Part 8 (2/2)
exclaimed the young mother.
Bending low over her babe she gave ear to the ground. Horrified was she to find the mysterious sound came out of the open mouth of her sleeping child!
”Why so unlike other babes!” she cried within her heart as she slipped him gently from her lap to the ground. ”Mother, listen and tell me if this child is an evil spirit come to destroy our camp!” she whispered loud.
Placing an ear close to the open baby mouth, the chieftain and his wife, each in turn heard the voices of a great camp. The singing of men and women, the beating of the drum, the rattling of deer-hoofs strung like bells on a string, these were the sounds they heard.
”We must go away,” said the chieftain, leading them into the night.
Out in the open he whispered to the frightened young woman: ”Iya, the camp-eater, has come in the guise of a babe. Had you gone to sleep, he would have jumped out into his own shape and would have devoured our camp. He is a giant with spindling legs. He cannot fight, for he cannot run. He is powerful only in the night with his tricks. We are safe as soon as day breaks.” Then moving closer to the woman, he whispered: ”If he wakes now, he will swallow the whole tribe with one hideous gulp!
Come, we must flee with our people.”
Thus creeping from teepee to teepee a secret alarm signal was given. At midnight the teepees were gone and there was left no sign of the village save heaps of dead ashes. So quietly had the people folded their wigwams and bundled their tent poles that they slipped away unheard by the sleeping Iya babe.
When the morning sun arose, the babe awoke. Seeing himself deserted, he threw off his baby form in a hot rage.
Wearing his own ugly shape, his huge body toppled to and fro, from side to side, on a pair of thin legs far too small for their burden. Though with every move he came dangerously nigh to falling, he followed in the trail of the fleeing people.
”I shall eat you in the sight of a noon-day sun!” cried Iya in his vain rage, when he spied them encamped beyond a river.
By some unknown cunning he swam the river and sought his way toward the teepees.
”Hin! hin!” he grunted and growled. With perspiration beading his brow he strove to wiggle his slender legs beneath his giant form.
”Ha! ha!” laughed all the village people to see Iya made foolish with anger. ”Such spindle legs cannot stand to fight by daylight!” shouted the brave ones who were terror-struck the night before by the name ”Iya.”
Warriors with long knives rushed forth and slew the camp-eater.
Lo! there rose out of the giant a whole Indian tribe: their camp ground, their teepees in a large circle, and the people laughing and dancing.
”We are glad to be free!” said these strange people.
Thus Iya was killed; and no more are the camp grounds in danger of being swallowed up in a single night time.
MANSTIN, THE RABBIT
MANSTIN was an adventurous brave, but very kind-hearted. Stamping a moccasined foot as he drew on his buckskin leggins, he said: ”Grandmother, beware of Iktomi! Do not let him lure you into some cunning trap. I am going to the North country on a long hunt.”
With these words of caution to the bent old rabbit grandmother with whom he had lived since he was a tiny babe, Manstin started off toward the north. He was scarce over the great high hills when he heard the shrieking of a human child.
”Wan!” he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, pointing his long ears toward the direction of the sound; ”Wan! that is the work of cruel Double-Face. Shameless coward! he delights in torturing helpless creatures!”
Muttering indistinct words, Manstin ran up the last hill and lo! in the ravine beyond stood the terrible monster with a face in front and one in the back of his head!
This brown giant was without clothes save for a wild-cat-skin about his loins. With a wicked gleaming eye, he watched the little black-haired baby he held in his strong arm. In a laughing voice he hummed an Indian mother's lullaby, ”A-boo! Aboo!” and at the same time he switched the naked baby with a th.o.r.n.y wild-rose bush.
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