“You’re right, Dick, we have done plenty of things before, and can again,” he declared with a ring in his voice that Dick liked to hear. “Our fathers never showed the white feather when they faced troubles just as bad, and why should we? How many times have we listened to them tell how they followed that band of Iroquois Indians ever so far into the North, and rescued their sister Kate, who had been carried away.[3] I’m done with repining, Dick; from now on you’ll find me different.”
“Then to-night, when we are in camp, we must try to outwit these red rascals. Even now I have something of a plan in my mind. And you may be sure that every mile we covered I kept tally of the direction, so I know just how to go in order to reach the Missouri again.”
“You shame me, Dick,” frankly admitted the other boy; “to know that, while I’ve been fretting and complaining, thinking only of our troubles, you were keeping track of such things as would help us get back to our friends.”
A little later on, Dick, who seemed to keep his eyes constantly on the alert, once more spoke to his comrade.
“There’s something brewing, as sure as you live, Roger,” he said; “for the Indians are consulting together in hushed tones, and examining the ground as if they had run across some tracks there that excited them.”
“Can it be game, and they are being tempted to start on a hunt?” asked Roger.
“Two-footed game, then,” replied the other boy, “for I can see there are moccasin tracks all around. Of course, as the different tribes make moccasins after their tribal way, it’s easy for these Dacotahs to know the others are not of their kind.”
“They certainly do act as if they suspected there might be a breath of danger hanging around, Dick. Do you know whether the Sioux and the Dacotahs are enemies or not?”
“They have been in the past,” acknowledged Dick; “but I know the print of a Sioux moccasin, and these are different, Roger.”