A cloud was upon the brow of the chief as he paced moodily up and down.
The moonbeams shone upon his stalwart form and glistened in sparkling rays of silvery light upon the blade of the keen-edged scalping-knife thrust so carelessly through the girdle that spanned his sinewy waist.
Care was on the brow and anxiety in the face of the Shawnee chieftain.
His thoughts were of the dreaded Wolf Demon—the terrible scourge that was laying his heavy hand so cruelly upon the warriors of his tribe.
The Shawnee chief had the heart of a lion. No face had ever yet made him turn upon his heel. A thousand bullets had whistled in waked wrath around his head and he had faced the storm undauntedly. The glittering knife of the hostile foe had sought his heart, and even as the point tore his flesh, he had grimly smiled and stricken his enemy to the earth.
Ke-ne-ha-ha feared not mortal man, but now his foe was a fiend from the other world, and the stout-hearted Shawnee chief trembled when he thought of the terrible foe who struck so silently and yet so fearfully.
He would have given all the fame he had acquired on the war-path, all the honor that he had won in the council-chamber, to be put face to face with the demon of his race, so that he might discover who and what the terrible creature was.
At a little distance from the chief stood two of the principal warriors of the nation. One was called the Black Cloud, the other, Noc-a-tah.
“A cloud is on the brow of the chief,” said Noc-a-tah, as he watched Ke-ne-ha-ha pacing to and fro, with all the restless, springy motion of the imprisoned tiger.
“Yes,” replied the other. “Ke-ne-ha-ha has not smiled since the death of the Red Arrow. She was his eldest daughter and the singing-bird that gladdened his wigwam with her song. The heart of the chief is sad—many moons have passed away, but he can not forget the child that he loved so well.”