Chapter XXIII
The Piegans Move In
"GET UP!" NAT-AH'-KI commanded, grasping my arm and nearly pulling me out of bed. "Get up! It is very happy outside."
"Why did you awake me?" I asked. "I was having such a good dream."
"Of course you were, and you were talking, too. That is why I awoke you; I don't want you to dream about her. Tell me, quick, what the dream was, and what she said."
"Well, if you must know, she said—she said—she said—"
"Yes, hurry! What did she say?"
"She said, 'It's time for you to arise and wash. I have your morning food cooked, and we are going hunting today.'"
"Oh, what a lie he can tell!" she exclaimed, turning to the Crow Woman. "He was not dreaming about me at all, because he spoke in his own language."
I insisted that I was speaking the truth. "In the first place," I said, "there is no 'her' but you, and even if there were, her shadow could not come away out here to visit me in my sleep, because it would be unable to find the trail."
This reasoning was convincing, and closed the argument. It was indeed a lovely morning. There had been a heavy frost during the night, the grass in the shadow of the Fort was still white with it, but the sun was shinina in a clear sky, a warm southwest mind had started up-everything was auspicious for a perfect autumn day.
We breakfasted, saddled our horses, and rode out across the river, up the slope of the valley, and out on the plain. Nät-ah'-ki began to sing one of the women's songs of her people. "Be still!" I told her. "This is no way to hunt; you will scare away all the game."
"I do not care if I do," she said. "What matter? We have still some dried meat on hand. I can't help singing; this happy morning just makes me do it."
As she said, it did not matter. It was pleasant to see her so happy, to see her eyes sparkle, to hear her laugh and sing. A not distant band of antelope scampered away over a ridge; out of a nearby coulée rushed a small band of buffalo and loped off westward; a lone coyote also appeared, sat down on his haunches, and stared at us. "Hai-ya', little brother," said Nät-ah'-ki, addressing him, "are you also happy?"
"Of course he is," she continued. "His fur is so thick and warm that he does not fear the coming cold, and he has plenty, oh, always plenty of food. Some he kills for himself, and he can always feast on the remains of the animals his big relations kill. Old Man gave him and the wolf great intelligence."
We rode on and on aimlessly across the plain, talking and laughing, very, very happy, as two young people should be who love one another and who haven't a care in the world. Often, on reaching the top of some little eminence, we would dismount and let the horses graze while I smoked and swept the country with my telescope. Nät-ah'-ki also loved to use the glass, and watch the various animals it would bring so near to one, as they rested or grazed, or the young bounded and skipped and chased each other in their exuberance of spirits. It was a powerful glass, that old telescope, revealing even the dead old cones and dark abysses on the surface of the moon. But that was an object at which I never succeeded in coaxing her to level the instrument. Night Light to her was no dead old globe, but a real and sacred personage—wife to the Sun—and not to be scrutinized and studied by mortal eyes.
It was mid-afternoon when we decided that it was time we should get the meat we had started after and return home. We were about to mount and ride toward a coulée to the west, where a few buffalo were feeding, when, away to the north, we saw columns of dust rising, and nearer, some bunches of buffalo, loping in various directions, but mostly toward us. A few moments later a number of horsemen came in sight, and behind them, on the top of a long ridge, appeared a long column of riders and loose animals.
"Ah!" I said, "the Pe-kun-ny are moving in."
"My mother is there. Let us go to meet them," said Nät-ah'-ki.
Some of the startled buffalo were making almost a bee-line for the place where we stood, so I told her to lead the horses back out of sight, and I myself moved down, so that I could just look over the top of the ridge. In a short time some thirty or forty of the animals came Within easy range. I aimed at a big cow, and broke the left front leg the first shot; she dropped behind the others at once, and a second shot laid her low. She proved to be very fat, and her coat was fine, not quite of full length, perhaps, but very dark and glossy.
I was about to cut the animal open on the back, intending to take only the boss ribs and the tongue, when Nät-ab'-ki came up and insisted that I should properly skin it for a head-and-tail robe, and cut up -all of the meat for packing. "We will give the hide to my mother," she said, "and get her to pack in the meat for us."
So I did as I was told, of course; the butchering taking some little time. Meanwhile Nät-ah'-ki went to the top of the ridge, but soon returned to say that the people were pitching camp near where we had discovered thern, and that it would be pleasant to remain with them for a night.
"All right," I said, "we'll go over and stop with Weasel Tail. We'll take a little of the meat and leave the rest and the hide for your mother to pick up in the morning."
But that, it seemed, would not do. "Either the wolves will feast upon it in the night," she said, "or someone will find and take it in the early morning; so, to be sure, let us pack it into camp."
I spread the great hide over her horse, entirely covering the animal, saddle and all, from neck to tail, and then hung the greater part of the meat across it over the saddle, covering it all by folding and refolding the hide. The rest I put in two large meat sacks and tied behind my saddle. Then I helped Nät-ah'-ki to get up and perch on top of her load, mounted my animal, and we wended our way to camp and in among the lodges. There were pleasant greetings and pleasant smiles for us on every hand, and some jokes were made about the young married hunters. We dismounted in front of Weasel Tail's lodge. My good mother-in-law ran and met her daughter, the two affectionately embracing and kissing each other, the former repeatedly saying, "My daughter! My daughter! She has arrived."
And the good woman looked at me and smiled, but gave me no greeting. Even in being in my vicinity, to say nothing of smiling at me, she bad broken a strict rule of Blackfoot etiquette, of which I have already spoken, which is that mother and son-in-law must never meet nor speak to each other. For my part, I transgressed this form at the very first opportunity. I came upon the good woman when she could not escape, nor help listening, and told her that with us it was to be different; that white people had no such custom. "Wherever we are," I continued, "you are to come and live with us when you will, and I shall go where you are when occasion to do so arises."
I am sure that my words pleased her, as they also pleased Nät-ah'ki. in time she became used to the new order of things, in a way, but was always rather backward about directly addressing me. Very often, when I asked her for information about something, she would turn to her daughter and say, "Tell him that it was in this way," etc.