As they alighted at the door, Jennie remained to look after her bundles, and Curtis and Elsie entered the library together. He who had waited so eagerly for this moment turned and folded her close in his arms. "I need you, sweetest! I'll never let you go again. Never!"
This was her moment to protest; but she was silent, with her face against his shoulder.
Jennie bounced into the hall with a great deal of premonitory clatter and hurried Elsie to her room to rest.
"And now you're to be my really truly sister," she said, closing the door behind her.
"I think—George," she hesitated a little, and blushed before speaking his name, "expects it—rather confidently."
"Then give me a good hug, you glorious thing!"
XXXVII
THE MINGLING OF THE OLD AND THE NEW
Early on the morning of the great day—before the dawn, in truth—the Tetongs came riding in over the hills from every quarter of the earth, bringing their finest clothing, their newest blankets, and their whitest tepees, all lashed on long poles between which the patient ponies walked as in the olden time. Every man, woman, and child able to sit a horse was mounted. No one wore a white man's hat or shoes or vest; all were in leggings and moccasins, fringed and painted, and they carried their summer blankets as they once carried their robes of the buffalo-skin. Even the boys of six and seven wore suits cunningly fashioned and decorated like those of their elders. The young warriors, painted, and with fluttering feathers, rode their fleetest ponies, with shoulders bare and gleaming like bronze in the sun.