“The Indians will surely have hooks, and spears, though,” John suggested.
“If they haven’t, we can make nets and spears too; I shouldn’t be surprised if we could contrive hooks as well,” Ree answered.
“I wish we had a big mess of fish for dinner!” John exclaimed. “I’m hungry as a bear.”
His wish was realized sooner than he expected. As was their custom, the Indians at once placed food before their visitors, and the fare was just what John had wanted. There was one objection—the savages cooked the fish without cutting off the heads, but the boys did this for themselves. That they could not be over-particular in the wilderness, they had long since discovered.
They learned that the Delawares had caught the fish with hooks made of bones—evidently small wish-bones, and readily saw how they could make just such hooks for themselves.
Capt. Pipe himself had received the boys, and it was in his lodge that they were eating. He sat nearby gravely smoking his pipe, seldom speaking except when spoken to. Gentle Maiden, the chief’s comely daughter, was sitting in a pleasant, sunny place just outside the bark hut, sewing with a coarse bone needle, on some sort of a frock, the cloth for which was from the bolt her father had secured from the young traders.
“Pretty as a picture, isn’t she?” John whispered, glancing toward the Indian girl. “Honestly, I never saw a white person more beautiful.”
Ree made no reply, for at that moment Big Buffalo put his head into the lodge. The boys had not seen him since early winter and both arose to greet him; but he ignored their action, and pausing only a second, strode haughtily away.
“What does that mean?” John asked in surprise.
“Has the Big Buffalo cause to be unfriendly?” inquired Ree of Capt. Pipe, wishing to call the chief’s attention to the Indian’s apparent hostility.