“The Unbeliever” by Dorothy M. Johnson

“Youth could not be revived, but its companion, peril, could still be found by a man who took the trouble to look.”

That gorgeous and true line is found in Miss Johnson’s perceptive story of a white man living among the Crow.

Johnson also wrote the classic “A Man Called Horse” and ably shows that this is not a mere repeat of that story’s theme. It has its own breadth and depth.

Short but memorable.

A Man Called Horse by Dorothy M. Johnson

He went home three years later. He explained no more than to say, “I lived with the Crows for a while. It was some time before I could leave. They called me Horse.”

He did not find it necessary either to apologize or to boast, because he was equal to any man on earth.

An absolutely superlative story. It is fine narrative fiction but any one also familiar with Sebastian Junger’s non-fiction premise propounded in his book Tribe will find extensive food for thought here.

Some stories are stories, and some are fingers gesturing to insight; this is one of the latter.

Lost Sister

Our household was full of women, who overwhelmed my uncle Charlie and sometimes confused me with their bustle and chatter. We were the only men in the place. I was nine years old when still another woman came—Aunt Bessie, who had been living with the Indians.

This gorgeous Dorothy M. Johnson story is based in part on Cynthia Ann Parker’s abduction by the Comanche Indians and her giving birth the to the chief Quanah Parker.

This theme of a reluctant return to “society” is a common one, but here it is handled with a gentle grace as seen through a child’s eyes.

Beautifully done.