, the wild young man had a big thought, and what he thought, he did. First he sneaked the fresh cow’s bladder from the drag and hid it under his blanket. Then he remembered something he had lost back on the trail, and told the old people he would have to ride back and find it.