And her sun-browned cheeks were aflame with red. 
Her hand to the spirits she raised and said: 
“I am pure!—­I am pure as the falling snow! 
Great Taku-skan-skan[51] will testify! 
And dares the tall coward to say me no?”
But the sullen warrior made no reply. 
She turned to the chief with her frantic cries: 
“Wakawa,—­my Father! he lies,—­he lies! 
Wiwaste is pure as the fawn unborn;
Lead me back to the feast or Wiwaste dies!”
But the warriors uttered a cry of scorn,
And he turned his face from her pleading eyes.

Then the sullen warrior, the tall Red Cloud,
Looked up and spoke and his voice was loud;
But he held his wrath and he spoke with care: 
“Wiwaste is young; she is proud and fair,
But she may not boast of the virgin snows. 
The Virgins’ Feast is a sacred thing;
How durst she enter the Virgins’ ring? 
The warrior would fain, but he dares not spare;
She is tarnished and only the Red Cloud knows.”

She clutched her hair in her clinched hand; She stood like a statue bronzed and grand; Wakan-dee[39] flashed in her fiery eyes; Then swift as the meteor cleaves the skies—­ Nay, swift as the fiery Wakinyan’s[32] dart, She snatched the knife from the warrior’s belt, And plunged it clean to the polished hilt—­ With a deadly cry—­in the villain’s heart.  Staggering he clutched the air and fell; His life-blood smoked on the trampled sand, And dripped from the knife in the virgin’s hand.

Then rose his kinsmen’s savage yell. 
Swift as the doe’s Wiwaste’s feet
Fled away to the forest.  The hunters fleet
In vain pursue, and in vain they prowl
And lurk in the forest till dawn of day. 
They hear the hoot of the mottled owl;
They hear the were-wolf’s[52] winding howl;
But the swift Wiwaste is far away. 
They found no trace in the forest land;
They found no trail in the dew-damp grass;
They found no track in the river sand,
Where they thought Wiwaste would surely pass.

The braves returned to the troubled chief;
In his lodge he sat in his silent grief. 
“Surely,” they said, “she has turned a spirit. 
No trail she left with her flying feet;
No pathway leads to her far retreat. 
She flew in the air, and her wail—­we could hear it,
As she upward rose to the shining stars;
And we heard on the river, as we stood near it,
The falling drops of Wiwaste’s tears.”

Wakawa thought of his daughter’s words
Ere the south-wind came and the piping birds—­
“My Father, listen—­my words are true,”
And sad was her voice as the whippowil
When she mourns her mate by the moon-lit rill,
“Wiwaste lingers alone with you;
The rest are sleeping on yonder hill—­
Save one—­and he an undutiful son—­
And you, my Father, will sit alone
When Sisoka[53] sings and the snow is gone.” 
His broad breast heaved on his troubled soul,
The shadow of grief o’er his visage stole
Like a cloud on the face of the setting sun.