“What do you hear, Hah-che-kah-sug-hah?” asked the agent, in the Otoe tongue.
“There is an Indian on the prairie,” was the answer.
This annunciation, being interpreted, drew forth loud expressions of surprise from the whites: but the Indians were perfectly quiet; they asked no questions and made no remarks. They appeared to have the greatest reliance upon the Indian, whose keen hearing had been first attracted by the sound. They watched him earnestly, but calmly, as he lay upon the ground. After continuing in this position for some time, he slowly rose up, and placed his hand again behind his ear—the very image of the most intense attention. Then taking up a pouch and rifle, belonging to one of the hunters, he stole off until he was lost in the gloom which hung over the prairie.
The contrast between the whites and Indians was now clearly observable. The former immediately commenced a conversation, teeming with suppositions, suggestions, and all that out-pouring of confused ideas, usual when a dozen persons, altogether ignorant of a subject, attempt to throw a little light upon it for the benefit of their neighbours. The Indians, on the contrary, remained perfectly cool; so much so, that one of them quietly turned the attention of the cook to a large piece of meat which he was frying to a cinder, in his eagerness to listen to the comments of the party. They appeared to take the matter with as much quietness as if they had been in the heart of their own town, instead of a large prairie, infested by bands of hostile tribes.
Nearly ten minutes had elapsed, when a loud shrill cry arose in the prairie from two different quarters.
“Ugh! Otoe!” repeated several of the Indians, but without moving.
At that moment another long quavering whoop sounded in the air.
“Hah-che-kah-sug-hah!” ejaculated one of the Otoes.
A few moments elapsed, and two strange Otoes appeared in the camp, followed by the dusky form of our Indian friend.
In a few words they told their story. They had been to the Pawnee village, which was about ten miles off, and had left it that evening. About an hour previous they had been espied by a party of Sioux Indians, who had pursued them. Seeing a light, they fled for it. Their enemies followed; and they believed that, even now, they were lurking in the prairie, at but a short distance from the camp.