“‘It is a lie! A big lie!’ the River Crow said, and signed.
“For answer to that, One Horn went to the door of the lodge and shouted to his women to bring over his quiver of arrows. It was soon handed in to him, and he said: ‘I have here two kinds of arrows: hunting arrows and war arrows. Here are the war arrows.’ And he laid them beside the arrow in front of the boaster. All there saw at once that they were exactly like it in every way, had the same private mark just back of the point. And suddenly, with jeers and cries of ‘Liar!’ ‘Coward!’ they took handfuls of ashes and earth from the fireplace and threw them in the River Crow’s face and on his head, and he ran for the door and was gone, leaving the arrow behind. One Horn picked it up and put it in his quiver, and said: ‘That no doubt ends his lying bragging!’
“Some days after this exposure of his lying, the River Crow, watching his chance, entered the lodge of the Mountain Crow chief and said to him: ‘That Blackfoot has shamed me. I was a chief, but now all people laugh at me. I want revenge. Let me kill that friend of yours and I will give you three of my best horses!’
“‘What you ask is impossible!’ the chief replied. ‘He is my friend! We have smoked together, have eaten together. I cannot allow you to kill him. And for your lying you deserve what you got!’
“The River Crow sneaked away, but on the next evening, when none but the chief and his women were at home, he came again. And this time he said: ‘Let me do what I want to do; you know what that is; and I will give you five of my best horses and my beautiful young daughter.’
“And this time the chief did not give him a short answer. He thought over the offer for a long time. He knew that it would be a terrible thing to betray his Blackfoot friend, but the temptation was great. His women were getting old. He wanted that beautiful girl. And at last he gave way to the temptation: ‘It shall be as you wish,’ he told the man. ‘All is arranged for to-morrow; we go with the hunters on a big buffalo hunt, and there will be no chance for you to do what you want to do. Come the day after to-morrow and I will help you—if you need my help—to kill the Blackfoot.’
“Very early the next morning the hunters started out after buffalo, One Horn taking with him one of his women to help in the butchering and packing in of the meat. They were no sooner gone than one of the Crow chief’s women hurried to One Horn’s lodge and told his other woman all about the plan to kill him. She told it because she was jealous; she did not want her man to take another wife!
“So it was that, when One Horn came home that evening, this wife ran to him and embraced and kissed him as though she would never let him out of her arms. This strong showing of love was unusual with her, and he asked her the cause for it.
“‘Because to-morrow you are to die, and sister and I are to become slaves. See now what you have done by coming to try to make peace with these Crows!’ And she told him all about the plot to end his life.
“But One Horn just laughed: ‘Wipe away your tears and take courage,’ he told her. ‘These Crows will not kill me, a bear medicine man, and a chief. They cannot kill me. I will show you to-morrow something that will surprise you!’