Then, he gave a low growl. It was exactly as if he had uttered the phrase of—
"All right!"
After this, dropping all semblance of caution, and shaking himself as a huge dog might, he shuffled off hurriedly to the hole in the snow which led to his and my habitation. When I entered it, he was circling round the whole of the somewhat narrow interior, smelling in every part, and repeating, from time to time, the low growl I have just alluded to as so significant.
It would be unnecessary to say, I did not enjoy a particularly sound slumber that night.
That the owners of these moccasins were Indians, it was impossible to doubt.
If, as some say the red men are able to do, I am unable to detect the moccasined foot-print of one tribe from that of another, I can at any rate tell whether the foot within the moccasin may chance to be a white one. These were not. Of this I had been, at once, assured. But why had they visited my hole in the snow, and why had they afterwards left it? This last question I was unable satisfactorily to settle.
In any case, it was necessary to let the other boys know red-skins were around. Accordingly, breaking my fast early, I started towards Brighton Bill's cabin, as he was my next-door neighbor, living merely at a distance of some fifteen miles. Arriving there in the forenoon, I found him seated by a roaring fire. But scarcely had I stepped within his door, than he was on his feet with his rifle, which had been between his knees, cocked, raised, and pointed at me. It was, however, as rapidly dropped.
"By 'eaven, Mose, H'i thought you was han H'ingin."
"The Indians brought me here, Bill!"
"The blasted red devils turned hup 'ere, when H'i was hout yesterday."