His features were clear-cut and regular, his body lithe but well-knit, and a tender expression beamed from the blackest of eyes. A long-barreled rifle rested on his foot, his mink-skin cap surmounted the stock, and on the index finger of his left hand there was a gold ring of singular workmanship, surmounted with a single brilliant.
He was so absorbed in the discussion of his repast, that he grew oblivious to his surroundings, until he put his hands into his pemmican bag, and discovered that his stock of that edible was exhausted.
“Pemmican all gone!” he ejaculated, with a smile. “Ahdeek go, too, now, he and Nahma not meet for three moons. Nahma promised to be in big cave when Ahdeek come back, and Ahdeek much to tell him.”
The youth slowly rose to his feet, picking up his rifle as he executed the movement.
“Sun nearly gone to sleep,” he murmured, glancing toward the west. “Soon he sink to the fishes of Gitche Gumee.”[1]
A moment longer the half-breed lingered. Then he started toward the lake, but with a single stride he came to a halt, and the click, click of a well oiled rifle-lock followed the lifting of his rifle from a “trail.”
A suspicious sound had arrested his steps, and, as he leaned forward, and with shaded eyes tried to penetrate the forest directly before him, the sharp report of a rifle changed the scene.
The half-breed recoiled with a quick ejaculation of surprise, and his own weapon dropped to the ground—the lock knocked out of time by the unseen enemy’s bullet.
“Who shoot?” cried the youth, as he sprung to his trusty gun, and snatched it from the ground.
His exclamation was answered by terrific yells, and as he sprung erect with the crippled rifle clubbed, he found a dozen savages rushing upon him.