The bronze face of the big man was quivering with emotion as he spoke, and not knowing what to say to comfort him I pretended to haste. "Let us go. You can tell me about it while we ride."
As we set forth he recovered his smile, for he was naturally of a cheerful disposition, and in our long, leisurely journey I obtained many curious glimpses into his psychology—the psychology of the red man. He led us to certain shrines or "medicine" rocks and his remarks concerning the offerings of cartridges, calico, tobacco and food which we found deposited beside a twisted piece of lava on the side of a low hill were most revealing.
"Wolf Voice, do you believe the dead come back to get these presents," I asked.
"No," he soberly replied. "Spirit no eat tobacco, spirit eat spirit of tobacco."
His reply was essentially Oriental in its philosophy. It was the essence of the offering, the invisible part which was taken by the invisible dead.
Many other of his remarks were almost equally revelatory. "White soldier heap fool," he said. "Stand up in rows to be shot at. Injun fight running—in bush—behind trees."
We stopped again at The Half-Way Ranch, and the manner in which the cattlemen treated Wolf Voice angered me. He was much more admirable than they, and yet they would not allow him to sleep in the house.
He rode all the way back to Fort Custer with us and when we parted I said, "Wolf Voice, I hope we meet again," and I meant it. His spirit is in all that I have since written of the red men. He, Two Moon, American Horse, and Porcupine were of incalculable value to me in composing The Captain of the Gray Horse Troop, which was based upon this little war.
From Billings we went almost directly to the Flat Head Reservation. We had heard that a herd of buffalo was to be seen in its native pastures just west of Flat Head Lake and as I put more value on seeing that herd than upon any other "sight" in the state of Montana, we made it our next objective.
Outfitting at Jocko we rode across the divide to the St. Ignacio Mission. Less wild than the Cheyenne reservation the Flat Head country was much more beautiful, and we were entirely happy in our camp beside the rushing stream which came down from the Jocko Lakes.