When the tree flowered

by John G. Neihardt

“The four men were so hungry that what the little girl brought only made them hungrier. So they got bolder and came to the tepee where Sitting Hawk was sleeping, and the mother and older daughter were scraping the deerskin, and the dog was feeding her pups. When the woman and daughter saw the four men all at once, they just stared. When the little dog saw them, she made whimpering noises to the little girl that said, ‘Why did you feed these men? They are enemies!’ And that scared the little girl. When Sitting Hawk sat up and saw them, he knew they were Blackfeet, although one of them spoke our tongue and asked for food. Sitting Hawk could do nothing, so he said to his woman, ‘Feed them.’ And she did. When they had eaten, the four lay down inside the tepee with their bows and arrows beside them. I think they were only waiting until it got darker. The woman had fed them, and she thought, I will treat them like relatives. So she took off their moccasins and rubbed the bottoms of their feet with warm tallow, the way she would do with her own man when he was tired. This made the men drowsy, and they fell sound asleep around the fire, being full of meat and weary. They were maka mani [afoot] and maybe they had walked far.

“Now the little dog began yawning and making strange noises like talking. The little girl listened, and understood. The dog was saying, ‘Hurry! Take my little ones and run away from here as fast as you can or you will be killed. These are bad men and enemies.’ This scared the little girl more than ever, and she whispered to her mother what the dog said. This scared the woman and she whispered it to Sitting Hawk, so that he was scared too, for he knew these were Blackfeet. And this is what he did. He whispered to his family to follow him with what they could carry. The little girl put the pups inside her dress, and the dog followed her. When the horses were all ready, Sitting Hawk went back to the tepee without making any noise. There were some big pieces of tallow on the ground, and these he put into the red ashes of the fire, with the men sleeping around it. The tallow sputtered. Then a big flame leaped up, and Sitting Hawk ran to his horse where the others were all ready to go. They rode fast, and when they came to the top of a hill they could see the tepee burning and men running here and there. Maybe the Blackfeet got burned with hot grease; I do not know. But Sitting Hawk and his family and the little dog and the pups were safe.”

“Ho, ho!” exclaimed Moves Walking and Eagle Voice together by way of applause.

“It is a true story,” resumed No Water, “and the very old man who told me—much older than I am—told me more about a dog just to prove it.

“The way I got the story, this man’s wife was well known among the Lakota. Her name was Loud Woman. Her man, I cannot give his name, for I have forgotten—but I will call him Good Buffalo. He had two sons and these had wives. Also he had a daughter and a sister. The daughter was just a little girl—maybe four or five winters—and she had a little dog. So it was a family of eight, if you do not count the dog.

“This family was on a hunting party, for the scouts had been looking around and no enemies were seen. So the councilors allowed small parties to go out. They were having a good time, and they were moving back slowly towards the village, which was not far away now and not very close either.

“One day Good Buffalo told his wife, Loud Woman, to camp in a certain place with his sister, his little daughter and his two daughters-in-law. It was a grassy place with plenty of good water and wood. So there were four women and a little girl in that camp, if you do not count the little dog. Then Good Buffalo and his two sons went hunting.

“It was getting to be evening, but it was early yet. The little dog had been running around here and there, smelling everything to learn all about the new camping place. This one was a mother dog too, but she did not have any pups yet. You see, they were all women in that camp. Afterwhile the little dog was sitting on top of a hill near the camp, and she was barking. Soon she raised her nose to the sky and began howling in a queer way. The little girl listened, and all at once she knew her dog was talking, and this is what the dog was saying: ‘Wahoo—oo-oo! It is going to be terrible! We should run away! It is going to be terrible! We should run away! Wahoo-oo-oo!’

“The little girl ran to her mother and told what she heard the dog say; but her mother was very busy doing something—and she kept on doing it—so that she did not hear the little girl very well. Then the little dog came running down the hill with her tongue hanging and all out of breath. She leaped up on each one in the camp, wagging her tail, and yawning with queer noises in her throat. Then she would whine and yelp. And the mother said, ‘What is the matter with that dog? She acts crazy!’ And the little girl said, ‘Mother, she is talking. I told you she was talking. She says it is going to be terrible and we must run away.’

“While the mother was looking hard at her little daughter and wondering if she might be making it up, the little dog ran back to the hilltop as though she might be chasing a rabbit.