When the celebration was over, Beaver-woman had to live as the wife of Red-eye, whom she hated. One night she stole to White-dog’s lodge and begged him to take her back. But White-dog got angry and bade her depart. “Do you believe he was ever my lover?” she asked.
He answered, “I do not believe it, but he has made the charge and seized you. Go back. I do not want people to sing songs in mockery of me.” And when she lingered he thrust her out and struck her a blow,—he who had never beaten her before. Then she mournfully retraced her steps towards her new home. But before she had gotten very far she felt a light tap on her shoulder. She turned about and faced not White-dog but his younger brother.
“The people here are bad,” said Little-owl, “come, let us two flee. By the mouth of the Yellowstone there are Crows too, and down the Missouri are the villages of the Corn-eaters. I have relatives among both; let us go and live with them.” So in the same night they packed some dried meat and other necessaries and they started northward down the Yellowstone without being detected in camp.
But on the second day’s journey they were espied by a group of scouting Cheyenne. Little-owl fought bravely but was killed and scalped. Beaver-woman with her baby became a captive of the hostile tribe, and the leader of the party took her as his wife, when they got back to the Cheyenne camp. Her new husband was a great warrior and treated her kindly, but he was an elderly man and she could not love him as she had loved White-dog. She grieved, too, for gentle Little-owl who had died for love of her, and she longed to go back to her own people.
About a year later another Crow woman was brought to camp as a captive. That was a joyful day for Beaver-woman. Now she learned all the news about her own people. She heard that Red-eye was dead, killed by lightning, and all the Crows said it was because he had abducted an innocent woman. White-dog had not married again; he had even sent away Turtle, his elder wife. He was more famous as a brave than ever, for he had struck several enemies and stolen two picketed horses from the Sioux. The people talked about his recklessness and thought he would surely become a chief.
When Beaver-woman heard about her people, she was filled with a great longing to go back to them. “We are not far from our own people,” she said, “let us run back there together. My husband is setting out against the Sioux; then we can escape.” So they made their get-away and arrived in safety among their own tribe. Beaver-woman went straight to her first husband’s lodge. She found him alone, smoothing an arrow-shaft. “They told me that other man was killed by lightning; I have come back,” she said. But he hardly looked up.
“A man does not take back a kidnapped wife,” he said, “go away.” Then she saw that she had come in vain and, weeping, she went to her parents’ home.
White-dog had always had a strong heart. But now the people were saying that he was positively foolhardy. When enemies were entrenched, he was the first to lead the attack; when a hostile camp was to be entered, he was the first to volunteer; he was always planning a raid against the Cheyenne or Sioux. But one time a Crow party returned wailing: White-dog had fallen in a reckless charge and they were bearing his corpse for burial among his people. His kinsfolk and the Foxes and all the tribe mourned his death, and the women in his family gashed themselves with knives to show their grief. But none grieved more, or inflicted more cruel wounds upon herself than Beaver-woman, and for a whole year she wore ragged clothes, and let her hair hang down disheveled. Then, because she was still good-looking, men came once more to woo her, and at length, because her brothers urged her, she married an oldish man and bore him children. And her children, as they grew up, married and had children too. But all her life she could not forget those early days when White-dog came and took her as his wife.
The old woman paused.