“Indian! So I was—see, lying here at my feet!”
He stooped and picked up the Navajo blanket which he had hastily caught off the couch and wrapped about him when his mother awakened him.
He quietly walked over to the girl standing on the log, nonchalantly enfolded himself in the blanket, crossed it over his face to his eyes, and for a moment stood motionless. Bess placed her fingers against her parted lips as if to keep back any idle words.
“Sometimes—sometimes—now, I wish all I knew was how to wrap my blanket about me!” he said, with effort. “The great outside world does not want me, cannot understand me. What need or comfort are the things which the world has taught me, when after all, my winding-sheet will be but a blanket? What right has the world to give me a desire for knowledge, a taste of heaven, an understanding of the past, a dread of the future, and then hold up its hands to say, ‘You are still an Indian.’”
Again he let the blanket drop at his feet and stood gazing into the moon, while written on his face were despair and longing and resignation. A chord in the girl’s heart was touched at the sight of the strong man before her, and it was set attune to the one which had been awakened in the churchyard, where she once before saw his misery. She sprang lightly to the ground, picked up the blanket and placed it again about his shoulders.
“I like to see you so. You are too often sad, Henry. Tell me something I may do to make you happy. Tell me!” Bess entreated.
West stood looking at her for a moment, the shadow of a fleeing cloud hiding the love-light which shone in his dark eyes, then said: “You placed my blanket about me, that’s enough. Mother is anxious about you, Bess, and sent me to bring you into the house. Come—one may have too much moon you know.”