They panted as they ran up a short hill, and came out in a little cleared space among the scrub-pines.
“Wait a minute, can’t you?” gasped Blackie. “What’s the use of killing ourselves?”
Gil snorted. “Does that little run make you tired? Wait until you’ve been here at camp a week, and a trot like this will seem so slow you’ll think you’re going backwards.” Nevertheless he stopped and threw himself on the soft ground, and Blackie gratefully followed his example.
“How far are we from camp now?”
“Oh, about a quarter of a mile, I guess. Don’t worry, little one, you’ll get there before dark.” He pointed his grass-stem, toward the hills, where the sun was dropping, a ball of red fire in the west. “The Indian council ring is over that way. We’ll have a pow-wow there to-morrow night, I guess.”
Blackie’s eyes followed in the indicated direction, but his attention was immediately claimed by a fan-shaped formation of gray rocks on the side of the western mountains. His dark eyebrows raised, and he whistled. “Hey, Gil, what’s that?”
“What’s what?”
“That pile of rocks there—are they rocks?”
“That’s a terminal moraine. Now, ask me another.”
“A what?”