down again; but sometimes she smiled a little as she looked down. It was
long since we had played together, but I thought that perhaps she had not
forgotten the time, so many years ago, when she pretended to be my wife,
and when she had mourned over me once when I was killed by a buffalo.

As I grew older I felt more and more that I wished to see and talk with
her. Of course I was too young to be married yet, but I was not too young
to want to talk with Standing Alone. I used to go out and stand by the
trail where the women passed to get water, hoping that I might speak to
her, but often there was no chance to do so. Sometimes she was with other
girls, who laughed and joked about me, and asked whom I was waiting for.
They could not tell who was standing there, for my robe or my sheet covered
my whole body, except the hole through which I looked with one eye. But one
day when Standing Alone was going by with some girls, one of them
recognized the sheet that I had on, and called out my name, and said that
she believed that I was waiting for Standing Alone. I was surprised that
she should know me, and felt badly, but I did not move, and so I think
neither she nor the girls with her knew that she had guessed right; and the
next time I went I wore a different sheet, and different moccasins and
leggings.

One evening I had good luck; all the women had passed, and Standing Alone
had not appeared. I supposed that all had got their water, and was about to
go away when she came hurrying along the trail, and passed me and went to
the water's edge. She filled her vessel and came back, and when she passed
me again I took hold of her dress and pulled it, and dropped my sheet from
my head. She stopped and we stood there and talked for a little while. We
were both of us afraid, we did not know of what, and had not much to say,
but it was pleasant to be there talking to her, and looking at her face.
Three times she started to go, but each time I said to her, "Do not go;