Mary translated. “Ahchoogah say he glad to see the red-coat, like he glad to see the river run again after the winter. Where the red-coats come there is peace and good feeling among all. No man does bad to another man. Ahchoogah hope the red-coat come often to Swan River.”
Stonor watched the man’s face while he was speaking, and apprehended hostility behind the smooth words. He was at a loss to account for it, for the police are accustomed to being well received. “There’s been some bad influence at work here,” he thought.
He said grimly to Mary: “Tell him that I hear his good words, but I do not see from the faces of his people that we are welcome here.”
This was repeated to Ahchoogah, who turned and objurgated his people with every appearance of anger.
“What’s he saying to them?” Stonor quietly asked Mary.
“Call bad names,” said Mary. “Swear Kakisa swears. Tell them go back to the tepees and not look like they never saw nothing before.”
And sure enough the surrounding circle broke up and slunk away.
Ahchoogah turned a bland face back to the policeman, and through Mary politely enquired what had brought him to Swan River.
“I will tell you,” said Stonor. “I come bearing a message from the mighty White Father across the great water to his Kakisa children. The White Father sends a greeting and desires to know if it is the wish of the Kakisas to take treaty like the Crees, the Beavers, and other peoples to the East. If it is so, I will send word, and my officers and the doctor will come next summer with the papers to be signed.”
Ahchoogah replied in diplomatic language that so far as his particular Kakisas were concerned they thought themselves better off as they were. They had plenty to eat most years, and they didn’t want to give up the right to come and go as they chose. No bad white men coveted their lands as yet, and they needed no protection from them. However, he would send messengers to his brothers up and down the river, and all would be guided by the wishes of the greatest number.