24 TRADITIONS OF THE CADDO. 
gone many days. She told Turtle that they were gone and that she 
was going to take him to her house and keep him there. He was glad, 
for then he could be with her all of the time. She went home and built 
a high bed, and when she had finished it she carried Turtle home and 
put him in the bed. She asked him what he liked best to eat, and he 
said that he liked potatoes better than anything else. Every day she 
went out to hunt potatoes and prepared a big bowl full and put it up 
in the bed for him toeat. After several days her brothers came home, 
and so she thought she would take Turtle back to the river, but he 
begged so hard to stay that she yielded to him, though she knew that 
she took a risk. She told Turtle that he must always stay up in the 
bed where her brothers could not see him and must not move when they 
were about, for they would hear him and look for him and would surely 
kill him if they found him. The boys noticed the high bed when they 
returned, but their sister told them that she had made it because she 
felt safer in it while they were gone. Then they thought nothing more 
about it until they noticed that their sister regularly filled a large bowl 
with potatoes and put it in the bed and then took it outempty. They 
began to suspect something, but said nothing. One day they said that 
they were going to hunt. The girl watched them until they were out 
of sight ; then she took her digging stick and started after more potatoes 
for Turtle. The boys only pretended to go hunting and soon came 
back. They slipped up to the house and peepedin. When they found 
that their sister was gone they went in and climbed up to the bed to see 
what was there. They found Turtle and killed him, then ran away. 
When the girl came home and found her husband dead, she knew at 
once that her brothers had killed him and she started after them. 
The boys ran until they came to a river. ‘There they met many 
white ducks playing on the water. In those days all birds were white. 
The boys offered to paint the ducks all different colors if they would 
carry them and their little bob-tailed dog that was with them across 
the river and not tell any one that they had seen them or helped them 
across. ‘The ducks agreed, and so the boys painted their feathers. 
Then the ducks took them on their backs and flew across the stream 
with them. Soon the girl came along and asked the ducks if they 
had seen anything of two young men and a white bob-tailed dog. 
They said that they had not seen them, and the girl was about to turn 
back when one white duck, whom the boys had forgotten to paint, 
flew up and told her that her brothers and their dog had just passed, 
and that the other ducks had lied to her, because the boys had painted 
their feathers if they would not tell her the truth. The white duck 
carried the girl across the river and she began again to pursue her 
