Told by Peter York.
Once a small party left the Rama Reserve for the purpose of going on a
hunt up the Gull River waters. Amongst this party was a bad man who had
left his wife on the Reserve and had taken another woman with him,
which was a very bad thing to do. After being on the hunt for some time
this man died and was prepared for burial, and a grave was dug. He was
left in a place just outside the camp for three days before burial. One
of the children of the camp who happened to go and look at the body,
came back and said that clothes were pushed off the body’s face and
breast, so the older people went to see. They found this was so and the
man coming to life. He came to life and said that he had been in heaven
and was sorry for what he had done by leaving his wife on the Reserve,
etc., but that he knew he was going to die in exactly a month from that
day at midday, and would never see Rama again. After a short while the
party moved camp on their homeward journey, and at Balsam Lake when the
month was just about to be up the man said that he was going to die and
knew he could not stop it. So he made a little camp and went in there.
He was all right the night before and also on the morning of the last
day, but before noon he said his time was near and began to act
terribly crazy-like. His eyes stuck out and he chewed his tongue and
rolled around his camp in terrible agony. He acted so strangely and
shook his camp so much that he so frightened the others that they were
afraid to go near him and so left him alone to die. His actions
continued till noon when the man died in horrible pain. Thus was he
punished for leaving his wife and taking another woman.