After some more searching Bill called out:
“Oh, come here, Tim. Here’s your fool coon. He’s washing a frog in my well.”
By the time Tim arrived, Meetcha had not only washed but also eaten his frog.
“You little fool,” Tim cried, as he gently boxed Meetcha’s ears, “the Sioux will cut off your tail and boil you in the pot if you run away from us. Haven’t you heard that war has begun?”
Meetcha snarled and struck at Tim with his short fore-paws, but Tim placed his pet in front of him on the saddle and men and boys started slowly for the small lake.
However, before they entered the woods, they halted the horses in an isolated thicket and Tatanka alone crept slowly through the grass and tall weeds into the woods.
“Where is he?” asked Bill, when Tatanka had gone a few rods. “I can’t even see the grass move, except by the little puffs of wind.”
“Of course you can’t.” Barker laughed. “Tatanka would not be a good scout if he could not vanish in the tall grass.”
Black Buffalo was gone a long time and Bill and Tim began to think that he would not come back or that he had been killed. But the trapper only smiled and said: “You boys don’t know what patience is. A good scout or a good hunter must be able to wait a long time, sometimes a whole day.”
When Tatanka did return he came into the thicket from the other side and was standing before them without either of the boys having seen him approach.