And it happened after the thinking of the big chief that a council was called—a coming-together of the leaders of the bands.
And the leaders came together, and sat with big thoughts. It was evening, and among the assembled leaders sat Rain Walker. His face was thin and cruel as a stone axe stained with blood.
Then the big chief raised his voice, and words to be heard grew there in the big lodge. “This man who sits with us has been wronged. When our brothers, the Poncas, were among us for the feasting and the talking together, Mad Buffalo was among them.
“A woman is a thing not to be understood. Now she dies on long winter trails for a man, or grows old and wrinkled suckling his zhinga zhingas; and now she leaves him for another; yet it is the same woman. I knew a wise man once; but he shook his head about these things; and so do I.
“You know of whom I speak. It was Sun Eyes; and she was this man’s woman. Mad Buffalo smiled, and she went with him.”
Rain Walker’s breath, that hissed through his teeth, filled up the silence that followed. His face was thin and sharp and eager, even as the barbed head of a war arrow.
“And this man has come to me crying for war,” continued the head chief. “Think hard, and let us talk together.”
And he of the Big Elk band said: “Let the Poncas come down in the night and drive away our ponies, and I will gather my band about me. But it has not been so.”
And he of the Hawk band said: “Let the Poncas destroy our gardens, and I will think of my weapons.”