“My arms were pulled from my sides by the surging, swiftly flowing waters, and it seemed to me as if somebody was pulling my limbs apart with terrible force. I held my breath until I thought I would be obliged to take in some of the water, and at one moment my lungs felt as if they were being torn asunder. There was a loud roaring in my ears, and I thought my head would split open.
“Fortunately, just at the moment when my senses were leaving me, I came up to the surface, and my hands instinctively grasped some reeds. I took a long breath, and looked up, and there were the stars looking down at me from the sky. I had come safely through the tunnel and reached the side of the Giant Spring. As I looked to one side I saw a number of tents, from some of which smoke was ascending.
“I was in the midst of the enemy’s camp, and my position was one of great danger. I kept my head well down among the reeds, and waited impatiently for my comrades. It seemed as if they would never come. I waited for what seemed like an hour, but probably it was only a minute or two, at the most, and then, one after another, I saw heads bobbing up around me, first on one side and then on the other.
“One of the braves, as he came up, gave a loud gasp for breath, and then went down, never to appear again. I regretted his loss, but only one man lost out of thirty in such an enterprise was better than I had ever expected.
“We got together silently on the bank, and then, drawing our tomahawks, rushed upon the silent tents with a mighty war cry. We were instantly answered by loud whoops from our friends on the outskirts of the camp, and in a few moments we had the Cave Dwellers at our mercy.
“We captured several of their chiefs and head men as they were sleeping in their tents, and many others we slew. It was the most complete victory that my tribe has ever achieved, and it reduced the Cave Dwellers to complete submission. A few of them managed to escape and get back to their inaccessible caves, but never again did they make a concerted raid upon our territory.
“Nevertheless, they cherish a bitter animosity against the Navahos, and especially against me. One of the chiefs whom we took prisoner managed to escape, after learning that I was the man who had dealt such a heavy blow to his people. Evidently he told them about it, for two or three times since then a few of the Cave Dwellers have tried their best to take my scalp.
“This attack that you saw, my brother, was not by any means the first one they have made upon me. I guard myself against them as well as I can, but I expect that some day I shall fall a victim to their poisoned arrows or be carried away a prisoner to one of their caves, and there be devoured by them in one of their hideous feasts.”
Red Cloud said these last words calmly, with all the stoical philosophy of an Indian, and then folded his buffalo robe about him and sank into profound thought, gazing into the dying embers of the camp fire.