“Antonio was right. The white chief and the young squaw, his daughter, are prisoners. Those who have the two followed another trail, but they will meet each other at the great crossing of the Yellowstone River. These, at the spring, have the scalp of the Crow at their girdle, and the Prairie Wolf would fight them for revenge.”
Even as the half-breed was speaking, the four Indians in council raised themselves from the ground, swiftly wending their way to the spring. Standing there for a moment, they cautiously set out on the trail which had been made. As the form of the last brave was lost to view, Ned Hawkins whispered, in a meaning tone:
“We’re in for it now, boys! Yer can’t blind old Eagle-eye, nor yer can’t run away. It’ll be a fightin’ matter, an’ it ar a blessin’ that half them varmints are sleepin’. Don’t fire unless they’re right atop of you, or gin the yell. Then fight like grizzly bears or catamounts. Ef yer don’t, yer hair will be riz, sure.”
“What do you think, Wolf?” queried Biting Fox.
He, thus addressed, quietly shook his head for an answer, making a gesture indicative of doubt.
“Yer in doubt. Now I allows it ar a doubtful subject, an’ if—hillo! Fire an’ yer a dead Injin!” whispered he, in a stern, low voice, at the same time bringing his rifle in line with the heart of Antonio, who, regardless of their dangerous position, was aiming in the direction of the Blackfeet camp.
The movement and address of Biting Fox recalled him to his senses, and, carefully letting fall the muzzle of his gun, he pointed to a dark object, dimly to be seen creeping slowly along toward the thicket, and, in a voice even lower than he had formerly used, he whispered:
“That is Talmkah.”
With a sagacity all their own, the Indians had divined that the whites had taken refuge in the thicket. Moreover, it was patent that from the care which they had exercised, and the time occupied in the movement, that they did so with the intention of watching them—perhaps of making an attack if a favourable moment presented itself.
The half-breed turned to the hunters.