There was a little bit of a flash in the black eyes of the Indian maiden. She had not the least idea but that it was the finest thing in all the world to be the daughter of Many Bears, the great Apache warrior, and it did not please her to find a mere white girl, only Indian by adoption, able to see or hear more than she could.
Rita did not reply for a moment, and a strange sort of paleness crept across her face, until Ni-ha-be exclaimed,
"It hurts you, Rita! It is bad medicine. Throw it away."
"No, it does not hurt—"
"It makes you sick?"
"No, not sick—it says too much. It will take many days to hear it all."
"Does it speak Apache?"
"No. Not a word."
"Nor the tongue of the Mexican pony men?"
"No. All it says is in the tongue of the blue-coated white men of the North."