"Yes," replied Donald, absently, "but there are several things about the fellow that I don't understand. To begin with, he is talking to those other chaps through an interpreter. Then he does not gesticulate, while most Indian orators depend more upon signs than words for effect. He stands with his toes turned out, and his ears are not cut. In fact, I don't believe he is any more an Indian than I am."
"What do you think he is?" inquired Christie, apprehensively.
"I don't know what he is; but I believe him to be an—a Frenchman."
"Oh!" said the other, in a relieved tone. "Do you really? I—Hello? what's that? Bullen's tub! By Jove!"
One of the older chiefs had been talking for a few moments, and now, evidently by his command, two young men brought the famous bath-tub into the circle and set it down close beside the dandy. Another presented a dish of water. The gorgeous individual shuddered as he took it, like one showing the first symptoms of hydrophobia. He looked imploringly about him, said something which was answered by an angry exclamation to the effect that the order just given must be obeyed.
The man stooped, took something from a compartment in the tub, with trembling hand, apparently dropped it into the vessel of water, and lifted the latter into plain view. In a breathless silence all eyes were turned toward it. For a moment the gorgeous one held it aloft, and then, as no result followed his manipulation, he dropped it with a sort of a groan, and gazed about him with the tearfulness of a hunted animal.
A murmur of discontent arose from the savage throng surrounding him. Donald glanced at Christie, whose face had grown deadly pale, but said nothing. Both young men had risen in their excitement, and now stood watching the strange scene with eager interest.
Now the elderly warrior picked up a stone and handed it to the dandy with an expressive gesture. Instead of obeying he shook his head despairingly, and an ominous growl came from the assemblage. Again Donald looked at Christie, whose face was now tense and drawn, as though he were suffering mental anguish.
Amid a deadly silence the warrior again advanced, and handed the man a smooth piece of bark, at the same time making certain motions that seemed to be clearly understood. The unfortunate dandy took the bark and held it irresolutely for a moment, while his gaze roved wildly over the assembly. All at once it rested on the two white men, whose presence he seemed to note for the first time. With a loud cry he dropped the bark and started to run in their direction.
In an instant he was seized, and with yells of rage the throng of savages rushed toward him. Eager hands tore away the nodding plume of feathers, the embroidered robe, and whatever else they could clutch, until only his coat of paint remained. Then, as the warriors stepped aside, the squaws, armed with sticks and clubs, fell upon him like so many furies, beating him unmercifully. He howled, danced, fought, ran this way and that, and, finally, breaking from his tormentors, fled to where the two young men were standing.