The girl shook her head. "Don't know," she replied stupidly. Mrs. Simpson asked half a dozen other people. Some of them spoke, others only grunted dully. "Crow's Nest," Laska's hut, had apparently never been heard of.
"Let's don't waste time asking questions, Aunt Sallie," Jack called back. "The Indians won't tell you about each other unless they know what you want. Let's drive straight to the school; Olilie's teacher can best tell us what to do."
In the midst of the Indian village were three well-built houses, the trading store, a small church and the school. Mrs. Simpson and Jack went into the schoolhouse together and were gone for half an hour. When they came out, Jack's face was crimson with excitement and Mrs. Simpson looked deeply interested. She entered the car after telling her chauffeur exactly how to find old Laska's hut, but neither she nor Jack gave any account to the others of what the teacher at the Indian school had told them of Olilie.
Jean could not bear it. She gave Jack a little shake. "What are you so mysterious about?" she questioned softly. "Olilie is not Laska's child, is she? You have found out something about her and you don't dare tell."
Jack hesitated. "It is queerer than we thought," she confessed. "Mrs. Merton, Olilie's teacher, does not think that Olilie is Laska's child, but she has no way of proving it. The funny thing is, she says that Laska gets money each month for taking care of Olilie and that is why she does not wish to give her up. No one knows who sends her the money nor where it comes from, Mrs. Merton says. But maybe if we tell Laska that she can keep this money if she lets us have Olilie, she will give her up to us. Mrs. Merton has tried to get Olilie away from Laska herself and to find out more about her, but she has never learned the least little thing."
Laska's hut was better than many of the other Indian houses, being made of timber plastered with mud and with a dirt roof. The door was half open, but it was impossible to tell whether any one inside saw the approach of the automobile.
Jack and Jean ran up the path ahead, without waiting for Mrs. Simpson and were almost at Laska's door when a low, savage growl stopped them. Jean stepped back a moment and clutched at Jack's skirts, but Jack went on without thinking of danger. She only half heard Jean's cry of warning as she lifted her hand to knock on the door. In that second a great, grey figure sprang up in front of her and Jack saw two rows of sharp teeth on a level with her throat. She had lived all her life among the wild animals of the prairies and of the ranch, and knew that if, in a second of danger, she flinched or showed cowardice, she was lost. How she was able to stand perfectly still for that second she did not know, for a moment later, she gasped and turned white as a sheet, but Jean and Mrs. Simpson caught her. Frank Kent had managed in some remarkable fashion to get in front of Jack and strike down the huge brute with his stick. A few minutes later Laska came to the door of her hut. She had seen Jean and Jack approaching alone and had not known what friends they had with them.
A long and useless conversation followed. Laska would give no satisfaction about Olilie, insisting that the girl was her child, that she knew nothing of any money that came for her care. Josef was away, but they both wanted the girl to return home.
Mrs. Simpson grew weary of argument and pleading. "Look here, Laska," she said at last, "we are not going to allow the Indian girl to come back to you. Any one could look at you both and see that she is not your own child, and if you try to get her away from us or to molest her in any way, I shall make it my business to find out who sends you money for her and you shall have neither the money nor the girl."
Laska made no further objection, but neither Jean, nor Jack, nor Frank Kent liked the expression of her face, as she watched them leave her cabin. She made a sign of some kind in the air and mumbled a curious Indian incantation that had a menacing sound.