Two hours after Kit Carey was mounted upon a fresh horse, and riding at the head of a score of Indian police, while following came the cavalry support, under the dashing Captain Fechet, and the infantry under the gallant Colonel Dunn, with the two machine guns bringing up the rear.
Having received his orders, Kit Carey was not one to lose time in their execution, and he rode rapidly on in the early dawn.
At last the camp of the great chief was reached near Grand River, and a glance told the experienced young Indian fighter that they were not a moment too soon, for the whole village was getting ready to move, and that meant that Sitting Bull was about to seek the Bad Lands and open hostilities.
To wait there for the soldiers Lieutenant Carey dared not, so he at once gave a few orders in their own language to his redskin cavalrymen, and a dash was at once made for the tepee of the great chief.
As they drew up in a circle around his home, Kit Carey leaped from his horse, and the chief and the young officer met face to face in the door.
Quickly fell the words of the officer, spoken in the Sioux language:
"The great chief, Tatanka Yotanke, has broken faith with the Great White Chief Father, for his people even now are starting on the war-path. Sitting Bull is my prisoner. He must go with me dead or alive."
The eyes of the Sioux chief blazed in their fury, and his hands dropped, one upon a revolver, the other on a knife in his belt; while from his lips came a few fierce words.
But the revolver of the commander of the Indian cavalry was covering his heart, and he dared not move.