To gain our flanking position we were compelled to dip into the bed of a small creek shaded by dwarf trees, and we followed this for perhaps a quarter of a mile. Coming out into the open again, an entirely different spectacle presented itself. Bearing down upon the herd from the northeast appeared a second party of warriors fully as numerous as our own. Exclamations broke from the Dakota ranks, and although at that distance the strangers looked to me no different from our allies, none of Chatanskah's men were in doubt as to their identity, and Tawannears answered my question without hesitation.
"Cheyenne, brother. They are the Striped-arrow People, so-called from their custom of using turkey feathers on their arrow-shafts."
"Are they friends or enemies?"
He smiled.
"When two tribes have one herd of buffalo, Otetiani, they cannot be anything else but enemies."
"Yet surely there are buffalo enough here for all the Indians in the Wilderness!"
"My brother forgets that once the buffalo are attacked they will begin to run, and no man can tell which way they will go."
"Then we must fight the Cheyenne?"
"So it seems, brother," he replied with truly savage indifference.
Chatanskah and his people were equally convinced that there was but one way out of the difficulty, and they advanced upon the opposing party at a run. The Cheyenne, of course, had seen us as soon as we saw them, and they made it their business to meet us half-way. But both bands halted as though by command a long bow-shot apart, and stood, with weapons ready, eyeing each other provocatively.