On hearing this, Okématan rose quickly, put out his pipe, and stuck the tomahawk in his belt. The sluggish good-natured air of contentment with which he had been smoking vanished; the half-sleepy eyes opened, and a frown rested on his brow as he said, shortly—
“Okématan goes to look.”
“May I go with you?” asked Dan.
“No. Okématan goes alone. It is known that a band of Saulteaux have been seen. They are roused just now by the actions of the great white chief and the words of my Nation. Rest here till I come. Go on eating. If they are here they may be watching us now.”
“D’ee hear that, Little Bill? You’ve got to go on eating,” said Archie. “Our guide commands it. If you disobey, the rascally Saulteaux will come down upon us somehow.”
But Archie’s light-heartedness was not shared by his older companions. They knew too well that the disturbed state of the country at the time, and especially the ill-will engendered between the Crees and Saulteaux by the ill-advised action of Lord Selkirk’s agents, rendered an explosion not improbable at any time, and a certain feeling of disappointment came over them when they reflected that the hunting expedition, which they had entered on with so much enthusiastic hope, might perhaps be brought to an abrupt close.
“If there’s to be any fighting I shall only be in your way,” said the invalid in a tone in which there was much of sadness, though none of fear.
“Not a bit of it, Little Bill,” returned Dan, quickly. “You’ll be in nobody’s way in the canoes. You’re as light as a feather. If we had even to take to the bush, Archie could run with you; an’ when he gets tired, Fergus and I would think no more o’ you than a grasshopper.”
“Iss it carryin’ him you will be taalkin’ of?” said Fergus. “Ay, ay! I would be forgettin’ that he wass on my back if I had him there.”
As he spoke, the Indian returned to the camp with the cat-like tread so characteristic of the Red-man.