"Why didn't they take the gun? It was worth a good deal, and the Indians hold such things in high value."
"When the Pawnees bury a warrior, they bury his weapons with him; they were afraid to take the gun; they covered his face with his hat——"
"Are you sure of that?" broke in Jack.
"Such were the words of Lone Bear, who spoke with a single tongue."
"If they left Otto three days' journey away, with his hat lying on his face, I should like to know how it comes to be here."
And Jack drew the article from under his coat, and handed it to Deerfoot. The latter did not conceal his astonishment, for he identified Otto's property at once. He asked his friend for the particulars, and received them.
Deerfoot's theory was overturned by this discovery, and it was beyond his power to explain the presence of the hat so far away from where the owner had been abandoned. It would be supposed that the discovery would throw discredit on the story told by Lone Bear, inasmuch as the two seemed irreconcilable; but such was not the case. Deerfoot did not doubt Lone Bear's words, and I make free to say just here, that subsequent discoveries proved that the vanquished Pawnee had not deviated from the truth in the first particular.
The active brain of the young Shawanoe grappled with the puzzling problem, and he was still unable to solve it, when the faint report of a gun was borne to the ears of himself and friends. It was so faint, indeed, that Jack Carleton just caught the sound, but it was as distinct to the warrior as if fired within a hundred yards.
I am aware that it sounds incredible when I state that the single report of the rifle, far away in the wilderness, as it was softly borne through the miles of intervening space, told the whole story to Deerfoot the Shawanoe; it solved the mystery; it made clear that which was hidden; he no longer saw through a glass darkly; the history of Otto Relstaub was as plain as if it had fallen from his own lips.
I repeat that it will seem incredible to the reader that such a thing could be true, but I shall soon make plain how it all came about.