"Savage, rude, wild, uncouth—with naughty tempers. Now go back to your stupid body, for the Blackfoot chiefs draw near. I hear them. I must pray to the Sun to smooth my temper too."
The fire blazed up strongly with a crackle of curling birch bark, and Storm looked out from his bed to see old Fatbald's chief woman putting on fresh logs.
"Two Bits," he called to her in Kutenais.
She looked round. "Awake?" she asked.
"Dear Two Bits, my Secret Helper is cruel and orders me to have a bath every day. Isn't it awful?"
"Huh! Your Dream must be a Blackfoot. Mark you, it takes more than a daily bath to wash off their dirty deeds."
"You'll get the sweat lodge ready?"
"You'll catch your death," she answered gloomily, "and then of course we'll all starve."
She went out grumbling to get the sweat house ready. But Two Bits always grumbled, and never in her life had risked a bath, having no dirty deeds to wash away.
The old man slept, and Storm lay watching him. Fatbald would awaken presently and demand to have his back scratched.