She rushed toward the prostrate body—tore off the eagle plume that decorated his head, fastened it in her hair, still crying wildly:
“Mahaska is sister to the Great Spirit; who dares doubt her now? She has killed a warrior and wears his plume. Mineto made her a prophet. She has made herself a chief.”
The warriors gathered in a circle around the council-fire. Mahaska stood in the center with one foot on the breast of her prostrate foe.
“Speak!” she said; “is Mahaska your prophet and your chief?”
“Mahaska is our prophet and our white queen. Gi-en-gwa-tah is her husband and our chief,” was the steadfast reply.
For one moment Mahaska’s face was as the thunder-cloud, but with acute foresight she saw that her power had been tasked to the utmost. The tribe was not prepared to acknowledge her as the supreme head of its warriors, and she was not yet strong enough to brave the band of chiefs that surrounded her.
Her face cleared. She looked down at the body of her foe and spurned it with her foot. With a fierce gesture she wrenched away the tomahawk which the dead chief still clutched in his hand, wielding it aloft.
“Mahaska has won her right to be called a chief,” she cried out, with fierce pride. “Do her people doubt now?”
Again that great shout went up:
“Our queen, our queen! We accept the gift of the Great Spirit. Mahaska shall be our queen forever!”