A suppressed murmur ran through the ranks at this cruel reproach.
"A sachem has spoken," Eagle-head continued sharply. "Is there no one to answer him? Have the Comanches of the Lakes no chiefs left to command them?"
A warrior then broke through the ranks of the Comanches, approached Eagle-head, and bowed his head respectfully down to his horse's neck.
"The Jester is a chief," he said in a gentle and harmonious voice.
Eagle-head's face was unwrinkled—his features instantaneously lost their expression of fury. He turned on the warrior who had addressed him a glance full of tenderness, and, offering him his right hand, palm upwards,—
"Och! My heart is joyous at seeing my son, the Jester. The warriors will camp here while the two sachems hold a council."
And making an imperious sign to the chief, he withdrew with him, followed by the eyes of the redskins, who hastened to obey the order he had so peremptorily given. Eagle-head and the Jester had gone so far that their conversation could not be overheard.
"Let us hold a council," the chief said, as he sat down on a stone, and signed to the Jester to take a place by his side. The latter obeyed without reply. There was a long silence, during which the two Indians examined each other attentively, in spite of the indifference they affected. At length Eagle-head spoke in a slow and accentuated voice.
"Eagle-head is a warrior renowned in his nation," he said; "he is the first sachem of the Comanches of the Lakes; his totem shelters beneath its mighty and protecting shadow the innumerable sons of the great sacred tortoise, Chemiin-Antou, whose glistening shell has supported the world since the Wacondah hurled into space the first man and the first woman after their fault. The words which come from the breast of Eagle-head are those of a sagamore; his tongue is not forked—a falsehood never sullied his lips. Eagle-head acted as a father to the Jester; he taught him how to tame a horse, pierce with his arrows the rapid antelope, or to stifle in his arms the mighty boar. Eagle-head loves the Jester, who is the son of his third wife's sister. Eagle-head gave a place at the council fire to the Jester; he made a chief of him; and when he went away from the villages of his nation he said to him, 'My son will command my warriors: he will lead them to hunt, to fish and to war.' Are these words true? Does Eagle-head speak falsely?"
"My father's words are true," the chief answered with a bow: "wisdom speaks through his lips."