He well knew the horses which the Red Cloud usually rode and used, and in mentioning the style of horse he now required he painted exactly those of his enemy.
“And what would you give for such a horse?” asked the Assineboine leader.
The trader thought for a moment. Here was his opportunity. Now or never he would name a price dazzling to the Indian—cheap to him, since it might for ever rid him of the man he feared and hated.
“I would give for such a horse,” he slowly replied, “two hundred skins.”
Two hundred skins! Never had horse fetched such a price since the mustang breed had reached these northern prairies from the great plateau of New Mexico and the Spanish frontier, two hundred years ago. The Indian was dumb with astonishment—for three such horses he and his band would get 750 skins. Why they would be rich for evermore. They would be the envy of every young Assineboine in the tribe. The fairest squaws would be their wives, for they could lay such a pile of presents at the lodge doors of the parents that it would be impossible to deny their suit. What guns, too, they could buy, and fancy rifles, and store of beads and gaudy dress, with porcupine quills, and blankets of brightest hue!
All these things flashed through the minds of the war-party as they listened to the trader’s offer. The bid was too high; the last doubt about attempting to kill the Cree and carry off the horses of the Sioux vanished, and already they began to speculate upon their future disposal of so much wealth and so much finery. So far as they were concerned the doom of the Cree, and for that matter of the Sioux, and his associates if resistance was offered, was settled.
The trader saw with suppressed joy this realization of his fondest hopes. He well knew the Sioux would fight to the bitter end sooner than lose friend or horse. He had only one fear, and that was that the murder of the Cree and the capture of the horses might be effected while the Sioux was absent from his camp, and that thus the life of his enemy might be saved.
As he wrapt himself in his robe a little later on in the night, and lay down to sleep by the still smouldering embers of the camp fire, he felt at last that his long fear was wearing to an end, and that the fate of his enemy was sealed.