“I thought of it also,” said one of the other women sulkily.
“Ai:––you all thought––but none of you dared say words while the new Ruler and the wise governor kept silent to the people!” she taunted them. “Of all the women I only can speak in the speech of the strangers.”
“Think you we will see them?” asked one girl doubtfully––“will we not all be sent to the hills the days when they come?”
“In other villages they did so in that long ago day––some men never let their women be seen of the white men who wore the iron.”
“I will not be sent to the hills,” decided Yahn. “From Ke-yemo and from Tahn-té I know their words. I will talk for the strangers. I will learn many things!”
“When was it you learn so much?” asked Säh-pah jealously.
“A little––little at a time all these years!” declared Yahn in triumph. “Tahn-té wanted not to forget it––so he said to me the words––now they are mine.”
The women regarded her with a wonder that was almost awe,––there might be something infernal and unlucky in talking two ways.
“If it be war, think you Ka-yemo will be the war chief as he has been made?” queried Säh-pah. “He will be made second if there is fighting,––think you not so?”
Yahn apparently did not think, but she did listen.