“You shall have it.”
“How am I to get it?”
“It is in my pocket. I will find an opportunity, in a few minutes, to give it to you when these men are not looking. Then you can take it up and secrete it about you. As you have already been searched, they will probably not trouble to look you over again.”
Hare was supplied with an early and good breakfast—a repast which he would have enjoyed but for the doom which awaited him, and which was now so close at hand.
As it was, he ate pretty heartily, and while he was doing so the captain succeeded in giving him the pistol unobserved.
The rest of the white men and Congo breakfasted, as they had supped, unobserved.
The women of the party were served, by the orders of Running Water, by the women of the tribe.
Breakfast was over in the chief’s tepee about sunrise, and still earlier in the other lodges, so that when Running Water and his guests went forth, the bustle of preparations for the great event of the day was everywhere to be seen.
The women were running in and out of each other’s lodges, clamorous and merry. The children were playing heartily, with whoop and shout, for they were anticipating a gala day as inspiriting to them as the Fourth of July to our own boys. Here and there, a brave, with his war paint on, might be seen hurrying about the village with all the important air of a militia officer on training day.