"The Piegans are wise, and they can judge anything laid before them," responded Red Knife, emphatically.
"I know very well what the Piegans are like," went on Dagard, who placed no faith whatever in them. "They are wise warriors, and to claim justice, when prairie law is infringed, is to get it."
The chiefs bowed; it was flattering to be taken for arbitrators, and, besides, the prairie and mountain arbitrator is entitled to take payment out of the property in dispute. So l'Embarrasseur continued as jauntily as if he felt secure now.
"I have so great a confidence in my red brother that I have put aside all to a toothpick to come right in among ye. Besides, there's no blood feud between the Half-breeds of Manitoba and the Blackfeet nation that ever I heard of. The hatchet never was used against either in the other's hand. Why, then, should I want to sit down with the knife in my girdle, as you carry yours? If I had been your foe—why, I have a good crowd left after a hot brush with the Crows that would have been entirely rubbed out but for the blizzard breaking up the evening's amusement; but I haven't come in any force. I knew perfectly well that I was meeting friends."
There was a silence. The Indians were clearly aware that the Canadian had been a tough bone for Ahnemekee, and that the remainder of his troop was not despicable. They had not Winchester rifles such as that which so rapidly disposed of half its owner's pursuers, and hoped no such rare fortune.
"This is the point," concluded Dagard, with an angry glance at the girl and her defender at the sacred fire of the sanctuary, "my men and I, on the open ground, captured that white woman and some stampeded animals that followed her mule; when in cut this renegade Half-breed, on a mare that called away her mule, and away went the whole outfit, helter-skelter. A stampede is fair enough—but not treachery. Either this Half-breed stands up for one colour or the other—red or white. If he hunts with the red, why, I am red. The Red River Half-breeds never yet held for the King George's, or the Yankees. And he should have let my prizes alone. Or, if he is a friend to the whites, either those gold seekers or the mountain trappers, he is our foe. I claim the girl, I claim the mongrel whom no race owns. My brother shall decide. That's my say."
All eyes were turned towards the fugitive, who was now carelessly leaning against the totem pole. The girl trembled with cold; he was steady as the staff itself. The sachem beckoned him thither, and darted a suspicious glance on him, inasmuch as, Half-breed for Half-breed, there was nothing to vary the scales between them.
"There is an accusation, brother. What is the defence?" he asked.
The other smiled scornfully, but making an effort over himself, he answered railingly, "In the land of my forefathers the mockingbird was often heard, but I little thought to hear its deceitful voice hereabouts. To what tribe does this patchwork man belong that he dares class me with such as he? I am a Sagamore! But look at his skin—is it white, is it red, is it even yellow? Can he name his father among men renowned in battle? Can he name his mother? Some white thief, kicked out of the frontier whisky room, and some squaw who hangs round the ports, these were his progenitors, and they shrank from owning him! By what right does he raise his voice in a council of dog soldiers, elders, hallowed men who have been initiated in the inner circle of secrets handed down from days when, from the White Ridge yonder to the Blue Ridge (the Alleghenies) there, none but pure red men trod the warpath, and fished and hunted. Because he commands a string of curs. My nation is the ghost of what it was, but we can whip the Red River mongrels any day! We are the Cherokees! I am a first chief among them—I am Quorinnah, the Raven, and I wear the treasured Totem!"
So speaking, with a voice that grew thunderous with pride, Bill Williams, for this was the man, ripped off the wet woollen shirt covering his breast to the waist belt. On his bosom was tattooed the "Great Round O," as the ignorant call it, which, however, by its rays, signifies the Sun. It was traced in pitch pine soot pricked in and only the high-class Cherokee, the very inspired one, Cheer a dagee, or "fire filled," are so tattooed. If by chance any foolish or wicked young man attempted even a rude imitation, the elders would scrub the marks out of his skin with green corn juice to the very quick, and then he might think he had got off lightly for the sacrilege.