"He cannot save the
dog. How hard it is! No one in the village seems to care for Black
Bull. The Stone, his own mother, treats him cruelly. The dog is his
only friend, as he says. I will tell my young mistress about him. It
may be she can help him."
As soon as Timid Hare had done her errand she ran home, still with the
thought of Black Bull's trouble in her mind. She had been in the tepee
only a few minutes before Sweet Grass noticed that something was the
matter with her little maid.
"What has happened, Timid Hare?" she asked. "Your face is long--so!"
She drew her own mouth down at the corners and made herself look so
funny that Timid Hare, sad as she felt, broke into a laugh.
"It is Black Bull," she answered. "He is in trouble. It is greater
than it would be with any one else in the village."
Then she went on to speak of the youth's lonely life, and that even his
mother treated him badly. Only one loved him: this was the dog Smoke
who followed him wherever he went and who did not mock him as the
children of the village sometimes did. Smoke was ever ready to smile
at him in the one way dogs can--with his tail.
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