"Ah," resumed Arnold with a smile, "I see that the understanding of the pale-face was wrong. We thought that the chief was Thunder-maker, as you hastened to obey his words."
"Thunder-maker great medicine——" began Swift Arrow, when the former speaker rejoined—
"Then he would make himself great chief. Will you braves suffer this insult to the wearer of the fiery totem?"
"Ka—Kawin!" was the chorus that met this question, and the dark looks that had been directed towards the Englishmen but a little while since were now turned towards the defeated Medicine Man, who was standing sullen and silent.
But Thunder-maker was not yet conquered, though he was apparently humbled. To give him his due, he was a man of wonderful resource, and when he saw that the tide was turning against him he was quick to meet the occasion.
"My brothers, listen not to the words of Thunder-maker," he said quietly, and with a pretence of sad emotion that he had failed to influence the other Indians to take the right course. "Did not Thunder-maker say that these evil spirits have tongues of magic? Did he not say that no weapon could prevail against those magic words? But let it be as my red brothers wish. Mighty Hand rest in teepee. He not come from tent at night, unless the war-cry call him. So let it be as these—dogs—say. Let them rest in their tent to-night, and at another sun we will bring them before the great chief Mighty Hand, who is the greatest of warriors, and chief of the greatest of all tribes, the Dacotahs. I have spoken."
"And spoken well," said Holden, thinking that it might be well to propitiate the Medicine Man for the time. But Thunder-maker, stooping forward with a pretence of picking up something from the ground, came close enough to whisper, so that only the Englishmen could hear him—
"By another sun, when Mighty Hand looks upon the pale-faces, it may be that the friends of Thunder-maker have looked first!"
The words were spoken with all the venom of a savage threat, and before Holden could make reply the Medicine Man was speaking loudly to Swift Arrow.
"The Dacotahs shall see great medicine when the fiery totem again turn eyes upon the evil water-spirits. Thunder-maker will now go to his teepee. He would speak with his little children that they show much magic."