After my first three years of school, I roamed again in the Western
country through four strange summers.
During this time I seemed to hang in the heart of chaos, beyond the
touch or voice of human aid. My brother, being almost ten years my
senior, did not quite understand my feelings. My mother had never gone
inside of a schoolhouse, and so she was not capable of comforting her
daughter who could read and write. Even nature seemed to have no place
for me. I was neither a wee girl nor a tall one; neither a wild Indian
nor a tame one. This deplorable situation was the effect of my brief
course in the East, and the unsatisfactory "teenth" in a girl's years.
It was under these trying conditions that, one bright afternoon, as I
sat restless and unhappy in my mother's cabin, I caught the sound of the
spirited step of my brother's pony on the road which passed by our
dwelling. Soon I heard the wheels of a light buckboard, and Dawée's
familiar "Ho!" to his pony. He alighted upon the bare ground in front
of our house. Tying his pony to one of the projecting corner logs of the
low-roofed cottage, he stepped upon the wooden doorstep.
I met him there with a hurried greeting, and, as I passed by, he looked
a quiet "What?" into my eyes.
When he began talking with my mother, I slipped the rope from the pony's
bridle. Seizing the reins and bracing my feet against the dashboard, I
wheeled around in an instant. The pony was ever ready to try his speed.
Looking backward, I saw Dawée waving his hand to me. I turned with the
curve in the road and disappeared. I followed the winding road which
crawled upward between the bases of little hillocks. Deep water-worn
ditches ran parallel on either side. A strong wind blew against my
cheeks and fluttered my sleeves. The pony reached the top of the highest
hill, and began an even race on the level lands. There was nothing
moving within that great circular horizon of the Dakota prairies save
the tall grasses, over which the wind blew and rolled off in long,
shadowy waves.
Within this vast wigwam of blue and green I rode reckless and
insignificant. It satisfied my small consciousness to see the white foam
fly from the pony's mouth.
Suddenly, out of the earth a coyote came forth at a swinging trot that
was taking the cunning thief toward the hills and the village beyond.
Upon the moment's impulse, I gave him a long chase and a wholesome
fright. As I turned away to go back to the village, the wolf sank down
upon his haunches for rest, for it was a hot summer day; and as I drove
slowly homeward, I saw his sharp nose still pointed at me, until I
vanished below the margin of the hilltops.
In a little while I came in sight of my mother's house. Dawée stood in
the yard, laughing at an old warrior who was pointing his forefinger,
and again waving his whole hand, toward the hills. With his blanket
drawn over one shoulder, he talked and motioned excitedly. Dawée turned
the old man by the shoulder and pointed me out to him.
"Oh, han!" (Oh, yes) the warrior muttered, and went his way. He had
climbed the top of his favorite barren hill to survey the surrounding
prairies, when he spied my chase after the coyote. His keen eyes
recognized the pony and driver. At once uneasy for my safety, he had
come running to my mother's cabin to give her warning. I did not
appreciate his kindly interest, for there was an unrest gnawing at my
heart.
As soon as he went away, I asked Dawée about something else.
"No, my baby sister, I cannot take you with me to the party tonight," he
replied. Though I was not far from fifteen, and I felt that before long
I should enjoy all the privileges of my tall cousin, Dawée persisted in
calling me his baby sister.
That moonlight night, I cried in my mother's presence when I heard the
jolly young people pass by our cottage. They were no more young braves
in blankets and eagle plumes, nor Indian maids with prettily painted
cheeks. They had gone three years to school in the East, and had become
civilized. The young men wore the white man's coat and trousers, with
bright neckties. The girls wore tight muslin dresses, with ribbons at
neck and waist. At these gatherings they talked English. I could speak
English almost as well as my brother, but I was not properly dressed to
be taken along. I had no hat, no ribbons, and no close-fitting gown.
Since my return from school I had thrown away my shoes, and wore again
the soft moccasins.
While Dawée was busily preparing to go I controlled my tears. But when I
heard him bounding away on his pony, I buried my face in my arms and
cried hot tears.
My mother was troubled by my unhappiness. Coming to my side, she offered
me the only printed matter we had in our home. It was an Indian Bible,
given her some years ago by a missionary. She tried to console me.
"Here, my child, are the white man's papers. Read a little from them,"
she said most piously.
I took it from her hand, for her sake; but my enraged spirit felt more
like burning the book, which afforded me no help, and was a perfect
delusion to my mother. I did not read it, but laid it unopened on the
floor, where I sat on my feet. The dim yellow light of the braided
muslin burning in a small vessel of oil flickered and sizzled in the
awful silent storm which followed my rejection of the Bible.
Now my wrath against the fates consumed my tears before they reached my
eyes. I sat stony, with a bowed head. My mother threw a shawl over her
head and shoulders, and stepped out into the night.
After an uncertain solitude, I was suddenly aroused by a loud cry
piercing the night. It was my mother's voice wailing among the barren
hills which held the bones of buried warriors. She called aloud for her
brothers' spirits to support her in her helpless misery. My fingers Grey
icy cold, as I realized that my unrestrained tears had betrayed my
suffering to her, and she was grieving for me.
Before she returned, though I knew she was on her way, for she had
ceased her weeping, I extinguished the light, and leaned my head on the
window sill.
Many schemes of running away from my surroundings hovered about in my
mind. A few more moons of such a turmoil drove me away to the eastern
school. I rode on the white man's iron steed, thinking it would bring me
back to my mother in a few winters, when I should be grown tall, and
there would be congenial friends awaiting me.