Week 10 Storytelling: The Red-Eyed Duck

There once was an old man that was going on a long journey. Old Man walked past a pond that was full of ducks. There were so many different types of ducks, but the man did not stop to talk to them because he was in a hurry to get where he was going.  He was on his way to a far off land to play music. He was a musician by trade and traveled from place to place in order to perform. The ducks started chattering amongst each other wondering who the man was. Finally one duck spoke up and said, “That’s Old Man.”  The duck that knew Old Man yelled at him and asked where he was going. Angrily, Old Man told them that he was in a hurry and had no time to talk to them. The ducks kept yelling at him to come over and sing them a song and he finally came over to the pond, but not just to sing them a song.

Old Man told the ducks that he was off to play music in a far off place. The ducks asked Old Man to sing them a song while he was at the pond. He agreed, but instead of pulling out an instrument from the bag, he pulled out a magical staff. Old Man was a wizard, and because all of the ducks had stopped him on his journey, he was going to make them pay. With his magic, he forced all of the ducks to collect lumber for him. He made them do chores for him the rest of the night until the ducks couldn’t do anything more. Old Man had left his mark an all of the ducks though. They now all had bright red eyes, the mark that magic had left on them. They all now acted like zombies as well. They could no longer talk and could hardly swim anymore. All of the hard work they had gone through had made the ducks different. The ducks lives had changed for the worse.

(horned grebe)

Having done his damage, Old Man went off on his way. Shortly after Old Man left, a coyote came and greeted the ducks. The coyote was a good friend of all the ducks and was surprised to see what had happened to all of his friends. He had immediately noticed that the ducks were no longer the same, and that they had bright red eyes. Luckily, the coyote knew of a magical cow that could cure the ducks. He immediately ran off to go fetch the cow. After a short while, the coyote came back with the cow and the cow conducted a magical spell on the ducks that would cure them. Once they were all cured, the ducks went off to get back at the old man. The found him very quickly and picked him up. They tied him from the tallest tree in the forest and left him there to die. The ducks always had the red eyes, which helped them remember what had happened that horrid day.

Author’s Note

I wrote this based upon The Red-Eyed Duck. In the original story, the man was a journey to go play music. The ducks pestered him to come over and after much pestering, the man finally came over to them. The man then told them to close their eyes while he sang a medicine song. He said if they opened their eyes, their eyes would turn red forever. He killed the ducks one by one while their eyes were closed. One duck opened its eyes and flew off just after trying to warn all of the others of the old man’s plan. The duck that tried to warn everyone had red eyes the rest of its life. The man tried to cook the ducks that he killed, but a coyote stole them all. I decided to make this story a little less violent. I like ducks a lot so I didn't want them all to die. Instead in this story, the old man ended up not making it. I wanted the ducks to get back at him for what he had done. I thought this was the best way for it to end. 

This story can be found here: Blackfeet Indian Stories by George Bird Grinnell (1915).