Suddenly the boy recalled the mystery which had puzzled him so long, and it seemed to him that the means of solving it might be now placed in his hands.
“Can you tell me, Maquesa, why it was that Little Rifle left me, as she did, and went away with you? You did not steal her, and why should she go without awaking from her sleep and saying good-by to me?”
The chief was about to answer this query fully and explicitly (a half-dozen words would have done it), when perverse fate interfered and closed his mouth again, with the all-important words upon his very tongue.
CHAPTER XII.
THE REVELATION OF MAQUESA.
The interference, this time, came in the shape of Old Ruff Robsart himself, who strode forward out of the gloom, and advancing straight to the chief, extended his hand, and said:
“How do you do, Maquesa? I have been huntin’ fur yer for a long time.”
The Blackfoot returned the salutation with every appearance of cordiality, much to the surprise of the other two red-skins, who were hardly prepared for the exhibition of any thing like friendship between a white man and one of their race.
Having paid his respects to him, the trapper turned to his young friend with one of his huge grins, that moved his beard clean back to his ears.
“I don’t s’pose you war lookin’ fur me; but the way on it was—while I was huntin’ round fur that Injin village that had strayed off somewhar and got lost, I found thar was a little clump of lodges closer by, and I made up my mind to pay them a visit fust. Wal, I was trampin’ ’long when I heard your gun go off, and purty soon I heard it go agin, and then I knowed you war in some row, so I struck a bee-line fur you, and here I is. Hello!” he exclaimed, noticing the bodies of the two wild animals for the first time, “that war the trouble, eh? And as sure as I’m alive, thar’s old Speckled Beauty gone under at last. Tell me how it all came about.”
As the Blackfeet showed no disposition to interfere, or prevent this conversation, Harry related, as briefly as possible what the reader has already learned of his adventure with the strange animal, from whose clutches he was hardly saved by the timely coming to his assistance of the tame grizzly bear.