“Perhaps,” said Eve, with a little smile, in which the extreme corners of her pretty mouth had the peculiar tendency to turn down instead of up—“perhaps it is because they are grateful. Indians are not altogether destitute of that feeling.”
“True, Eve, true; it must be that. Will you tell us, Big Otter, how you managed to make these fellows so grateful?”
“I saved the chief’s life,” returned the Indian, curtly.
“Yes; but how, and when?”
“Four summers have passed since then. I was returning from a trip to the Rocky Mountains when it happened. Many bad pale-faces were in the mountains at that time. They were idle bad men from many lands, who hated work and loved to fight. One of them had been killed by a Sioux Indian. They all banded together and swore that they would shoot every Indian they came across. They killed many—some even who were friendly to the white men. They did not ask to what tribe they belonged. They were ‘redskin varmints,’ that was enough!
“The Strong Elk, whose hospitality we enjoy to-night, was chief of the Blackfeet. I was on my way to visit him, when, one evening, I came upon the camp of the pale-faces. I knew that sometimes they were not friendly to the red-man, so I waited till dark, and then crept forward and listened. Their chief was loud-voiced and boastful. He boasted of how many Indians he had killed. I could have shot him where I lay and then escaped easily, but I spared him, for I wished to listen. They talked much of the Strong Elk. I understood very little. The language of the pale-face is difficult to understand, but I came to know that in two hours, when the moon should sink, they would attack him.
“I waited to hear no more. I ran like the hunted buffalo. I came to Strong Elk and told him. It was too late to move the camp, but we put it in a state of defence. When the pale-faces came, we were ready. Arrows, thick as the snowflakes in winter, met them when they came on, and many of them bit the dust. Some ran away. Some, who were brave, still came on and leaped our barricades. They fought like fiends. Their boastful chief saw Strong Elk and rushed at him. They grappled and fell. The pale-face had a keen knife. It was raised to strike. One moment more, and the Blackfoot chief had been in the happy hunting-grounds with his fathers, when the gun of Big Otter came down on the skull of the boastful one. It was enough. Strong Elk was saved—and he is grateful; waugh!”
“Well, he has reason to be!” said I, much impressed by the modest way in which the story was told. “And now,” I added, “since we have got a capital horse, and the journey before us is long, don’t you think we should start to-morrow!”
“Yes, to-morrow—and it is time for Waboose to rest. She is strong, but she has had much to weary her, and her grief is deep.”
With a kindly acknowledgment of the Indian’s thoughtful care of her, Eve rose and went to her tent. Big Otter lighted his pipe, and I lay down to meditate; but almost before I had time to think, my head drooped and I was in the land of forgetfulness.