“Crowfoot, come back to the cabin. I want you to stay and teach Dick all that you can.”
The Indian seemed incredulous.
“You fool Old Joe,” he declared.
“I am not in the habit of fooling,” Merry asserted. “I speak the truth; I want you to teach him as much as you can. I believe that no man acquires useless knowledge. It may seem that he does, but, some time during his life, he is certain to find need of it. It always has been my policy to keep my eyes and ears open and learn all that I could. I know something of Indian lore, for I am not quite the tenderfoot I look, and one of my friends was a young Indian by the name of John Swiftwing.”
“Ugh!” grunted Crowfoot. “Him go to Injun school, marry half-blood squaw?”
“Yes.”
“Old Joe know um.”
“You know him?”
“Him live in mountains, not hundred mile from here.”
“Crowfoot, are you telling me the truth?”