Story of a young man who was purified from sin

So they split some wood and took off the curtain and made the fire. Afterward they covered up (the smoke-hole). Then the bowls were brought in also. After they had finished with the bowls, they remained seated. At the back of the room, in the middle, where they were accustomed to sit, they remained, while the men of the village went out to their own houses. So of all the young men, only they two did not go out, but always remained in that place. Then the one who used to go to sleep first, that one went to sleep again; and the one who yesterday was the last to go to sleep again sat up. That one who was the last to go to bed shines at night, they say. Yes, they say, he always does so, because he tries to govern his temper; while the other one does not shine. So then his partner went to sleep; and a long time afterward he too went to sleep, but only for a little while. And he watched for it to grow light up (at the smoke-hole), and by the time that it was growing light he was dressing. And then again he returned to that mountain and ascended it again. It is the same mountain whither he always went since the time when he was a boy.

So he looked around. Lo! they say, where he had been accustomed to get deer, there were none to be seen. Meanwhile it grew light. He looked in both directions. To the southward there was a great tundra. On the other side, mountains were to be seen. The sun was about to rise; and out on the great tundra, a little to one side of the middle, lo! suddenly he saw a fine house, with the curtain bellying out. Was he not looking just now, and there was nothing there!

The young man thought, they say, “I believe I will go to it.” Then he put down his arrows, and his pack also, and went out to the place. So he came there. What a fine house it was! He went and stood in the doorway, and looked around outside. He looked, but there was no cache to be seen. He looked for tracks also, but there were no footprints. He turned it over in his mind. “I wonder,” thought he, “whether there are any people where I am going!” So he went in. Down into the entrance he went, and pushed aside the curtain. Lo! they say, a sudden burst of light. So he went in. There was a very small room. He crossed it. On the other side he turned and looked around. On the opposite side, toward the front of the house, on the platform, sat a beautiful woman, sewing. Without looking up, she pushed her sewing (into the corner) toward the front of the house, and said, “It is because of my intention that you came here. Though I have been looking all over the world,” she said, “I could see no one but you. You only could I see upon this world,” she said. “Because you were pleasing to me have I showed you my house,” said she. Then the woman went out, and was gone for some time. Finally she came in. What a fine, clean bowl of food it was that she brought in, steaming, from the pot! So he began to eat; and when he had finished, he gave her back the bowl. After she had been gone a while, she came in again, bringing great back-strips of deer-skins. She took them directly over to him, and said, “These are for you to lie upon.” He took them from her and put them on the platform. She also gave him a martenskin blanket for his bed. So he lay down, and they went to sleep. The next day also they woke up. So, for two days and two nights he remained in the house, and meanwhile he did not even see the outside. Then, as they arose, she went out. She came in, bringing meat, which she gave to him, and he ate. Then he concluded that he would stay another day also. Then, as it grew dark again, the man said, “Am I still to stay here in this house?” “Yes,” said she. Then said the man, “What a long time it is that you bid me stay in the house!” “Yes,” said she, “what is wanting that you can go and get, that you should say that? Why, already you have become part of my life,” said she. So she gave him to eat, and they finished eating and went to bed. Then the young man lay awake, while on the other side of the room the woman was beginning to go to sleep. And the young man thought, “Can it be that I am destined always to live here in this way? Why,” he thought, “did she show her house to me? I believe,” he thought, “that I will go (over) to her.”

So he arose and left his place, and went out in front of her. Suddenly, they say, he lost consciousness. While he was going out there in front of her, this befell him. He could not tell where he was. Presently, they say, he seemed to himself to wake up; and he sat down again there, in his own place. “What am I doing here?” he thought. “What is this that she is doing to me? I supposed that I was going across to her, but I was asleep.” Meanwhile, on the other side of the room the woman was snoring. Again he thought, “I wonder whether it is I that am doing this, (or whether some one else compels me!) I believe I will go over again.” So he left his place again, and went over to where her head was. Again he seemed to go to sleep. Here he is as if asleep, they say. Then again he seemed to wake; and there at his place he lay, as he became conscious. “Why,” thought he, “I supposed I crossed the room to her head. Sakes alive! what ails me?” Meanwhile, on the other side of the room, the woman was sleeping. “I don’t know what to do here,” he thought. “I believe I’ll try again.” So here he goes to get to the platform beside her head. Thereupon the back end of the room suddenly opened at the middle. At that a great fright seized him. Then from some source of light there was a great illumination. Beside that, from the direction where he turned himself some one laughed. From within, where it is all clean, a woman is laughing at him. Before he could recover himself, the woman said, “Why, what are you about? That is my mother.” Then the man became ashamed. “Come!” she said, and he went to her. Then said the woman, “It is because you pleased my mother that she showed you our house.” She then led him inside and took off his parka and the rest of his clothes, so that he was naked. Then she placed warm water by him, and shaved deer-fat into it. Then she bathed him, and furnished him with clothes. She dressed him in fine clothes. After she had dressed him, she said, “Come, sit down! Come,” she said, “let me have your hand!” From where he sat he held out his hand to her. She took it and put it into her mouth, and sucked it until her mouth was full. When her mouth was full, she emptied it into the water in which he had washed himself. Twice she did the same thing. Then she put his feet also into her mouth. At length it was full, and she emptied it into the water in which he had washed himself. Twice she did the same thing. Then she said, “Come, look at this!” So he looked, and saw that the water in the vessel was as black as coal. Then said the woman, “This is the evil that you have done since the time that you began to grow up. Come, see here your sin!” she said. Then the man spoke, and said, “Yes,” he said, “that is it. It is a great benefit that you have done me; for that I am deeply thankful to you.” And the man threw everything that he had been wearing into the water that he had bathed in.

Then she started to take the water out. “Empty it far away,” said he. Then she took it a long way off and emptied it, and threw away the bowl with it. Then she came in and gave him food, and he ate. After that he made her his wife. So he remained there, living with her.

One day she said to him, “Let me show you this house of mine!” And when he saw it, what a fine house it was! Their house was full of every kind of skin that there is upon this earth below. That was a rich woman indeed. The man said to her, “How did you ever come by this?” The woman said, “I shall not even yet tell you all about it. In time you will find out.” So he continued to live with her there. Neither, while he lived with her, did he go out of doors, or know how his food was cooked. Always the mother, when she goes out, sits close by the house, and brings in what is cooked. Thus they always do. At length the man’s wife gave birth to a baby, a boy, and they brought him up. In time he began to walk. One day the man said, “Am I always to live here in this fashion?” The woman said, “What are you thinking of? What can you do, that you should say that?” “What a long time it is that I am keeping to the house!” said he. The woman answered, “Tell me what is wanting, that you can get by working for it.” That was what she said to him. So then they continued to live there. It came to be a long time after she had said this to him, when she said, “Come, and I will show you from whence I have such an abundance. Come!” she said, and he went to her. He went to her, and they went to the back of the room, at the middle. Then she caused the ground to open, and said, “Come, look down!” So he stooped and looked down. How many were the animals that he saw as he stooped and looked down! How many of the animals of the earth! “Say, then, do you see it well?” she said. “Yes,” said he; and she closed it up, and they returned to their places. Then the man thought, “It must be these people’s doings, that there were no deer where I used to go to hunt.”

He thought this; and his wife said to her husband, Why do you think evil within yourself? Ever since the time that you came here,” she said, “ever since that time I have been able to see plainly what was going on in your mind.” And she said to him, “It is because you were pleasing to us, that we revealed our house to you.” Then the man said to her in answer, “I am thinking about my parents. I wonder somewhat whether they are still living.” “No wonder,” said his wife. “It is now four seasons since you came here.” “What!” said he. “What now? I supposed that I had been here only four days.” — “Because you did not know how the year passed outside,” said she. “This is now almost the end of the fifth year. It is now nearly winter, as it was when you came to us.” — “Is that so?” said he. “How could I tell how the time passed, since I never went outside?” “Do you wish, then, to take a look outside?” said she. “Come, go out!” Then he went out and looked, and, sure enough, the autumn was past. So he went into the house. “I want to go and see how it is with my parents,” said he. “Yes,” said she, “early tomorrow morning you must go and get material for a sled.” So early the next morning he went to get wood to make a sled. He got the wood in a short time, and returned with it to the village, and immediately set at work whittling. That wood that he had brought he whittled out hastily. On the second day he had finished it. The day after he began, his wife said to him, “I should like to go with you.” “Just as you please,” said he. So he loaded up the sled and packed it full. Then said the mother of the woman to the man, “Perhaps, now, she would not care for the society of mankind.” “Perhaps not,” said the man. “It would be well,” she said to them, “that you should spend only four days.” “Yes,” said he. Then she spoke thus to the man. “When you get down to the village, that fellow who used to be your partner — beware of him! When your wife warns you that there is danger, if she tells you that a certain thing is wrong, — if you should do that concerning which she gives you warning, you would be doing wrong,” said she. “Now, I doubt whether your wife will care for the society of mankind,” said she, “for she is not of humankind. Now,” said she, “when you two leave here, when you are not far from this house, be sure to look for this house.” So they left, and they put that little child of theirs into the sled. So they left. The husband pulled the sled, and his wife pushed. So they left; and they looked for the house, but it was gone. They made camp on the way down; and on the next day they went on, and the village appeared in sight. The young men of the village shouted, saying, “The one who was lost is bringing some one with him!” So then they arrived at the village, and went up. They went to the house of the man’s mother. “My child,” they said, and caressed him. His wife also they caressed. The people who lived there were ready to do anything for love of them. The mother made ice-cream and gave it to them. Meanwhile the woman had said to her husband, “I do not feel at home in the society of men.” Bedtime came; and the man said, “Lie down here in my mother’s house, for my cousin has asked me to sleep with him in the kashime.” But his wife was unwilling to let him go. Her husband, however, said that he wished to go to the kashime, and at length she told him to do as he pleased. So he took his bedding and went into the kashime. He lay down by his cousin, head to head, in the middle of the room. Then they fell to talking all night long, telling each other what had taken place. At length the one who lived there said, “Come, go in to my wife yonder, and I also will go in to your wife!” but that one of a good disposition said, “That one with whom I live is not a human being.” His partner, however, kept on urging him. Still he said, “I am not willing.” Still he urged him and at last he said, “Just as you please,” So then the one who lived at the village went to the wife of the one who had come. So then he went in to his (partner’s) wife, also. Then the one who went in to the wife of the one who had come, crept into the entrance and down inside the house. There at the back of the room the woman was sleeping. He approached her, and went to the side of the platform. Then he pushed her, and the woman was greatly frightened. As he pushed her again, she vanished. Then he went out and entered his own house. The one who had come to the village also entered the house, and he told him what had happened. Thereupon he put on his parka and went out. He went over to his mother’s house and entered, looking for his wife; but she was not there. Then he left the house and ran (after her); and as it grew light, [whither he goes,] behold, his wife had gone back. There were her tracks. Behold, where she went along back, she had thrown the mucus from her nose! Plainly, she had been crying as she went back there. Then her husband, too, became sad; and he too returned to that dwelling. He would have gone in; and as he was going in, he came back into the entrance. And, they say, there his feet stuck. How in the world was he to get free? As he stood there, he began to cry. “Ah! therefore it was that I warned you,” said the woman’s mother, speaking to him. “Come, stop that and let me in!” said he. “No,” said she, and he began to cry again. He cried, they say, until the night was past, and the next day also. At last, they say, his foot was freed. Down into the entrance he went also, and again his foot stuck fast. “Do let me in!” he said; but she said, “I will not let you in. Only on condition that you never again see (the village) down (there) will I let you in,” said she. “You shall never see your father and your mother again. Only on this condition will I let you in. Ah! you did very badly by me,” she said. “My child is very greatly downcast on your account. I pity you,” she said, “therefore I will let you in.” Then she let him in, and he went back to where his wife was. She, too, how the tears stream down her face!” What is it that you have come back here for?” said she. “What about that woman that you went in to? Do you intend to live with her?” “Was it of my own accord that I did it,” said he, “that you should say that?”

So, then, there he lived with them; and he went nowhere else, but began to stay there for good, and the mother concealed the house. And year in and year out the man never went to his mother’s to see his relatives. So, then, the story is finished.

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