It was about a week after the events related in the preceding chapter, that, in a deep romantic glen, apparently locked in by impassable mountains, there sat a hunter busily engaged in changing the flint of his rifle, it having just missed fire, and thereby lost him a fine chance of killing a bighorn, or mountain sheep; his countenance expressed little of the disappointment which would have been felt by a younger man on such an occasion, and its harsh, coarse features would have led any observer to believe that their possessor was habituated to occupations less generous and harmless than those of the chase.
As he fixed a fresh flint into the lock of his rifle, he hummed, or rather grunted, in a low tone, a kind of chaunt, which was a mixture of half a score different tunes, and as many various dialects, but from the careless deliberation with which he went on with his work, it was easy to perceive that his mind was otherwise occupied.
Whatever might have been his reflections, they were suddenly interrupted by a hand laid upon his shoulder, which made him start as if he had been stung by a serpent. Springing to his feet, and instinctively dropping the muzzle of his rifle to the breast of his unexpected visitor, he exclaimed, after a momentary pause, “Does Wingenund come as a friend or an enemy?”
“Neither,” replied the youth, scornfully. “Wingenund has no friendship for a forked tongue; and if he had come as an enemy, Besha would not now have been alive to ask the question; ‘twas as easy to shoot him as to touch his shoulder.”
“For what, then, is he come?” inquired the horse–dealer, who, although somewhat abashed at this reproof, was not disposed to endure the tone of superiority assumed towards him by the young Delaware.
“He is come to speak to Besha, and then to return; this is not a place to throw away words and time.”
“Indeed it is not, for Wingenund knows that his enemies are within hearing of a rifle–shot.”
“There may be other rifles nearer than Besha thinks,” replied the youth, dryly. “Wingenund is not a bird; wherever he goes his friends can follow him.”
The horse–dealer cast an uneasy glance around, and muttered half–aloud, “If Wingenund is not a bird, I know not how be came to this place unseen by the Upsaroka scouts, who are abroad in every quarter?”
To this Wingenund deigned no reply, but entered at once upon the business upon which he had come. As he explained his proposal, the single eye of his auditor seemed to dilate with unfeigned astonishment, and at its conclusion he shook his head, saying, “It cannot be! the mad–spirit has entered my young brother’s head. Besha would do much to serve his friends, but this would hold a knife to the cord of his own life!”