Presently there was silence, because the old man, the wives, and all the offspring watched with enormous solemnity while Storm sat on the floor cross-legged to a bowl of berry pemmican, a dish of three large trouts, and a stew of camas.
In his own corner the American was being fed, apart, not quite as a guest, nor yet as a prisoner. These people would not let him starve or suffer, but they made him doubt the nature of his welcome.
This new arrival, the trapper reckoned, was certainly by his coloring a white man, but in his speech and manners Indian, perhaps the old man's son, undoubtedly the master of the house, honored, obeyed, and loved. Was he husband to these four women, father of all these children? Surely too young.
He seemed to have traveled far, and at his topmost speed, to be ravenous, weary, and now, after the meal and a pipe of wild tobacco, right well disposed towards sleep. He dismissed the women and children to their supper in the kitchen, kissed the old man who was fast asleep in the chair, then crossed to his bed and lay down looking at the fire while he smoked his pipe. It dropped upon the robes.
"Oh, Secret Helper, I come!" he muttered softly.
Through the closed eyelids he felt the flicker of the firelight. He smelled in fresh warm air a fragrance from some burning herb, then heard a low voice at prayer.
"Oh, Holy Spirit in the Sun!
"Hear, Old Man!
"Listen, oh dear Above-people!
"Hear me, Under-water-people!