"He sent you this red-stone pipe."
Ben took the pipe in his fingers and turned it over and over, with careless curiosity. "I can carve better than that," he said calmly, and laid it down.
"Yes, you carve very well. You have strong and skilful fingers. But I think Washitonka sent you the pipe in token of friendship rather than to show his skill. He says he taught you to carve pipes long ago. Is that so?"
"Maybe so. I have forgotten."
"He hasn't forgotten you. And I saw Ehimmeshunka, who made the big basket I bought of Pahrunta. She is old." Burton glanced again at his watch, and as he replaced it in his pocket he took out a little wooden box. "Here is something else I brought you," he said, crossing over to Ben. "It's a box of red pigment. Did you ever try to color your carvings? I have seen Indian carvings that were colored, and I thought you might like to experiment with something of that sort. It would make your work look more Indian. This is a powder, you see, but it dissolves readily in water, and it makes a fast color. It's some kind of earth, I suppose,--"
"Fire! Fire!"
The cry came so sharply and shrilly across the quiet that Burton started, spilling the powder. He hastily snapped the cover on the box and sprang to the door. A puff of smoke, acrid and yellow, rushed into the room from the hall.
"Your kitchen is afire, Mrs. Bussey," he exclaimed, and ran down the stairs. Mrs. Bussey followed in a clattering hurry. The kitchen door, opening into the back hall at the foot of the stairs, was wide open, and the smoke was rushing out in great volumes. Burton heroically dashed into the midst of things, and then in a minute he laughed reassuringly.
"No great harm. It's only your dish towels, Mrs. Bussey."
The noise and the smoke had penetrated to the rest of the house, and almost at the same moment Leslie, Henry, and a stranger came rushing to the spot, followed by Mrs. Underwood and the doctor. Even in that moment of general confusion, Mrs. Underwood was calm enough to still the turmoil of the elements. Burton could not but admire her perfectly consistent poise. Turning her still eyes upon Mrs. Bussey, who was exclaiming hysterically over the pile of smouldering towels, she dropped her cool words like snowflakes on the fire.