Chiquita knew that the young warriors would eventually precipitate a clash, which might occur when Jack was coming or going from the reservation. She grew sick at heart when she reviewed the actions of Colorow, and how certain it was that Jack's life had been in peril, and always would be whenever he visited the Ute camps. She determined to stop the agitation which Susan was fomenting, or at least get assurance in some way that no overt act would be committed until after she and Yamanatz should be far away towards the "Blazing-Eye-by-the-Big-Water."
The new grass was beginning to show itself along the creek. Mountain crocuses bloomed in the edge of the fast melting snow, as the white blanket gradually receded towards the tops of the high peaks under the heat of the early spring sun. Chiquita watched the beaver dams as the inhabitants industriously fashioned new homes for the next winter, cutting down the big trees and laying in a supply of willows for food and comfort. She looked toward the sun as he peered down into the deep cañons and besought the sun god to hurry Jack upon his way.
It was near midday, and Chiquita sat in a little grove of piñons, watching the splashing waters and gleaming flash of a trout darting hither and thither for a morsel as it swept along in the vicious, turbulent stream. She had hung a branch of spruce buds, entwined with a vine of Kilikinnick, upon a convenient tree, and she knew that it would bring Antelope to her. She knew the symbol by him would be interpreted, "hope in peace," but she intended that his hope must result in peace. As she listened she heard a voice close beside her. She had felt for some time the forest intuition that some one was approaching, but so silently had those footsteps glided along that no sound gave any warning.
"The daughter of Yamanatz is fair as the morning dove, and it pleases Antelope to do her bidding, for is not Antelope a suitor for the hand of Chiquita, and has not Antelope done many things that make him worthy of the great chiefs daughter?"
"The son of Big Buffalo stands erect. He speaks with the tongue of one who is a master, one day to be chief. Antelope is brave and his prowess great enough to entitle him to the daughter of any chief."
"The daughter of Yamanatz is as good as she is fair in that she speaks of Antelope in this wise, and it is a pleasure that the eyes of Antelope go thirsty and his heart hungry for the return of the love which Chiquita can give. It would be for Chiquita that Antelope would build the signal fires, that the Utes may put on their war paint and sharpen their hatchets to take the land where were the great buffalo before the paleface drove them into the deep sea where the sun goes down, and when the paleface has been driven away, then Antelope will claim Chiquita that she may sing him songs of love by his camp fire. And when Antelope is big chief then Chiquita will be the mother of many tribes, and our people will again hunt the buffalo which shall be as the needles in the pine forest, and no more shall the white man drive the noble Ute away from the paradise the Great Spirit has made for them. Hear me, daughter whose breath is as the perfume of the trailing arbutus and whose voice is like the voice of the lark. It is Antelope who speaks."
"The son of Big Buffalo is as brave as the wild horse who leads his herd to drink of the waters of the deep cavern, but know this, that in the sky Chiquita reads of deeds done by her white sisters who teach the little paleface to say 'Our Father,' and she hears the song of spirits from another land, as they sing 'peace on earth, good will to man.' The great Antelope is not a hen to cackle and run away at the sight of danger. He is brave but sees not that Chiquita thinks not of deeds of battle, nor the mighty buffalo, which the great Antelope says will return. It grieves Chiquita that the hand of the white man on the throttle of the great iron horse is driving our people back, back into the deep sea where have plunged the buffalo, and in their trail are the cities where the white children are taught that the red faced Ute is a dog, a coyote that snarls and bites and like the owl that goes hoo! oo-oo-oo-hoo! The paleface has widened the trail from the great ocean by the rising sun to the mountain, to the big water where the sun again quenches his thirst. The paleface has spread out as the wings of an eagle until the lands are gone. The smoke rises from the tall stacks and long ago have we been forgotten by the old Ute warriors who have passed into the great Happy Hunting Ground, there to live on pots of savory flesh while we slave in the sage brush or eat army rations and wear army blankets, which are brought to us on the cars. This is civilization and it is so that Chiquita is to learn what her white sister does in civilization, and Antelope is asked to be patient and wait for Chiquita while she may see the fair sister unto the end. Then if Chiquita cares not for the civilized life, she will sit by the camp fire and sing to Antelope and Antelope may caress Chiquita and she will be his wife."
ANTELOPE, THE WARRIOR, 1877.