When the tree flowered

by John G. Neihardt

“When we had eaten, Charging Cat rolled over like dead, and it was hard to hold my head up; but I thought of Crazy Horse and I wanted to be like him. So I said, ‘Cousins, go to sleep and I will watch. Then I can ’waken you and sleep too.’ And they rolled over and were like dead men.

“The sun was gone. There were stars, and the tops of the hills saw the moon coming far away, but it was dark around me yet, and the herd was only shadow. I kept staggering around to stay awake. It was not easy to be like Crazy Horse. I thought hard about the victory dance they would have for us. So I made myself dance the way I would be doing then, and sang to myself. All at once I would be down on my hands and knees, and it would be hard to get on my feet again. The moon looked over a hill at me, and it was trying to dance. The stars danced too. I tried to ’waken somebody.

“All at once it was not the moon looking over the hill. It was the sun blazing on us and I was lying on the grass. I looked around, and when I did not see any horses, I yelled. The others jumped up, excited and ready to fight. But there was nothing to see. The place in the hills was empty.

“When we had looked awhile, Kicking Bear said, ‘We are not dead, so it was not enemies that did this.’ And I said, ‘Maybe they went looking for water.’ And Charging Cat said, ‘That is what they did, and we can find them.’ And High Horse said, ‘If we do not find them, we can go back maka mani the way we started and find another village.’ And we all said, yes, we could do that.

“But it was easy to track the horses, for they were all going one way down along the edge of the hills. And after a while we saw them. They were scattered out in a valley below us. The hills opened up there and a creek was running through towards where the sun comes up, and the grass along the creek was deep. It was not hard to catch the horses we had been riding, because their lariats were looped around their necks, and they were tired; but this time we tied them to bushes. It was a good place to rest the horses and get them full of grass; and it was a good place for us to eat and sleep.

“There were deer in the valley, and some of them were grazing with the horses at the edge of the herd. I think they had not learned to be afraid of men. So I got on my horse with my gun ready and rode slowly among the grazing herd towards where the deer were. I was lying close to the horse’s neck, and a little wind was blowing towards me. I got a fat one. When I shot, the horses nearby started milling and crowding, but they were so tired they stopped soon and began grazing again.

“We ate plenty. Then before we slept, High Horse and I prepared the two scalps we had taken. There were four of us, so we cut the scalps in two; and when we had soaked them in water awhile, we scraped them thin and stretched them on hooped sticks to dry. Also, we had to have drums for the victory; so we scraped enough of the deer-hide to make four and stretched it on hoops. When we had done this, sitting by a little fire, we slept; but this time two slept while two watched.

“When the morning star looked over the edge of the world, we ate again. And when we had bunched the horses and started driving down the valley of the creek, a streak of day was growing away off yonder towards our home. We drove all that day, but sometimes we stopped a little while to let the herd rest and drink and graze. There were many lame ones, and it was hard to keep them going with the others, for we were in a hurry yet. Maybe the enemy had caught enough strays by now to follow with a large party. Maybe they thought there were many of us, and so they waited until they could find enough horses. We talked about this, and we said if they came we would fight them; it was not good to grow old; nothing remained but the hills; we were men and we could die. But all day, whenever we came to a ridge and looked behind us, the back trail was empty. I think the pipe helped us, the pipe and the vow we made on the high hill.”

The old man fell silent, and for some time he sat with closed eyes, head bowed, his hands on his knees.

“It was many snows ago,” he said at length, emerging slowly from his reverie. “That was my first victory. Before it was dark that day, we began to know our own country again, and we sang to see all the good horses we had, for we began to feel safer. There were about seventy-five of them, and they were the good ones. We had done great deeds; the people would praise us; and we would not be boys any more, but men.