I
Horses neighing, women scurrying to cover, the report of guns, his
mother, Pretty-weasel, gashing her legs for mourning,—that was
Takes-the-pipe’s earliest memory. Later he learned that his own father,
a famous warrior of the Whistling-water clan, had fallen in the fight
and that his “father,” Deaf-bull, was really a paternal uncle who
had married the widow. No real father could have been kinder than
Deaf-bull. If anything, he seemed to prefer his brother’s son to his
own children, always petting him and favoring him with the choicest
morsels.
When Pretty-weasel needed help in dressing a hide or pitching a
tent, her sisters and cousins of the Sore-lip clan came as visitors,
often bringing moccasins and gewgaws for their little clansman,
Takes-the-pipe. One of the sisters stood out more clearly than the
rest, a lusty wench who would pull Deaf-bull by the ear and pour water
on his face when he took an afternoon nap. He in turn would throw her
on the ground and tickle her till she bawled for mercy. Another salient
figure was the grandmother, old Muskrat, who used to croon the boy to
sleep with a lullaby: “The dog has eaten, he is smoking. Haha, huhu!
Haha, huhu!” Whenever she came to the refrain she raised a wrinkled,
mutilated hand, and snapped what remained of her fingers in the child’s
face.
The people were always traveling back and forth in those days. Now
Takes-the-pipe was throwing stones into the Little Bighorn, then with
other boys he was chasing moths in the Wolf Mountains. When he caught
one he rubbed it against his breast, for they said that was the way
to become a swift runner. One fall, the Mountain Crow traveled to the
mouth of the Yellowstone to visit their kin of the River band. All
winter was spent there. It was fun coasting down-hill on a buffalo-rib
toboggan and spinning tops on the smooth ice. Each boy tried to upset
his neighbor’s with his own, and when he succeeded he would cry, “I
have knocked you out!” Takes-the-pipe was a good player, but once he
came home inconsolable because his fine new top was stolen, and another
time a bigger lad had cheated, “knocking him out” with a stone deftly
substituted for the wooden toy. His mother comforted him saying, “That
boy is crazy! His father is of the Bad-honors clan, that’s why he acts
that way!”
Takes-the-pipe was still a little fellow when Deaf-bull made him a bow
and arrows, and taught him to shoot. Now he ran about, letting fly
his darts against birds and rabbits. There was ample chance to gain
skill in archery. The boys would tie together a bundle of grass and
set it on a knoll, then all shot at this target, and the winner took
all his competitors’ arrows. Whenever Takes-the-pipe brought home a
sheaf of darts, his father would encourage him, saying, “You’ll be like
Sharp-horn, who always brings down his buffalo with the first shot.”
And when his son had killed his first cottontail, Deaf-bull proudly
called Sliding-beaver, a renowned Whistling-water, feasted him royally
and had him walk through camp, leading Takes-the-pipe mounted on his
horse and proclaiming his success in a laudatory chant.
One spring there was great excitement. The supply of meat was
exhausted, yet the buffalo remained out of sight. Scouts were sent to
scour the country in search of game, but in vain. At last Sharp-horn
offered to lure the buffalo by magic. At the foot of a cliff he had the
men build a corral. He summoned Deaf-bull to be his assistant. “Bring
me an old unbroken buffalo chip,” he said. Takes-the-pipe found one,
and together he and his father brought it to the shaman. “Someone is
trying to starve us; my medicine is stronger than his; we will eat,”
said Sharp-horn. He smoothed the earth in his lodge and marked buffalo
tracks all over. He put the chip on one of the tracks and on the chip
a rock shaped like a buffalo’s head, which he wore as a neck ornament.
This rock he smeared with grease. “The buffalo are coming, bid the men
drive them here,” he said.
Deaf-bull went out and issued the orders received from Sharp-horn. On
the heights above the corral, old men, women and children strung out in
two diverging lines for the distance of a mile or two. The young men
rode far out till they sighted the herd, got behind it and chased the
game between the two lines nearer and nearer to the declivity. They
drove them down into the corral. Some were killed in leaping, others
stunned so they could be easily dispatched. That was a great day for
Takes-the-pipe. He rode double with his father, and Deaf-bull was a
person of consequence. Had he not assisted Sharp-horn? Then, too, he
was a member of the Big Dog Society, and the Big Dogs were the police
for that season with power to whip every man, woman or child who dared
disobey Sharp-horn’s orders.
After the hunt, the meat-racks sagged with the weight of the buffalo
ribs, and the people made up for past want by gorging themselves with
fat and tongues. One evening the Big Dogs held a feast and dance, the
next evening the Fox society, then the Lumpwoods, and so on. There
were promiscuous gatherings, too, where the valiant warriors rose to
tell the assembled multitude about their exploits, while the old men
exhorted the callow youths to emulate the example of their fathers and
the camp reëchoed the ancient warriors’ songs:—
Sky and earth are everlasting,
Men must die.
Old age is a thing of evil,
Charge and die!
On one of these occasions Takes-the-pipe was proudly listening to
Deaf-bull’s record. He would have been a chief, had he ever wrested a
gun from an enemy in a hand-to-hand encounter; in every other essential
he more than passed muster. Three times he had crawled into a Piegan
camp and stolen horses picketed to their owners’ tents; six times he
had “counted coup” on enemies, touching them with his lance or bare
hand; twice he had carried the pipe and returned with blackened face as
leader of a victorious expedition.
While Takes-the-pipe was listening spellbound to his father’s
narrative, he felt a sudden pinch. He turned round to smite his
tormentor only to face Cherry-necklace, a boy somewhat older than
himself. He was Sliding-beaver’s son and that put a different
complexion on the matter, for Sliding-beaver, like Deaf-bull, was a
Whistling-water, so their sons might take what liberties they chose
with each other and enjoy complete immunity. At present, however,
Cherry-necklace had more important business than playing a trick on
Takes-the-pipe. “Magpie,” he whispered, “they are playing magpie.” Off
both boys dashed to a creek nearby, where some twenty lads were already
assembled round a big fire. They smeared their faces with charcoal till
one could hardly recognize his neighbor. “Now, we’ll be magpies,” they
said, “Takes-the-pipe is a swift runner, he shall lead.” They scampered
back to camp. The women, seeing them approach in their disguise,
snatched their meat from the racks to hide it inside their tents. But
Takes-the-pipe had already fixed his eye on some prime ribs, pounced
upon them and carried off his prize, followed by the other boys, each
vanishing with what booty he could safely capture.
It was a great gathering about the fireplace by the stream. One of the
lads strutted up and down as a crier and announced, “Takes-the-pipe
has stolen the best piece!” Then he and a few others who had won like
delicacies were granted their choice of the spoils, whereupon all
feasted. When they had done eating, the oldest boy declared, “We’ll
remain seated here. If anyone gets up, we’ll rub our hands with this
grease and smear it over his body.” So they sat still for a long
time. At last Cherry-necklace forgot about the warning and got up.
In an instant they were upon him like a pack of wolves. Here was a
fine chance for Takes-the-pipe to get even for that pinch; he daubed
Cherry-necklace’s face all over with the fat. Others followed suit and
soon his body glistened with grease. He leaped into the creek to wash
it off, but the water glided off the fat.