UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 DAVIS 
 

O 1ST O Q U A 
 
 BY 
 
 FKANCES C. SPARHAWK 
 
 BOSTON 
 LEE AND SHEPARD PUBLISHERS 
 
 10 MILK STREET 
 1892 
 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1892, BY FRANCES C. SPARHAWK 
 
 All Eights Reserved 
 
 ONOQU A 
 
 C J. PETERS & SON 
 
 TYPE-SETTERS AND ELKCTBOTYPEBS 
 
 145 HIGH STREET, BOSTON 
 
TO MY SISTERS 
 
 1L . an* IS. 3. S, 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. NAUMATIN 5 
 
 II. IN ONOQUA'S FOOTSTEPS .... 16 
 
 III. AHSANIAK'S EXPECTATIONS ... 23 
 
 IV. No HOPE 34 
 
 V. CETANGI 41 
 
 VI. THE STUMBLING STONE .... 50 
 
 VII. KEEPING CLOSE RANKS .... 58 
 
 VIII. ONOQUA'S EXPERIMENTS .... 63 
 
 IX. RATION DAY 72 
 
 X. MAUKEENEET 78 
 
 XI. THE VISIT 85 
 
 XII. THE MESSAGE OF WANIGISKA . . 89 
 
 XIII. CETANGI SPEAKS 101 
 
 XIV. OVERHEARD 107 
 
 XV. A GRAY NIGHT . . . . . .117 
 
 XVI. THE WARNING ..'... 125 
 
 XVII. THE THREAT 131 
 
 XVIII. WINTER 138 
 
 XIX. IN THE STORM 146 
 
 XX. CETANGI' s RIDE 154 
 
 XXI. PURSUIT , 160 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAP. PAGE 
 
 XXII. WOBK 166 
 
 XXIII. MISREPRESENTED 176 
 
 XXIV. DID SHE TELL You 183 
 
 XXV. FACE TO FACE 191 
 
 XXVI. A JUNE DAY 195 
 
 B 
 
 XXVII. GATHERING CLOUDS . 203 
 
 XXVIII. THE WERE WOLF 207 
 
 XXIX. A COUNCIL OF STATE .... 216 
 
 XXX. MAUKEENEET'S NEWS 225 
 
 XXXI. GHOST DANCERS 229 
 
 XXXII. MAHAKA'S APPEAL 235 
 
 XXXIII. REVENGE 240 
 
 XXXIV. ONOQUA'S DECISION 248 
 
 XXXV. THROUGH THE HOSTILE COUNTRY . . 253 
 
 XXXVI. BEARING ONOQUA'S MESSAGE . . . 258 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 A LADY said to me not long since : " I have bought 
 calico at an Indian agency at twelve and a half cents 
 a yard, and seen the trader sell this same calico to 
 an Indian woman for fifty cents a yard." In the 
 discussion over the Indian appropriation bill in Con 
 gress, it was stated that at one agency there were 
 two Indian traders who made $20,000 a year apiece. 
 
 A returned student writes : " Some of the girls,' 7 
 naming them, " seemed to keep up as long as 
 their school dresses lasted. Last winter, in one of 
 
 our club meetings, F appeared in a neat blue 
 
 flannel dress that looked like the school uniform 
 dresses. She looked very nice, and seemed to enjoy 
 herself ; her face was bright and interested, and she 
 looked like old times." 
 
 "All the Indians hunt and fish a great deal," 
 writes another returned student. " They have no 
 way to make money. The men hunt deer and elk for 
 
 i 
 
ii INTRODUCTION 
 
 their hides; the women tan the hides, and make 
 them into gloves and moccasins, which they sell, and 
 sometimes get a good price when worked with silk 
 thread and beads, in that way get their provisions. 
 The men also cut cord wood and haul freight for the 
 
 agency and school use, from D , seventy-five 
 
 miles north of us, to here. The women pick berries 
 and sell them at a town forty miles east of us. 
 They get provisions and old clothing, which they 
 mend up, and in that way clothe themselves. There 
 are many poor Indians, but none poorer than among 
 
 the . Imagine, dear friend, lying on a piece of 
 
 a saddle blanket in the winter, and not as much over 
 you, and nothing to eat, only what you can get of 
 neighbors. Sometimes I have known them to pick 
 up dead cattle that have lain several days, and live 
 on that. Many times it has made me shudder to 
 think I could not help them in their daily bread. 
 Gambling is practised on ^the whole reservation. 
 The officers and agent do not care. As it is now, 
 young men and women are growing up in ignorance, 
 with no employment whatever; consequently, they 
 cultivate the art, or rather, practice of gambling. 
 They have no definite plan for work." 
 
INTRODUCTION 111 
 
 How long are Indians, the true Americans, to 
 wait for that blessing that comes at once to all for 
 eigners who touch our shores, the inspiration of 
 American laws ? How long are we to hold them 
 back from our opportunities, which every other indi 
 vidual may grasp wherever he can find them ? How 
 long are arid acres, which they have no means to 
 irrigate, to be considered the sole requisite of these 
 people for civilization and citizenship ? In a land 
 full of arts and manufactures, how long is the cordon 
 of the reservation, like the Libby death line, to 
 imprison this race, full of mechanical and artistic 
 skill ? 
 
 Who will free the Indians ? Only Indians who 
 are free themselves, as only free white men have 
 freed their race. 
 
 The story of " Onoqua " was brought out as a 
 serial by the " Congregationalist," the desire of 
 whose editors for justice to the Indians and belief 
 in their possibilities are gratefully acknowledged by 
 
 F. C. S. 
 
 NEWTON CENTRE, MASS. 
 
ONOQTJA 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 NAUMATIN 
 
 
 
 LITTLE Onoqua held her father's hand tightly and 
 looked up into his face with those beautiful eyes that 
 always made him want to do whatever she asked. 
 
 And now she wanted to go away to school, days' 
 and days' journey from her own race, to be in the 
 charge of white people and to learn to be like them. 
 They had been enemies so often and so lately that it 
 could not be safe to call them friends. And yet if 
 some of them were so here on the reservation, why 
 should there not be others elsewhere ? 
 
 It did not occur to him that some of the blood of 
 the white race was in his child's veins, in his own 
 also, and in Onoqua's mother's veins as well. For 
 that they had any affinity with this white race, any 
 claim by birthright to what it enjoyed, any other ties 
 than those to Indian life, had never come into the 
 minds of either. The Indian race was their race, the 
 Indian life their life, the Indian fate their fate. 
 
 6 
 
6 ONOQUA 
 
 And now Onoqua wanted to be taught like the 
 white people. She thought that her father could do 
 everything he wished. But Matoska had never felt 
 his limitations more. For it was Naumatin who 
 governed by a power that men stronger than Matoska 
 have not effectually resisted. 
 
 " I want to go away where the wonderful things 
 are," repeated Onoqua still more earnestly, " I want 
 to go with Okestan, and Mesan, and the others. Let 
 me go, my Matoska." 
 
 As she pleaded she seemed to be again listening to 
 the interpreter as he gave the story that the teacher 
 from the far-off school was telling of the new life 
 and the better ways, the ways that would give them 
 power and a place among white men. And if little 
 Onoqua's head had been too ignorant to understand, 
 she had comprehended it all with her heart. And in 
 listening she had not felt the cold wind blow through 
 her scanty garments, nor the tingling of her little 
 bare feet on the cold earth of the floor; the unplas- 
 tered walls of the log house had seemed hung with 
 strange and beautiful pictures, undarkened by the 
 smoky light of the dingy room. After the talk was 
 over, Onoqua had seen the teacher and the interpreter 
 come up to her mother. They had glanced toward 
 
NAUMATIN 7 
 
 her. Then Brother Sebastian, the priest at the mis 
 sion school, had talked with Naumatin, and she had 
 looked at the child and nodded. 
 
 Matoska answered her that she must ask her 
 mother, and just then Naumatin came in from a 
 neighboring tepee. 
 
 The child ran up to her. But something in Nau- 
 matin's face stopped her before she had taken hold 
 of her dress ; and she hesitated as she made her 
 request. 
 
 "Go away to school, Onoqua?" echoed Naumatin. 
 "No, indeed. You will stay here with people that 
 know how to take care of you, not go away to be 
 killed by the white men." 
 
 The child's eyes dilated as she shrank back from 
 her mother's angry face. " They won't kill me," she 
 said, plucking up her courage ; " I know they won't 
 kill me. I want to go." 
 
 A lurid light burned in the woman's eyes. " Matos- 
 ka's doing," she muttered, and turned her gaze upon 
 him. 
 
 " No, Onoqua's own doing," he answered. " But I'd 
 like to have her go, Naumatin. She will learn much ; 
 it will be good for her." 
 
 " She shall never go," cried the other, and relapsed 
 
8 ONOQUA 
 
 into a silence of sullen anger. Experience had taught 
 Matoska the uselessness of words. He stroked Ono- 
 qua's hair softly and sent her to play with her mates. 
 
 But all their play was about the strange school of 
 which they had heard. 
 
 Two men sat talking in a little house a few miles 
 away from the agency buildings of this Indian reser 
 vation in Montana. 
 
 " I'll be up with the mischief-making thieves, and 
 more," cried the speaker furiously; and paused for 
 breath. He was a thick-set, bullet-headed man who 
 looked as if he had large faith in the persuasiveness 
 of fists, and as if in this case he would not be averse 
 to trying them. 
 
 "How are they thieves?" questioned his compan 
 ion with a ring of cold contempt in his tones which 
 bit the ears of the hearer like frosty iron. " What do 
 they steal ? " 
 
 " Do you dare to question our authority ? " retorted 
 the other. 
 
 "To hold what we have if we can? No. But 
 to take from others by force what we have never owned, 
 I do. And let me tell you this, Brother Sebastian ; 
 you're not too familiar with these waters. Look out 
 for snags, and be thankful if you keep out of the 
 
NAUMATIN 9 
 
 whirlpools. ' Vestigia nulla retrorsum ' is a safe motto, 
 and if it does not sweep on in accordance with your 
 humor, yet, as the elder here, I insist that you 
 remember it. We have not won these people here by 
 our persuasions, and we should not be too angry that 
 others have done it. We must be more diligent 
 another time." 
 
 " And whose is Naumatin's child, if not ours by 
 right ? And Charee's and hosts of others, whose, I 
 say, if not ours? You eat too little meat, Brother 
 Ansel (I'd like to have said ' anserj " he muttered 
 under his breath), " and you're too much given to fears 
 and comparisons. The church must have its rights, 
 and I say again, and as many times as need be, those 
 children are ours ; they must come into our fold ; 
 and they shall. Don't burden yourself with the ques 
 tion of details ; they will only change their minds. 
 Somewhat difficult to touch. Or you may prefer to 
 have them all snatched off to school and lose them 
 forever, as well as seeing our own school dwindle 
 again to nothing, as it was before I came here." 
 
 "Nothing grows from dissensions but hatred," 
 returned the elder man, his quietness at variance 
 with the flash in his eyes. " But it is late. Remem 
 ber only that as we are placed, I cannot escape the 
 
10 , ONOQUA 
 
 brunt of whatever blame your rashness may bring 
 upon us." 
 
 " Nor escape the credit of the glory," retorted the 
 other as his companion quitted the room. 
 
 Brother Sebastian went to the window and looked 
 out into the night. April had brought few signs of 
 spring in that northern highland of Montana. The 
 snow still lay in masses upon the ground, and in the 
 cold brightness, for it was the full of the moon, 
 added a deeper chill. The leafless trees and the 
 pines had alike that aspect of winter harmonizing 
 with the ground and the glittering sky, in which not 
 one soft shade could be found. The dazzling light 
 upon the hills, the deep shadows in their clefts, the 
 dark outlines of the river basin, with the black lines of 
 the water seen here and there as it ran between him 
 and a range of hills on the left, the solitude of the 
 spot, for the nature of the ground hid what few dwell 
 ings lay near it in the valley, the large, rude building 
 that, on a hill a short distance away overlooked the sur 
 rounding landscape, appearing in the mystical glow of 
 the moonlight as nearly picturesque as possible to its 
 ungracefulness all these cold and hard and desolate 
 outlines met the eye of the gazer. 
 
 In the reaction from his heated argument, and the 
 
NAUMATm 11 
 
 consciousness that if things should not turn out well, 
 his spiritual brother would win the day, the chill and 
 desolation of the scene touched even the robust 
 nerves of Brother Sebastian. Would not the lot of 
 a Bavarian peasant, his birthright, have been better 
 than this ? But all at once he laughed, and the 
 snowy vales and the dreary hills renewed for him 
 their deep attractions. How far would his voice 
 have ranged in his own village ? But here ! For 
 beyond this hill, on the other side, clustered the 
 Indian tepees of the camp, and scattered here and 
 there were the few houses of the most progressive, 
 and stretching out 'from these, their farms, if such 
 tracts could be called farms. Nature had meant them 
 for grazing, and in the race that now held them skill 
 had not yet defeated nature. 
 
 Beyond these were the camps with their harvests 
 of souls to be reaped, and with every harvest fresh 
 honors for the reaper. This rude building on the 
 hill was the mission school, -his special triumph. 
 Here should not be his defeat. 
 
 Mr. Thurston, the teacher from the Eastern school, 
 stood waiting. 
 
 It was time to start. The great wagon was at the 
 door of the agency buildings on the morning follow 
 ing Onoqua's request. 
 
12 ONOQUA 
 
 But where were the score and over of bright chil 
 dren who were to start that morning for their Eastern 
 school ? 
 
 Before the twilight had brightened into dawn all 
 but the handful" 'now silently surrounding him, the 
 handful who had dared the dangers of the death 
 threatened to body and soul, in order to learn what 
 the white man had to teach them, had been whirled 
 off silently and swiftly to the mission school on the 
 hill. 
 
 Chagrined at his defeat, Mr. Thurston helped the 
 girls into the wagon and bade the boys clamber in 
 after them. 
 
 The driver had already gathered the reins into his 
 hands, when a pair of nimble feet flashed over the 
 space between the fir wood at the back of the agency 
 buildings and the wagon, and a pleading little face 
 looked up into his. 
 
 " Do you want to go too ? " he asked. 
 
 Onoqua knew what he meant, although she did not 
 understand a word of English ; as he comprehended 
 her eager response in her own tongue. 
 
 " Come, then," he said, and he held out his hand to 
 help her into the wagon. 
 
 Matoska came forward. 
 
NAUMATIN 13 
 
 Onoqua drew her hand away from the teacher, and 
 springing forward clung to her father. She spoke a 
 few hurried words, and then kissing him with a sti 
 fled sob turned again to the wagon. Her father lifted 
 her high in his arms, and dropping Lor well into the 
 middle of it talked with her a moment longer. " She 
 shall not take you away, Onoqua," he finished, and 
 went hurriedly into the agency office. He had seen 
 his wife go into the opposite end of the house ; he 
 must find something that would keep her there until 
 the party had driven off. 
 
 But as he went in, Naurnatin came out again by the 
 same door at which she had entered. Onoqua had 
 been aroused in the night to hear the exhortation of 
 the priest, and Naumatin had promised her to the 
 mission school. But in some way she had escaped 
 into the darkness. Her mother, beyond the moment 
 ary annoyance, had not cared and had promised her 
 for another day. Now, as unsuspecting, she passed 
 through the group toward the wagon, she suddenly 
 caught sight of Onoqua. 
 
 The woman's short, square figure seemed to heighten 
 and dilate, her eyes flamed, her nostrils distended ; 
 for a moment she stood glaring, incapable of speech, 
 her hands clinched at her sides. 
 
14 ONOQUA 
 
 Onoqua, after her first sudden attempt to hide her 
 self behind the other children, sat pallid and steady, 
 her little hands grasping each other tightly, her eyes 
 searching the group about her for her father. 
 
 " Come down from there, Onoqua." 
 
 But the little figure never stirred, except that the 
 eyes looked into the speaker's. " My Matoska told 
 nie I could go to school away off in the wagon," she 
 answered. And again her eyes sought for Matoska 
 who was so faithfully looking for Naumatin. 
 
 Nauinatin listened in a silence so portentous that 
 Mr. Thurston drew nearer. His presence excited her 
 still further. With a cry of rage she rushed forward, 
 and beginning to climb over the wheel of the wagon 
 like a cat, she suddenly drew from under her shawl 
 a knife, holding it ready to plunge into Onoqua. 
 The child sprang up and was already on the other 
 wheel to escape, when her mother caught her. 
 
 A hand as quick as her own, and stronger, came 
 between, and Mr. Thurston caught her away from 
 Onoqua. But the hand with the knife was still free, 
 the knife which had been meant for nothing more 
 serious than the cutting of meat for cooking, and 
 this she turned upon herself, crying that she would 
 kill the child, that she would die herself, rather than 
 
NAUMATIN 15 
 
 Onoqua should go. The group looked on with no dis 
 position to interfere; if the white man could not 
 defend the children, he ought not to have them. It 
 was when, with the help of his companion, Mr. Thurs- 
 ton had succeeded in getting her firmly in hand that 
 Matoska came out of the house. In an instant he 
 was beside her. He took the knife from her un 
 nerved hand and put it into his belt. He bent over 
 Nauinatin, and the authority that he so seldom used 
 filled his face and voice with something from which 
 she shrank. 
 
 "I have said Onoqua shall go to school." She 
 made no answer. Then he turned to Mr. Thurston. 
 " He says let her go," announced the interpreter. 
 
 They did so. Naumatin remained standing beside 
 Matoska. In sullen rage . she watched them spring 
 into the wagon where Onoqua had already seated her 
 self again. 
 
 In another moment they were off at the top of 
 their speed. 
 
 Onoqua had gone to school. 
 
 This was in the spring of 1882. 
 
16 ONOQUA 
 
 CHAPTER II 
 JNOQUA'S FOOTSI 
 
 As the wagon was hidden from sight in the turn 
 ings of the road the cry of mourning for the lost rose 
 from the throats of the Indians who had been watch 
 ing it. Their children had gone for years, perhaps 
 forever. Letters were to them full of vagueness, 
 mysterious news of the white man which might mean 
 nothing, or might be a part of the deceit which they 
 had so often met with from him. The vacuum of a 
 departure which the most philosophical feel some 
 what, was to them full of apprehension. 
 
 At the familiar sounds a man appeared at the door 
 of the agency building, and by a sharp command suc 
 ceeded in enforcing partial silence. The next mo 
 ment another joined him and with his hands in his 
 pockets stood looking on half-amused, half-disdainful, 
 and with an occasional comment. This was the clerk. 
 Presently he singled out a boy of fourteen with his 
 eyes fastened upon the gap through which the wagon 
 had passed and with a wistfulness in his face. 
 
 " You wish you'd gone with your sister, don't you, 
 Mahaka?" he asked. "But then, if you'd tried, 
 
IN ONOQUA'S FOOTSTEPS 17 
 
 your mother would have certainly been wild enough 
 to kill somebody. Wait until next time." 
 
 Onoqua's brother looked up at him. " When is 
 next time ? " he asked. 
 
 " The fellow means it/ 7 muttered the other under 
 his breath to the agent. " This carrying them off to 
 school seems to have the effect of a wedding, it starts 
 up more to follow. We seem to be cleaned out now ; 
 but when they come for the next lot, you'll see. 
 They'll be along in the course of a few weeks," he 
 answered the boy. "But if you want to go, I'd 
 advise you not to say anything about it at home ; the 
 knife may hit next time." 
 
 Shame and pride struggled in Mahaka's face as he 
 turned away. But he did not go to his tepee; he 
 joined some of the boys who were going hunting. 
 
 " They've captured sixteen out of the twenty-five," 
 said Mr. Griswald, the missionary, to his wife. 
 " They've left poor Thurston the toughest of the lot, 
 to be sure, the plucky little ones who were resolved to 
 see what this terribje place was which they had been 
 so much warned against. Things were not done in 
 that high-handed style before that fellow, Sebastian, 
 came here. Anselmo lets him too much alone." 
 
 "I should be tempted to let him alone if I were 
 
18 OKOQTTA 
 
 Anselmo," said Mrs. Griswald. "But better in the 
 mission school than on the reservation. I'm never 
 sorry when I hear that the poor young things are 
 dead, if it's a choice between death and this life. 
 Oh, don't mistake me ; I'm not complaining for my 
 self, it's different with me. But we've been here 
 three years, and in that time I've learned a few things 
 in regard to this Indian question ; and one fact comes 
 to me more and more, and that is, we can never give 
 these Indians more than the milk of the Gospel until 
 they get some solid work to set their teeth against to 
 prepare them for the strong meat." 
 
 " Meantime " began her husband. 
 
 "Oh, yes, meantime," she interrupted him, "I'll 
 wash the dishes for an example to those who have 
 any dishes." 
 
 As the boys went on toward the hunting-ground 
 Mahaka said abruptly, " I'll go away to school some 
 day." 
 
 The boys all turned to him with interest. 
 
 " What is it about this school ? " asked Taypate. 
 "Why isn't one school just like another? We have 
 a school here, and we go to it when we don't go hunt 
 ing, or after horses, or on the farm, or when we don't 
 want to go to sleep. And, then, there is the good 
 
IN ONOQUA'S FOOTSTEPS 19 
 
 father's school. I can have enough here. Going to 
 school doesn't help you kill deer. And I hunt the 
 bears. The braves say I shall be one of themselves. 
 Do they tell you about it in the books, Mahaka ? " 
 
 But Mahaka had never gone beyond his primer, 
 and if he had no more knowledge, he had the wisdom 
 not to think this sufficient. He could not tell what 
 was in the books. 
 
 " When I have killed my grizzly all myself, then I 
 shall be a brave," said Xiyo. " What school will 
 teach me this ? I stay in the woods ; they are my 
 school." 
 
 " I like that blue the Indian boy with the school 
 chief had on," said Mahaka. "Some day I want to 
 wear clothes like that." 
 
 Xiyo came up close to him. "You don't know, 
 Mahaka," he said. " That's what the men have on 
 when they shoot us with their guns as some day I 
 shall shoot the grizzlies. No, I shall never wear that. 
 I'm a free boy, a hunter. I like it best here ; I shall , 
 stay here." 
 
 "But if you learn in the books," said Pejito, "you 
 have some money some time. White men always do, 
 Indians never do. When Indians get any money, < 
 white men get it first. I shall study in the book that 
 
20 ONOQUA 
 
 tells the way they always do that. Is it in that great 
 book they read to us in the agency school ? The 
 good father will not let us read in that, it is too hard 
 for us, he says. But in the school far away they do ; 
 it may be in that. I shall see. I shall find out about 
 many books ; I'll go to school with you, Mahaka. We 
 will be there the next time they come for us." 
 
 " Yes," answered Mahaka. Xiyo was silent for a 
 time. Then he said, " It may be I can do both. I'd 
 like to see the strange things and the new ways." 
 
 " They say," began little Taypate, but here one of 
 the older boys darted back to warn them that they 
 had found fox-tracks. Instantly the hunter in them 
 made everything else forgotten. 
 
 In the course of a few months Matoska grew tired 
 of Naumatin's invincible sullenness. 
 
 His absences became more and more frequent. 
 
 Finally, it came about that he went away and did 
 not return to the tepee. He had gone across to the 
 other creek and married a woman who was willing, 
 not only to speak to him, but to speak very kindly. 
 He left the children with Naumatin, all but Onoqua. 
 When she came home she was to be his daughter. 
 He missed her very much ; but she was a great deal 
 better off than she would have been with him, and 
 
nsr ONOQUA'S FOOTSTEPS 21 
 
 everybody loved her. He pondered a good deal over 
 the fact that when the Indians went to white people, 
 these were always good to them, and when white 
 people came to Indians they were often so bad. He 
 wondered if they were bewitched, as Indians some 
 times were when they crossed a certain line ; and, if 
 so, where that line was. He should like to rub it out. 
 As long as he lived with Naumatin he told her of 
 Onoqua's letters, he remembered all that was in them 
 as they were read over to him. But if she cared, she 
 would give him no satisfaction. 
 
 Mahaka went away to an Eastern school, shortly 
 after Onoqua had gone, but to a different one ; for the 
 teachers who came later picked up, not him alone, but 
 Pejito, and even Xiyo, who made up his mind that he 
 should like to see what the new things were like. 
 And little Taypate was gathered in also, and went to 
 find out why there were any other schools than on 
 his reservation. And with these, among a few other 
 girls, went Pejito's sister, Ahsaniak, the daughter of 
 Waha, the chief of the tribe. It was owing to her 
 mother's influence that she had gone to school, and at 
 her mother's death, three years later, Waha sent for 
 her. At about the same time there straggled back a 
 few boys and girls with a fair knowledge of English 
 
22 ONOQTTA 
 
 and such instruction in the things of civilization as 
 the ardent labor of their instructors could give them 
 in their short apprenticeship. They were in that 
 transition state when so much depends upon environ 
 ment. 
 
 They had reservation environment to the full. 
 
AHSANIAK'S EXPECTATIONS 23 
 
 CHAPTEB, III 
 AHSANIAK'S EXPECTATIONS 
 
 THE October of 1887. 
 
 The fresh wind had given color to Ahsaniak's eager 
 face as she went to the door of her log house and 
 looked toward the hills where her father had gone for 
 the ponies that were to take them to the agency. 
 
 It was in the long and bitter winters that these 
 angular ridges and snow-covered summits were too 
 strong a reminder of the harshness and the terrors 
 which made them deserve to the full their name of 
 Wolf Mountains. 
 
 Now these mountains still shone here and there 
 with brighter foliage mixed with the brown of the 
 dying year. On such a morning of dazzling sunshine 
 all that was left of color in the earth burned through 
 these purple mists of the mountains, glorified their 
 outlines, and drove the lighter shadows from their 
 resting-places. 
 
 On the other side of the house ran the river in the 
 valley of which many of these Indian tepees were 
 nestled, because here was the arable land of the 
 reservation. On the hills which formed the divide 
 
24 OtfOQUA 
 
 between this stream and the other river on the reser 
 vation, the bunch grass and the blue joint and the 
 buffalo grasses grew in abundance. But only small 
 and. uncertain crops rewarded the desultory labor 
 given. Here was no return without irrigation. 
 
 Far on the southern horizon loomed the mountains 
 of the Big Horn. Behind these the winter sun rose 
 reluctantly and dropped hastily down again long 
 before he said farewell to more favored regions. And 
 the moon silvered their tops as it rose above them 
 and dipped again to glow over southern lands. 
 
 A very few log houses could be seen. The greater 
 part of the Indians clung to the old life, and lived it 
 with only such modifications as they were compelled 
 to make. 
 
 Ahsaniak sang softly as she washed her dishes. 
 She had no mop, her dish-pan was too small, and she 
 had so little soap that all her efforts could not make 
 her single towel look as the dish-towels had looked 
 at school when she used to take them white and 
 ironed from the drawer. 
 
 " So, you're not going to-day, Ahsaniak ? " 
 
 " Yes, I am," cried the girl, turning at the voice, as 
 a squaw with a shawl over her head came in. "I 
 must go today ; because when the money comes, I'm 
 
AHSANIAK'S EXPECTATIONS 25 
 
 to have a new dress. My father has promised me the 
 money, and Mrs. Winder is to send for the dress 
 when she sends for her own things. She's waited a 
 week for me. I shall remember it." 
 
 And Ahsaniak smiled and dimpled. She was very 
 pretty. 
 
 Having finished her dishes, she began to sweep her 
 floor with a stub that was more a suggestion of what 
 should be than a broom. 
 
 " How long did you stay at school ? " asked 
 Naumatin. 
 
 "Three years. Waha wouldn't let me go back. 
 It seems so long since I came home." 
 
 "How long is it?" 
 
 " Two years and three months." And Ahsaniak 
 swept in a corner until her eyes cleared. " When did 
 you hear from Onoqua ? " she said. 
 
 " Onoqua's Matoska's daughter," returned Nau- 
 matin harshly. " She will not come home all this 
 winter. She is studying in the school longer. She 
 will not come home for another year. Then six years 
 she has been away. She has forgotten us all ; she's 
 no good to us now ; no Indian left in her. Mahaka 
 comes home at the same time, and the rest of them. 
 What will they do here, Ahsaniak ? " 
 
26 ONOQUA 
 
 Ahsaniak laughed. " Just as I do," she answered. 
 
 Waha drove up with the ponies harnessed into a 
 heavy wagon, the back of which he had piled full of 
 vegetables. The girl climbed over the side of it with 
 as much satisfaction as if it had been a royal chariot. 
 
 The miles to the agency, which wound over the 
 hills and across the river beyond them, were passed at 
 last. Ahsaniak, talking and laughing, had assured 
 her father that he would have only a small bill to pay 
 at the store that month, she had been so very careful. 
 
 As Waha joined the group around the door of the 
 office she sat holding with a firm hand the restless 
 ponies while the young men talked and laughed with 
 her. She had too bright smiles for them to forget her. 
 
 " We get a pile of money this time, Ahsaniak," 
 said one of them, showing a faultless set of teeth. 
 
 " That isn't so," corrected Pejito, who had come 
 home from school the year after Ahsaniak. They 
 think too much of our money to give it to us to 
 spend; they take care of it for us. They put it on 
 interest, and then they vote it out to us every year. 
 They don't let us come home from school for our 
 vacation for long after the school is over, and they 
 don't have to make the money for us, anyway. 
 our own money." 
 
27 
 
 " That's so," assented Howaxte. But as he spoke, 
 he laughed with a mind at ease from any perplexing 
 anxieties as to how the money was to come, and why 
 it did not come sooner, and why it was not a larger sum. 
 
 But all the while Ahsaniak was watching her father. 
 
 At last she saw him go into the house. 
 
 It was a long, low building in the ugliest style of 
 architecture, and not in any style of repair. The 
 well-worn paint of the doors was blackened by the 
 touch of innumerable hands. The small panes of 
 the little windows showed the landscape through 
 their flawed glass like distorted views of life through 
 the flaws of prejudice and passion. 
 
 In the outer of the three rooms which made up the 
 house sat the agent with his clerk, in the opposite 
 outer room goods of all kinds were stored, and in the 
 middle room was the agency store. It was in this 
 middle room that, two hours before, the trader had 
 turned to his clerk with, 
 
 All ready, Bob?" 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 " Get it through as soon as possible." 
 
 " Let me alone for that." After a silence in which 
 each was busy with his own work, the clerk added, 
 " Winder made a thorough job of it last night." 
 
28 ONOQUA 
 
 He laughed, and Hines joined in. 
 
 " Did it up brown. Oh, he was put up to it, New 
 man. That fellow here a while ago insinuated all 
 sorts of things ; he made the agent nervous. But, on 
 the whole, it's done us no harm. For instance, what 
 does Winder know of the price of molasses except as 
 we tell him ? But, as he has to buy it himself as 
 well as the other provisions, why, we certainly don't 
 make a big profit on these things, hey ? " 
 
 "Not we." 
 
 " And he knows without our telling him that an In 
 dian can't tell the difference between a gill and a gal 
 lon when it's written down on the books. And if he 
 did, what's a man's memory against black and white ? 
 But, see, they're beginning to come at last. I suppose 
 they'll be at it all day. However, if I had only one 
 piece of business a month, I'd string it out." 
 
 By the arrangement of the building, the Indians 
 who went in at the office door did not go out that 
 same way, but passed through the store and out 
 again through the third room opposite the office. No 
 one thought of resisting this arrangement which sent 
 them into the trader's hands with their money from 
 the agent still unpocketed. For if the Indians were 
 reluctant to earn, they were willing to pay. Not to 
 
AHSANIAK'S EXPECTATIONS 29 
 
 do this was quite out of their comprehension. So, the 
 long file which throughout the day straggled up to 
 the agent's desk turned from here to the store. In 
 the office talking and laughing went on, though not 
 boisterously. But in the store the hush of uncertainty 
 fell upon them and the voices that were heard at all 
 were in a different key. 
 
 Waha, after waiting his turn at the office, fell into 
 line and walked on with the rest. Here he found a 
 dozen men and women with faces of dissatisfaction. 
 There was no loudness in the crowd, unless it was 
 the clerk's incisive voice as he read off the indebted 
 ness of each one. A woman ventured to remonstrate. 
 She was sure she had not owed so much as twenty 
 dollars ; he must be looking at the wrong place. 
 
 "Look yourself, then," cried Newman, thrusting 
 the ledger into her face. The woman never looked 
 at it ; what would it have told her ? But she gave 
 him one long, steady glance, the sort of gaze a man 
 would not want to remember when he was dying, and 
 handed him the money he demanded, and passed out. 
 As she went by them two men turned and looked 
 after her. 
 
 " Sopee's husband is sick ; she wanted the money for 
 him," said the elder, and threw a glance at the trader. 
 
30 ONOQUA 
 
 But Mines neither saw nor would have understood ; 
 he was busy watching a new arrival. He turned at 
 last, a movement which brought him face to face 
 with a young girl. " Cenee," he asked, " is your 
 brother better ? " 
 
 Cenee answered that he was, and passed on. She, 
 too, had not known that she owed so much here. 
 
 Waha was behind her. He came forward next and 
 asked what he owed. Ahsaniak's assurances of her 
 prudence were fresh in his mind ; but that great 
 book on the clerk's desk seemed to obscure all faith 
 and contradict all assurances. What did he owe ? 
 Newman looked up briskly and named the amount 
 after a moment's search. Waha stood motionless for 
 a few moments, breathing hard, and holding the 
 money tightly in his hand. Then, one by one, with 
 out a word, he passed the bills over to Hines who 
 stuffed them into his bursting wallet. And still with 
 out a word Waha went out. 
 
 Ahsaniak saw her father's shadow and the merry 
 words that she was saying to Kasde ceased suddenly 
 as she turned to the new comer. But her dimples 
 were deeper than ever as she made way for him to get 
 into the wagon beside her. Waha nodded to Kasde 
 as they drove off ; but he had not yet spoken when 
 
AHSANIAK'S EXPECTATIONS 31 
 
 Ahsaniak uttered an exclamation of surprise. " But 
 we are going to the house first/' she said. " I'm going 
 to give Mrs. Winder the money for my dress to-day. 
 You forget, father." 
 
 " No, I don't forget, Ahsaniak," he answered her, 
 looking straight before him. " We don't go to the 
 house ; we go home ; that's the only place for us." 
 
 The girl choked back the sudden tears. " And you 
 won't give me the money, father ? " she asked, seeing 
 that something had happened and striving in the 
 dark to discover what it was. 
 
 Then Waha turned upon her. 
 
 But his fierceness was not for the child by his side. 
 " They have taken it all, Ahsaniak. I have not one 
 dollar left. I guess you bought more than you 
 knew." 
 
 " No, no," cried the hearer vehemently, " I did not. 
 
 
 
 They're cheating you, father. Let's go back and 
 get the money; it's a mistake. I will tell them. 
 Let me go back." 
 
 " That mistake they make every time. It's no use 
 to go back. You can never get money out of a white 
 man's hand ; they will laugh at you and be rude to 
 you. No, Ahsaniak, there is nothing for us to do but 
 to go home. There is nothing yet," he added in an 
 
32 ONOQUA 
 
 undertone. " But some day some one will work for 
 us. It will not be like this always. The white man 
 tells us one religion and he shows us another. We 
 like what he says better than what he does ; we 
 choose this." 
 
 "Can you get me back my money?" asked the 
 girl. 
 
 Waha shook his head silently as he looked at her. 
 
 Ahsaniak drew down her hat over her eyes and 
 pulled up her shawl until her face was well muffled. 
 And on the homeward drive she spoke not another 
 word. As she drove on with her head bent she 
 looked more like an Indian than she had done since, 
 years ago, a little girl, she had gone away to school. 
 
 Mrs. Winder hearing of this misfortune assailed 
 her husband indignantly. She knew that these 
 Indians were cheated. She should be glad to have a 
 chance to prove it. She wished he would let her try. 
 
 "My dear," he returned, "you are mistaken. I 
 went over those accounts yesterday ; arid Waha's was 
 one that I remember. It's all right. Those people 
 don't know what they are getting, nor what money 
 means. I'm sorry for the girl if she can't have her 
 finery ; but I suppose that's common enough among 
 women. You know how to sympathize with her. 
 
AHSANIAK'S EXPECTATIONS 33 
 
 But one thing I tell you, Annie, you mustn't inter 
 fere." 
 
 And the most indulgent husband went off smiling 
 at his wife's tender-heartedness, and liking her none 
 the less for the indignation that had overswept him 
 for lack of its legitimate object. There were so many 
 difficult things in Indian affairs, that a girl's new 
 dress was too much of a trifle. 
 
34 ONOQITA 
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 NO HOPE 
 
 WHEN Ahsaniak reached home her father came 
 into the house with her, having found one of his sons 
 to take care of the horses. She occupied herself with 
 getting the meal for him and for Pejito who soon 
 followed. They talked earnestly together and 
 Pejito was telling his father something of interest to 
 him. But the girl did not hear enough to comprehend 
 whom he meant by the stranger that Waha heard of 
 so eagerly. She was dumb with the prospect before 
 her. She must be alone. 
 
 Haneeyet looked in as she went by to ask if 
 Ahsaniak was going to the festival the next day; 
 everybody was going. She should like to go with 
 her if Ahsaniak meant to go. Ahsaniak with her 
 eyes on the ground answered that she did not know ; 
 she did not think she would go. And Haneeyet 
 who had never been to school and whose liking for 
 Ahsaniak was largely mingled with admiration and 
 spiced with fear, withdrew with a suspicion that she 
 would not be welcome even if Ahsaniak went, she 
 
NO HOPE 35 
 
 who wore the Indian dress and did not know a word 
 of English. 
 
 Was it one gown or another, simply, the not having 
 a new gown that she had longed for which distressed 
 Ahsaniak ? No ; but it was what this lack signified to 
 her. She was a girl who fell in with things rather 
 than led them. It was a tribute to the power of the 
 influence to which she had been subjected that, for all 
 these two years, she had kept on doing as far as she 
 could the domestic duties that she had learned at 
 school. She still wore the school dress, and the 
 associations with it were so many that in it she felt 
 like the school girl who had come home to keep up 
 the ways of white people. 
 
 But now this support was to be taken from her. 
 For this was what to-day meant to her. Her dress 
 was worn out ; she had no other ; she had only the 
 Indian dress which, until this hour, she had refused to 
 put on in spite of laughter, and even threats. All 
 this time she had resisted and hoped. The toils had 
 seemed to close about her ; yet she had thought that 
 she could keep her own ways. Soon Onoqua would 
 come home ; she would help ; she had not gone to 
 Ahsaniak's school, but she had been taught in the 
 same way ; and when she came home things would go 
 
36 ONOQUA 
 
 better with the girl who had had to fight her battle so 
 much alone. 
 
 But Onoqua was not coming home at present. She 
 was at school having a good time, happy and well 
 clad, dressed like white people. To Ahsaniak the 
 putting on of her Indian dress seemed an open con 
 fession of failure ; it was leaving all the past, it was 
 being like the rest. If she did this, what had she to 
 keep the other life in her heart ? 
 
 The firelight quivering over the little room only lit 
 up the desolation, and its shadows only intensified 
 the darkness of these empty corners. 
 
 Ahsaniak's eyes followed these lights and shadows. 
 No girl reared in luxury from infancy ever had a 
 keener sense of beauty, a greater delight in it, than 
 had this little waif from that civilization, the out 
 ward forms of which she had caught at so readily. 
 She had not learned subtle distinctions in three years. 
 What she saw was a part of her faith ; to her civiliza 
 tion meant wearing a civilized dress which necessi 
 tated certain differences of living ; and wearing the 
 Indian dress meant Indian living. If in that hour there 
 had been something of the past around her to which to 
 hold, a picture on the wall, a book, a magazine, a news 
 paper, any link to the old life, it would have made an 
 
NO HOPE 37 
 
 immeasurable difference to Ahsaniak. She wanted 
 brightness, joy; she liked the white man's way. 
 But she was an Indian. Indians never had money ; 
 they only owned it. This was what Pejito had said 
 many a time. 
 
 She thought of one day at school when the girls 
 and the boys and the teachers had praised her for her 
 tasteful Christmas decorations. She had been so 
 happy. Life had had so many pleasant things then. 
 
 All these things had gone forever. 
 
 But it was more than a question of pleasures ; for, 
 all that she could see before her was the renunciation of 
 the life to which she had clung. She had cried until 
 she had no more tears, and sat gazing with heavy 
 eyes into the fire which gave her little heat and still 
 less consolation. For, instead of the cheerfulness 
 which should have lurked in its bright flashes and 
 glowing coals, she saw the poverty and misery about 
 her, and, in contrast, bright pictures of the days in 
 which she had been so proud of growing civilized. 
 Between her savage inheritance of centuries and her 
 semi-savage surroundings of to-day, there stretched 
 three years of the things that she liked and wanted, 
 but had no power to get for herself, these things 
 which she must go on without forever. If she had 
 
38 ONOQUA 
 
 never known them ! How she wished that she never 
 had. 
 
 There was only one thing left, to forget them. 
 
 There were no dimples about the young mouth 
 now. The eyes were sombre. 
 
 It was a lo/ng time before the young head drooped 
 and Ahsaniak leaned against the wall asleep. 
 
 Meanwhile, in the agency store with bolted shutters 
 two men sat making up their accounts and going over 
 their gains. They talked in low tones and with sub 
 dued laughter. And, as they divided the money 
 according to prearrangement, and each pocketed his 
 share, neither saw in it the betrayal of innocent 
 blood ; both chuckled over their good bargains. 
 
 Ahsaniak's father opened his own door softly and 
 looked in. The cold air did not arouse the girl from 
 her sleep of weariness and grief. He drew back an 
 instant and beckoned to some one without; and 
 another figure followed him into the house and stood 
 for a moment at the hearth silent. Waha brought 
 in more wood and threw it on the fire and the two 
 men sat and talked softly, with occasional glances 
 at the sleeping girl. The stranger was a young 
 man, wild in his dress, and with sudden and rapid 
 gestures as he talked. Waha listened to him with 
 
NO HOPE 3d 
 
 the utmost attention and his look at the speaker 
 was one of admiration and almost awe. 
 
 " And can you tell the time ? " he asked at last. 
 " Did he say this to you ? " The answer was full of 
 mystical indefiniteness. But Waha found in it a 
 meaning that filled him with delight. 
 
 At this moment the door opened again, and Pejito 
 came in bringing Kasde with him. This movement, 
 and the sense of presence, roused Ahsaniak. She 
 sprang to her feet, and after a glance at the others, 
 fixed her gaze upon the stranger. Then she turned 
 to her father with the bewilderment of sudden wak 
 ing still upon her. 
 
 " Who is he ? " she asked. 
 
 " He comes from the north," returned Waha, " and 
 he is always welcome. He brings us good news." 
 
 "What news ? " cried the girl, with a sudden thrill 
 of hope of she knew not what. 
 
 "News too great for children," answered her 
 father. " When it is time you will know it." 
 
 " Is it news about getting the money back from 
 the man ? " questioned Ahsaniak with quickened 
 breath. 
 
 " I told you you could never do that." And Waha 
 frowned at his daughter. 
 
40 ONOQTJA 
 
 Kasde drew near cautiously. "You will go to 
 morrow, Ahsaniak ? " he asked, looking at her with 
 admiration. 
 
 And Ahsaniak looked at him. Her face relaxed, 
 and she smiled. 
 
 After all, there was a way to be happy ; or, if not 
 quite happy, to have a good time. 
 
CETANGI 41 
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 CETANGI 
 
 IT was a brilliant assembly that Cetangi stood 
 looking down upon that cloudless day of the May 
 following Ahsaniak's trial. And that he should be 
 standing there before this audience taken from 
 among the most cultivated and the most liberal- 
 hearted people in the land, with something of his 
 own writing in his hand to read to them, was a strik 
 ing phase in that problem which is laying bare to 
 the world the strength and the weakness of the 
 forces upon which we pride ourselves. We, Ameri 
 cans, have rejoiced in our freedom ; we have sent our 
 missions around the world. But here in our own 
 splendid portals crouch gruesome beings, their 
 presence and their need reproaching us until the 
 blessing of our own act shall transform the loath 
 someness into a strength and beauty for us. For as Sir 
 Launfal in his " Vision," after long and weary search, 
 found the Holy Grail only in the food and drink he 
 shared, so shall we find that the food which will 
 transform is that food alone which we share. 
 
42 ONOQUA 
 
 Cetangi standing on the rostrum, had a distinct 
 perception that there was something peculiar in his 
 situation ; and with that instinct for the dramatic so 
 keen in his race, enjoyed it to the full. But he need 
 not have been an Indian student with his essay to 
 read before such hearers to have felt a thrill of pride 
 and a tremor of anxiety as to how he should acquit 
 himself. Many a white boy would have rejoiced in 
 his vantage ground. Here, in the broad arena of a 
 common tongue and a common knowledge, he was 
 to run his tilt against the enemy and win his 
 laurels. But he smiled at the thought of the tom 
 ahawk. This was fading out of sight with the 
 savage ancestors who had sworn eternal enmity to 
 the white man. 
 
 All that he saw of the past now were the friends 
 of his own home. He pictured them as he should 
 tell them of this scene. 
 
 And he was no solitary exception. Beside him 
 upon the platform were numbers of his race, and 
 behind these in the distance thousands more. In 
 this new work of the brain they were to put them 
 selves into friendly rivalry with the white race with 
 whom by favor now they stood for a time shoulder 
 to shoulder. 
 
CETANGI 43 
 
 His was not the age, nor that the moment to doubt 
 the issue. 
 
 And Cetangi standing there with the dignitaries 
 of the nation and the high social powers listening to 
 him gave utterance to thoughts that showed that he 
 had begun to appreciate the life and work around 
 him. As he finished his thesis and bowed his ac 
 knowledgment of the plaudits received, he seemed 
 to see the pleased faces of his friends ; and there 
 came before him a picture of the savage ancestors, 
 more than a generation removed in his case, who had 
 sworn enmity to the pale-faces, and had kept their 
 vows. But these were fading into eternal dimness ; 
 for the old had gone. 
 
 Yes ; the old had gone. The new was to come. 
 He belonged to neither. But to-day he did not 
 perceive this ; his feet trod easily on air. It seemed 
 like passing over a space to think of his people. 
 It was in connection with this present life that 
 there was no sense of distance. What he had 
 learned, what he could do, was recognized in this 
 assembly. And, if here, then this would be true 
 anywhere. 
 
 With eyes shining, lips smiling, heart beating 
 with proud happiness, he took his seat again. 
 
44 ONOQUA 
 
 The next speaker came forward. This was Ma- 
 haka, Onoqua's brother. He acquitted himself well, 
 although not as Cetangi had done. Then came for 
 ward a girl from a reservation far from Cetangi's. 
 And after her, others. 
 
 In the audience fans waved and the soft air sweep 
 ing in from the open windows and doors brought 
 with it the perfume of the roses bursting into bloom 
 and the fragrance of the clover fields beyond. Eyes 
 brightened and moistened as stronger and stronger 
 grew the evidence that the nation's neglect and broken 
 pledges, and not the Indian's inability, had kept these 
 children from their birthright of Americans. 
 
 In the enthusiasm of the hour rights became clear 
 and wrongs abhorred and abjured ; and the power of 
 these young people, and the work opening before 
 them were painted in vivid colors against the dark 
 background of former ignorance. 
 
 The speeches had all been made, the music by the 
 Indian band applauded to the echo, the adieus given, 
 the day was over, and another set of Indian youth 
 was ready to go forth upon its life work. On every 
 hand smiles greeted the group. No, there was one 
 exception. An old man stood looking on with a 
 frown. Suddenly, he muttered to the man at his el- 
 
CETANGI 45 
 
 bow, " And so these are the Hercules whom we set to 
 clean these Augean stables, the reservations, that we 
 can't do anything with ourselves." 
 
 " What does he mean, the old cynic ? " questioned 
 a fair girl who had overheard him. " Whom is he 
 talking about?" 
 
 It was late one afternoon in July. The tepees and 
 the log houses on the banks of the stream were emp 
 tied of their inmates who lay on the grass in the 
 shade, the men smoking their pipes, the women with 
 occasionally outstretched hands as some child was 
 about to roll down from its place at the mother's side. 
 Parties strolled up and down the bank. But with the 
 thermometer in the nineties, motion was not an en 
 joyment to the greater part of them. 
 
 Ahsaniak came down the path toward Haneeyet's 
 tepee. Kasde was beside her and she was talking 
 and laughing merrily. Ahsaniak had never laughed 
 and talked so much as since she had become thor 
 oughly an Indian girl ; and this was from the day 
 after she had been obliged to give up her expected 
 dress. She had put on her Indian dress and gone to 
 the festival. The child had really had no other which 
 was not too ragged. But in putting this on a certain 
 
46 ONOQUA 
 
 hardness and a new boldness had coine upon her. 
 She not only had cast the past behind her, but she 
 seemed never to glance back at it. The old look of 
 regret that sometimes had saddened and softened her 
 face was never seen there now. Her reputation for 
 brightness of wit had grown. But Howaxte often 
 watched her with silent pain. Howaxte, however, 
 was fond of Ahsaniak, and she cared only for Kasde 
 who was thoroughly Indian, who knew nothing about 
 school and cared less. That afternoon as she saun 
 tered down the path another figure came toward her, 
 not seen until a sudden turn of the way showed it 
 quite near.. 
 
 At the sight Ahsaniak came to a sudden halt. 
 Her eyes dilated, her breath came hurriedly ; for an 
 instant it seemed as if she were about to turn back ; 
 then her lips set, the hardness deepened in her face, 
 the smile returned. With steady pace she went for 
 ward to meet Onoqua whom she had not seen since 
 her return the week before. 
 
 Onoqua came on with outstretched hand; and as 
 she clasped Ahsaniak's was about to kiss her early 
 playmate. But the girl drew back. 
 
 " You've got home at last, Onoqua/' she said. 
 " You'll find it dull here. We only do things you 
 
CETANGI 47 
 
 won't want to do. I don't know how you'll get 
 on." 
 
 " I am among my own again, Ahsaniak," returned 
 the new-comer, looking with a smile into the other's 
 eyes. 
 
 But Ahsaniak did not meet her gaze. She was 
 studying every detail of Onoqua's attire, from the 
 tasteful and very becoming hat, the white cambric 
 gown with red dots which was so simply and prettily 
 made, to the neat boots. The band of soft white 
 around the throat and the little red bow at the neck, 
 and the red belt, did not escape her, nor the shining 
 of Onoqua's dark hair, nor the sunshine in her face ; 
 everything commended itself to the gazer's esthetic 
 tastes and womanly desires. 
 
 Her eyes turned coldly to the other's face and she 
 said, " You and I have got new mothers since I saw 
 you the last time." 
 
 Onoqua's eyes fell. She had been wounded in the 
 sensitive part of her home life and she saw that this 
 thing had been intentional. She made no answer for 
 the moment ; then she said, " I'm very sorry for your 
 loss, Ahsaniak." 
 
 " Oh," said the girl. Then she added, " I see Hanee- 
 yet coming. I must speak to her, I will see you 
 
48 ONOQUA 
 
 soon, Onoqua. I will come and see you." But it was 
 her pride, not her will, that spoke. The other should 
 not think Ahsaniak avoided her as if she were too 
 good for a genuine Indian girl. She would be the 
 same herself as soon as her clothes wore out and she 
 went back to the dress that belonged to her tribe. 
 
 Onoqua looked after her. " Poor Ahsaniak ! " she 
 said to herself. " She's forgotten everything." 
 
 It was one hot morning in the latter part of Au 
 gust that Mahaka came into the house which Matoska 
 had built, and rough as it was, it was better than the 
 tepee which it replaced. Already, Onoqua had put 
 into it a few touches of embellishment. But she had 
 very little ; and then, the house was not hers, the 
 new wife was here, and children, two boys, and a girl 
 two years old, whom Matoska had introduced to her 
 as brothers and sister. 
 
 " Onoqua," cried Mahaka, " look here. Head this." 
 And he put a letter into her hands. " It's from Ce- 
 tangi ; he's coming to see me. But read it and see 
 what's the matter with him. I can't make it out." 
 
 And he stood patiently waiting until Onoqua had 
 finished the long epistle. 
 
 She made a pretty picture as she stood there lean- 
 
CETANGI 49 
 
 ing against the door-post, the soft wind blowing her 
 hair about her face, and toning the flush in her cheeks 
 that had come from bending over her cooking, for 
 she was trying to teach her step-mother some new 
 ways of doing things, that is, she had begun with this 
 intention ; but no sooner had Tahnas been well started 
 than she had wearied of the instructions and gone 
 off to a neighboring tepee, leaving the girl to cook at 
 her own pleasure which, although no doubt the viands 
 gained by it, had defeated her object. Her step 
 mother did not care to learn, and if she had would 
 have resented the teaching of Onoqua with her fine 
 ways. 
 
 " What's the matter with him ? " inquired Mahaka 
 when his sister looked up from the letter. 
 
 " He's unhappy. He can't find what he wants to 
 do. I hope he will come here. Perhaps we can show 
 him what his work among his people is." And hand 
 ing back the paper, she added, " Is he the one that is 
 so bright ? I)oes he know a great deal, Mahaka ? " 
 
 " More than all the rest of us put together," he 
 answered. 
 
50 ONOQUA 
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 THE STUMBLING STONE 
 
 "DiD you go to church this morning?" And the 
 trader, drawing up his foot and nursing his knee, set 
 tled himself comfortably in his chair which was on 
 the piazza of his house, and turned his face toward 
 his companion. 
 
 Newman brought back his eyes from the rugged 
 outlines of the hills as these shone out in golden 
 light against the great disk of the sun which hung 
 poised ready to drop down behind them. "Not 
 much," he laughed. " Time's too precious to waste in 
 hearing old Griswald's prosing." 
 
 " But you missed something today. We had a ser 
 mon about Moses." 
 
 " I've heard of Moses before," retorted Newman. 
 
 "Ah, but you never heard of him this way. He 
 came out in quite a new character this morning. Now, 
 you know, we have always thought of Moses as a 
 venerable and very wise and learned man, quite up to 
 all the little devices of the Egyptians, indeed, ahead 
 of them every time ; a man who needed all his wisdom 
 
THE STUMBLING STONE 51 
 
 and experience to bring the Israelites out of their 
 house of bondage. But it seems these things were 
 not necessary at all. There are any number of Moseses 
 now-a-days, young fellows just out of their teens 
 and knowing nothing more than perhaps a little Eng 
 lish. These are up to affairs at this stage of the 
 world ; we've come to appreciate youth. And as for 
 wisdom, much study is a weariness to the flesh. 
 We'll do very well without it." 
 
 " What are you driving at ? " cried the other, turn 
 ing upon him sharply. " What's up now ? " 
 
 "Why, I've just told you what's up, the young 
 men are up. The Israelites were in a reservation, the 
 Indians are in a reservation. Moses, the aged and 
 learned, led out the first; therefore the Moseses, 
 young and unlearned, should lead out the second. 
 The first coming out was a journey on foot, an actual 
 exodus ; this coming is to be the departure from bar 
 barism. The comparison was carried on step by step ; 
 it was just as I've given it, only there wasn't any 
 thing said about the difference in age ; experience 
 and wisdom didn't get a showing." He stretched 
 himself and went on, " If we're the Egyptians, how 
 ler, we needn't have any fear of the Red Sea yet 
 awhile." 
 
52 ONOQTJA 
 
 " Not much/' laughed the listener. 
 
 "Caisson was delighted," said Hines. "I heard 
 him talking to Griswald. I didn't observe to him that 
 if Moses had spent his life in Goshen it would have 
 been a long time before he would have been able to 
 defeat the Egyptian magicians." 
 
 "Why didn't you?" 
 
 Hines laughed. " You never heard the old proverb 
 about not quarrelling with one's bread and butter, 
 hey, Newman ? " 
 
 " Yes. But I don't understand you." 
 
 The other surveyed him a moment in silence. 
 Then with a short laugh, he said, " Well, do we want 
 greater wisdom here than that of the Egyptians, taking 
 us to be the Egyptians ? No, Newman, there is a cer 
 tain astuteness about the Indian race that must be 
 kept under. If we ever give these young fellows a 
 fair chance, they'll catch on. Then our day is over. 
 Then good-by to the whole agency business, and the 
 patronage that helps to build up the bulwarks of party. 
 No, no, we'll take care of this. I tell you where the 
 danger lies, Newman. It's in letting these fellows 
 see how we do it ; it wouldn't take them a great while 
 to find out." 
 
 " But how can you help it when they are educated ? " 
 
THE STUMBLING STONE 58 
 
 " Educated ? Oh, we couldn't then. But you don't 
 call this education, do you ? a little English, where 
 to find their own reservation on the map, and some 
 thing of the rule of three, we're proof against such 
 wisdom as this brings, we shall not get ousted on that 
 account." 
 
 " What will do it, then ? " 
 
 Hines took his cigar from his mouth and leaning 
 toward his companion, said, " That only will be a fatal 
 day for us when the young men begin to go out into 
 the world and learn how we run the machine. As I told 
 you, it won't take long for them to catch on. When 
 that day dawns, Newman, we may as well strap on 
 our knapsacks at once, for we shall never stay it out. 
 That's the day when every one of those young Indians 
 will be a real Moses standing where a Moses ought to 
 stand, before Pharaoh, the Pharaoh of the people. 
 He can fight as well as the white man, and he can do 
 some things better when he is trained, and he will 
 make himself heard, that is to say, he would do 
 it. But, no, we're safe enough ; that won't come 
 about." Again he took a puff at his cigar, and added, 
 "We'll take care of that. The embargo laid upon 
 that is too sacred to be taken off ; it's as sacred, Ah, 
 Mr. Caisson, delighted to see you. Take a seat, sir." 
 
54 ONOQTJA 
 
 And Hines offered his chair to the stranger, and 
 going into the house, brought out another in which 
 he seated himself, with his air of easy confidence 
 changed to one of courteous attention. 
 
 The new comer was a slight, middle-aged man, with 
 delicate features, a face of great refinement, and an 
 air of breeding which contrasted sharply with New 
 man's roughness and gave Hines a rustiness of manner 
 beside his polish of constant use. 
 
 "I hope you find some improvement since you 
 were here three years ago," said the trader. " Things 
 are going on here slowly, to be sure ; but then we don't 
 look for rapid progress. It takes a while to civilize. 
 It took us a matter of a thousand years more or less ; 
 and some people say that we've not arrived yet." 
 
 " Yes, I see some changes," answered Mr. Caisson. 
 " But I hope much from these educated young people 
 who are to take the lead here, as from the nature of 
 things they must do. Their record is, on the whole, 
 encouraging ? " And he turned to the trader. 
 
 " I find it so," returned that gentleman. " They 
 form a nucleus for a new society, not altogether civil 
 ized, I must confess, a kind of hybrid between the 
 savage and the enlightened, we might call them a half 
 way house between these Indians and civilization." 
 
THE STUMBLING STONE 55 
 
 "Exactly," said his hearer with approval. "And 
 we must be half-way before we're there. And they 
 are industrious ? " 
 
 In the instant between this question and the reply 
 the trader's thought had traversed every acre of the 
 reservation that could be in the widest meaning con 
 sidered occupied, and had found here and there scanty 
 fields of grain, here and there patches of vegetables, 
 and along the narrow valleys on the river banks, the 
 rank hay stacked and in some places covered with 
 thatch to protect it from the weather. But except the 
 Government workmen, there were no mechanics. When 
 there were vacancies in the agency work possible for 
 them to do, or in the blacksmith's, or the carpenter's 
 shop, the returned students were to fill them if they 
 could. Meanwhile, there was open to them the part 
 of Micawber with much competition in the role. His 
 sarcasm was with difficulty kept from uttering it 
 self in some form. 
 
 "They're ready to do whatever is open to them," 
 he answered. " The Government always considers 
 them paternally, you know, and on the reservation 
 a red skin counts for more than a three-storey brain." 
 
 " Yes, yes, of course." Then Mr. Caisson was si 
 lent a moment. " We ought to have more work for 
 
56 ONOQUA 
 
 them than we do," he began again. " But this will come 
 in time. And that reminds me. I saw two good-looking 
 girls here ; one appeared to have nothing to do, and 
 it seemed a pity. She was Waha's daughter. The other 
 was with that woman you pointed out as so violent 
 and sullen." 
 
 "That was Naumatin," said Newman. "The girl 
 must have been Onoqua ; she's just come home from 
 school." 
 
 " Yes, that's the one. Onoqua was so full of devotion 
 to her race, and of purpose to do great things for them, 
 that I didn't say much to her on the subject; the 
 other one was ready enough to accept my offer, but 
 her father wouldn't let her go. I told them that Mrs. 
 Caisson who came out to Portland with me had gone 
 on to Bismark to visit friends, and I should go on to 
 meet her to-morrow, and would be glad to put the two 
 girls* under her care, and we would take them to a 
 good Eastern school or college and let them stay for 
 a year at least. That would have fitted them better 
 for anything they could do here. Of course I respect 
 Onoqua's noble devotion ; and I, certainly, should feel 
 it very wrong to interfere in any way in the matter 
 of the other girl." 
 
 " With Ahsaniak," again interposed Newman. 
 
THE STUMBLING STONE 57 
 
 " Whatever her name may be," resumed the other, 
 " her father wanted her to remain with him ; and 
 parental affection is too sacred to be set aside here for 
 any other consideration whatever. That these people 
 love their children is the great cause for hopefulness 
 in this whole business of civilization, and for us to 
 show disregard of their ties of home and blood would 
 be worse barbarism than the Indian." 
 
 " We can't have too much respect for human rights," 
 returned Hines in a tone that made Caisson look with 
 some curiosity at this phemomenon of an Indian 
 trader. But here Winder came for him, and he went 
 away, resolved to continue through the agent the 
 investigation he had been about to begin, whether 
 such remarkable theory in this place agreed with the 
 practice. 
 
58 ONOQUA 
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 KEEPING CLOSE RANKS 
 
 HINES busied himself in lighting another cigar un 
 til the two men were out of sight ; then he turned to 
 Newman. " There it is," he said; "there's the bond 
 that the whole nation is more afraid of than the whole 
 race of genii of the seal of Solomon. Indian parental 
 affection does more for you and me, Newman, and 
 noble specimens like us, than all the societies can do 
 against us. That day I warned you of hasn't dawned 
 yet. You don't lose your drove as long as you can keep 
 them close together. You can carry one nation in the 
 heart of another for a thousand years, if it will only 
 keep close ranks. Look at the gypsies ; look at the 
 Jews. The first are somewhat like the Indians to 
 day, and the red man will never be as learned as the 
 other. But they've gone through every country in 
 Europe without becoming anything but gypsies and 
 Jews. Eace sympathies, nothing more needed. And 
 so, when Onoqua stands by her people, and Mr. Caisson 
 won't make Waha see how much better it would be for 
 the other girl to go to school, which we know lie so 
 
KEEPING CLOSE RANKS 59 
 
 easily might have done, why, it's our part to encore; 
 for the farce is benefit night to us. So, now, we drop 
 out of sight the fact that if they're going to rule, they 
 should be taught how, and think of the crying shame 
 it is to separate parents and children, Newman, you 
 ought not to be here, you should be with your dad. 
 Look now, at that fellow, think of the cruelty of his 
 living anywhere but at his parents' hearthstone, if 
 they happen to have one, what wickedness to take 
 him out of the reach of the paternal voice and the 
 maternal caresses." 
 
 The two men burst into a laugh as a young Indian, 
 tall, stout and vigorous in frame, went sauntering by 
 with a long gaze at his observers, the sound of whose 
 merriment reached him, and as he looked, he scowled. 
 
 "How are you, Pejito ? " called Hines blandly. The 
 Indian answered by a monosyllable and went on, 
 glancing back as he approached a bend in the trail. 
 
 Before he reached this, a figure came out to meet 
 him, at the sight of which the trader uttered an oath. 
 " Look ! " he said to his companion. " With all the 
 absurd get-ups here, I never saw anything come up 
 to that. Who is he, do you know ? What's he here 
 for ? " 
 
 Newman also was bending forward watching with 
 
60 ONOQUA 
 
 interest what at that distance seemed to him a mass 
 of animated ornament, largely feathers. As Pejito 
 reached this, the two shook hands. In another mo 
 ment Kasde joined them ; Waha strayed up ; others 
 appeared from the woods a short distance away ; and 
 to these woods the whole party turned, talking ani 
 matedly as they went. " I'll wager there's a big lot 
 of them in there," the watcher cried. " I'd give some 
 thing to know what they're up to. But if I could get 
 at them, I couldn't understand a word ; it's a disad 
 vantage to us sometimes not to be able to talk Indian." 
 
 The figure whom Pejito and the others had met 
 was grotesque enough to attract attention, even on a 
 reservation where the dress of the savage and that of 
 the civilized man were so constantly united in absurd 
 ways that very little of the kind gave rise to com 
 ment. Around his head, in place of the favorite 
 ornament of the bull's horns, was a circle of feathers 
 surmounted on the forehead by an eagle's quill. The 
 belt was also of feathers, and the arrows which filled 
 his quiver were feather tipped. His robe of deer 
 skin was richly embroidered, so were his mocca 
 sins. His whole air was that of a person of impor 
 tance. 
 
 " We haven't seen as much Indian as that for many 
 
KEEPING CLOSE RANKS 61 
 
 a day," observed Hines. " What does it mean, I 
 wonder ? " 
 
 In the woods, surrounded by a circle of attentive 
 and admiring listeners, this stranger was the chief, 
 and for a long time the only speaker. The sermon 
 he preached, for his oration amounted to this, was 
 much more appreciated than the one of the morning 
 had been. Eespect and devotion greeted him. In 
 the speeches that followed, some things concerning 
 the present and the future of the Indians were dis 
 cussed that would have deeply interested the two 
 white men helplessly wondering what was going on 
 and, with the sensitiveness of a consciousness of 
 deserts, fearing mischief. 
 
 But when the meeting broke up all the assembly 
 separated quietly, and nothing revealed to the ques 
 tioners whether they had any cause for alarm. 
 
 " It's a new medicine man. They'll be having a 
 dance in a few days," announced Newman. 
 
 The stranger with Waha and Pejito took his way 
 to their home. It was the same one whom Ahsaniak 
 had found there when she had waked that evening 
 the autumn before. 
 
 She was absent that day. The council of three 
 that was to be held there was not for women. But 
 
62 ONOQUA 
 
 Ahsaniak had not waited to be sent away. Naumatin 
 had gone to her hours before, and said, "Come and 
 help me make Onoqua wear the dress of her people." 
 The girl looked at her an instant with dilating eyes. 
 Then she turned away as they filled with tears. 
 
 " No," she answered firmly, " I will not. Onoqua 
 must decide for herself." Naumatin urged in vain, 
 and went away alone. 
 
 But Ahsaniak hid herself, lest she should come 
 back. 
 
ONOQUA'S EXPERIMENT 63 
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 ONOQUA'S EXPERIMENT 
 
 ONE day in early September Onoqua sat in the 
 pine woods trying to study out a problem that had 
 been given her. She had come that day to see her 
 mother, and Naumatin sat with her under the trees 
 which, from a little distance behind her tepee, stretched 
 far up into the mountains. Here at the edge of the 
 forest the sights and sounds of the Indian village 
 came to her plainly : she heard the laughter of the 
 children at play, a laughter unmixed with any noise 
 of quarrel ; she heard the voices of the men as they 
 staked the hay on the meadow below; she caught 
 glimpses of young girls and of young men who were 
 sauntering and lounging in a place where sauntering 
 and lounging were the rule and where idleness 
 ^triumphed in the absence of opportunity and in 
 centive for work. 
 
 Onoqua, so far from holding herself apart from 
 these people, was trying how to bridge the distance 
 which her education and her different modes of 
 thought had inevitably made. It was just a little 
 
64 ONOQUA 
 
 behind her that Naumatin sat. Once in her per 
 plexity the girl looked around at her mother. The 
 Indian woman's eyes had been fixed upon her with a 
 watchfulness that had grown more intense as Onoqua 
 became less determined. 
 
 At this silent appeal Naumatin at once bent for 
 ward. " Tahuas never does as you say," she asserted. 
 " You are too far off from her, you make her proud." 
 
 " Is that why how do you know that ? " cried 
 Onoqua in surprise. 
 
 Naumatin chuckled. " That's why," she answered 
 nodding emphatically. " Mahaka told me so ; Mahaka 
 says you're too stiff, he doesn't like it." 
 
 "Mahaka not like it ! " cried the girl in amaze 
 ment. For she had held her brother her stanch 
 ally. 
 
 Naumatin's keen eyes grew sharper, her wrinkles 
 deepened, her habitually sly expression grew into a 
 look of craft. She might have been taken for the 
 evil spirit in the legend whispering over the left 
 shoulder of a mortal. And yet not a thought of evil, 
 nor the desire for it, troubled the heart of the beauti 
 ful girl beside her. It was no question of sinning or 
 not sinning that was swaying Onoqua, it was with 
 anxiety to see what was the right thing to do that 
 
ONOQUA'S EXPERIMENT 65 
 
 her sweet face grew wistful. For, how could it be 
 right to yield in this thing, that ever since her return 
 her mother had been pleading for ? How could she 
 be the instructor and the example she had determined 
 to be if she could abandon her vantage ground of 
 civilized looks as well as habits ? Yet, on the other 
 hand, could she bring herself nearer to her people by 
 showing in this outward way that she still considered 
 herself one of themselves ? Would they not in this 
 way see more plainly her sympathy and her desire to 
 help them ? 
 
 She sighed. 
 
 Naumatin watching breathlessly, heard the sigh. 
 She was a foe who knew how to thrust when the 
 enemy was weary. "Yesterday," she began, "Mau- 
 keeneet came to me. She said to me, ' Onoqua is not 
 my sister, Onoqua is a strange lady ; I do not love 
 her/" 
 
 " mother ! did she say so ? " cried her hearer. For 
 Maukeeneet who had been only a little while to the 
 mission school, who was next in age to Onoqua, and 
 who possessed traits of character that encouraged 
 her sister, was of all persons the one whom the girl 
 desired to win; and she had told Naumatin so. 
 
 As the Indian heard that eager question she smiled 
 
66 
 
 a crafty smile. "It's not only Maukeeneet," she 
 answered, "it is all the Indian girls who don't any 
 longer like you ; Ahsaniak and all of them." 
 
 And she went on to assure her that this was not 
 the half that might be told of the feeling aroused by 
 these strange looks and ways. Onoqua remembered 
 Ahsaniak's greeting. Naumatin, in assuring her 
 daughter of the antagonism that her dress and her 
 ways had aroused, spoke the truth. What did she 
 care for Onoqua's motive so long as the girl yielded ? 
 
 "For Maukeeneet's sake, then, and your sake, and 
 only for a little while, to show that I am still one of 
 you," she answered Onoqua at last, turning away her 
 head to hide the bitter tears ; "for just a very little 
 while, and only for this reason I will do it, mother." 
 
 Naumatin grunted her approval ; but poor Onoqua, 
 trembling with the distress of her sacrifice, would 
 have been glad of a warmer acknowledgment. 
 "Come now, then," said her mother. And as the 
 girl drew back, she insisted. " You promised," she 
 said, " and you must go now to your sister ; Mau- 
 keeneet will listen to you if you go to her now. I 
 have a dress for you." 
 
 The news flew through the camp as swiftly as if 
 telegraph and telephone had aided it j but the inter- 
 
ONOQUA'S EXPERIMENT 67 
 
 pretation of the act halted. "Onoqua is Indian 
 again," they said; "she is tired of the white man's 
 ways." And the girl found this assertion on every 
 hand. Had her mother told this ? She could not 
 trust Naumatin if she were fifty times her mother. 
 
 It was hours before Maukeeneet appeared. Onoqua 
 went to her with loving words. " I show you that I 
 am really your sister, that my heart is Indian, and 
 that I want to help you," she said. And as she 
 looked at her young sister, it seemed worth while to 
 her to have made any sacrifice that would lead her 
 away from her present life into a better. She put 
 her arm about the girl. 
 
 Maukeeneet did not draw away ; she laughed good- 
 humoredly, and looking her sister over in her Indian 
 dress, asked what Onoqua wanted altered ?* For her 
 part, she couldn't see that they were not just alike 
 now. Then with another laugh she ran away again 
 to Haneeyet and Ahsaniak who were waiting for 
 her. 
 
 It was almost the end of what had been to Onoqua 
 a day of defeats. She had fully resolved that this 
 experiment should never be tried again, whatever the 
 arguments used. Even Tahnas's greeting of her had 
 not been warm; she resented Naumatin's influence; 
 
68 ONOQUA 
 
 Onoqua should have been guided by herself instead 
 of by her own mother, for Tahnas had been ready to 
 adopt her when she came home from school, and she 
 had been kinder than Naumatin; for she had been 
 willing to let the girl do as she pleased, provided she 
 did not attempt to instruct her elders ; but Naumatin 
 never could let anybody alone, she was always man 
 aging. Onoqua saw that her sacrifice had been 
 more than useless ; she had done wrong. Yet she 
 had meant it to be for the best. 
 
 She would go and take off her Indian dress now, at 
 once, not even the rest of the day would she wear 
 what was everywhere taken as a token of return to 
 the past ; for it had failed of its good purpose, it had 
 only accomplished an evil one. 
 
 It was sunset when she came back to her father's 
 house. 
 
 No one was there. She stood a moment with her 
 foot on the threshold of the door, her uplifted arm 
 and hand laid against the doorpost, her forehead on 
 her wrist; her eyes fixed upon the ground, trying to 
 think out how she should retrieve herself and show 
 what she really had meant. 
 
 " Will you tell me which is Mahaka's house ? " 
 asked a voice. 
 
ONOQUA'S EXPERIMENT 09 
 
 She looked up startled. She had not heard a 
 sound; but there only a few yards away, stood a 
 man whom she had never seen before. He was 
 young, tall, lithe, yet strong, with a dark skin and 
 features in which the traits of Indian and white were 
 mingled ; it was a handsome face, and the eyes were 
 full of intelligence. They were fixed now inquir 
 ingly upon Onoqua as he repeated the question that 
 in her surprise she had not answered. He spoke her 
 own tongue well, yet not quite like one belonging to 
 the tribe and he came nearer as he asked again how 
 to find Mahaka's house. 
 
 "Mahaka lives here,' 7 answered Onoqua. The 
 stranger was dressed in the army uniform that the 
 Eastern students wore. This must be Cetangi. Ce- 
 tangi to-day ! And she here now, like this ! 
 
 He looked at her with curiosity as she answered 
 him in English. 
 
 "But he's not in," he said in the same tongue, com 
 ing up and looking into the house and then turning a 
 keen gaze upon the shrinking girl. " Can you tell 
 me anything about him ? Or if he's away, where is 
 his sister ? " 
 
 " I am his sister." 
 
 His eyes swept her as she stood there. " Yes," he 
 
70 ONOQUA 
 
 answered. " But not you. I want to see his sister 
 who has been to school. Where is Onoqua ? " 
 
 The girl's face crimsoned through all its darkness 
 of hue, the sweet lips trembled and she did not lift 
 her eyes as she said, " I am Onoqua." 
 
 " You ? " he cried in astonishment. " Oh ! " 
 
 The contemptuous tone cut her to the heart. 
 Cetangi had heard everything good of her from 
 Mahaka who, she knew, was proud of her ; and he 
 was amazed, disappointed, disgusted. 
 
 How could he know that she had been told that 
 Maukeeneet called her " a strange lady," that Mahaka 
 said she was "too stiff," that all the reservation 
 resented her assumption of superiority and believed 
 that she wanted to separate herself from her people, 
 and that this was destroying her influence ? Ah ! 
 Naumatin had known how to put things. And 
 Onoqua had flattered herself that she should be able 
 to teach Cetangi what he could do for his people. 
 And now! He even despised her. 
 
 And yet, because she had meant to do right and 
 had not gone back to Indian ways, she lifted her 
 head and looked at him. 
 
 "I hear Mahaka's voice now," she said. And at 
 the moment the young man himself came running 
 up having learned of an arrival. 
 
ONOQUA'S EXPERIMENT 71 
 
 As her brother came up, Onoqua made her escape. 
 
 But she would not now take off her Indian dress 
 that evening. Cetangi should not think her acting in 
 deference to his presence. She busied herself in 
 getting the evening, meal ready ; for Tahnas often 
 left this work to her and praised Onoqua's cooking 
 to excuse her own neglect. 
 
 Matoska brought quite a party home with him 
 and they had a merry evening. Cetangi listened 
 and laughed and talked with an ease and tact that 
 made him at once acceptable. 
 
 Onoqua sat in the corner. She, too, listened; 
 but she neither talked nor laughed. 
 
72 ONOQUA 
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 RATION DAY 
 
 " AND so you ran away ? " said Mrs. Griswald. 
 
 " Everybody does, from Naumatin," returned Mau- 
 keeneet. "Nobody ever did fight her, except that 
 time that the teacher wouldn't let her kill Onoqua, 
 and Matoska told her she must behave. But he 
 couldn't make her, only that moment." 
 
 And Maukeeneet's laugh had in it an undertone of 
 bitterness. It did not please her to be the daughter 
 of Naumatin. It was characteristic neither of her 
 race, nor of a girl as she was openly to defy her 
 mother's authority ; but if Naumatin could not find 
 her when she went away anywhere ho\v was Mau- 
 keeneet to be blamed for not accompanying her ? 
 
 Mrs. Griswald handed her guest an illustrated 
 paper that had recently come to her and watched the 
 girl's enjoyment of the pictures and, cautiously, her 
 spelling out of the title of one. At length the other 
 looked up and announced her discovery. 
 
 " Bight," said Mrs. Griswald pleased. " Maukee- 
 neet," she added, " you learn so fast, why don't you 
 go away to school ? You'd like it very much." 
 
RATION DAY 78 
 
 Maukeeneet made her an evasive answer and re 
 turned to the newspaper. Soon after she announced 
 that when the others had set out for the beef issue 
 she was going to Onoqua's. " We have some sewing 
 to do," she added. 
 
 Mrs. Griswald smiled at the girl's eager face and 
 wished that all the other girls had some sewing to do. 
 
 And she asked herself again that morning what she 
 had asked her husband many times before how they 
 could be expected to subdue the old Adam in these 
 Indians without the power that the Lord had insti 
 tuted and was constantly using to do it in all people, 
 work ? After a moment she spoke of the stranger 
 whom she had seen so much with Mahaka. He was 
 a civilized young man. Was he going to the beef 
 issue ? 
 
 " I suppose so. Cetangi likes to see people and do 
 something. He gets so tired lying around I should 
 think he'd go home ; he's been here three weeks and 
 he doesn't say anything about it." 
 
 " Do you want him to go ? " 
 
 " No, indeed, I talk English with him ; though he 
 does laugh at me. He tries not to, but he can't help 
 it sometimes." She was talking her own tongue now. 
 
 " And, Maukeeneet, who is that other stranger, the 
 
74 ONOQUA 
 
 Indian whom I have heard of about here lately ? He 
 has feathers on his head and comes and goes like a 
 vision. Who is he ? " 
 
 Instantly, the girl's face changed. A veil fell over 
 the candor of her look and she answered, "I never 
 spoke to him. They say he is a prophet. Naumatin 
 talks to him, but she will not tell me about him. So, 
 I let her alone. I've never seen him but twice, and 
 one time he did not speak." Mrs. Griswald watched 
 her a moment. Maukeeneet returned her gaze fully. 
 "They say he is a prophet," she went on. "But 
 when I heard him he only said this year would be 
 good, that this year the Indians would be rich, that 
 blessings would come out of the ground." 
 
 "Ah, yes, an abundant harvest," returned the 
 other with a sigh of relief. " I hope you will have all 
 he predicts, and better still." 
 
 " You're going with us, Onoqua ? " asked Matoska 
 that morning in a tone between deprecation and 
 entreaty. "It's the Government that gives us the 
 ration day, and you want us to do as the Government 
 says. Then why won't you come to this ? " he re 
 turned as she answered him gently. " Why do you 
 set yourself against so many things ? " 
 
 What was the use of saying that her father's dress 
 
RATION DAY 75 
 
 as he stood before her that day had more of the old 
 Indian about it than he ever wore except when the 
 spectacle of beef on the hoof revived something of 
 the excitement of the old days of the hunt without 
 any of that spice of danger which lifts the chase a 
 little out of the category of slaughter ? He was no 
 worse than all the other Indians ; for on ration day 
 every bit of savage finery that was hidden on the 
 whole reservation was displayed in triumph; it did 
 not fit in with haying and hoeing, but it was in excel 
 lent accord with ration day. For this was in the lat 
 ter part of the September of 1888. The Government 
 had not then crossed off from the statute book the 
 record of its own barbarity in the manner of furnish 
 ing these rations. 
 
 Onoqua answered simply that she expected Mau- 
 keeneet. 
 
 "Maukeeneet will go to the agency with her 
 mother," he said. "Naumatin will make her. Every 
 body does as Naumatin says, when she is near 
 enough." The shrug of satisfaction with which he 
 finished this sentence amused Onoqua in spite of her 
 self. She had long ago given up useless arguments 
 with Matoska as to the sacredness of the marriage 
 tie. Matoska always listened patiently. But he 
 
76 ONOQUA 
 
 always came back to the question why he should live 
 alone when he could not live with Nau matin ? 
 
 "But I like Tahnas' ways," he reasoned. "She's 
 kind to me ; she makes me happy. I like to be 
 happy, Onoqua. And white men are good men ; they 
 never marry but once, except when their wives die ? 
 But I couldn't kill Naumatin. I wouldn't hurt her 
 little finger. Only, I can't see why it is not right to 
 keep the other side of the river with Tahnas. The 
 white men are different from that, you say ? I 
 wish some of those white men that always do right 
 would come out here." But as to Tahnas, he would 
 promise Onoqua he would never leave her for another 
 woman. Why should he ? Tahnas was good. 
 
 "But I must wait for Maukeeneet," Onoqua an 
 swered that morning. "And then, father, I don't 
 want to go there ration day. I'll go with you to the 
 agency some other day. It's a long time since we 
 had a ride together." 
 
 His face softened. 
 
 "Yes," he said, "but it's not like the old days, 
 Onoqua. I think all the time now you don't like 
 what I do. I'd like to please you, and I don't know 
 how." 
 
 Onoqua's beautiful eyes met his in a long, steady 
 
RATION DAY 77 
 
 look of such affection that Matoska's heart bounded 
 and his gaze held hers until her eyes filled with tears 
 and dropped. 
 
 A long silence in which Matoska was still there 
 made her look up again at last. Her father had 
 taken out the tuft of feathers from his hair and was 
 fastening it to the nail from which he had just taken 
 down his hat. Still in silence he put this on and 
 turned* about. Then he said, " Next time I go to the 
 agency, you go with me, Onoqua," and went out. 
 
 Laughter and shouting came up to her from the trail 
 along which the straggling procession went on to the 
 beef killing. She grew sick with suggestions of the 
 horrid scene and tried to banish the memory of it' as 
 she had seen it once since her return. 
 
 As she looked out at the passers she saw Ahsaniak 
 splendidly mounted with Kasde beside her, and Ha- 
 neeyet and a group of girls behind with young men 
 riding beside them, all of them dressed as if for a 
 festival and all in the highest spirits. Was her sis 
 ter among these ? As her eye ran over the group 
 scarcely daring to dwell upon it lest her fears should 
 be confirmed, a shadow fell across her sunlight. 
 
 But it was a shadow that radiated brightness, 
 
78 ONOQUA 
 
 CHAPTER X 
 MAUKEENEET 
 
 " MAUKEENEET ! " 
 
 Maukeeneet burst into a laugh. "Ah, ha! You 
 didn't expect me after all, Onoqua. You thought 
 my mother would pitch me on a horse and send me 
 off with the others. Not if she didn't know where to 
 look for me." She threw off her shawl as she spoke 
 and bent down eagerly over the work in her sister's 
 hand. " Onoqua, you've given me the very prettiest 
 of. all," she cried. 
 
 "I advise you to sew instead of talking if you 
 want this altered to wear to-night," said Onoqua 
 smiling up at her. "There's a thimble and your 
 needle and thread. And here's a good deal to be 
 done. I'm taller than you, and you are larger round 
 the waist. The dress must be shortened and let out 
 in some of the seams." 
 
 "As many colors in it as if it were Indian," cried 
 Maukeeneet examining the bright plaid, her face 
 beaming. "And all this red to trim it with. I tell 
 you what, Onoqua, I'd be as willing as not to have 
 
MAUKEENEET 79 
 
 all the girls hate me if I had such a good reason. It 
 would only be because they didn't have anything so 
 pretty themselves." 
 
 Onoqua let her sewing fall into her lap and looked 
 up at the speaker. " Tell me what you mean ? " she 
 cried. Her face was flushed, and her breath quick 
 ened. " Don't jest all the time. Tell me really what 
 you mean." 
 
 " I couldn't live if I took things as hard as you do ; 
 but I'm not in fun when I say it's my opinion that 
 not a girl on the reservation would refuse to wear 
 such a pretty dress as this. But there's no chance of 
 her getting it. Everybody hasn't Onoqua for a sister. 
 And so she has to pretend she doesn't care. What's 
 the use of fretting ? It's not the Indian way. We're 
 nothing but Indians. The white people despise us 
 and we shall not cry after their things. We will live 
 out our own lives, so far as they will let us. They 
 don't give us things, they only show us pretty things 
 and take them away. I'll wear the dress because you 
 give it to me and it's so pretty. But I'm not 
 going to be a half-way thing, neither Indian nor 
 white." 
 
 "That's what you are," returned Onoqua, "and I, 
 too ; and all of us, neither Indian nor white, but part 
 
80 ONOQUA 
 
 of both. Matoska and Nauniatin both have white 
 blood, Maukeeneet." 
 
 "I'm not the kind to be half-way," she repeated, 
 "and I couldn't be white if I chose. You know our 
 way, one drop Indian, all Indian. And besides, 
 Onoqua," and the girl suddenly lowered her voice, 
 " you know what is to be, you know what is coming 
 to the Indians ; you know that the Christ that the 
 white man refused and tortured to death the Indians 
 accept, and he is going to be our king and give us all 
 the land for our own again. You know this ? You've 
 seen the Messenger, Wanigiska? He has been to 
 this house ; but he goes oftener to Waha's. We only 
 whisper it yet ; but the day is soon coming when it 
 will be shouted throughout all the tribes. Surely, 
 you know about it, Onoqua. Why, Cetangi has been 
 told of it ; he has seen the Messenger, and Cetangi is 
 with Mahaka; he must talk a great deal with you, 
 Onoqua." 
 
 In the instant that passed before the girl answered 
 that she saw little of her brother's guest and talked 
 with him still less, she had time to remember what 
 Maukeeneet had said to her the next time that she 
 had seen her after Onoqua's wearing the Indian dress. 
 " I should have despised you for giving in, Onoqua," 
 
MATJKEENEET 81 
 
 she had declared ; "only, I knew how Naumatin had 
 put it to you. I could tell from what you said to me, 
 and I'm up to her ways." Cetangi had not known, 
 he had not been up to Naumatin's ways, he had seen 
 the dress ; to him it appeared that she had given in 
 to the old life, and it was not impossible that he 
 thought that she had returned to the student 
 dress once more through fear of his opinion. He 
 despised her. And she ? She had never seen any 
 one like Cetangi, so strong in character, so bright, so 
 handsome. 
 
 "Then, you don't let him talk to you," said 
 Maukeeneet. " He told Ahsaniak one day he didn't 
 know you very well. Why do you do so, Onoqua ? " 
 Then she added suddenly, "Don't you know why 
 Naumatin was so very anxious to have you turn 
 Indian again ? She wants you to marry Pejito." 
 
 "Pejito!" 
 
 "Ah ! He's never toldjou. He's afraid, the brave 
 man. And the idea has never come into your head 
 before ; you're so busy making dresses and things for 
 everybody. You don't want him ; he's not good 
 enough for you. But he wants you and he has told 
 Naumatin. I've caught enough to understand." 
 
 " I'd rather he'd talk to her than to me." 
 
82 ONOQUA 
 
 " If you look at him like that I don't wonder he's 
 afraid. But Pejito would be glad to know you never 
 talk to Cetangi. Shall I tell him ? " 
 
 Soon the girls were bending over a painting that 
 Maukeeneet had brought with her. It was roughly 
 done, yet with unmistakable ability. It was a winter 
 scene. The fir trees bent under their load of snow 
 and the lowering clouds promised more. The Indian 
 hunter coming out from the woods, the wintry land 
 scape, the very atmosphere of cold and desolation 
 impressed themselves upon the gazer. The work was 
 greater than its faults. 
 
 " If only you could have a chance, Maukeeneet ! " 
 
 "You've had a chance," returned Maukeeneet. 
 "And you're only an Indian just the same. And 
 you're not half so happy as I am. If the white people 
 cared about you as you think they do, they'd help 
 you do these things you're trying to do. They let 
 you alone, why don't you let them alone ? All the 
 white people get things with money; but we haven't 
 any money and we can't get anything. Pejito says 
 they won't let us have our own money, not even when 
 we're hungry. I don't know how it is. But it's 
 going to be all right soon ; you'll see. Only wait." 
 
 " Not war, Maukeeneet ? " For something in the 
 speaker's tone thrilled her listener with sudden fear. 
 
MAUKEENEET 83 
 
 " Not like the old wars," returned the other, " where 
 every time we're more and more beaten. This time 
 we shall not need to fight ; we shall only have to 
 stand still and see what comes to the white man ; how 
 he will be swallowed up in death and all the land be 
 our own once more. Then we shall reign, Onoqua, 
 for the Christ is coming. The white man has refused 
 and tortured him to death, but the Indian has never 
 refused him ; and this time the Indian will not need 
 to fight, as I told you. It will all be done for him." 
 
 She paused, breathless, her eyes sparkling. 
 
 " But is that what you want, to have the old 
 days come back ? It's because you don't know the 
 new ones." 
 
 "Perhaps," returned Maukeeneet. "But we'll 
 never know them. Who wants Indians, anyway ? 
 Nobody. Ahsaniak says you get on best when you 
 don't care. She doesn't care and she's right." 
 
 " Then, why do you want to wear this dress ? And 
 why do you paint ? " 
 
 " I want the dress because I like it ; and I paint 
 because I love it." Her eyes shone. "I love it," 
 she cried. " That didn't come from the whites, that's 
 Indian ; the Indians have painted before there were 
 any whites. They don't know all we can do, Ouoqua. 
 
84 
 
 ONOQUA 
 
 If they did, they'd take away the power from us, as 
 they've taken away everything we have. But the 
 day is coming " 
 
 "I hope it's a good day coming," said a voice at 
 the window. 
 
THE VISIT 85 
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 THE VISIT 
 
 IN a moment Cetangi had entered the house, taken 
 off his cap and was standing watching the two girls. 
 
 " I thought you'd gone to the agency/ 7 said Onoqua 
 with a sudden distance in her voice. 
 
 "No; Fve had enough of that," lie answered 
 briefly. "May I stay here awhile? Perhaps Mau- 
 keeneet will be willing ? " 
 
 Onoqua crimsoned. " I'm not so inhospitable ; Fm 
 willing, too," she answered. " I'd say ' sit down/ but 
 there's not a chair for you. We're not like your 
 people. We must seem to you very near savages 
 here." 
 
 " Our tribe has been at it longer ; that makes the 
 difference," said Cetangi, seating himself on 'the floor 
 opposite Onoqua. He thought her unreliable and 
 knew that she must be uncivilized at heart for he 
 had had evidence of this in her dress. But he could 
 not help watching her whenever he had the chance ; 
 he wished that it had been some other girl whom he 
 had found relapsing, for Onoqua was the prettiest, 
 
86 ONOQUA 
 
 sweetest, daintiest-looking girl he had ever seen in 
 his life. She had the most beautiful eyes and when 
 she smiled he found it hard to resist believing in her 
 with all his heart. But she so seldom smiled. He 
 wished she did it oftener. Sometimes he found himself 
 trying to make her and wondering why he could not 
 succeed better and not liking his failure. 
 
 " How busy you both are," he said after watching 
 the flying needles, for Maukeeneet sewed as deftly as 
 her sister. "It seems not like Indians to be in a 
 hurry, unless they're on horseback. But I like it." 
 
 Onoqua smiled and colored, and then was angry 
 with herself for liking his praise. 
 
 "This isn't all I can do," returned Maukeeneet 
 saucily. 
 
 At her nod he took up the painting. His exclama 
 tion and his comments satisfied Onoqua. He did not 
 really know so much about it as she herself did but 
 it would have been impossible to convince her of this. 
 In the midst of his praise of it and his assertions of 
 what Maukeeneet ought to do, Cetangi suddenly 
 raised his eyes, to find Onoqua's fixed upon his face 
 with an expression of intensity. 
 
 " What would you do ? " she asked. 
 
 " I'd send her to school," he answered. 
 
THE VISIT 87 
 
 "Yes," she said readily, and paused. Then in an 
 other moment the question that in all these weeks 
 had been forcing itself upon her found a voice. 
 " And then ? " she persisted. 
 
 " And then ? " he echoed. " Why, then, I would, 
 send her to school some more." 
 
 As he spoke he fixed his dark eyes full upon Ono- 
 qua's. In her anxiety, in her intensity, he saw the 
 same tumult that was agitating him. Whatever ten 
 dencies to savage ways there might be in her she was 
 now seeking for help in the noblest work, this girl of 
 his own race, of about his own age who was bearing 
 in her heart the sorrows of her people. All that was 
 ideal, all that was best in Cetangi responded to the 
 appeal. And also, how could he, a young man, fail to 
 perceive at the same time that these eyes, so full of 
 expression, were beautifully set and that when they 
 drooped the lashes that fringed her cheek were long ? 
 He saw the sadness of the mouth and its gentleness. 
 This question which troubled him, what was to be 
 done for their people, was troubling her also. What 
 was to become of them ? 
 
 As he sat watching her this bond of sympathy 
 grew none the less evident to him that he saw the 
 tapering of her fingers and the beauty of the rounded 
 wrist. 
 
88 ONOQTTA 
 
 " It's easier to say this than to do it," she an 
 swered. " How would you do it ? " 
 
 " I don't know in Maukeeneet's case," he said. " I 
 know what is best in a general way. But you 
 wouldn't agree with me ; you would not even under 
 stand me." 
 
 "You might try and see if we're so stupid," re 
 torted Maukeeneet. "I'm only an Indian who 
 doesn't know anything ; but I don't see why Onoqua 
 shouldn't understand. She has been to school." 
 
 " It's not that at all. I mean she will not like 
 what I say. She may be wiser but she's not the 
 same when it comes to what we should do. You'll 
 see what I mean." 
 
 The discussion was earnest. Each without chan 
 ging ground found force in the other's arguments. 
 But through it there grew up a better acquaintance. 
 
 When late the Indians came back from the agency 
 they found Cetangi still with the sisters who had 
 given him a dinner served in as much of the fashion 
 of school days as circumstances permitted. Mahaka 
 came in laughing; Matoska followed with a smile of 
 welcome. Pejito who had been with them on the 
 way home, looked in as he went by with a frown of 
 hate and malignity. 
 
THE MESSAGE OF WANIG1SKA 89 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE MESSAGE OF WANIGISKA 
 
 THE heavy clouds that swept across the sky hiding 
 the sun for the most part so that it only flashed out 
 in cold and fitful brilliancy, the earth, hard and 
 bitter cold as it does not grow in milder lands until 
 late November, and covered with the dead grass, the 
 brown, crisped leaves, the faded flower stalks, the 
 bare trees and bushes, the wind in the great pine 
 forests which from summer sighing had changed to a 
 sharper sound as if getting into tune for winter moan 
 ing, all these were a fit setting for one of those 
 struggles between good and evil, between worship 
 and superstition, only other names for life and death, 
 the struggle which no place is too dreary to witness, 
 and none so luxurious as to secure immunity from. 
 
 Here on the edge of the forest, in the grove that 
 Waha had spoken of there were in the Indians assem 
 bled that day two minds, the one aggressive, domi 
 neering, determined upon victory ; the other so little 
 represented, so overawed in numbers and in power 
 that it dared scarcely lift its head. For the inexora- 
 
90 ONOQUA 
 
 ble law of assimilation had already seized upon these 
 latter ; the world of civilization to which they looked 
 backward was so far away, no frequent messages of its 
 sayings and its doings bridged the gulf for them, no 
 consciousness of the mighty force behind them added 
 courage to their hearts and strength to their voices ; 
 they did not see faces turned toward them, nor hear 
 voices calling, " Well done." There were a very few 
 young people here who had been taught to work. 
 They had come home. Where was the work ? 
 
 It is not the Indians who invented the proverb, " In 
 Kome do as the Romans do." 
 
 Cetangi looked about him with a swelling heart. 
 The brilliancy of promise in the white man's land 
 and the utter absence here of the support which 
 there seemed so abundant, smote upon him. But 
 with smiling face and ready laugh he moved among 
 the people. 
 
 The dress seen that day was hybrid enough. There 
 were very few of the school uniforms and these were 
 generally in the last stages of usefulness. Some of 
 the girls wore, after a fashion, the dress of white 
 girls, and from the care they took of this it was evi 
 dent that they had come as near as they could to the 
 condition of their happier sisters. But many were 
 
THE MESSAGE OF WANIGISKA 91 
 
 thoroughly Indian, even those who had known some 
 thing of better ways ; and conspicuous among these 
 last, not only by her beauty, but by her emphasis of 
 all such ways, was Ahsaniak. It seemed as if she 
 did not once glance at the pretty dress Maukeeneet 
 wore. She talked and laughed with Kasde and 
 scarcely spoke to Howaxte who in his school uni 
 form stood silent watching her. 
 
 Winder and Hines came sweeping down having, 
 they said, an errand beyond there. They found so 
 large an assembly of Indians that had it not been for 
 evidences of feasting in preparation they would have 
 been uncomfortable. But what was there to be 
 alarmed at in a harvest festival ? The agent made a 
 little speech to them which was duly rendered by the 
 interpreter, and Waha responded to it inviting the 
 white men to share their festivity. But these plead 
 ing business soon left the Indians to themselves. 
 
 " I was relieved to see that scarecrow of a wild 
 Indian wasn't among them," remarked Hines as they 
 drove off. "I don't relish the idea of that fellow 
 about." 
 
 Pejito's eyes followed the wagon out of sight; then 
 they turned upon his companion. 
 
 " Our good friends, the white men, found not much 
 
92 ONOQUA 
 
 mischief in our doings to-day, Kasde. They're not 
 alarmed ; the red man only wants to eat." And his 
 laugh made Onoqua turn and look at him in sudden 
 fear. He went up to her at once and talked with her 
 for some time. 
 
 Kaumatin's presence was felt throughout the assem 
 bly, whether it was that she seemed to make herself 
 ubiquitous, or that something in her look and manner 
 seemed an embodiment of the spirit of mystery that 
 pervaded everything. The immunity of childhood 
 \vas complete; but the young men, and even the 
 girls, had under their staidness of demeanor a 
 secret expectation. The games, the feast, the gen 
 eral idleness and lounging, with the talking and 
 smoking were not to be all that day, and even the 
 speeches without which no Indian banquet is com 
 plete, any more than an Anglo-Saxon, wound 
 themselves up sooner than usual as if to make way 
 for something more important than these light 
 words. For Waha had not spoken yet, nor any of 
 the Council. 
 
 At last Pejito took his stand. 
 
 Pejito's was the leadership of the medicine man 
 rather than of the brave. It was believed of him 
 that he always had a purpose, but that time and not 
 
THE MESSAGE OF WANIGISKA 93 
 
 his words, were frequently necessary to bring this to 
 light. He spoke now of the festival as of a harvest 
 home. He compared the scanty returns of the 
 present with the plenty of the old days of the chase 
 when all the land belonged to their people ; he referred 
 to the dealings of the white man which, swift enough 
 as punishments, when they came to benefits, took place 
 mainly in the future ; this had led them to distrust 
 promises. But there were promises which could never 
 fail of being kept. These were made neither by white 
 men, nor to them. After suffering came reward; 
 and to the Indians who had suffered long reward 
 was coming. When ? He could not tell. How ? 
 This was for wiser lips than his to declare. Lips 
 could speak only where ears had heard. Not in 
 blindness, not in haste, but quietly when the day 
 for it should dawn and not through their im 
 patience, would their reward come. And in that 
 day no pain would be remembered ; joy would wipe 
 it out. 
 
 The listeners looked at one another in deepen 
 ing wonder. Only the initiated exchanged smiles. 
 Pejito had done well; he had prepared the way. 
 Those who followed him would not trifle, for the 
 keynote had been struck. Now for Waha and his 
 
94 ONOQUA 
 
 guest. His guest ? There was none. No strange 
 face except Cetangi's was in that attentive audi 
 ence. 
 
 Then Waha began. He, too, spoke of the summer 
 that had passed, of the harvest. "We are glad of 
 the hay and grain we have," he said, "and we are 
 glad of the beef that the Government gives us. But 
 when the winter conies in hard, then we are not 
 glad; we open our mouths wide and find not any 
 food to put in them, the food all eaten up, and it not 
 time for more yet; and so we have to say to our 
 mouths, 'You wait, you shut, it do you no good to 
 open.' And then in the winter the pain comes here," 
 with his hand on his stomach, " because we cry, cry 
 inside, and there is nothing to eat. And then we 
 think of the days when there was plenty, when all 
 the hills and all the fields were ours. If they were 
 ours now, we should not be hungry any longer. But 
 why did we sell them ? When somebody asks a 
 white man to sell his land, and he says, { No, I will 
 not sell ; ' that is all, nobody can buy. But when the 
 Indian says 'No,' what use? The white man says, 
 'If you sell, I pay you; if you don't sell, then I 
 take, and you have nothing/ And when he buys 
 and pays the money, he keeps it for us in his great 
 
THE MESSAGE OF WANIGISKA 95 
 
 box away off; and when we want food he says, 'By 
 and by/ and when we ask it again, he says, 'Lazy 
 Indian, you go to work, that's the way we do, that's 
 the way to make you citizen.' What good will it do 
 us to be citizen ? that's the question I ask and ask, 
 and nobody tells me. When the white man buys, he 
 gives us not the money he pays with;. when he tells 
 us to farm, he gives us land he will not use himself ; 
 when we are hungry, he says, 'Work.' Now, if we 
 work hard, the grain will not grow before we starve. 
 He means well, everybody says he means well ; but 
 I notice one strange thing, when he means well to 
 himself he starts out another way." A burst of 
 applause greeted this statement. "And the white 
 men always come out well in the end. It may be 
 that they do not mean bad things to us, but we don't 
 know their ways. They tell us we shall never be 
 any good till we do. But what I've come to tell you 
 to-day is that we shall soon do our own way and it's 
 a good way. I tell you the old plenty will come 
 back ; and when I promise you this, it's not a white 
 man's promise, it has not a rotten place in it so that 
 it breaks when you lean on it. This promise is made 
 not to be broken ; we may trust in it and show that we 
 trust in it, and this is all there is for us to do. We 
 
96 ONOQUA 
 
 are tired of being cold and hungry and poor. When 
 we are rich we do not beg ; and the great promise is 
 that we shall have our own. I bring to you one who 
 has heard the promise with his own ears, who has 
 seen with his own eyes the Great One who has prom 
 ised, and who comes from him to you almost the 
 first among tlje tribes because he trusts you, he 
 knows that you will wait and watch and not forget. 
 Wanigiska will tell you what he has heard and seen, 
 Wanigiska, the Messenger." 
 
 The moment before Waha had been alone. As in 
 saying this he turned, a figure stood beside him, 
 the figure that Ahsaniak had seen months before and 
 that in strange glidings had been visible to a number 
 of Indians, by actual sight and word to only the 
 chosen few. He must have been at hand to have 
 appeared thus opportunely. Yet to the Indians with 
 their keen sight he had not been visible until the 
 instant before he had stood tall and motionless be 
 side Waha as if he had risen up from the ground. 
 The mystery of his coming added to the effect of his 
 presence and prepared his listeners to receive without 
 question whatever he might say. 
 
 A breathless silence followed Waha's announcement 
 and this sudden response. Wanigiska's keen eyes 
 
THE MESSAGE OF WANIGISKA 97 
 
 ran over the expectant and eager faces of the as 
 sembly. 
 
 " Waha has told you who I am," he began. "I come 
 to bring you tidings. They are tidings of life ; they 
 are no white man's promise. They are the word of 
 One who performs, the word of the Christ. We believe 
 what the white man says of him. The Great Spirit 
 gave the white man words. He saved the deeds for us. 
 About this strange message we must not talk ; but 
 listen and watch, and do nothing until the time 
 comes. All the tribes must know ; all must be ready. 
 And when the day comes, the joy will come. For 
 the Indians have never rejected the Christ and cruci 
 fied him ; it is only the white men who crucify their 
 friends. The Christ has seen their cruel ways, and 
 he has seen our cold and hunger. He takes care of 
 people who suffer, for when he was on earth he knew 
 how suffering felt ; the white man made him. And 
 so, he comes to us. You ask me how I know all 
 this ? " 
 
 His voice sank into awe and delight ; and in mys 
 tical phrase he told of his wondrous journey through 
 the desert in which springs opened for his drinking 
 and of his wonderful meeting with the Christ himself 
 and the message given to him which he was faith- 
 
98 OXOQUA 
 
 fully to deliver. He quoted that all things were 
 possible to the people who believed and asserted that 
 the old days of the buffalo and the free life would 
 come back again. ' ; What will become of the white 
 men ? " he asked after a long description of the re 
 turning glories of the old days. "You have felt the 
 hurricane. But you have never felt any wind like 
 that which will one day come in the land of the white 
 men. None who feel it will ever be there for it to 
 come back ; they will be all swept away and dead. 
 We cannot bring this wind ; we must wait and do 
 what he tells us. To-day and to-morrow and the 
 next day we wait. We can do nothing, one tribe 
 alone, nor all the tribes, until the Christ is ready. 
 Then he will do for us. Indians, I tell you to wait, 
 to watch, to worship, and to you the old days of your 
 loved Indian life shall come back again. Join hand 
 to hand until you are strong. Send from tribe to 
 tribe and find out what all are doing, and make all 
 ready. I bring you the message of the Christ. I 
 have delivered it. I have finished." 
 
 The strangeness of the interest awakened and its 
 intensity as well as its nature restrained for a time 
 full expression in the hearers of this message. Since 
 it was to be secret, it must be in some other way than 
 
THE MESSAGE OF WANIGISKA 99 
 
 by speech that their delight must utter itself. Wani- 
 giska had spoken of obedience, of worship. What 
 was this ? Waha talked aside with the medicine 
 man, Cahnahban ; there was no doubt that if the 
 Christ was to bring them back the old life he ap 
 proved of the old ways. After the festival they were 
 to have a medicine dance already arranged for. 
 
 What would follow ? 
 
 Pejito standing somewhat apart leaning against a 
 tree, now for an instant took his eyes from the face 
 that he had been watching from between his half- 
 shut lids for the last half hour, Oetangi's. 
 
 But he took them from this face only to turn an 
 instant to Waha. 
 
 " My father," he said, " the guest that is among us 
 has not spoken. He is learned, he is wise in the wis 
 dom of the white men for he has been long among 
 them and he has heard from them much of the Christ 
 as he is to them in their faith. We do not show him 
 honor unless we listen to what he has to say to us. 
 Let us hear Centangi." 
 
 Onoqua looked up at the speaker in sudden wonder, 
 for she had learned from Mahaka of Pejito's opposi 
 tion to Cetangi's presence here. 
 
 But Pejito's gaze was as open as the day and his 
 
100 ONOQUA 
 
 smile had only the blandness of courtesy. Mahaka 
 glanced at him with a smile ; then he frowned. For 
 in dealing with Pejito, one's senses were the last 
 things that one might trust. Eyes and ears seemed 
 made only for the Indian to baffle. 
 
CETANGI SPEAKS 101 
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 CETANGI SPEAKS 
 
 CETANGI'S troubled face lighted. He took a step 
 forward, so that he could see the semicircle of up 
 turned faces. 
 
 His heart was on fire to say out what he thought 
 and felt to these people of his own race. 
 
 " I am one with you," he began. " Although I was 
 away a long time, yet I did not forget ; and since I 
 have come home and seen the needs of the Indian, 
 I have been more than I was before an Indian. All 
 that I speak to you I say as an Indian to whom his 
 people are dear. At school so many tribes are to 
 gether that we do not think of tribes, we think only 
 of the whole, only of the Indian race, and we find we 
 can see best in this way. Christ hears the poor and 
 the oppressed. He remembers us ; he will come and 
 save us. He has begun." A murmur of applause 
 followed. The veins on Pejito's forehead stood out. 
 But Cetangi was seeing only that the faces which in 
 the rebound from Wanigiska's speech had at first 
 looked at him with languid interest were now more 
 
102 ONOQUA 
 
 eager. These people must listen, to him. "What is 
 it that the Indians need ? " he said. "All things that 
 Christ brings to the people who believe in Him." 
 Again applause. " How shall we get these ? It does 
 not belong to Indians to sit down in weakness and let 
 things go away from them." A third time the re 
 sponse of applause assured Cetangi that he had his 
 audience. " You speak of the old days coming back," 
 he went on. "But the old days are like the last 
 year's harvests." 
 
 And then he reviewed the old days of savagery, of 
 warfare, of alternate feasting and fasting, and sketched 
 out the new surroundings, the new opportunities of 
 his race, the surroundings and opportunities of the 
 white man. 
 
 " In the old times how did our young men learn to 
 be warriors ? " he said. " Didn't it cost them long 
 trials and watchings and fastings and much pain ? 
 And did not the old warriors test their courage by the 
 pain they could bear, by all the hard things they could 
 do, by their holding on and never tiring ? In those 
 days they were taught to use the bow and arrow, 
 and they had wonderful skill in this." He paused, 
 and while they waited for his words, he bending for 
 ward asked slowly, " Why don't we use the bow and 
 
CETANGI SPEAKS 108 
 
 arrow to day ? Why do we use Winchesters instead ? 
 Because the white man's weapon will shoot better 
 than the Indian's. And does the white man shoot 
 better with his own weapon than the Indian does?" 
 He shook his head with slow emphasis, and added, 
 " All the old skill and patience count ; the Indian 
 fights well with the white man's gun. And it will be 
 so with other things that the white man uses. Let 
 us try them. Supposing we had the buffalo back, 
 should we give up our Winchesters altogether ? Then 
 it would not be wholly the old days ; or if we did 
 not have these, we should remember them ; we could 
 not go wholly back. We have power to be as great 
 and wise as the white men, but we look at things 
 upside down. We think the past is of most conse 
 quence. No, it is the future ; this is the white man's 
 strength, he loves to-morrow and he works all day 
 to get it. He used to go afoot or on horseback, like 
 us ; now he travels by steam and he has cars that go 
 by lightning ; it may be some day he will get hold 
 of the northwest wind. We Indians must catch on ; 
 he's in a hurry, he won't wait for us. Do you ask me 
 how we shall do this ? Did our forefathers hunt the 
 buffalo without labor ? Did they wait for him to turn 
 out of his way to come to them and be shot ? Is not 
 
104 OtfOQUA 
 
 knowledge worth as much trouble as the buffalo 
 when it will give us better food and clothing ? We 
 Indians like hunting, let us hunt knowledge ; it will 
 not give out like the buffalo, there'll always be some 
 left for to-morrow. Wanigiska says our enemies will 
 be destroyed. I have been among white people, I be 
 lieve him. He says the white men are our enemies. 
 Yes, some of them are. He tells us that it is Christ 
 that will destroy them for us. I believe with him in 
 this. How does Christ destroy enemies when the 
 Father leaves it in his hands ? He turns them into 
 friends. Let us take all our skill and all our wisdom 
 and go out to meet pur friends. Then the Christ will 
 have given us back our own land again ; because we 
 shall be free to go anywhere and to do all that we can, 
 side by side with them. For I tell you that Wanigiska 
 deceives you when he says that the white men will 
 be swept off the land ; it will never be so. It is not 
 for us to sit down and wait for our enemies to be 
 destroyed. It is for us to be like our heroes of old 
 who went out to meet the enemy and destroyed him. 
 Our enemy is our ignorance ; this is what we are to 
 fight. We are to go forward to a better freedom than 
 in the old days, the white man's free laws, different 
 from agency laws. We are to send our wise men to 
 
CETANGI SPEAKS 105 
 
 the white men and tell them we will be free like other 
 men that live under the flag. We will have the same 
 laws for all ; if we steal, punish the thief ; if we kill, 
 put the murderer to death, let the one who has done 
 the wrong suffer for it, not all of us. We must not 
 go back, we cannot if we want to j we must get on 
 into the new freedom where all the wise and great 
 skill our forefathers have bequeathed us shall be seen 
 and honored. This is the message of the Christ to 
 us." 
 
 Cetangi's words left his audience breathless. 
 
 Suddenly, the returned students applauded the 
 opinions that they would not have dared to utter. 
 Some sprang to their feet. 
 
 Then Pejito, his eyes blazing, made a swift signal. 
 
 Waha stood forward. 
 
 " This young man is none of us," he said. " The 
 white man owns him. He teaches us no ways that 
 are better than ours ; he knows nothing ; he repeats 
 only what he has heard others say. We have no part 
 in him ; no counsel of his shall guide us. Whoever 
 is on his side is the enemy of his tribe and of his 
 people." 
 
 The few who had felt with Cetangi fell back awed. 
 Howaxte alone went straight on until he stood by 
 
106 ONOQUA 
 
 Cetangi's side ; and then Mahaka, though without 
 haste, joined his guest. 
 
 Pejito's smile grew more pronounced. 
 
 Wanigiska stepped forward and confronted Cetangi. 
 The young man met his piercing look with a gaze not 
 less keen, although no glance or movement betrayed 
 disrespect. 
 
 And so the old and the new stood face to face. 
 
 At length Wanigiska slowly raised his arm until it 
 was outstretched against Cetangi. Every eye was 
 fixed upon him. Every ear was strained. 
 
 " The Christ will deal with you as I have told He 
 will with the white man," he said, with slow distinct 
 ness. " It is very near." 
 
 " If my 'heart is not full of love for my people and 
 of hope to serve them, yes," returned Cetangi, 
 while his unwavering eye held his antagonist. 
 
 Pejito skirted the circle and drew Kasde aside. 
 
OVEEHEAED 107 
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 OVERHEARD 
 
 TAHNAS, starting for home with her children was 
 joined by Maukeeneet. After a few general remarks 
 upon the good time they had had and the largeness 
 of the attendance, the latter began, " Cetangi knows 
 how to speak ; he makes me feel. He's got good 
 sense ; don't you think so, Tahnas ? " 
 
 " That's what all you young ones think about each 
 other," responded Tahnas, showing her white teeth. 
 
 " And all you old people of yourselves," retorted 
 Maukeeneet laughing. After a pause she added 
 gravely, " I'd like to go off and see the world ; Nan- 
 matin wouldn't let me go when I was little, like 
 Onoqua. She wouldn't let Onoqua, they say, but I'm 
 not like her. Onoqua's too good for us." 
 
 "She cooks such nice things," returned Tahnas. 
 " I let her do all the work she wants to ; I don't like 
 to work, Maukeeneet ; but Onoqua, she sweeps all 
 the time, and she washes all the things so much, 
 she wears a hole in her skin here," and Tahnas 
 displayed her knuckles which, certainly, showed 
 
108 ONOQUA 
 
 no results of hard labor. "Pejito hates Cetangi; 
 Cetangi's too strong for him," she went on. " Pejito 
 wants people to follow him only. I saw Pejito's 
 look." 
 
 "Looks don't kill," returned the other. Tahnas 
 made no answer. At length when they had gone on 
 a few minutes in silence, Maukeeneet asked abruptly, 
 "Do you believe Wanigiska, Tahnas ? " 
 
 "Believe Wanigiska?" answered the other with 
 slow wonder. " Of course I do. Don't you believe 
 him when the Christ has spoken to him; I believe 
 the Christ is coming to give us back our own again ; 
 and I don't see why Oiioqua needs to wash so many 
 dishes. I suppose she's run home now to get ready 
 for Matoska, he likes to see her round." 
 
 But when they reached the house Onoqua was 
 not there. "What has become of her?" queried 
 Tahnas ; while a fear that she could not explain filled 
 Maukeeneet. Matoska's waiting with the men," 
 Tahnas went on, "perhaps she'll come home with 
 him." 
 
 Matoska was waiting with the men and in a per 
 plexity from which he could not recover without time 
 to retire within the citadel of his own thoughts and 
 study out the matter, he watched and listened to the 
 
OVEKHEARD 109 
 
 reception given to Cetangi's assertions. The young 
 man had been so clear and so honest that for his 
 part Matoska could not see why people should not 
 believe him or not, as they saw fit, and let the matter 
 rest here ; Matoska had in his Indian head so much 
 of American liberality as this, he believed in free 
 speech. What had been openly said might be con 
 troverted, might be opposed, but the anger that had 
 met his son's guest he did not like. Waha had 
 sternly denounced his ideas and his statements, but 
 this had been nothing to the solemn warning of 
 Wanigiska. It was Pejito alone who had said to 
 him that Cetangi had not spoken without being 
 asked, and that for his part, he was glad to know 
 what the young man thought. But what had Pejito 
 really meant ? As Matoska looked about him he was 
 not pleased. 
 
 " What is it he wants us to do ? " questioned one 
 of Naumatin's neighbors, nodding toward Cetangi, 
 who now stood speaking with Mahaka. 
 
 " He's no good," returned the squaw, " he's the 
 white man's friend, he's no Indian ; we don't want 
 him." And her eyes met Pejito's with a smile 
 which made him draw nearer to her. 
 
 "Is it all settled?" he asked, in an undertone. 
 
110 ONOQUA 
 
 She nodded, and her fierce eyes shone. "You've not 
 told Mahaka ? " he pursued. 
 
 " Mahaka's iny son ; I understand him/ 7 she an 
 swered ; " he's an honest boy ; I never tell him, he's 
 not like my friends." And her malign smile made 
 Pejito frown and mutter something which she could 
 not catch. " I help you," she added ; " it's time to 
 start." 
 
 He shook his head. " It's not your business when 
 we start," he said ; " that's not for squaws to 
 decide." 
 
 It was at this moment that Matoska looked about 
 for Onoqua. She must have gone home with Tahnas 
 who was also missing. He was sure she had liked 
 what Cetangi had said ; he would talk with her when 
 he got home and then he would think the matter all 
 over. 
 
 The wind through the pine trees, now roaring as if 
 from the trumpet of a winter blast, now sinking into 
 soft sighing as the loud note died away, was the 
 only sound that reached Onoqua as she lay, her face 
 hidden in her arms which rested on a heap of pine 
 needles that covered the projecting root of a great 
 tree. Here, half way up the hill, far enough from 
 the trail that wound up over the top of it to be out 
 
OVERHEARD 111 
 
 of sight of any passer, the girl lay nestling against 
 the ground as on the breast of her mother, as it was> 
 indeed, the only mother to whom she could breathe 
 the thoughts that rilled her. Or, it was emotion 
 rather than thought with which her heart was beat 
 ing with great bounds that hurt her, and yet that 
 made life so full to her of power and of splendor that 
 the pain was a thousand times dearer than any joy 
 she had known ? Her quick insight, her fervid ima 
 gination had seized upon the strength and gracious 
 hope of Cetangi's message as wings to bear her into 
 a world of fulfilment of all things she had dreamed 
 of. But to herself at that moment the flight had 
 been made, the fulfilment had come to her, as she 
 lay with her face buried in her arms, her quick 
 breath coming and going as if it were wafting her 
 through Heaven itself. There was no consciousness 
 of want, no grasp upon any need of a future, the 
 image of the present in its power, its greatness, its 
 beauty, filled all needs and overflowed them, and this 
 image was Cetangi ! A certain shining warmth 
 and splendor had risen upon her like the sun upon a 
 new day. This life, pulsating heat, radiating glory, 
 she did not know as her own ; there was no sense of 
 possession, there was no right to any ; it was all a 
 
112 ONOQUA 
 
 revelation, not of herself, but of him. She had 
 admired him, had appreciated him, had enjoyed her 
 interviews with him, brief as, with one exception, 
 these had been. But to-day all at once her whole 
 soul had flamed with that delight which no life can 
 know twice, any more than one day can know two 
 sunrises. To look at him, to listen to him, to com 
 prehend him was all that she had done, was all that 
 she had thought of ; that her life should fill his had 
 no part in her emotion, for this had no outlook ; it 
 flashed and throbbed until he stood luminous in its 
 transfiguration. The past was naught, the future was 
 unheeded. Herself unheeded? No sting of this 
 touched her in that mood of exultation. In all her 
 after life she remembered this hour as something so 
 strange, and there were times when she prayed 
 in tears that God would forgive her because in 
 that one great moment she could feel no need of 
 Him. 
 
 She forgot all that might be taking place down at 
 the foot of this hill up which she had glided unno 
 ticed when at the last words Cetangi had spoken 
 she had obeyed the subtle instinct which bade her 
 hide her face and listen to her heart. She had 
 heard nothing of what followed the momentary still- 
 
OVERHEARD 113 
 
 ness after Cetangi's speech j Waha's stern denuncia 
 tion and Wanigiska's warning had been lost; and, 
 more than all, she had not caught the stealthy gaze 
 of Pejito's eyes upon her brother's guest. She had 
 no knowledge of how long she had been there, when 
 voices roused her. 
 
 She raised her head and listened; then, as the 
 voices came nearer, she carefully hid herself. For 
 she had caught Cetangi's name. These were not his 
 friends. And now she could see the figures of the 
 Indians as they wound up the narrow trail in search 
 of their horses some of which had wandered to 
 the top. Kasde came first, behind him was Pejito. 
 Several Indians followed whom.Onoqua knew only 
 by sight, they lived at a distance from her home, 
 and they were not young men with whom she wished 
 to have even the slightest acquaintance ; it was they 
 who made it so hard for the returned students. 
 They were more Indian than the old Indians, inas 
 much as they had not even the prudence of years. 
 They were talking now with the freedom of security 
 from all hearers. 
 
 " Wanigiska predicted it," Pejito was saying. "He 
 warned him against interfering with his sacred mes 
 sage ; he said death to him would follow. But if he 
 
114 ONOQUA 
 
 should die after lie has spoken, what could that 
 fulfil? His words would not die. His words are 
 against the triumph we must win. He must not 
 say them elsewhere." 
 
 "He knows how to make people listen/' said Kasde. 
 
 Pejito's brow grew darker. And after a few sug 
 gestions had been offered and rejected, his subtle 
 voice rose again. 
 
 " It's not only to Indians, but to white men that 
 he may speak," he said. " And what he says at this 
 agency may be sent on all around. It has been so 
 sometimes. I don't trust him. He must not be let 
 to do us harm when all things are prepared for 
 victory." 
 
 " He shall not," retorted several listeners vehe 
 mently. 
 
 "How will you help it ? " 
 
 " We know how," they cried again with a sugges 
 tive movement that made the hidden watcher shudder. 
 
 But Pejito shook his head. 
 
 " He has gone on with the others," he said. " We 
 shall all meet on the plain. He is the guest of 
 Mahaka; and Mahaka is one of us. He does not 
 know all we do, but we can lead him anywhere, 
 unless we touch Cetangi." As he spoke he had 
 
OVERHEARD 115 
 
 turned to face those below him and there was a 
 momentary pause in ascending the hill, so that 
 Onoqua caught the next words with great distinct 
 ness. "We cannot touch the guest of one of our 
 tribe," he added ; " but when we're on the trail on 
 the edge of the cliff that looks down into the great 
 river which we pass to-morrow, the surest footed 
 horse will jump aside sometimes in sudden fright ; 
 and if he does, he falls down into the river. If that 
 should happen to Cetangi, he would not talk any 
 more. If it should happen, how could we help it ? 
 We were travelling with him. We had asked him 
 for the pleasure of his company, and to keep him 
 from being lonely. We grieve for him like the 
 rest." 
 
 Pejito had turned and was going on again, and it 
 was with difficulty that Onoqua made out the last 
 sentence. He added something which she did not 
 catch. 
 
 "It's the curse of Wanigiska that made him so 
 ready," answered one of the Indians. " It comes to 
 pass so soon." 
 
 They had gone. 
 
 Onoqua sprang up. It was to be soon, then, this 
 
116 ONOQUA 
 
 crime, this curse of Wanigiska, which meant Ce- 
 tangi's death ? To-morrow, Pejito had said. 
 
 She sped down the rugged, slippery trail at a pace 
 that recalled the days when she had been the fleetest 
 child of the tribe. 
 
A GRAY NIGHT 117 
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 A GRAY NIGHT 
 
 A GRAY night with a ghostly glimmer of moon 
 light; the hills left behind, the plain stretching on 
 interminably ; behind, miles between the rider and 
 human habitation ; all around dreariness ; for com 
 panionship in this the single thought that before, far 
 before, was a terrible danger to be turned aside and 
 that the hand which now held the rein with so firm a 
 grasp must guide the rider into the midst of it, that 
 the voice which now spoke words of coaxing and 
 encouragement to the faithful steed going on with 
 all possible speed through the night and over the 
 broken trail, must give the warning that alone could 
 save. 
 
 For Cetangi had gone off with the young men not 
 an hour after his speech. Mahaka at Matoska's re 
 quest was to wait until the next day. 
 
 Cetangi was alone with his enemies. This she had 
 learned on the way home. 
 
 That it must be she and no one else who could give 
 this warning to Cetangi she had seen with a forget- 
 
118 ONOQTTA 
 
 fulness of all difficulties in the dreadful urgency. 
 She had found Mahaka not returned, Matoska still 
 away ; and after an instant of terror had come to see 
 that neither father nor brother was the man to face 
 Pejito and defeat his purpose. In all probability 
 they would not believe that she had understood, and 
 if they should, Mahaka's fiery temper might chal 
 lenge Pejito with treachery. But Pejito with his 
 deep smiles could make him more assured than ever. 
 Matoska could tame a horse to perfection, but he 
 could not manage Pejito. No ; Onoqua herself must 
 go. What she should do when she reached the party 
 camping for the night, how she should deliver her 
 warning, she did not yet see. But he who was send 
 ing her did. There was only one thing that she must 
 not do, fail. If success must cost her life, she 
 would give this. 
 
 In that long, desolate ride it was not hidden from 
 her that to save Cetangi's life would be a joy 
 worth dying for. 
 
 She had glanced into the house and seen Tahnas 
 and Maukeeneet there busy over the fire ; they had 
 not caught a glimpse of her ; and finding no one else 
 at home she had seen her way. She had snatched up 
 the bridle of her own horse, Peyan, and running 
 
A GRAY NIGHT 119 
 
 swiftly up to the pasture had captured her pet who 
 came at her voice to be caressed. She had sprung 
 upon him barebacked as she had constantly ridden 
 in her home life. If, under Heaven, she and Peyan 
 could not save Cetangi, there was no salvation for 
 him. 
 
 But as the miles stretched on and on, she realized 
 more and more that other horses than Peyan had 
 speed and endurance, and that these had "had the start. 
 The clouds grew thinner, but the added light showed 
 no human being in sight. From the woods came the 
 distant sounds of night, a commingled murmur which 
 the night wind now and then bore to her, but so 
 faintly that she could not distinguish in it the cry of 
 beast or bird. She thought only how far Cetangi 
 must have travelled. She forgot that in these woods 
 the wolves were howling and that from any point they 
 might break across the plain. 
 
 " On, on, Peyan, good horse," she urged by voice 
 and touch, " poor fellow, farther, farther ; it's not time 
 to lag,yet." 
 
 And still her eyes swept the horizon in vain for the 
 camp fires. But beyond that hillock in the distance 
 the land fell away, the beginning of the descent to the 
 river. She might find them on the lower ground. 
 
120 ONOQTTA 
 
 The Indians with whom Cetangi had come on had 
 met the advanced party of the Sioux, and all had 
 camped for the night. 
 
 But that scene was anything but a promise of the 
 rest of that time. First, supper ; then, the beginning 
 of their dance. The lires were made and the food 
 cooking in an incredibly short time, the boys helping 
 the squaws to keep the flames roaring under the great 
 kettles. A few girls had come with Pejito's young 
 men, among them Ahsaniak. She flitted about among 
 the other women laughing and talking and in her 
 bright way helping on the preparations. 
 
 When the supper had been eaten, Cetangi throwing 
 himself down with his back to one of the encircling 
 fires watched with a sombre eye the arrangements 
 being made to begin the dance. 
 
 The firelight lent an added grotesqueness to the 
 figures over which it threw its flickerings and its 
 shadows. The greater part of the Indians had some 
 thing of the dress of civilization about them; but 
 face and movements at that time served only to make 
 this the more out of place. Were these the men who 
 when occasion demanded could move with the slow 
 precision, the military dignity of veteran soldiers ? 
 Two or three of them were schoolmates of Cetangi's. 
 
A GRAY NIGHT 121 
 
 He compared them that evening and as he had seen 
 them marching in file to their meals or their school 
 room. If it had been only to return to this, why 
 need they have known the other life at all ? And 
 yet, Cetangi pitied them, for he saw that they, like 
 many others, were only falling in with the crowd, a 
 sad way with human nature. And then they did not 
 dance all the time, they sometimes worked. They 
 greeted him warmly, but finding him spoiled by the 
 white man, left him to himself lying on his elbow 
 beside the fire, a heartsick spectator of their prepara 
 tions for the medicine dance. His own tribe had long 
 since given up all this sort of thing. When a boy 
 he had visited for a few days this very tribe with an, 
 uncle who spoke the tongue and had taught it to him. 
 Since then he had not seen a medicine dance until 
 that night. 
 
 Then, why was he there at all ? 
 
 In itself, he cared nothing for Wanigiska's de 
 nouncement. But it mattered very much to him that 
 he had offended Mahaka's people ; it seemed a poor 
 return for hospitality. With such opportunity he 
 would not have refrained from speaking out his con 
 victions upon a subject so important to all Indians. 
 But he, and not Mahaka, must take the consequences. 
 
122 ONOQUA 
 
 He was wondering how he could withdraw himself 
 without giving offence when Kasde came to him. 
 
 Kasde said that he had heard him say a few days 
 before that he was going home soon. He had come 
 to tell him that a number were going his way that 
 night and farther the next day, and if he wanted 
 company a part of his journey, he might go along 
 with them and they should have time then to dis 
 cuss his new plans for the Indians. Cetangi disliked 
 Kasde and Pejito and the young men about them. 
 But he could not refuse this challenge. Should Kasde 
 be able to boast that Cetangi was afraid ? 
 
 On accepting he had found that they were to start 
 immediately. But he had not forgotten to look about 
 for Onoqua. He thought of her as he lay now by 
 the campfire, and compared her with the girls about 
 him. Why she had once put on the Indian dress he 
 did not know ; but everything else that he had seen 
 in her made it seem impossible that she should ever 
 be in any scene like this. 
 
 Suddenly, he half sprang up, then bent forward, 
 motionless and eager. 
 
 For there, passing almost close beside him without 
 turning her head, moving straight on to the outer side 
 of the circle around another fire where Ahsaniak sat 
 
A GRAY NIGHT 123 
 
 was Onoqua. She glided into the scene like a vision, 
 and she was as utterly alien to it. She came to the 
 Indians like their possibilities. It was as if the be 
 ginning of the present century and of the next stood 
 face to face. 
 
 The laugh died on Ahsaniak's lips. Her eyes di 
 lated - as she looked up at the figure standing gazing 
 down at her, the hand reached out to her from under 
 the dark blue cloak with its bright lining that wrapped 
 its wearer from head to feet, the scarlet knitted cap 
 like those that the girls at the school were so fond of 
 wearing setting off the blackness of the hair blown 
 about the face now in the wind, and that face appeal 
 ing to her, commanding her with a power that Ahsan- 
 iak had never seen there before. 
 
 For Onoqua with heart unafraid had said that God 
 would show her what to do, and there as she came 
 to the camp, directly before her, too bright, too good 
 for the life she had entered upon, was Ahsaniak. 
 Straight as an Indian arrow to its mark went Onoqua 
 to the work appointed her. " Come, Ahsaniak," she 
 said with the divine authority of right in her tones, 
 "come with me. Come away." And she reached 
 out further her small, firm hand and took hold of 
 Ahsaniak's. By this clasp she raised the girl, and 
 
124 ONOQUA 
 
 putting her arm close about her, led her forward a 
 few steps. 
 
 No one interfered, no one spoke ; all her own band 
 looked at Onoqua with a certain pride in her that 
 went strangely with the purpose for which they were 
 here. There was one among the Sioux, a young man, 
 who had known her at school ; as she looked at him, 
 he half raised his hand involuntarily for the salute of 
 a gentleman which he had learned at the school, but 
 it fell again as he remembered the feathers in his 
 hair. 
 
THE WARNING 125 
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 THE WARNING 
 
 " WHERE is your horse, Ahsaniak ? " said Onoqua. 
 " I must leave Peyan to rest. Perhaps Cetangi will 
 get him for us. He's not busy." 
 
 Then, she had seen him. Cetangi sprang up. 
 
 " Cetangi knows nothing about Ahsaniak's horse/' 
 said a sullen voice behind her. And wrathful eyes 
 looked into hers. 
 
 " Oh, thank you, Pejito ; you will do it for us ? 
 You're very kind; I shall be so much obliged to 
 you." And with her eyes meeting his in appre 
 ciation of the offer that she had caught behind his 
 statement, Onoqua gave him a flashing smile of grati 
 tude with her back to Cetangi as if he no longer 
 existed for her. Pejito looked down a moment at 
 the sweet, bright face in a certain bewilderment. It 
 was then that Onoqua began to move on glancing back 
 at him. 
 
 "This way," said Pejito turning in the opposite 
 direction. She followed him, and Ahsaniak and Ce 
 tangi followed her. She talked with Pejito as they 
 
126 ONOQUA 
 
 went on. He answered briefly, and in the first pause 
 he turned to her with, "What did you come here 
 for?" 
 
 " I came here," returned Onoqua in untroubled 
 tones, " to do my duty." Instantly, she turned her 
 head. " Ahsaniak, are you there ? " she asked. She 
 looked again at Pejito without any attempt to speak 
 to Cetangi. If this were true, he reasoned, it was 
 not the first time that Onoqua had tried to turn his 
 sister from the old life. 
 
 He could forgive her since it was at Ahsaniak's 
 brother that she had just smiled gratefully. 
 
 He drew nearer to her. 
 
 The hand hidden under the cloak clinched itself, 
 but the steady feet never swerved a hair's breadth 
 away from his side. Men for power, for greed, for 
 policy, dissemble well ; but not the subtlest of them 
 can approach a woman's skill when she battles for 
 the life of the man she loves. " You know how fond 
 I am of Peyan, Pejito," she began. " I cannot ride 
 him back to-night. Will you let me leave him in 
 your care ? Will you see that no harm comes to 
 him ? And will you bring him back to me ? I shall 
 be so grateful to you." This new confidence in him 
 made Pejito's heart bound. 
 
THE WARNING 127 
 
 "I'll give you my horse," he answered her; a he 
 goes like the west wind when it is angry, and you 
 keep him till I bring back Peyan to you. I'll look 
 after him I will ride him myself. When I come 
 home, I'll give him back to you safe." 
 
 Only Onoqua herself knew that she had hesitated. 
 
 " You're very kind," she said ; " I will take your 
 horse, Peyan must rest." Then she saw that it was 
 the fresh horse of the pursuer that had been offered 
 to her. Still she had not glanced toward Cetangi. 
 Pejito stopped them. "The horse is close by," he 
 said. "Wait." 
 
 " In the road along the cliff by the river they are 
 to make your horse jump and go over the cliff with 
 you. Then you'll talk no more. It's his doings, 
 Pejito's. Save yourself, and God help you." Ce 
 tangi was startled by this voice low and clear in his 
 ear. He turned to answer. But no one was there. 
 Pejito at the moment looking back saw Onoqua 
 standing beside his sister. 
 
 "I'll strike the railroad. When they're in the 
 midst of this I can get away. Onoqua, I " 
 
 "Here he is," called Pejito returning. 
 
 And with the bridle of his own horse over his arm, 
 he went forward to Ahsaniak's. It was plain that he, 
 and not Cetangi, was to help Onoqua mount. 
 
128 ONOQUA 
 
 "Wait!" cried Cetangi. "If you're going back 
 in the night, you two girls must not go alone. I'll 
 get my horse ; I'll go with you." 
 
 "Oh," cried Onoqua in a terror that for the mo 
 ment she could not control, "no, no, Cetangi, you 
 mustn't think of it. I don't want it." 
 
 " What do you say, Pejito ? Shall we do it ? " 
 
 Pejito had too prominent a part in the night's per 
 formances to be able to absent himself, and he was 
 too ready to have Onoqua away from the sight of them 
 to throw the least impediment in the way of her 
 carrying off Ahsaniak. But Cetangi go with them ? 
 He looked at him with new suspicion. For it was 
 not of the other's talk to his people that Pejito had 
 the greatest fear. But here was a girl who had just 
 shown herself brave enough to make any chief proud 
 to own her. 
 
 "Ko, no, I will not have it," cried Onoqua. "I 
 will not have either of you. We shall go alone." 
 
 Pejito smiled grimly. "You're educated, Cetangi, 
 you're like a white man. The white men do what 
 the women say to them to do ; they think it not good 
 manners to disobey. You cannot go. Onoqua doesn't 
 like you. I cannot go, I have business here. Get 
 up, Onoqua." He held out his hand for her to place 
 
THE WARNING 129 
 
 her foot in it, as if he, too, knew something of the 
 ways of white men. " You help Ahsaniak, Cetangi," 
 he added. And Cetangi gave her a laughing good-by 
 as he helped her spring upon her horse. 
 
 Then he came up to where Onoqua was seated. 
 
 " If you won't let me go with you," he said audibly, 
 "at least you'll let me say good-by to you when I 
 came away without doing it and thank you for all 
 your kindness." Then coining closer, he added in 
 rapid English, " Did you come all this way to warn 
 me ? Tell me, Onoqua." 
 
 " I should be wicked if I would not do more to save 
 a human life and my brother's guest," she answered 
 him in the same tongue. She took the reins from 
 Pejito, and before Cetangi could say another word, 
 before he could touch the hand she did not hold out to 
 him, she was off. 
 
 Ahsaniak followed. 
 
 As they swept past the Indian camp the whole wild 
 scene stamped itself upon Onoqua's vision with a 
 vividness that left its impress for years. The un 
 couth, half savage attitudes of the men, the women 
 and girls, now spectators and now actors in the scene 
 and full of boldness in voice and movement forgetting 
 all that makes the charm of womanhood, came back 
 to her again and again. 
 
130 ONOQUA 
 
 Ahsaniak, too, must have been watching them, for 
 when the camp had been left in the distance she drew 
 near to her companion. 
 
 "0, Onoqua, I wish you'd come for me oftener," 
 she said. " I wish " She struck the reins upon her 
 horse's neck and the creature darted away. After 
 she had waited for Onoqua to come up, she was silent 
 a long time. 
 
 The two young men watched them out of sight. 
 " Our Indian girls are smarter than the white girls, 
 hey, Cetangi?" asked Pejito. "What do you think 
 of Onoqua now ? " 
 
 Cetangi made him no answer. 
 
THE THREAT 131 
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 THE THREAT 
 
 "I'VE brought him back to you safe, Onoqua. 
 He's up on the mountain now. I took care of him 
 myself because he was your horse." 
 
 Onoqua turned suddenly at the voice. Pejito 
 watching her, saw a sudden light in her eyes and a 
 flush on her cheek. Was this gladness to have re 
 covered Peyan ? As she stood silent a moment look 
 ing at him, there was an eagerness in her face, and 
 she seemed about to say something that had sprung 
 to her lips and was trembling there. The young 
 man's face glowed in answer. He smiled his kind 
 est, and coming a step nearer, added, " Are you 
 going home now ? I'll go along with you. I want 
 to speak to you." 
 
 Onoqua's color faded into pallor. The question 
 that had trembled on her lips died there. Ask this 
 man how Cetangi had fared ? Yet no one knew as 
 well as he. Matoska said he had gone off in the 
 night. He said also that Pejito and Kasde had 
 heard the sound of cavalry in the distance and had 
 
132 ONOQUA 
 
 gone out to see what it meant ; lie did not know how 
 long they had been gone, nor which way they went. 
 And Matoska knew only through others. Onoqua 
 was too wise to arouse suspicion now that this would 
 do no good, and she should never have proof. It 
 might not be as she feared, but here was the man 
 who could tell her. Yet she must not ask him. It 
 would be fatal, at least to Cetangi if he were living. 
 She turned away from the door of her schoolroom, 
 for this autumn the day school had been given to her, 
 to the satisfaction of the parents and the great de 
 light of the children. She was trying to make the 
 best of her time, because when the winter came the 
 weather would be too severe and the snows too deep 
 for a time to permit her to keep up even the sem 
 blance of a school. 
 
 " Thank you for taking care of Peyan for me, 
 Pejito," she answered. "I knew I could trust you 
 to do it." 
 
 " Yes," returned the other. " You can trust me 
 a great deal when you are in it, Onoqua. You can 
 trust me all the way." 
 
 The girl glanced at him, and again looked down 
 at the path she was treading, and turned the 
 subject. At last the conversation came about to 
 Pejito's brother whom she was teaching. 
 
THE THREAT 133 
 
 " You work too hard in that school," pursued her 
 companion. 
 
 "Oh, no; I like it. I don't want to forget my 
 going to school, and the things I've learned there. 
 I wish you didn't, either, Pejito. Why do you ? " 
 
 " I went to school only two years," he answered. 
 
 " Yes. But why didn't you go longer ? Wouldn't 
 Waha let you ? " 
 
 He laughed. " Waha and I, we fixed it," he said. 
 He could not endure that Onoqua should think him 
 ruled, even by the chief, when that chief was his 
 father. " We have power," he went on. " We're 
 not men to work on the roads and in the gutters ; we 
 don't dig and hoe." 
 
 She gave him an explanation of white men's hopes 
 and purposes toward Indians, taking some time in 
 doing it. He listened attentively. "With your brains, 
 you need not dig and hoe, if you shoulcf do as white 
 men do," she finished with a smile of encouragement. 
 
 He turned to her with a softening of his face that 
 she would not have thought possible. " You like my 
 brains, Onoqua ? " 
 
 " Why, yes, Pejito. And I like everybody to have 
 brains ; and especially Indians. We all need as much 
 as we can get." 
 
134 ONOQUA 
 
 The young man looked at her open face, and 
 laughed dryly. 
 
 " You've been long time at school/' he said. 
 "You've learned white women's ways, Onoqua. 
 You're not caught and run away with, and that's all. 
 You give trouble." Looking down at her, he 
 pressed closer. " You know Pejito has brains ; 
 you know he likes that thing which gives him 
 trouble ; he despises that which is to be got without 
 his skill. He likes a woman that knows how to 
 answer him, how to please him with her wise words. 
 Pejito is real Indian, Onoqua, he likes the chase. 
 Be my wife, Onoqua, little one. I will marry you 
 white man's way. I will have only you forever. 
 I'm proud of you, Onoqua, I let you do as you like. 
 You lift me up. You try it, my little one." 
 
 The girl sprang away from him. Every nerve 
 quivered. What ! he, perhaps the murderer of 
 Cetangi ? She believed it of him at the moment. 
 She convert him ! She knew him too well. But she 
 would not have been woman if his passion for her 
 had not roused a momentary pity that made her re 
 fuse to deepen pain by scorn. 
 
 " I should be glad to have you live differently, glad 
 to help you all I could. But, Pejito, God sends love 
 
THE THREAT 185 
 
 down from Heaven ; and He has not sent me any for 
 you. I cannot be your wife ; that would not be good 
 for you or me." 
 
 "I can tell best what is good for me, and for you,, 
 too," responded Pejito, his eyes blazing. " I have no 
 girl tell me that." 
 
 " Neither do I have any man tell me what is best 
 for me," returned the girl in a haughty voice. " I 
 thank you for the honor of your offer ; but I must 
 decline." 
 
 "That's what the white women say," sneered her 
 hearer. " That's the end of all your school ; you 
 learn to despise us, you're good for nothing, spoiled 
 with white women's ways." 
 
 She bore unflinchingly his furious eyes. 
 
 He came up to her again and stood a moment, fas 
 cinated, longing to claim her in spite of herself, yet 
 held back by the will that was confronting him. 
 And as he looked, his breath came hotter ; and at last, 
 bringing his face on a level with hers, he hissed, 
 
 "You shall know what' I feel. Know it now, 
 scornful. Let it writhe you with pain. My wish 
 is not more beyond me than yours beyond you, nor 
 so much. I can crush you into obedience. . But you, 
 watch and wait ; watch and wait forever." 
 
136 ONOQUA 
 
 Onoqua's eyes had grown wild with horror. She 
 was trembling visibly. As Pejito ceased, he drew 
 back and turned to go down the path away from her. 
 
 She made a hasty step after him, and cried in a 
 voice choked with agony, "Pejito! what is it? Oh, 
 Pejito, one moment! Tell me, wait, tell me, 
 0, Pejito, what is it ? " 
 
 For the young man looking back mockingly, was al 
 ready far down the footpath that led to his home. 
 She covered her face with her hands with a low wail. 
 Pejito had killed Cetangi ! 
 
 In face of this, what was it that her enemy knew 
 her secret ? 
 
WINTEK 137 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 WINTER 
 
 BESIDE a fire in a wretched tepee one day in 
 November were two girls. One wrapped in bed cov 
 erings little better than rags, cowered in a shivering 
 silence broken only by the few words that came from 
 her gaspingly as she watched her companion who 
 with hand clasped in hers had been talking softly to 
 her and at last singing the songs of which poor Cenee 
 was so fond. But the singer saw that the other had 
 had enough, for she was too weak even to listen a 
 long time together, and she began to draw her hand 
 away gently and. to say good-by, speaking low in the 
 hope that Cenee would fall asleep in the peace of the 
 music. But the other opened her eyes, and before 
 releasing, held her hand more firmly. 
 
 "Come to-morrow, Onoqua," she said. "I want 
 to see you to-morrow ; I want you to sing to me. The 
 sisters don't sing like you. They say the angels will 
 sing better ; but I shall not like it so much, because 
 I know you." 
 
 Onoqua bent over her and stroked back the dying 
 
138 ONOQUA 
 
 girl's heavy, damp hair, and promised to come again 
 the next day. Cenee smiled back at her and closed 
 her eyes and nestled a little, as if she were now prepar 
 ing to sleep. Onoqua slipped away. 
 
 But as she turned, a form filled the doorway. It 
 was one of the sisters from the mission school on the 
 hill come to see how Cenee was that day, and whether 
 the time had come for the last visit of the priest. 
 
 "You're always doing good," she said holding out 
 her hand to Onoqua." 
 
 " I try to help," answered the girl as she took it. 
 " They are my own people, and I thank you for help 
 ing them." The nun looked at her earnestly with 
 out speaking. " Cenee is failing, " Onoqua went on 
 in English, and added an account of the change she 
 had found in her since seeing her two days before. 
 
 Sister Constance stood listening to her and still 
 watching her closely. As Onoqua finished and was 
 turning away with a courteous word, the other sighed 
 softly. 
 
 " Ah, Onoqua, I wish you were one of us ; you are 
 too good and noble not to be in the fold. Think of it, 
 my dear child, think of it." 
 
 The picture of a frightened child roused in the 
 night to listen to threats of horror against her if she 
 
WINTER 139 
 
 did not yield to this power that was now so softly 
 wooing her, of a gloomy spring morning, a wagon but 
 scantily filled with the children who had dared these 
 terrors, of a raging mother inflamed by this same 
 power, of escape and years of happiness, rose up in 
 Onoqua's memory. She looked at the speaker with 
 a faint smile, for she perceived the humor of the 
 situation. She knew now the part that Brother Sebas 
 tian had played personally in that affair, and, justly or 
 not she would never know, she connected it with his 
 change of place the following year. 
 
 " It is the same God that we all pray to," she 
 answered. "And there is so much to be done. But 
 Cenee is watching for you. I must not keep you." 
 For at the sound of voices the restless eyes had 
 opened wide. 
 
 The nun fingered her beads as she looked after 
 Onoqua's light figure speeding over the snow-cov 
 ered ground. But her heart was wiser than her 
 creed, and by no casuistry could it make her be 
 lieve this girl one of the lost. To be sure, it could 
 only be a miracle which could save ; but this would 
 be wrought, at some time, in some way. She would 
 pray that it might be by her means. And this duty 
 she by no means neglected. 
 
140 ONOQUA 
 
 " I'll get it out of them," said Hines. 
 
 " Used to getting things out of them," whispered 
 Newman. 
 
 Hines swept his eyes from clerk to agent, and 
 asked, "You say they wouldn't give you any idea 
 who he was ? " 
 
 " Said in effect it was their affair. But they seem 
 to have quieted down after their dance; we can't 
 question too closely. We must give them their own 
 way sometimes." 
 
 "Especially when we've nothing else for them." 
 
 "No joking matter. The supplies must be very 
 late, they were so long in starting; and the bitter 
 weather is " 
 
 
 
 "On time," laughed Hines pulling up the collar 
 of his great coat as he stood facing the north wind, 
 having just met the agent going into the store. 
 " There's one of them now," he added, breaking in 
 upon Winder's proposal to send a few more of the 
 Indians logging to keen them in the only work there 
 was for them. " Hold on a minute ; he talks English 
 a little. I'll get it out of him in a jiffy ; it's a way I 
 have." He knocked on the pane, and beckoned. 
 " Good-day, Waha," he began as this summons 
 had been reluctantly obeyed. "I called you to 
 
WINTER 141 
 
 ask you about hauling some wood for me; I want 
 it for my own house, I'll pay you for it at once." 
 He then went into explanation of amount and quality, 
 talking with a certain jocoseness and promise of 
 making the work worth while, to' which the Indian re 
 sponded by few words. "I suppose you've finished 
 your dances for the present, Waha, and can go to 
 work ? " he asked, looking at him smilingly. 
 
 " I can go to work," responded Waha, " if you give 
 me the money." 
 
 " No fear of your missing that when you've earned 
 it." 
 
 "I might owe it to you," returned the Indian, fix 
 ing the trader for an instant with his eyes. 
 
 "No, you owe me almost nothing now. You paid 
 it all last month." Waha's eyes passed from the 
 speaker to the agent, and the former went on lightly, 
 " By the way, Waha, who was that stranger that has 
 been here among the tribe ? I've seen him sometimes." 
 
 u That's Cetangi. He went to school with Mahaka. 
 He not much Indian, mostly white man." 
 
 " 0, no, no ; I know Cetangi. I don't mean him. 
 But who was that strange man in Indian dress that 
 came and went away again, and then came back ? I 
 never got a good look at him, he had such a queer 
 way of disappearing, who was he, Waha ? " 
 
142 ONOQUA 
 
 The Indian's face darkened. Silently he came up 
 to the trader with an expression that made the other 
 draw back involuntarily. "What you want to know 
 about him ? He not owe you money ? " 
 
 The two auditors roared. Waha looked from one 
 to the other. " You got all the wood you want now ? " 
 he asked, looking at Hines. 
 
 " No, no/' he answered, rallying. " Of course not, 
 Waha." 
 
 Without another word the Indian turned and 
 stalked away. 
 
 But his scorn penetrated through all Newman's 
 toughness of fibre. Waha's higher business standard 
 impressed him. Was it so strange that Indians were 
 slow to appreciate the white man ? Hines had had 
 the worst of it. He fell in the clerk's estimation. 
 
 Pejito was the only Indian who answered the tra 
 der's inquiries with anything but gruffness, and Pejito 
 looked him in the eyes and assured him that the 
 stranger was the best friend of the Indians because 
 he had come to teach them more of the white man's 
 religion. All the Indians were proud to have Inyan- 
 boslahan visit them. Now he had gone south. 
 
 When Newman boasted that Pejito had told the 
 stranger's name, and that he was a missionary, the 
 
WINTER 143 
 
 other Indians made no answer. He could not be sure 
 that they cared that the matter had come out. 
 
 And so it came about that it was not until the begin 
 ning of another winter that the white man upon this 
 reservation learned the errand of the Messenger, or 
 even his name. 
 
 It was the winter of 1888 and 1889. In a climate 
 where the thermometer is capable of sliding down to 
 sixty below zero, and has a way of keeping itself in 
 practice, even in comparatively mild winters, only 
 abundance of food, clothing, and fuel can keep warmth 
 in the blood. Onoqua was not the only Indian who 
 cared for the sick and ministered to the needs of all 
 so far as she could, but she was the leader of them. 
 Mr. Griswald found them efficient aids ; but there 
 were too few and they were far too poor. His wife, 
 and among his little congregation, Mrs. Winder, la 
 bored untiringly. But the one was often needy her 
 self, and the agent's wife, aside from her domestic 
 cares, was embarrassed by her position. She found 
 so many things that ought to be complained of and 
 righted and that still went on in the same old way in 
 spite of all her efforts, that she often groaned in 
 spirit. " They think I ought to help them, and I 
 can't," she would complain to her husband. 
 
144 OXOQUA 
 
 " Then, why don't you let it all alone ? " he would 
 answer. " You're not Indian agent." 
 
 "No; but I'm God's." 
 
 And then Mr. Winder would clear his throat and 
 have some errand down to the store, or some work in 
 his office. Or sometimes he would bring forward a 
 list of Indian offences, the first and last of which 
 would be laziness. 
 
 " Then, why don't you set them at work, George ? " 
 she would ask as innocently as if she did not know 
 that he was at his wits' end to find even the scanty 
 supply of that commodity indispensable to civiliza 
 tion which he assumed to keep on hand. He himself 
 could not have raised much on their farms, and they 
 could cut only a little timber at a time because they 
 were so far from the railroad. 
 
 "There goes another spoiled Indian," said Hines 
 one day as Mahaka lounged past. " When that fel 
 low came home first he shoed a horse as well as I 
 should care to see. He was on the road to make a 
 first class workman. Now, look at him rusting out ; 
 just the stuff for the medicine men and the bucks to 
 prey upon. Why can't he go off and find something 
 to do, you say, Newman ? Oh, well, he wants to have 
 it put into him, Most men are like clocks ; they'll go 
 
WINTER 145 
 
 well enough if you wind them up. Why should we 
 expect of Mahaka what so many white fellows with a 
 white man's past behind them wouldn't do unless the 
 white man's present was about them, and the white 
 man's scorn of idleness nagging at them ? The black 
 smith's place here was filled when Mahaka came 
 home. Arid by the time it's vacant, mark my words, 
 he won't want it." 
 
 In face of such discouragements Orioqua's own 
 hardships were light to her. Maukeeneet was her 
 greatest comfort ; the two had grown to be sisters in 
 affection as they were in blood. To Onoqua's aston 
 ishment, the girl kept on with her painting ; she made 
 many daubs, but she painted some things that the 
 other thought well done ; and she certainly gained in 
 perception of form and coloring. And then, the work 
 was so safe in this place where Onoqua's innocent 
 eyes saw many dangers. She was so glad that she 
 had taken painting lessons at school and could show 
 Maukeeneet something, although the younger sister 
 distanced her in performance. Why would not Mau 
 keeneet go to school ? 
 
146 ONOQUA 
 
 CHAPTEE XIX 
 
 IN THE STORM 
 
 IT was a fearful night in January. The wind 
 swept through the valley in a hurricane, driving the 
 snow before it until the air as well as the ground 
 seemed one great winding sheet ; the cold stung like 
 needles ; to find one's way anywhere, to keep one's 
 bearings on such a night seemed impossible. Onoqua 
 peering out into the storm, was glad to shut the door 
 again in haste. Nothing could live outside, she said 
 to herself, except the storm. She threw more wood 
 upon the fire and sat down beside it once more. Ma- 
 toska was snoring in the corner, Mahaka had wrapped 
 himself in his blanket and travelled into dreamland, 
 Tahnas with her youngest child in her arms was fast 
 asleep on the floor, and the other two children hud 
 dled together in one corner, would know nothing of 
 the wind and snow until the next day. 
 
 Onoqua could not sleep. All losses and all longings 
 crowded upon her. The old happy school days came 
 back to her, the days when everybody about her had 
 enough to wear and enough to eat, when those who 
 
IN THE STORM 147 
 
 were ill were cared for, when comfort and what would 
 now seem the greatest luxuries were to be had every 
 day. 
 
 But deepest of all was that haunting fear. She 
 could not trust Mahaka's discretion enough even to con 
 fide it to him, especially as he lived chiefly with Nau- 
 matin. But day and night she wondered what had be 
 come of Cetangi. For after the first shock of Pejito's 
 threat had passed off, she would not be sure that he 
 
 had done more than try to terrify her. Since Cetangi 
 
 * 
 
 had been warned, he had perhaps escaped, even if 
 they had pursued him. Over and over she told her 
 self this. And yet, there was the horror never dead 
 within her heart. For if Cetangi had really escaped, 
 why had he not written to Mahaka ? He must have 
 known that one who has visited ought to write. She 
 had made her brother write to him. But there had 
 been no answer. 
 
 Only to know that he was safe ! 
 
 The flames began to dance with blurred outlines 
 before her eyes until tears fell upon the hand lying 
 in her lap. Listening to the storm she seemed to see 
 Cetangi lying in the river, or somewhere on that 
 dreary plain with the snow heaping mounds above 
 him. 
 
148 ONOQUA 
 
 Was it the wind that suddenly rattled the door, and 
 fell ? 
 
 No, the sound came once more in the lull before the 
 next blast hurled itself against the house. 
 
 Some one was there. 
 
 The hour, the storm, the thoughts that had just 
 filled her mind suggested to Onoqua's quick imagina 
 tion something uncanny. Was she going to see Ce. 
 tangi, and not in the flesh ? 
 
 A third algempt decided her. No human being 
 should ask shelter in vain. Whoever knocked, she 
 must open the door on such a night. 
 
 No sooner had she done this, than a figure rushed 
 past her and fell rather than crouched on the hearth 
 before the fire. 
 
 The snow-covered garments, torn in places by the 
 wind, the shawl blown back from the bare head and 
 helping to muffle the face that tried to bury itself in 
 it, the despair, the exhaustion of the attitude, in utter 
 contrast to everything that she had known before, 
 even the impossibility of the thing, made Onoqua at 
 first doubt her recognition of this strange guest. As 
 she turned from closing the door, and came back to 
 the fire, the girl with a trembling hand held back the 
 mass of wet hair that had fallen over her face and 
 glanced up timidly. 
 
IN THE sTomi 149 
 
 " Ahsaniak ! " 
 
 At the sound of her name she crouched again, and 
 the terrified look of a hunted creature was in her eyes. 
 Only the dumb agony in those eyes implored for help. 
 
 Onoqua knelt beside her and gathered up her hair, 
 wringing the water out of it as she coiled it. "Poor 
 child ! " she said softly. " What a terrible thing to 
 have been out in this storm. Were you away some 
 where ? Did you try to get home ? But first I'll 
 give you some dry things. Come with me ; we will 
 not wake the others. 7 ' 
 
 And she pointed to a corner cut off from the main 
 room, in part by rough boarding, in part by a curtain 
 of cotton flannel that she had brought with her from 
 her school. The closet thus made was her own domain 
 respected as such by all the family, and it was an in 
 estimable comfort to her. 
 
 But Ahsaniak did not rise. She drew away her 
 head from Onoqua' s touch. " How did it happen ? ; ' 
 she repeated. " Did I try to get home ? I was at 
 home ; I haven't any home ; they turned me out, 
 out into the storm because I was so wicked. I have 
 disgraced them. I was going to die and then I saw 
 your light, and I don't know how I came. It will dis 
 grace you to have me here. Onoqua, let me go. I 
 
150 ONOQUA 
 
 am wicked ; you'd better let me go." The words ended 
 in a moan. Physical force had failed the girl. 
 
 Dry clothing, the blazing fire, a cup of tea, and food 
 revived Ahsaniak who had had a chill so that her face 
 was deadly pale and her teeth chattered. 
 
 Tahnas roused in the added warmth, looked a mo 
 ment sleepily at Ahsaniak when Onoqua explained 
 that she had been lost in the storm, and turning over, 
 went to sleep again. 
 
 The girls were left alone once more. When Ahsa 
 niak was lying on the bed in Onoqua's room, she said 
 piteously, " You don't know how wicked I am. Why 
 should you do all this to-night, Onoqua? To-morrow 
 you will turn me out into the snow." 
 
 "No, Ahsaniak." And then, "How wicked have 
 you been ? Tell me all." 
 
 " I saw you through the window as I came up. But 
 I would never have knocked if it had not been for 
 that night at the camp. It was Sasalm that brought 
 it all about this evening. She rules in the house now. 
 But what difference did it make ? I am too wicked 
 to live. I have disgraced them all ; I must die ; it is 
 not too late now. I will go out into the storm again." 
 She sprang up, and Onoqua's firm hand put her back 
 upon the bed. " If I could have kept my dress. Ono- 
 
IN THE STORM 151 
 
 qua, I should have lived in a different way. You 
 wouldn't wear the Indian dress; you tried and 
 couldn't. But I had to; I hadn't any other. That 
 man at the agency cheated my father. They always 
 do ; we're only Indians, it isn't any use to think of 
 anything. But I didn't mean it when I came home 
 from school." 
 
 " I know it," said the other, stroking her hair with 
 gentle touch. For the first time it occurred to her 
 that she might not have done wisely in refusing Mr. 
 Caisson's offer. If she had gone to school again, Waha 
 might have allowed Ahsaniak to go, too. And had 
 she done as much good here as her one act of taking 
 Ahsaniak from her temptations would have been? 
 She sighed, then she thought of Maukeeneet. But 
 Maukeeneet might have followed her. 
 
 " I always knew Howaxte was a hundred times better 
 than Kasde," Ahsaniak went on, "but I was angry 
 and wicked. I was determined to be pure Indian, 
 since they wouldn't give me a chance to be anything 
 else, and Howaxte wasn't so. He didn't like it in me. 
 But, Onoqua, he liked me in spite of it, I could see 
 that, and somehow, I thought that some day I would 
 try to please him again." Her words ended in a sob. 
 " My father has driven me off, he told me never to 
 
152 OKOQTJA 
 
 speak to him, never to look him in the face again," 
 she went on after a heart-broken pause ; " and I never 
 will. And Pejito, O, Onoqua, he was terrible. He 
 pierced me through and through by the sword of his 
 words. I will never see Pejito again. I must die. 
 There's no place for me to live." 
 
 " Yes, Ahsaniak, you may live here. My father will 
 not turn you out of doors. Don't be afraid of it." 
 
 " If I had been only Indian woman," moaned the 
 other, "I could turn back from that. But I've dis 
 graced the Indians. They will not have me among 
 them. Matoska will not let me stay with you. You 
 will not have me yourself. You must listen, Onoqua. 
 No, I mustn't wait till to-morrow." 
 
 And with perfect truthfulness Ahsaniak gave her 
 the history of the past year. She told of the reckless 
 ness which had often been assumed, of the hardness 
 which she had used as a cloak for her regrets and her 
 sufferings, of the despair that had driven her on, and 
 the pride and fear of ridicule that would not let her 
 turn back ; of her jealousy of Onoqua's possessions 
 that had kept her from fleeing to her when she might 
 have been saved. Now it was too late ; she was lost 
 in sin ; none of her family would ever see her again ; 
 they were right. They had put her out to die in the 
 
IN THE STORM 153 
 
 storm, and she ought to have done it. She had not 
 meant to try to find shelter ; she had wandered, and 
 her wandering had led her here. 
 
 " It was God who led you here, Ahsaniak." 
 
 " God ? " cried the girl. " Oh, no, He would not 
 look at me ; He is angrier than my father. I came 
 across the river, Oiioqua. In the bend the ice was all 
 broken and piled up, and it was open water. I al 
 most slipped through in one place. I ought to have 
 gone under. If only I had." 
 
 There was a long silence. Through it there came 
 a sob from Onoqua. 
 
 Lying on the narrow bed beside the girl, she put her 
 arms about her, and when Ahsaniak's trembling 
 ceased a little, whispered a verse from her Bible 
 about the love of God. 
 
 The morning light found Ahsaniak asleep in her 
 arms. 
 
154 ONOQUA 
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 
 CETANGl's RIDE 
 
 CETANGI walked back to the camp with Pejito and 
 threw himself down again in the same attitude that 
 Onoqua had found him in. It seemed as if again 
 that vision must glide into the midst of the dance, 
 and as if the wildest there would feel the power of 
 that earnest face and that clear voice. Her grace, 
 her refinement which he had always felt, stood out to 
 him now in contrast with the old life with which she 
 had no sympathy. He was not afraid of Pejito, and 
 he was wonderfully glad to owe his life to Onoqua. 
 She had scored two victories that night, she had 
 saved two lives. He had looked on. 
 
 He rose impatiently. " Where are you going^ ? " 
 asked a voice in his ear. He had thought Pejito the 
 other side of the camp, and so he had been the 
 moment before. 
 
 " I'm going to stretch myself, and then find a more 
 comfortable place to turn in; I'm not going to dance," 
 he returned scornfully. "Where's the quietest cor 
 ner ? Pick it out for me, won't you ? " 
 
CETANGl's RIDE 155 
 
 "Look out for yourself." And Pejito turned on 
 his heel. Cetangi looked after him with a scowl. It 
 was not going to be so easy to get away, then. The 
 lynx eyes of his enemy would not be so absorbed in 
 the dance as to forget him. 
 
 " I'll try it under that tree, and don't let me over 
 sleep," he called after Pejito. 
 
 "If I don't forget you," retorted the other, not 
 looking back as he moved off. Cetangi's resting- 
 place had been as near the horses as he had dared to 
 make it. And as wrapped in his blanket, which he 
 had not discarded for travelling, he lay down just 
 outside one of the fires, youth and health and nature 
 asserted themselves over not only all the wild tumult 
 about him, but the consciousness of personal danger, 
 and the sleep that he had been feigning came to him. 
 
 When he awoke the dance was at its height. But 
 he remembered Pejito's eyes, and resisted his first 
 
 impulse to sit up and look about him. To steal away 
 
 i 
 
 himself in the shadows of the firelight would be com 
 paratively easy ; but to get his horse was another 
 thing. If he had only been trained an Indian horse 
 thief before his days of civilization, how easily he 
 might have captured his own beast, he thought with 
 grim amusement. 
 
156 ONOQUA 
 
 He walked quietly to the next tree, keeping well in 
 the shadow. There was no evidence that he had been 
 seen. He took the next with the same result. 
 
 At the third he caught sight of Pejito's face turned 
 in his direction with an intentness of attitude ; he 
 had stopped dancing. 
 
 Cetangi picked up a huge dead branch lying just 
 beyond him, carried it back, and threw it on the fire. 
 The flames crackled up into the sky and lighted all 
 around. 
 
 Kasde cried out, " Wood for this one, too." 
 
 " Take care of your own fires," retorted Cetangi. 
 " I'll keep up mine. I don't pick up your wood for 
 you to dance by. It's bad enough to keep a fellow 
 awake all night without setting him drudging. It's 
 as much as I want to take care of one fire." 
 
 " Shall we set him in here ? " asked Kasde in an 
 undertone of Pejito. " If he fights, that'll be the end 
 of him ; there'll be no need of waiting for to-morrow." 
 
 But Pejito, the wary, had a reason that Kasde 
 could not fathom for hesitating over this bird in the 
 hand. Onoqua would surely learn of such treatment 
 of her brother's guest. She was not a girl to be wooed 
 with a scalp in his belt, and that scalp Cetangi's. 
 And Pejito smiled in pride as he perceived how 
 impossible it would be to sell Onoqua, 
 
CETANGl'S RIDE 157 
 
 "Let him alone," he answered. "I have planned 
 it ; you can't make it better." 
 
 And Kasde, with his respect for Pejito's brains, 
 went back to his place again. 
 
 Cetangi sat himself down to enjoy the blaze his 
 branch was making, and when this had died down he 
 went for and threw on another. What did he care 
 that Pejito was watching him, or if all the party left 
 their amusement for the purpose ? He leaned his 
 back against a tree and closed his eyes, not as if 
 feigning sleep, but courting it. Again the fire died 
 down, and again he went in search of more wood. 
 
 But this time the branches were farther off; in 
 deed, they were so far off that Cetangi must have 
 been lost in looking for them, for he never came 
 back. He had seen that Pejito had relaxed his watch 
 fulness somewhat. 
 
 He led away his horse, skirting round on the edge 
 of a bog where the moss deadened the hoof falls. 
 
 Then, mounting, he galloped for his life. He 
 should have a good half hour's start, whoever pur 
 sued. The nearest station on the railroad was almost 
 twenty miles away; he knew the general direction, 
 and civilization had not deadened his Indian instinct 
 as to finding his way. A train went through there 
 
158 ONOQUA 
 
 some time in the morning. If he hit that, there was 
 no fear of pursuit. But now that he had shown his 
 consciousness of danger, he would rather not be de 
 tained on the way. He rode on and on, growing more 
 assured as he heard no sound of pursuers. But for all 
 this, he went forward as fast as possible. 
 
 Pejito's watchfulness had relaxed only with his 
 greater absorption in the dance, and this had grown 
 into a kind of frenzy with the yielding to it, when a 
 voice in his ear brought him to himself instantly. 
 
 " What's become of Cetangi ? " whispered Kasde. 
 
 "Oh, he's safe enough," returned Pejito. But he 
 immediately suspended his dancing to look in all 
 directions, sweepingly at first as if the answer were 
 easy to prove, then with a peering gaze into every 
 recess of the encampment, and as far as possible into 
 the wood where, except in the direction in which the 
 horses were, he saw nothing. Then, quitting the 
 circle, he and Kasde made a thorough search, for it 
 was possible, they said, that Cetangi had gone off a 
 little distance to find the sleep that he could not get 
 here. As it became evident that the young man had 
 really gone, the other questioned if it had been merely 
 in disgust at the dance, or if he had any suspicion 
 of his danger ? Had he been warned ? Kasde sug- 
 
CETANGI'S RIDE 159 
 
 gested Onoqua. " Impossible," answered Pejito. " I 
 was with them every minute. And if I'd not been, 
 how should Onoqua have known ? Mahaka doesn't, 
 nor Matoska. I looked out for that. He's struck for 
 the railroad, Kasde. But he shall not escape us. We 
 shall find him there before the train goes. Come." 
 
 Cetangi riding on in the morning gloaming, which 
 found him only three or four miles from the station, 
 noticed all at once that his horse turned his ears back 
 and forth restlessly, as if something had caught his 
 attention. He stopped, and springing down, laid his 
 ear to the ground. 
 
 The tramp of horses ! 
 
160 ONOQUA 
 
 CHAPTER XXI 
 
 PURSUIT 
 
 THE sound was distant, but unmistakable. His 
 life depended upon his catching the train ; simply to 
 reach the station wou-ld not be enough. He sprang 
 into the saddle again and went on. The advantage 
 of distance was not so much as it seemed, since he had 
 to find his way, and his pursuers only to follow him. 
 
 He went on and on. 
 
 But had they fleeter horses behind, or had the rest 
 made them fresher, or had his flight been discovered 
 much sooner than he had supposed? It was too 
 evident that they were gaming upon him. Nothing 
 was in sight, but the sounds were more distinct. 
 
 At last, far in the distance, the railroad running 
 east and west. But on which side of the station had he 
 struck the track, east or west ? Which way must he 
 go to reach *it ? Nothing told him this, and yet, 
 God help him, on taking the right way his life de 
 pended. 
 
 He came close and stood a moment looking up and 
 down. The waiting was not so much loss as to go in 
 
161 
 
 the wrong direction ever so little. For if he should 
 do this, his pursuers when they struck the track, 
 would cut off his retreat. 
 
 Up and down the long miles of iron road, nothing, 
 not a sign to guide him, nothing but in one place the 
 shadow of a bank close at the side. 
 
 As he stood, nearer and nearer came the hoof beats 
 behind him, with no intervening sounds to break 
 these on the hard ground. Cetangi drew his revol 
 ver, examined it, cocked it, and stood waiting. Flight 
 was of no use in this uncertainty. He would not be 
 shot in the back, he would sell his life as dearly as 
 possible. Already, it seemed to him that he saw a 
 dark speck on the horizon. 
 
 All through his ride before this sudden alarm, he 
 had seemed to see before him the light figure in the 
 dark blue cloak and the scarlet cap, and, clearest of 
 all, that face beautiful in its purpose. For delicate 
 outlines and beauty of feature were not all that the 
 young man had caught there in that revelation of 
 Onoqua. Once he had brought his horse to a stop 
 with the determination to go back to her at all haz 
 ards. And then and there he would have turned and 
 defied Pejito's treachery, if in her farewell Onoqua 
 had thrown but one touch of softness, even of person- 
 
162 ONOQtJA 
 
 ality. But he was " a human life " which she had 
 saved. What hope was there in that ? And Cetangi 
 had gone on again. And now, as he stood facing 
 death, for he had heard the hoofs of more than one 
 horse in pursuit, the vision of Onoqua came back to 
 him. He hoped that his last thought would be of her, 
 and it seemed to him one so near Heaven as not to 
 be unfit for a parting from earth, one from which he 
 should not fear to turn to the Saviour in whom they 
 both believed. 
 
 As he stood there holding his pistol ready for the 
 inevitable attack, determined to dispose of at least one 
 of his assailants before the others should despatch 
 him, and in no uncertainty as to who this one should 
 be, the sun rose. 
 
 What was that mass far up the track so close 
 against it ? As the sun struck full upon it, he saw 
 that it was not a shadow at all, but a hand car side 
 tracked. Then, this must be the way to the station. 
 
 But how loud the sound had suddenly grown. 
 Could they have gained so much so soon ? 
 
 Wild with a sudden thought, he threw himself on 
 the ground again and listened. 
 
 The train ! 
 
 It was rushing on at full speed. Either it had 
 
PURSUIT 163 
 
 passed the station beyond hearing, or it was flying 
 on toward this. 
 
 And he must fly, too. He must keep pace with it. 
 It was his only chance for life. 
 
 And with the new hope of it life grew still more 
 dear. He thrust his revolver into his belt again, 
 turned his horse up the track, and the animal as if 
 scenting danger, sped all the faster for his moment's 
 breathing space. 
 
 But the iron horse was far fleeter. It thundered 
 nearer and nearer, and passed him. The speck on 
 the horizon grew larger and larger. He could see 
 that the pursuers were trying to head him off before 
 he could reach the station. That failure to strike 
 the track higher up, and that delay, would cost him 
 dear. 
 
 The station was just beyond now. The train was 
 slowing. He was too far behind. He had signalled 
 as it had dashed past him. But at his wild haste 
 this might only have determined the engineer to delay 
 as little as possible. 
 
 The bell was ringing before he reached the end of 
 the long train. 
 
 The flying hoofs dashed along the platform, Cetangi 
 signalling with all his might. The conductor negli- 
 
164 ONOQUA 
 
 gently or wilfully, was looking in the other direction, 
 and stood swinging his arm vigorously to the engi 
 neer. 
 
 Cetangi glanced over his shoulder as he swept on. 
 Pejito and Kasde were within shot. 
 
 Then it was that something happened which Ce 
 tangi in his cooler moments found it hard to believe 
 that he could do over again. The bell was losing 
 itself in the puffings of the engine when he came to the 
 open door of the baggage car. Whether he goaded his 
 reeling horse, or, springing down, half dragged him 
 there, he could not well remember. But what he did 
 remember well was that when that train was fairly 
 under way, he and this same brave steed of his were 
 standing in the baggage car, and every puff of the 
 engine was carrying him into safety. 
 
 Civilization had conquered, civilization had saved 
 him in a literal sense that he had never dreamed of 
 in his school orations upon the subject. 
 
 But the train had come none too soon. For, what 
 was that sharp report that had rung out just as he 
 was springing into the car ? What was this sharp 
 twinge in his arm, and what caused the blood that 
 he soon saw on his sleeve as the feeling of something 
 warm made him look at it ? 
 
165 
 
 It was a mere flesh wound. But if he had not 
 moved as the shot left the gun, the ball would have 
 kept its aim in his heart. 
 
 " You don't know how to hit," Pejito said angrily. 
 " Why did you get in my way ? I'd have finished 
 him." 
 
 " How do you know I haven't ? " the other asked. 
 " Fin as good a shot as you, Pejito." And the eyes 
 that turned on the caviller made him remember that 
 he had too much to do to quarrel with Kasde. " Re 
 member Wanigiska's curse," the speaker went on. 
 
 "Yes," returned Pejito with apparent satisfaction, 
 " I remember." He was careful not to add his greater 
 faith in a Winchester. 
 
166 ONOQTTA 
 
 CHAPTER XXII 
 
 WORK 
 "WORK?" 
 
 "Yes, sir, work." 
 
 " And on harnesses. Ever made a harness ? " 
 
 "Yes, sir. And sold it, too." 
 
 " Ah ! Did you get a good price for it ? " 
 
 "Yes, sir, very good." 
 
 "Price, you know, is the test of work. I turn off 
 a good quality. I don't want to cheapen it." 
 
 " I don't want to do cheap work. It would get my 
 hand out." 
 
 The other looked at him more closely. "You 
 worked in a harness shop ? " he asked. 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 Another pause. " You're not an American ? " 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 " Oh, I thought " the speaker paused again, and 
 looked still more carefully at the seeker of work. 
 
 " Where did you work ? " 
 
 The young man named several places. 
 
 " And you learned your trade at the Indian school ? 
 
167 
 
 Then you must be an Indian ? " And the short, 
 stout, elderly man surveyed the tall, muscular young 
 man, taking in his straight features, dark eyes and 
 hair, erect carriage, glance keen and steady, com 
 plexion which the sun, or nature, had decidedly 
 bronzed. The scrutiny was returned. 
 
 "Yes, sir," answered Cetangi. 
 
 " I asked if you were an American." 
 
 The listener smiled at him. " Who is, if I am 
 not ? " he asked. 
 
 " Oh, to be sure. But, then, I never looked at it 
 so. Yes, yes, of course you're an American. But, 
 you see, we never think of Indians doing anything." 
 
 " Time to begin," answered Cetangi. 
 
 " Time for which to begin ? " with the frown of an 
 autocrat. 
 
 " Both of us, sir." And Cetangi smiled full at him 
 with a gaze so appreciative that Mr. Mathers laughed. 
 
 "I rather think you're right there. Have you a 
 certificate of your work at the school and all that 
 sort of thing ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir ; " and Cetangi showed it. 
 
 "Very good indeed," said Mr. Mathers. "And 
 now tell me exactly how you would go to work to 
 make a first-class harness. How would you select 
 
168 OXOQTJA 
 
 the stock ? " He stood waiting for the answer with 
 a look of amusement as if all this did very well to 
 talk about, but an Indian for a workman was quite 
 another thing. As the young man went on, however, 
 he looked at first surprised, then fully aroused, until 
 he was listening with the keenest interest. He asked 
 as Cetangi finished, " And now, can you do as well as 
 you say ? " 
 
 "I can't answer that by talking," returned the 
 young man. 
 
 Mathers laughed. " I rather think I shall have to 
 give you a chance to try," he said. " When can you 
 come ? " 
 
 "Now, sir." 
 
 " Oh ! Well, that's good. I like promptness." 
 
 By evening it had gone through the town that one 
 of Buffalo Bill's wild Indians had settled down to 
 learn a trade ; and that Mr. Mathers was a bold man, 
 and would probably be scalped some night. 
 
 That was a winter of prosperity to Cetangi. His 
 work was very satisfactory, his wages were good, and 
 he showed no desire to wander, as his employer had 
 at first expected. If the other workmen had been 
 prepared to make him run the gantlet of criticism 
 and ridicule often the fate of new comers, the sinewy 
 
WORK 169 
 
 figure of the Indian bending over his work in a silence 
 contrasting with the chattering of his companions 
 would have restrained them. They were not sure 
 what disposition might lurk under that dark brow. 
 But when his dignity and reticence had won their 
 respect, as his good service had that of his employer, 
 when, as they put it, they had got better acquainted, 
 Cetangi was well liked by them. In the church to 
 which he went he was kindly received. And after a 
 while, because he would not be known among the low, 
 he came into acquaintance with a most respectable 
 class of people. 
 
 Besides his personal success Cetangi was presenting 
 a new phase of Indian character to the people of 
 
 One evening at a temperance meeting he was called 
 upon for a speech. He at once went to the platform 
 with a fear which was never suspected; but once 
 launched, he found the sailing smooth. He believed 
 in his subject, and neither want of thought nor want 
 of words impeded him. He heard the applause with a 
 triumph which was not all personal, for it seemed to 
 him also evidence that an Indian could make himself 
 heard among white men on matters of common con 
 cern. 
 
170 ONOQUA 
 
 The following morning Mr. Mathers added to the 
 orders he was giving him a comment. 
 
 " I hear you're quite an orator, Cetangi," he said. 
 " Glad you did well." 
 
 And then Indian eloquence was remembered. 
 
 In January there came a note from one of the 
 
 social leaders of L , asking Cetangi to call upon 
 
 her that evening. Oddly enough, she had been one 
 of those most afraid at first of the hidden tomahawk. 
 " We've been thinking this winter," she began, " that 
 we ought to have an Indian Association in this place, 
 and we are going to organize it as soon as possible. 
 We want ladies and gentlemen to belong to it. They 
 work together better in any such thing, you know ; 
 we ladies have so much more time on our hands, and 
 they save us from looking too much on the senti 
 mental side ; they bring in the practical. And then, 
 you see, the gentlemen always pay more. We shall 
 be a richer society if we bring them in." 
 
 "And then they vote," said Cetangi. 
 
 " Yes, yes," she laughed, " that's true ; they vote ; 
 and if we have them in our Association, we'll instruct 
 them how. Now next week we are going to call a 
 public meeting, and we want to get up all the interest 
 possible and to present all we can of the Indian's side 
 
WORK 171 
 
 of the question. You will do this admirably. You 
 see, the Indians ought to have a representative. Will 
 you come and tell us what the Indians need, and how 
 to help them ? " 
 
 " The Indians ought to have a representative," she 
 had said. "Will you come and tell us what the 
 Indians need and how to help them?" The blood 
 ran hot with delight through Cetangi's veins. 
 
 " Will you do it ? " repeated Mrs. Linton. 
 
 "Yes, I will do it," answered the young man 
 simply. And she went on to give him particulars of 
 the coming meeting. 
 
 "She afterward commented to her husband that 
 Cetangi was an intelligent young man, but there was 
 no enthusiasm about him. 
 
 The hall was well filled. A number of speeches 
 had been made when Cetangi was introduced. 
 
 At his school exhibitions circumstances had made 
 his place for him. But he saw that now he was in a 
 place which Heaven had given him power to make 
 for himself. Then he had spoken to those predis 
 posed in his favor. Here might be many predisposed 
 another way. He was here to fight his way in opinion, 
 as he had fought it in work ; and in both cases he 
 was fighting for his race. 
 
172 ONOQUA 
 
 " My tribe, as you know," he said, " is not wild. 
 The people are going to school to civilization. Now, 
 how do we teach at school ? Children don't remem 
 ber telling ; but when they begin to work at the thing, 
 then they learn. That's the way with Indians. We 
 don't have the same rules for our school that you do 
 for yours, or else we should learn." Here some one 
 asked what he meant. " I mean," answered Cetangi, 
 that you're trying to make us American citizens out 
 of America. There 's no American freedom on a res 
 ervation. God teaches men to find out laws and to 
 keep them by making them suffer when they break 
 them. He puts them out into the middle of things, 
 and so they have to look around and understand. 
 That's the way the Indians ought to be treated ; they 
 ought to be made citizens by doing examples in citi 
 zenship. We're not in America now, I say, on the 
 reservations ; we're outside of it. Some men are born 
 brighter than others. But if they're Indians they're 
 expected to wait around for the tribe. The Indian 
 hangs half way now ; he's nowhere. He is proud, he 
 doesn't like to be nowhere. Do you ? He knows 
 about Government ; he's born to govern ; he's been at 
 it a long time." And the speaker straightened him 
 self. " Somebody asks me what an Indian reserva- 
 
WOKK 173 
 
 tion is ? " he went on. " First of all, it's a place where 
 there isn't any work. What if all the work were 
 taken out of here ? " 
 
 " Bread riots/ 7 said some one in the audience. 
 
 " Perhaps that's what some of the Indian dances 
 are," returned Cetangi. 
 
 As the applause subsided he bent forward with 
 eager face and flashing .eyes. 
 
 " You ask for examples," he said. " I will give you 
 those." 
 
 And he did until he set his audience on fire with 
 his own intensity, and the Indian cause looked to 
 them as it had never looked before, and instead of 
 wearisome obligation promising only indefinite end, 
 it stood a burning question of the test of American 
 institutions, of American justice and fair play, and of 
 the practical illustration of the golden rule, with the 
 needs and possibilities of a common human nature 
 overs weeping all differences. "Why do you put all 
 Indians in one broad swathe ? " he finished. " Why 
 not let them civilize Indian file ? That's the natural 
 way." 
 
 He knew as he stood there that night with plaudits 
 ringing music in his ears, that here he had won the 
 
174 ONOQUA 
 
 recognition of the present American rights of his 
 people, he had put a hand to the only lever that could 
 lift the mighty block to progress out of their path. 
 While the new society was organizing, and as after 
 ward he stood silently listening to the comments and 
 praises of the people about him, his eyes were full of 
 the vision of Onoqua as she had appeared in the midst 
 of the camp, an embodiment of purity and power, 
 lifting up Ahsaniak and carrying her away from the 
 contamination of the dance and the scenes that ac 
 companied it, and speaking to him the warning that 
 saved his life. Her voice seemed sounding in his ears 
 and he saw the glad look that she would turn upon 
 him if she knew what he had been doing. Now they 
 were working together. 
 
 Was it this that made him thrill with a new 
 and strong delight ? Would to work always with 
 Onoqua mean to be always the highest possible to 
 him? 
 
 The longing for her which his busiest moments had 
 scarcely held in abeyance, returned upon him with 
 tenfold power. 
 
 The strength of a new resolve gave his head a 
 prouder bearing and his voice a finer ring as he 
 
WORK 175 
 
 turned his thoughts to the questions pouring in upon 
 him. 
 
 He spent the night in wondering who that man 
 would be who to Onoqua should not mean merely " a 
 human life." 
 
176 ONOQUA 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 MISREPRESENTED 
 
 "'TWAS that night in the storm," said Mrs. Winder, 
 as she rose to take leave of Mrs. Griswald. " Nobody 
 could stand it. Poor little thing ! She's never had 
 half a chance for her life. But, after all, it's best she 
 should die, for where could she go ? Her father will 
 not see or hear about her, even now ; and he, certainly, 
 would have no pity if she were to get well." 
 
 "No," returned Mrs. Griswald accompanying her 
 visitor to the door. " I've been there all the morning. 
 If devotion could save her, she'd surely live. That 
 young girl, by her own power of will, turned them all 
 out but Tahnas, and has done everything for her her 
 self with what little help she could get out of Tahnas, 
 and the little I could do for the poor child. But, 
 poor Ahsaniak, it's only a question of a few hours 
 now. I'm glad the forlorn baby died." 
 
 "When I left there this morning it seemed as if 
 she'd not last till now. The house was full then, 
 however," said the agent's wife. 
 
 " Oh, that, of course. Onoqua can't keep the squaws 
 
MISREPRESENTED 177 
 
 from crowding into the outer room and squatting 
 there and whispering. But she does keep them away 
 from Ahsauiak ; she couldn't, though, if the poor thing 
 were not in disgrace. Then the medicine men would 
 flourish over every order we could give. Onoqua's 
 will would be nothing. However, as I said, 'twill all 
 be over soon. The doctor said there wasn't a shadow 
 of hope." And with a sigh the visitor turned away. 
 
 Ahsaniak lay as she had lain for hours. She could 
 scarcely have been paler had it been the last paleness, 
 and she would not be more silent when her lips should 
 close forever. But her eyes were open and fixed upon 
 Onoqua, and her hand held that of the girl who had 
 proved her truest friend. The moments ran on and 
 there came no change, except that the sun of early 
 February as it moved on nearer its setting slanted 
 longer lines through the little window. 
 
 But, gradually, her lids drooped more and more. 
 Onoqua thought of what the doctor had said, that she 
 would soon go. This was a sign of it. The hand 
 clasping the other's still kept its hold, however, and 
 Onoqua's still folded about it in assuring quiet. 
 
 All at once Tahnas' head appeared in the doorway. 
 
 "Cetangi is outside, Onoqua, and wants to speak 
 with you." 
 
178 ONOQUA 
 
 Cetangi ! 
 
 Every fibre in her thrilled. Her soul flashed back 
 from the dark valley over which she had been leaning 
 into the full sunlight of life. She rose, and her hand 
 began gently to withdraw itself. 
 
 But, suddenly, Ahsaniak's grasp tightened; her eyes 
 opened. Onoqua bent over her. " I'll come back in a 
 moment, Ahsaniak. I must go away only one minute." 
 And she tried more decidedly to free her hand. " I'll 
 come back to you at once, Ahsaniak," she repeated. 
 
 The dying girl's other hand clasped itself about 
 Onoqua's, and the dark eyes so soon to be closed for 
 ever, turned full upon her face with an agony of 
 entreaty. The appeal was all the stronger that it 
 was made in a silence that foreshadowed the last. 
 
 Again Onoqua bent over her. " It is only for one 
 moment, Ahsaniak ; let me go for one moment, I'll 
 come back again," she pleaded. 
 
 But either the other did not comprehend, or else 
 she could not lose sight of her only friend. Onoqua 
 must release herself by force, must leave her, perhaps 
 to go into the dark valley alone, and who could tell 
 how close she was, or she must send Cetangi a 
 message instead of going. How had she strength for 
 this? 
 
MISREPRESENTED 179 
 
 A third time she tried, silently, to release her hand. 
 
 But again the pathetic eyes completed the work of 
 the clinging hands. 
 
 "Tell him how it is," she entreated. "Tell him 
 that I'll see him by and by, make him understand 
 why I cannot come now ; will you, Talmas ? " And 
 with a nod Tahnas withdrew dropping the curtain 
 behind her. 
 
 But before she could go to Cetangi standing out 
 side, she had first to recount to those within how 
 Ahsaniak would die holding fast Onoqua's hand. 
 When, finally, she went to speak to the young man, 
 he had gone nearly out of sight in his walk up and 
 down before the house. While she was waiting for 
 his return, one of the women in the room came to the 
 door on her way home. 
 
 "I'll tell him," she said. "You needn't wait." 
 And Tahnas went into the house again. 
 
 Ahsaniak, left alone with Onoqua, with the captured 
 hand in her own, looked up at the girl with a smile 
 so beautiful that Onoqua could never forget it. Then 
 her face settled into its quiet again, she withdrew one 
 hand and the clasp of the other lightened ; again her 
 eyelids dropped for a longer and a longer time, and 
 then closed altogether. She was so pale, so still, that 
 
180 ONOQUA 
 
 the watcher bent forward to listen if there were any 
 breath, or if this were the end. No, Ahsaniak was 
 breathing very faintly ; she was asleep. 
 
 The girl watched her attentively for a time, the 
 breathing still went on ; the grasp had relaxed so 
 that she gently drew away her hand, and yet Ahsan 
 iak did not wake. For a few minutes at least, all 
 seemed well. And now Onoqua would go to find 
 Cetangi; she would see him and speak to him, 
 unless Pejito should do it first. And she shuddered. 
 
 The outer room was empty for the time, the women 
 had gone home because it was late. " Did you tell 
 him ? " she asked Tahnas as she threw on her cloak. 
 And Tahnas assented, having delivered the girl's 
 message exactly to the woman who had promised to 
 deliver it to Cetangi already coming toward the house 
 again. Onoqua went out. Surely, he would be near. 
 . No one was in sight. She looked up and down the 
 path, dreading to turn in the wrong direction when 
 every moment was precious. Would he not be likely 
 to learn where Mahaka was, and try to find him, if, 
 indeed, he had not been there first ? Yet in that case, 
 he might have gone back to wait for her. 
 
 But Cetangi had not gone to Mahaka. He had 
 met the woman who had come out of the house where 
 
MISREPRESENTED 181 
 
 he knew Onoqua was, and Naumatin's evil eyes had 
 looked into his. " I bring you a message from Ono 
 qua," she had said after her greeting. " She will not 
 see you. She has been told you asked for her, and 
 she will not see you. But perhaps you're not like 
 our braves in our tribe ; it may be you'll ask her 
 again, you'll, want to see her so much. She knows 
 you're here ; she will stay in the house, or why didn't 
 she come to the door to speak to you when you'd 
 come so far to see her ? Onoqua's a great lady. If 
 Cetangi waits round long enough, he may see the 
 print of her footsteps in the snow, he may have that 
 to make him happy." And to this jeer she added 
 others, until Cetangi turned on his heel and hurried 
 away from her. She watched him out of sight. 
 "Naumatin's tongue is longer than Pejito's arm," she 
 muttered. 
 
 Onoqua had not gone far when a figure came toward 
 her that at first she thought was Cetangi ; and her 
 quick pace slackened, she would not fly to meet him. 
 But the step out of which the lightheartedness of 
 youth had gone, the mournful eyes, were not Cetangi's. 
 Opposite her he stopped; his look questioned her 
 with pathetic eagerness. He hesitated, then he asked, 
 " Onoqua, is Ahsaniak living ? " 
 
182 ONOQUA 
 
 " Only just living, Howaxte," she answered him 
 with her eyes full of tears. He moved aside for her 
 to pass on, and when after a minute she looked back, 
 he had disappeared. She went forward faster than 
 before. 
 
DID SHE TELL YOU? 183 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 DID SHE TELL YOtJ? 
 
 MAUKEENEET coming from the home of one of her 
 friends passed the woods that ran far up one of the 
 hills which formed the dividing line between the two 
 rivers on which were the greater part of the settle 
 ments of the reservation. It was near here that 
 Cetangi had spoken in the autumn and roused the 
 opposition of many of the Indians. 
 
 The slanting sun shone through the lower boughs 
 of some of the nearest trees, and her quick eye 
 detected among the long shadows that fell there two 
 figures which, surely, were not thrown by any 
 trees. 
 
 Following up the irregular outlines, she saw a man 
 unfastening his horse. 
 
 Immediately she ran toward him, and panting from 
 her haste, and the steep climb, arrived just as he was 
 mounting. He took his foot from the stirrup as she 
 called his name, and accepted the hand she held out 
 to him in greeting. 
 
 "Why, Cetangi! Where did you come from, and 
 
184 ONOQFA 
 
 where are you going in such a hurry that you can 
 hardly speak to me ? " 
 
 " I came from a long way off. And I'm going back 
 again." 
 
 Then his gloomy face suddenly lighted. "Who 
 sent you here, Maukeeneet ? " 
 
 "Who sent me here? Why, nobody. Who sent 
 you here ? And what are you going home for when 
 you've just come ? " She scanned him with deter 
 mined curiosity. What was the matter with him ? 
 As he did not answer her at once, she asked, " You've 
 seen Mahaka, and Onoqua ? " 
 
 "No" he answered. "Mahaka doesn't know I'm 
 here, and your sister has refused to see me, Mau 
 keeneet. She would not even come to the door to 
 speak to me." And he turned to his horse again, and 
 again put his foot into the stirrup. 
 
 " But she sent you some word ? She sent you why ? " 
 
 " Yes, she sent me why ; she didn't want to. She 
 thinks that's reason enough." He flung himself upon 
 his horse. " Good-by," he said. 
 
 Maukeeneet stood in dumb amazement at this 
 revelation of Onoqua. Cetangi gathered his reins. 
 The horse took a step forward into the steep path ; 
 but Cetangi must wait until the girl should move 
 
DID SHE TELL YOU ? 185 
 
 before, lie could go further. She barred his way. 
 "Who told you?" 
 
 " Naumatin ; she came out of the house." 
 
 Maukeeneet had a very sweet smile, and it broke 
 out now like the sunshine. " Naumatin is my mother. 
 I know her very well. She speaks the truth. But 
 Naumatiii doesn't give everything away at once. 
 She doesn't tell all the truth always ; she tells a 
 part and saves the rest for another time. Did she 
 tell you that Ahsaniak is dying ? And that Onoqua 
 is taking care of her ? " 
 
 Cetangi sprang to the ground. He threw off the 
 reins, not seeing whither, and came up to Maukeeneet. 
 "Perhaps she could not come," he said. And his 
 voice was vibrating with delight. 
 
 The girl's laugh rang out under the trees, so long, so 
 full of uncontrollable mirth, that the young man stood 
 abashed and the blood surged up into his face. 
 "I I don't see anything to laugh at," he said, 
 embarrassed and annoyed. 
 
 Maukeeneet's eyes danced with their fun. "0, 
 Cetangi, that's because you haven't gone round on 
 the other side of it. If you were I and I were you, 
 you'd see it fast enough." Suddenly, she looked at 
 him gravely. " Was it better two minutes ago ? " 
 
186 ONOQUA 
 
 she asked. "If you want to," she added, without 
 giving him time to answer her, " you may wait here. 
 I'm going to see Onoqua." 
 
 And she ran down the hill, and was soon out of 
 sight. 
 
 Half a mile beyond, she met her sister, who told 
 her errand and begged her to wait with Ahsaniak, 
 and asked if she had met Cetangi. Maukeeneet 
 answered gravely that she had passed him somewhere 
 near the woods, and he might still be there. 
 
 The snow gave out a crisp sound under Onoqua's 
 swift steps. The ground was sparkling with the 
 bright mantle, the western sky was radiant ; all her 
 pathway was lit with splendor. She was passing 
 from death to life, from her haunting fears of the 
 fate of Cetangi to his living, speaking presence. 
 Her words must be few, for at home a duty waited 
 her. But could he not see her again to tell her more 
 of his work for their people, the common cause ? 
 This was what she said to herself. Yet under it, her 
 heart was beating with a strange wonder that Cetangi 
 should come at all. 
 
 In sight of the woods her steps lagged a little, for 
 Cetangi came down the road toward her as if Mer 
 cury's winged shoes were on his feet. 
 
DID SHE TELL YOU ? 187 
 
 Onoqua did not need the sunset glow in her face 
 to illumine it to him. All her loveliness, all his 
 boldness rushed over him at the sight of her, and 
 that fear which does not shame a warrior filled his 
 heart. He was so unworthy of her, how could she 
 help seeing it ? He looked at her in a sudden embar 
 rassment and held out his hand in greeting. " How 
 do you do, Onoqua ? " he said simply. 
 
 She answered him, and added that she did not 
 know he had been about the reservation. 
 
 " I've come only now," he said. And there was a 
 momentary silence. Onoqua longed to ask about his 
 escape, but she could not bring forward a matter 
 with which she herself had had so much to do. Had he 
 come from his own reservation ? " No," he answered 
 her. " There was nothing to do there. Nobody can 
 be a man there as things are now, only an Indian. 
 I've been working." 
 
 And he gave the experience of the winter. 
 
 She listened with breathless eagerness as the two 
 went slowly on toward her home, for she had told 
 him that poor Ahsaniak must not wake and find her 
 gone. 
 
 Cetangi leading his horse, talked more and more 
 earnestly, watching the interest in the sweet face be- 
 
188 ONOQUA 
 
 side him, and the light that shone in the eyes now 
 raised to his, and now drooping in a new shyness. 
 She did not hear every word he said to her, for the 
 constant thought that all her fears had fled like night 
 before the sunrise and Cetangi was walking in health 
 and strength beside her. And in going on nearer 
 and nearer to Ahsaniak, to give her last comfort to 
 the dying girl, it was still always life, and not death, 
 that was filling Onoqua's heart. 
 
 " It has been very different with us here," she said. 
 " The winter has been so hard and there has been so 
 little hope. But I always believe that God will re 
 member us." 
 
 And she went on to tell him in detail many of the 
 sufferings of the past months, not of her own, but of 
 those of the people about her, even poorer than she 
 was, and without the little knowledge that helped 
 her in many ways. As she talked, the loveliness of 
 her character came out more and more, and the young 
 man drew closer as they went on, and listened with 
 only a word of comment now and then. 
 
 All at once she stopped. "I ought to remember 
 it's so different from your life," she said. "Perhaps 
 you don't care for all this, I mean, all these stories 
 
DID SHE TELL YOU ? 189 
 
 about people that you scarcely know. And you've 
 done so differently, so much." 
 
 " Onoqua ! " He stood before her in the path. 
 She looked at him with eyes in which the wonder 
 deepened, until they fell before the gaze that met 
 them. " Onoqua, I've done nothing, I can do nothing 
 without you. It's for you I've come here. My 
 heart is full of you all the time. I love you, Onoqua. 
 I want you for my wife. This is what I've come to 
 tell you." 
 
 As he stood still barring her way, slowly the girl 
 looked up at him. His flashing eyes, his tones vi 
 brating with passion and delight, sight and music 
 wedded unto words, told all the story to her. 
 
 In his arms she hid her face close away from those 
 eyes she could not meet. And if he scarcely caught 
 her whispered words, he understood them. 
 
 And yet it was soon, very soon, that the two were 
 walking on again toward Onoqua's home. She had 
 remembered Ahsaniak. 
 
 Cetangi looked at her with new trust. Something 
 in her heart would be forever beyond his reach ; it 
 belonged to God. And his reverent nature saw in 
 this the source of her loveliness. 
 
 Ahsaniak lay motionless. But life had not gone. 
 
190 ONOQUA 
 
 For, as Onoqua bent over her, she perceived that the 
 breathing had not grown fainter. On the contrary, 
 wonderful as it was, yet in the deep and quiet sleep 
 that had fallen upon her, it seemed to the watcher that 
 this breath had steadied itself and gained some 
 what. 
 
FACE TO FACE 191 
 
 CHAPTER XXV 
 
 FACE TO FACE 
 
 CETANGI running lightly down the hill after he had 
 left Onoqua, came face to face with a large Indian on 
 whose lowering countenance were lines of craft that 
 are usually considered to belong to lighter muscles. 
 
 This Indian at the sight of Cetangi stopped sud 
 denly, drew back, stood a moment as if to make sure 
 that his eyes were not deceiving him, and without 
 any other greeting than his prolonged stare was about 
 to turn off on one side of the trail. 
 
 Instantly, Cetangi's pistol was levelled at him. 
 
 " One step, and you're a dead man," cried the young 
 Indian. " My aim will be better than yours. Stand 
 there, Pejito. Pve something to say to you." 
 
 " Are you coming back here ? " asked Pejito, meet 
 ing fully the eyes he could not avoid. 
 
 "What I do is no concern of yours," returned 
 Cetangi. "I shall render you no account of my 
 actions, or my plans. But I have one thing to say to 
 you. What you tried to do last fall is known where 
 you would not want it known. I have those who can 
 prove, and if anything happens to me on this reserva- 
 
192 ONOQUA 
 
 tion, or anywhere else within reach of you, you will 
 suffer for it ; and for what you tried to do before. 
 Try it when you like. That's all I want of you. 
 Tell Kasde and the others what I've said." He 
 dropped his pistol to give his hearer a chance to pass 
 on. 
 
 But Pejito stood a moment. There was more than 
 personal hatred in his heart. Things were going on 
 so well on the reservation, the long, slow plans of the 
 deeper heads among the Indians were working them 
 selves out. Day by day he was gaining influence 
 among the wildest of the people, as well as with those 
 who were turning more and more away from their 
 former desire for the white man's ways. Was this 
 young man coming here now to upset the best of his 
 work ? For Cetangi's words still lingered in the hearts 
 of those who had listened to him. Pejito looked at 
 him steadily, even coming a few steps nearer. 
 
 " Pejito scorns those that flee," he retorted. " But," 
 and his voice deepened, " the curse of Wanigiska. 
 You will not escape that ; " 
 
 " I defy the curse of Wanigiska. I warn you of 
 the curse of God. That is all any man should fear." 
 And Cetangi came down the slope, passed by Pejito 
 and out of sight in the turnings of the way, while the 
 other still stood looking back at him. 
 
FACE TO FACE 193 
 
 Onoqua ? This was what Cetangi's coming meant. 
 True, Pejito had seen a girl in another tribe whom 
 he knew was better suited to him, whose ways had 
 pleased him, and whose reception of him had nattered 
 his vanity. For what he would have called his heart 
 had been caught at the rebound. If not the civilized 
 girl, then an Indian to the top of her bent. Still, he 
 was in no mood to see Cetangi win where he had 
 failed. 
 
 But if anything were done to him, and the white 
 man should begin to question, where would he stop ? 
 There were things to be brought about in Indian 
 liberty, the whole success of which depended upon 
 secrecy. He would consult the others, not, surely, on 
 account of Onoqua, but as to what might be done 
 with Cetangi for the safety of their cause. 
 
 Plainly, nothing. 
 
 Onoqua sitting by Ahsaniak, saw Pejito go past in 
 gloomy meditation, saw him glance at the house with 
 a scowl of malignity. He must have 'just met 
 Cetangi, and now she had learned the story of the 
 autumn. She fell on her knees in sudden terror and 
 prayed for the life of the man she loved. 
 
 That evening Matoska sat by his fireside talking 
 with Cetangi. Onoqua flitted back and forth, now 
 
194 ONOQUA 
 
 with Ahsaniak, and then for a few minutes listening 
 to the two. Matoska heard the story of Cetangi's 
 winter, and full of respect for his prospective son-in- 
 law, he yet sighed. " You'll be all gone away from 
 us then," he said. 
 
 Onoqua standing for a moment beside her lover, 
 laid her hand lightly upon Matoska's shoulder. 
 "We're always one with you, father," she said. 
 " Don't be afraid. We all belong to one another." 
 
 Cetangi looked up at her suddenly. 
 
A JUNE DAY 195 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 A JUNE DAY 
 
 IT was a day in early June. The tender green 
 of the young leaves was still upon the trees, the 
 brightness of the grass knew no fading of time, the 
 clouds floated high, and through the heaviest of them 
 the sunlight struck so that they dazzled the eyes of 
 those who in them would have sought for rain or an 
 augury of sorrow. This was the wedding morning of 
 Onoqua and Cetangi. The ceremony was to take 
 place at Mr. Griswald's house. Many guests were 
 invited, and everything was to be done to give impor 
 tance to a marriage in the white man's way. 
 
 It was a busy morning. Mrs. Griswald was most 
 active, but Mrs. Winder was not far behind; even 
 the agent went back and forth briskly more than 
 once, coming out of the house with a well-pleased 
 expression. 
 
 The guests began to arrive early. The men came 
 up to Cetangi in groups of twos and threes. As they 
 sought out on ration days every bit of savage finery 
 to display in honor of the savagery of the day, so, 
 
196 ONOQUA 
 
 here with a nice sense of the fitness of things, they 
 had labored to make themselves as far as possible in 
 accordance with the American order of things going 
 on at the house of the white man. The honor done 
 to Onoqua was in a sense honor to them also, and 
 they did their best to reciprocate it. For whatever 
 of citizen's dress they possessed was worn on the 
 occasion. 
 
 The result on that far-away reservation, into which 
 civilization had entered slowly and slightly, was 
 unique. Matoska's overalls had been replaced by 
 nether garments more appropriate to the occasion, 
 and he wore a coat of deer skin exquisitely em 
 broidered, and a stove-pipe hat which, as he did not 
 think it proper upon such a day of ceremony to 
 remove it, somewhat interfered with his comfort by 
 hitting against the ceiling of the low-studded room 
 whenever in a moment of forgetfulness he lifted his 
 tall figure to its full height. But the moccasins still 
 held their own, and to some extent compensated for 
 the inconvenience of the headdress. 
 
 Tahnas, with scarlet ribbon at her throat lying 
 against a neat print dress, felt as really at the dawn 
 of a strange day as if she herself had been a bride, 
 and, it must be confessed, no ballroom belle in a robe 
 
A JUNE DAY 197 
 
 of her own designing and confident of its success, 
 ever watched more keenly and covertly for the evi 
 dences of her triumph. She would be Indian again to 
 morrow, but who could say that she did not know 
 how to be civilized ? If Haneeyet's dress was Indian, 
 yet her hat was as much a white girPs as if it were 
 still in New York, from which place in some mysteri 
 ous way it had wandered. Maukeeneet's blue muslin 
 was very pretty and becoming, and more than one of 
 the young men looked at her with a new approval. 
 
 Onoqua's simple white dress was the gift of the 
 agent and his wife, and Cetangi had gathered for her 
 a great bunch of violets half hidden in their leaves, 
 though she had thought it was too late for them. 
 
 Even the many Indian costumes in the assembly 
 were modified, here by a red or a blue necktie, there 
 by a pair of boots, most frequently by a hat of some 
 shape which had once been fashionable in some far- 
 off city; and one Indian being possessed of a 
 pair of gloves, probably thrown aside by some travel 
 ler, wore them peeping out from under his blanket 
 with every movement, to his own immense satisfac 
 tion which quite overbalanced the discomfort. 
 
 Waha would not come. Pejito was absent from the 
 reservation. His wife was present in full Indian 
 
198 OXOQUA 
 
 finery. Mahaka in his school suit looked well at 
 Cetangi's side. 
 
 Howaxte, the friend of both, came in last, also in 
 his school suit, but with no holiday aspect. He tried 
 to do his part well, but Onoqua's eyes dimmed with 
 sudden tears as she looked at him. For, through all 
 the joyful music of her heart, there floated a minor 
 strain full of the tears of one voice that should have 
 rung with laughter, the once happy voice of a girl. 
 
 After the wedding came the feast. This was held 
 in Matoska's house, or rather, about his house. It 
 was from this feast that the two had come to the 
 house built by Cetangi, and furnished with odds and 
 ends that would have done little to satisfy a more 
 exacting bride. But Onoqua's judgment and taste 
 had made the best of her small possessions, and she 
 would not listen to Cetangi's assertions that they 
 were not what she ought to have. 
 
 The two turned to the door. The cottage was on 
 the side of a hill, farther back from the river than 
 the two other houses in sight, and on higher ground. 
 They looked down upon these and upon the bright 
 stream on which the western sun was then shining. 
 The golden light struck across the grass and sifted 
 through the foliage of the trees, until all the air 
 seemed glowing. 
 
A JUKE DAY 199 
 
 As they stood there, Cetangi's arm about Onoqua, 
 her hand resting on his shoulder, her sweet face 
 suddenly grew sad. For between her and the glowing 
 sky there rose up the vision of the face that, as she and 
 Cetangi were on their way here, had for one instant 
 looked out at them from the thicket beyond Matoska's 
 house, where its owner had hidden herself all that 
 day, a face so wan, so despairingly sad, that Onoqua 
 could have wept at the sight of it. For Ahsaniak 
 had not died as men call death. Many times had 
 Onoqua wished that the poor girl had gone out of life 
 with the smile of peace upon her lips. But she had 
 lived, to die in all but breath, lived to separation from 
 all about her, to an isolation complete in the midst of 
 life, a death without its sanctity. Waha had refused 
 ever to see her again. The shelter of Matoska's roof 
 was still hers ; but this shelter was all. To Onoqua's 
 further entreaties he had been inexorable. She must 
 bear her punishment, her life apart. That afternoon 
 as Onoqua had come up the hill with Cetangi, Ahsa 
 niak had looked out at them. But before Onoqua could 
 call her, she had vanished again. It would have been 
 useless to try to follow her then, but she should be 
 sought out the next day. 
 
 And then Onoqua's eyes came back to Cetangi, 
 
200 OtfOQtTA 
 
 and again she saw the golden glory before them, as 
 through the hill gaps the clear sun shone its brilliant 
 prophecy of the morrow. With a smile she looked 
 into his face. 
 
 As Cetangi stood looking out upon his future home, 
 it seemed all at once as if the band of hills behind 
 which the sun was hastening to drop down rose up 
 before him like a barrier, that he could never climb 
 them, that they were holding him down, closing him 
 in ; as if they were nearer than ever before, higher, 
 and kept off the light and air of heaven. Beyond 
 them was the life that he had looked for, that he had 
 loved. In a few days after his betrothal to Onoqua 
 he had gone back to his work again, and had been 
 more successful than before. He had gone far 
 toward winning himself a vantage ground worth 
 having, toward bringing the people about him into a 
 new view of Indian possibilities and Indian rights. 
 And now, all this good work he had undone. For he 
 had heard behind him as he went away, whispers of 
 scorn at Indian instability and lack of appreciation 
 of kindness and encouragement. "What does it 
 amount to if he can do, and won't ? " people had 
 sneered. Energy, push, pluck, endurance, all the 
 qualities that had built up a continent, must be 
 
A JUNE DAY 201 
 
 wanting in one who would begin his work and desert 
 it in the height of its success. Cetangi saw that 
 with all his ambitions, he had done more harm than 
 good to his cause. 
 
 And why had he done this ? 
 
 Onoqua would not follow him. She would leave 
 him free, she would rejoice in his work. He had no 
 ties and duties to keep him in his home. But it was 
 different with her; she must not leave her people, 
 they needed her. 
 
 In all his suffering Cetangi had not hesitated. He 
 had looked into the beautiful eyes so pathetically 
 turned upon him. " I must have you, Onoqua," he 
 had said. " I will come back and live here with you." 
 
 And so from being a man free like other men, he 
 had come back to being an Indian on a reservation. 
 Only an Indian who has tasted other life and appre 
 ciated it, and from this goes back to drink to the 
 dregs the humiliation that the reservation system 
 heaps upon him can ever know the bitterness of the 
 degradation. Even now, as yet only sipping at it, 
 this bitterness filled his being. Would the time ever 
 come when he would grow accustomed to the taste, 
 and cease to mind it? His gloomy eyes fastened 
 themselves upon the hills. 
 
202 ONOQUA 
 
 The light hand pressed his shoulder. "What is 
 it, Cetangi ? What troubles you ? " 
 
 He turned. 
 
 All the scene changed. He saw only the lovely, 
 pure-hearted girl at his side, he heard, instead of 
 scorn, the marriage vows which seemed still trembling 
 on her lips. If he had lost, had he not gained 
 a thousand times more ? Who had so much right as 
 he to be perfectly happy ? Onoqua had told him 
 truly that he could do much here. Did he repent of 
 his choice ? Eepent ! Would he not make the same 
 at this moment if it were needed ? 
 
 My darling ! " 
 
 But as he felt her heart beating against his own, 
 he remembered again the different life that he had 
 dreamed of for her. 
 
 Then, in the sweetness of her presence there came 
 to him a sense of that freedom of soul which may be 
 a human being's under all circumstances. 
 
GATHERING CLOUDS 203 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII 
 
 GATHERING CLOUDS 
 
 IT was a happy summer to Cetangi with Onoqua 
 beside him. The weather had been good and the 
 harvest promised fairly. He saw the brighter side of 
 all things, and when his melon patch, which he had 
 hoped would bring him in some money, brought only 
 a party of Indians who feasted on them until not a 
 melon remained, he listened to Onoqua's patient 
 prophecy that the people would learn better in time, 
 and laughed at the surprise that the descent of the 
 Indians had been to him, and at the recollection of 
 how they had enjoyed the feast, and how they had 
 eaten. The sunshine of the long summer days, the 
 happy talks and plans, the work that he and Onoqua 
 did together, filled his heart. The two, certainly, set 
 an example of industry, but if this was observed, it 
 was not imitated. 
 
 One day Cetangi remonstrated with Matoska, 
 because he was practically doing nothing, and would 
 have no crops. 
 
 But we have to go to the beef issue every week in 
 
204 ONOQUA 
 
 the summer, and, you know, Cetangi, ration day 
 comes two days after. We can't help that; we have 
 to get our food. This ground doesn't raise much. 
 How can I hoe my corn when I have to go off to 
 the agency ? How can any of us ? If they give us 
 farms where we make money, that's different. But 
 we like it here, we want to stay. We get some hay ; 
 that does very well. But we're tired of beef. W^e 
 want our old food, we want our buffalo again. This 
 grass grows for him. We like to hunt ; we are men 
 then; we do as we please. We hoe our corn for 
 nothing but just to have the white man see we can 
 work. When the white man works he gets money. 
 Hey, Cetangi ? He's right to work then. We 
 work, too, when that time comes. But now when we 
 get money we always owe it to a white man ; I don't 
 know how it happens. The Government doesn't give 
 us our beef ; we've paid for it over and over. We're 
 not beggars ; we have money. And if we don't get 
 any food out of the white man for our land, we get 
 nothing at all. We Indians like to trade, too; we 
 know how." 
 
 And Matoska's laugh had the ring of tragedy in 
 it. He was so ignorant, so helpless ; and he per 
 ceived neither. 
 
GATHERING CLOUDS 205 
 
 And at the feasts to which he occasionally went 
 because there was nothing else to go to, Cetangi 
 caught references to the country being made for the 
 buffalo, and mysterious hints as if the past had not 
 gone out of reach forever. 
 
 With autumn the prospect darkened. There was 
 more dancing, more complaint, more reason for the 
 latter. Cetangi was not the only Indian who per 
 ceived in their situation the lack of that motive for 
 exertion which in all lands goads on the white 
 man, the reward of it. 
 
 " We must be patient, Cetangi," said Onoqua, one 
 of these autumn days, answering his expression, for 
 he had said nothing. " I'm sure it's the right way." 
 
 "Patient, Onoqua?" he said, glancing through 
 the open door at the signs in the landscape. Here 
 was winter at hand. The stiffened leaves of the trees 
 gave out a crisp sound as they moved with the first 
 faint breath of that wind that would soon whistle in 
 rage through the bare boughs, winter with nothing 
 wherewith to make ready for the snow and the long 
 cold. " Do you mean with the patience of the hunter, 
 that long waiting that has victory at the end of it ? 
 Yes, we can show that patience. But patience for 
 nothing ? Why, Onoqua ? " He came still closer to 
 
206 ONOQUA 
 
 her. " Give Mahaka an anvil and some iron, and 
 horses to shoe, and money when he has done it, and 
 he would never dance another medicine dance. You 
 know it. I've seen him work out there at school, 
 and for months straight on. He likes money. He 
 got it out there. He didn't spend it all, either. Give 
 him the work, now, before he gets back too far, and 
 he'd be all right. You know it," he repeated, and 
 resumed his walk. 
 
 "Yes, Cetangi," she answered him with a sob. 
 " But I haven't got the work. It isn't here." 
 
 "It ought to be here; and it's somewhere," he 
 answered, and turned away abruptly. In a moment 
 as he came back, he stopped before her again. " If 
 enough of us did well," he said, " the white people 
 would believe in us, and then," he broke off in his 
 eager speech. 
 
 "And then, -what?" 
 
 " Then they would save the rest. They would find 
 out it would pay. White people are always willing 
 to do things that they see are going to pay." 
 
 Onoqua's eyes flashed responsively, and then fell 
 again, and she sighed. 
 
 She was thinking of Mahaka. 
 
THE WERE WOLF 207 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII 
 
 THE WERE WOLF 
 
 THE winter crept on until the days grew only little 
 arcs of light in the circle of the dark. And up from 
 the floor of the snow, out from the sky in sunshine or 
 in storm, and whirling down from the iceplains of 
 the North came the cold. In the legends of the 
 Norsemen it is in the cold, a cold fearful beyond all 
 human thought, that the darkness creeps over the 
 earth, that the doom of the gods is upon them, and 
 that ever higher and higher leaps the Were Wolf 
 fated to clutch and devour them. In the cold the 
 Were Wolf of human savagery leaps ever higher and 
 higher to catch and devour the godlike in the soul. 
 For, in prosperity, it is man's power which the cold 
 stimulates ; but in adversity, it is his savagery. 
 
 Cetangi watched in those winter days, and often, 
 sleepless, through those winter nights. For the whis 
 pers of change, perhaps of struggle, that had stolen 
 through the summer woods, rang out hoarse cries in 
 the winter sharpness, and the movements, somewhat 
 languid in the heat, had assumed the fierceness suited, 
 
208 ONOQUA 
 
 not only to the season, but also to warm the blood 
 chilled by hunger and scanty clothing. Cetangi 
 watching thus his people, and with heart aglow with 
 the sense of their wrongs and their helplessness, saw 
 the power of the new receding, and the old ways 
 gaining upon them day by day under some secret and 
 blighting influence. His words had little weight. 
 Sometimes he thought that silence would serve his 
 cause better, since it was constantly kept in the 
 minds of his hearers that he belonged to another 
 tribe, and that his advice was interference, if not 
 presumption. 
 
 So, in poverty, in anxiety, in sorrow for others, and 
 often in trouble themselves, the days wore on. 
 
 For all Onoqua's desire to have Maukeeneet go to 
 school, it would have been still more dreary without 
 her. Her wit lightened the burdens, and her knowl 
 edge of affairs was of service. She often told Cetangi 
 about things with which they would not trouble 
 Onoqua. Maukeeneet lived with Naumatin, and Nau- 
 matin knew everything that the Indians were doing, 
 and when they danced, where, and what. For Wani- 
 giska had been frequently at the reservation, and the 
 medicine dances had given place to the ghost dances. 
 And besides all this, there were murmurings about 
 
THE WERE WOLF 209 
 
 their grievances, and rumors of dissatisfaction on 
 other reservations. Maukeeneet told all this to Ce- 
 tangi, not only for sympathy, but also for guidance 
 and counsel. 
 
 And under these things which might come, were 
 the poverty and the illness already there. 
 
 But it was Onoqua, and not Maukeeneet, who told 
 Cetangi how the girl had saved herself from being 
 sold to Kasde, by vowing by the most sacred Indian 
 oath, that if she were forced to marry any Indian 
 against her will, she would at all costs, not excepting 
 life, betray Naumatin and her associates to the Gov 
 ernment. 
 
 " Newman ! " The clerk hurried up at the trader's 
 incisive tones. " Look at that fellow that's just gone 
 by. D'you see ? " 
 
 "Why, that's Waha." 
 
 The other laughed derisively. " I didn't call you 
 to tell me who the fellow was. I wish, though, you'd 
 seen the look he gave me as I called f good-morning ' 
 to him. I wanted to see what he had in his hand ; 
 and I did, I saw enough of it, Newman." 
 
 " What was it ? " 
 
 " A Winchester. I could swear it was the twentieth 
 
210 ONOQUA 
 
 I've seen in those fellows' hands this week, and how 
 many there are we haven't seen passes me. 'Twould 
 be safe to say every man has one, and the boys and 
 the women, for anything we know to the contrary. I 
 tell you what, man, I sometimes begin to suspect this 
 climate doesn't suit my constitution." 
 
 " Health would fare better elsewhere, hey ? Waha 
 isn't the man you like to see with a Winchester." 
 
 " Will you tell me the Indian you like to see with 
 one ? " 
 
 " Oh, the educated ones are not going on the war 
 path." 
 
 "Wait, Newman, until this seething Christ craze 
 gets to the boiling point. Dancing's nothing. But 
 when it comes to Winchesters, it may occur to the 
 Indians to help the Christ in this work of extermina 
 tion of the whites. In that case, we should get it ; 
 though the end is not doubtful. For whatever Christ 
 may have in store for their Indian pleasure, they'll 
 get in another world ; we'll take care of them in this 
 one." 
 
 As he turned with a brutal laugh, he started. 
 
 Cetangi stood only a few feet away, his eyes on the 
 speaker's face. 
 
 "Then, you think there's no Christ for us in this 
 
THE WERE WOLF 211 
 
 world ? " he began ; but broke off in open scorn at the 
 expression on the other's face. 
 
 " I've no gun with me. Don't be afraid, Mr. Hines. 
 What would be the use in killing you if I wanted to 
 kill at all ? We'd only get somebody else. What 
 we hate is the whole thing. We want no agents, no 
 agencies ; we want to live under the laws of the 
 country. I've seen the people that come in the ships 
 into New York to be civilized ; they're wild enough. 
 But they go to work. They get civilized as they go 
 along. You don't shut white people up in reserva 
 tions." 
 
 " Nobody to do it," sneered Hines. 
 
 He retreated a step at the flash in Cetangi's eyes. 
 
 The Indian turned away. 
 
 It was the last insult that Hines' position in the 
 Indian service gave him a chance to utter to an 
 Indian. 
 
 He had of late winced more than once at evidences 
 of new vigilance at the head of affairs. There were 
 too many people turning up unexpectedly, too many 
 questions to be answered, too much investigation. He 
 had decided to resign. 
 
 He was a day too late. A very different person 
 from Winder suddenly appeared as Inspector. The 
 
212 ONOQUA 
 
 very people whom Hines had wronged witnessed 
 against him. 
 
 He was discharged. 
 
 That morning Newman looked after him. " Poor 
 fellow ! " he said. " Pity he isn't white ; he's almost 
 smart enough to be." Then he went into the store 
 and forgot all about Cetangi, until that evening when 
 with Winder and Hines he was talking over the situa 
 tion. The agent was no coward. He did not antici 
 pate trouble ; his Indians would not make any unless 
 they were incited by those from the other agencies. 
 He would have been glad to banish Wanigiska. But 
 he was too wise for this. 
 
 There was one remark of Cetangi's that winter 
 which Onoqua never forgot. It was when rejoicing 
 over the contents of a box sent her by her friends at 
 the East, she tried to give him from it some little 
 thing that he needed. " No," he answered, " there 
 are people here that need it more." Then, watching 
 her in silence a moment, he added, more to relieve 
 his burdened mind than to her, " I know how to make 
 harnesses well ; I've filled orders and got praise for 
 my work. I'm able to support myself and my wife. 
 We, Indians, don't want charity ; we want a man's 
 chance, an American chance," "Yes," she answered 
 
THE WERE WOLF 213 
 
 him softly, and, suddenly, all the treasures that she 
 had been exulting over lost their brightness. Perhaps 
 Cetangi had comprehended something of this, for he 
 came forward and praised the gifts and expressed 
 gratitude to the givers. But as he left her soon after 
 upon an errand, she watched his fine, erect figure until 
 it disappeared. Was the strain too hard upon him, 
 she asked herself ? Could it be possible that he would 
 rust out in the inaction into which she had virtually 
 forced him ? If she could only see the beginning of 
 the end of this. 
 
 Coming home one day, she found standing motion 
 less before her door, Ahsaniak. It was the first time 
 that the girl had come to her house, and Onoqua 
 greeted her with delight with which there mingled 
 curiosity, for Ahsaniak, so far from resisting the 
 isolation to which she had been doomed, had in every 
 way possible made it more complete. That morning 
 her humility and shrinking had not gone. But the 
 other saw in her face a softness which had not been 
 there before, as if it were from shadow made by sun 
 shine, and not all darkness, as it once had been. 
 
 In the cottage alone together by the fire, Ahsaniak 
 sitting where she chose to sit at Onoqua's feet, 
 leaning against her friend and looking up into her 
 
214 ONOQUA 
 
 face, told her errand. There had come some one to 
 Matoska to ask her of him in marriage, for she was 
 under Matoska's care. "Am I too wicked, Onoqua ? " 
 she asked. " There is only one to do that," she added, 
 and paused. And in the pause a flush came into the 
 pale face, and in the sad eyes sprang up a light of 
 joy. " It's only Howaxte to do that, Onoqua." And 
 the light still shone in her face. " Am I too wicked ? 
 I know you will tell me truly, Onoqua." Again the 
 young head drooped in its habitual humility, and the 
 face with its downcast eyes was paler and sadder 
 than ever. 
 
 " Will you be assured if I tell you what God says, 
 Ahsaniak ? " 
 
 And she went to her bookcase and brought back 
 her Bible. Like one whom love had made familiar 
 with its deepest meanings, she read passage after 
 passage of forgiveness and love. "Don't you see, 
 Ahsaniak," she said, "it is God that has given you 
 Howaxte ? " 
 
 " Then I may love him ? " And Onoqua, looking 
 into the eager face upraised to hers, saw for one in 
 stant the old dimple dawn there. It had gone ; it was 
 long before she saw it again. " It will be a marriage 
 like yours, Onoqua," Ahsaniak went on ; "I mean, it 
 
THE WERE WOLF 215 
 
 will be by Mr. Griswald ; not like yours in any other 
 way. Nobody will be there but you, if you will come. 
 But it shall not be Indian. If it had not been for 
 that, I should have married Howaxte long ago, and 
 been so happy; not like now." 
 
 Onoqua with glad heart looking after Ahsaniak, 
 saw Pejito and Wanigiska going by, and with them 
 in close conference, Mahaka. She knew what it 
 meant. There was to be a ghost dance that night, 
 that is to say, it was to begin then, nobody could tell 
 when it would end ; none the sooner for this confer 
 ence, she was sure. 
 
 As she stood watching, Cetangi came toward them. 
 Onoqua saw him stop and speak with them, and then 
 he came on again. With a scorn of the unreasoning 
 fear that had seized upon her, she told herself that 
 she had never so much as imagined that he would 
 walk a step with them in their ways. 
 
 In the spring of 1890 Winder's confidence was 
 restored. Now the Indians would begin their plough 
 ing, now the little danger there had been was over. 
 
216 ONOQUA 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX . 
 
 A COUNCIL OF STATE 
 
 IT was the November of 1890. 
 
 Among the hills which stretch across the reserva 
 tion, and sheltered by its position from the north 
 wind, stood a tepee in which a great fire was blazing. 
 Around this fire there sat one evening a Council of 
 State, the councillors self-appointed, the state one 
 which was yet to be, a state as wild as the surround 
 ings and the costume of its representatives. Here 
 were from a dozen to twenty men. Upon the faces 
 of some of them was already stamped an assurance of 
 the triumph that the future promised ; but others 
 were more wary and held back the first from precipi 
 tate action. 
 
 " All is ready," said one of these first. " Sitting 
 Bull has the promise of the chiefs of many tribes. 
 We've only to join him. All the Sioux are here with 
 him. The Shoshones will move when he gives the 
 word, and the best of the Cheyennes. And these are 
 only the beginning. You will yet see the land alive. 
 This is what we mean when we say the earth will 
 
A COUNCIL OF STATE 217 
 
 move. When once we are free, you will see how 
 these quiet ones will pour forth from all quarters to 
 join us. The white man teaches how to be strong. 
 We will all join together." 
 
 " Where shall we camp ? " asked Pejito. 
 
 " In the Bad Lands, out of the white man's reach. 
 We shall sweep down upon them, not they upon us. 
 I say to you we have only to begin and thousands 
 will come to us. What are you waiting for, Waha ? " 
 demanded Wanigiska. 
 
 He was not now and here the Messenger of the 
 Christ. To the chief conspirators he had come from 
 Sitting Bull ; it was from him that he had drawn 
 whatever wisdom and inspiration he possessed. And 
 now he unfolded the counsels of the crafty leader 
 with a decision that met with universal assent. 
 
 " What are you waiting for, Waha ? " repeated 
 Shonkaza, one of the wise men, and the others echoed 
 his question. 
 
 Waha stretched out his hands to the blaze, and in 
 silence signed to his son. And Pejito answered with 
 deliberation, "We only wait for the ghost shirts to 
 grow strong. We must dance the magic into them. 
 We must be ready with one man to meet a hundred 
 palefaces and not turn back, but fight to the last. 
 
218 ONOQUA 
 
 Sitting Bull is very great and very wise. But Pejito 
 is a medicine man also. Does my leader, Sitting Bull, 
 want us to bring him a strong band, the flower of our 
 tribe ? Or will he have us come to him with our own 
 arms alone ? However great his power, he has never 
 refused the guns of his warriors." And with a crafty 
 smile he added, " Medicine men are always good. 
 But there must be somebody to take the medicine. 
 They're of no use all alone. Wanigiska knows that. 
 He knows his visions are not for himself." 
 
 " That's so," returned Weetkah. " They're not for 
 us either. They're for Matoska and such as he." 
 
 As the laugh went round, Wanigiska turned with a 
 frown to Pejito. "When will you be ready?" he 
 asked. 
 
 " I told you when we have danced the magic into 
 our shirts. Then I'll bring you the best of our tribe." 
 
 " All the young men ? " 
 
 A sudden scowl flashed over Pejito's face. "Yes, 
 all worth anything." 
 
 " You forget Cetangi," whispered Kasde. 
 
 A look blacker than he had ever seen before an 
 swered him, as there came back the hoarse whisper, 
 " We'll not leave Cetangi, only his body. He thinks 
 Pejito has forgotten. He laughs now. He shall find 
 how it is." 
 
A COUNCIL OF STATE 219 
 
 Kasde nodded. 
 
 Teopasha began to speak. 
 
 The men whom it would be safe to initiate further 
 into these schemes for the future, and those who 
 could only blindly follow their leaders were marked 
 off. The women, too, came under discussion for the 
 work they would do. " The white man doesn't sus 
 pect a squaw. If you had one that would go about 
 everywhere and sow her words softly, like corn drop* 
 ping into the ground, she would do much," suggested 
 Wanigiska. 
 
 "Nauniatin loves to sow war as most squaws love 
 peace," returned Pejito. "Naumatin fears nothing 
 and hates everybody. All are afraid of her, and lis 
 ten to what she says, and obey her. The Great Spirit 
 that wills our victory must have sent Naumatin 
 here." 
 
 " Beware how we let a woman deep into our coun 
 sels," said Oakha, the Sioux. 
 
 "Naumatin can be silent as the grave," returned 
 Waha. "She sees farther than any of us, except 
 Pejito." 
 
 Pejito's dignified silence was full of satisfaction. 
 
 "Let Pejito tell her, then," said Wanigiska. And 
 so it was determined. Pejito did not think it neces- 
 
220 ONOQUA 
 
 sary to state that she already knew all that he did 
 about the coming struggle, that it was she who had 
 taught him to foment and use the deep disaffection 
 of the heathen Indians who were willing to risk their 
 all to reinstate the old order of things, and had taught 
 him also to play upon the superstitions and unhappi- 
 ness of the half educated Indians ; and so few on 
 this reservation had ever been to school that Pejito 
 had not a hard battle. What he had to fight was the 
 subtle sense of change in the air, the sense of some 
 thing new and strange, and better, in the future 
 which, even here, filled the heart of youth with its 
 pain and its promise. This the wily leaders turned 
 often to their own account. There was to be a new 
 time better than the old, the messages of the Christ, 
 and the ghost dances roused faith in the future and 
 appealed to the wildness of the past. 
 
 It was with fresh courage in the help that Waha 
 and Pejito would bring with them that the Indian 
 plotters rolled themselves in their blankets and slept 
 the rest of the night away. 
 
 And what were they plotting ? 
 
 Indian nationality. 
 
 Against what were they combining ? 
 
 Against a system that no white man would tolerate 
 
A COUNCIL OF STATE 221 
 
 for a day, that no Indians but those who have lost 
 their birthright love of freedom can find anything but 
 tyranny. Their evil was not that they whispered of 
 Indian freedom, but that to them this meant simply 
 their own domination. 
 
 It was on the very afternoon of this council that 
 Onoqua in her home was beaming with happy smiles. 
 
 " Look at him," she cried. " Isn't he a nice, big 
 fellow ? Mother's darling. He grows so fast. See." 
 
 And she held out her five months' old baby to be 
 admired by Ahsaniak, since the spring the wife of 
 Howaxte. The child had just wakened from his nap, 
 and Onoqua stood with him uplifted in her arms press 
 ing the little cheek still flushed from sleep against 
 her own, her loving eyes looking out upon life side 
 by side with those baby eyes full of wonder at the 
 marvels he had seen in sleep or the equal marvels 
 that awakening had shown him. 
 
 "They think that Indian parents love their chil 
 dren best," she said. " But I've found out how that 
 is. A mother's a mother, that means enough." And 
 smiling softly, she put the baby into Ahsaniak's lap 
 to let her see how heavy and strong he was. "I 
 think how the big world will look to him, and of all 
 
222 ONOQUA 
 
 the things that may happen to him," she said, after 
 watching Ahsaniak for a time. " He looks like his 
 father." 
 
 " No," said Ahsaniak, " he's a little beauty, and he 
 looks exactly like you." 
 
 Onoqua laughed and shook her head. But she was 
 too human not to be pleased with the praise, what 
 ever she might think of the want of perception. 
 " Cetangi has done well for here this summer," she 
 went on. "He has raised a good deal more wheat 
 than last year, and a great many vegetables, consider 
 ing the size of the garden, and the climate, and that 
 it's all one man's work." Then the gravity that the 
 sight of her baby could not banish came into her face 
 as she added, " I believe, Ahsaniak, Howaxte and Ce 
 tangi are almost the only two men on this reservation 
 that haven't danced something sometime this last 
 year. I know that a good many of the Indians left 
 off to plant. They always do. But they go back 
 again ; they don't take care of their things after 
 they're in the ground. But there's more of the dan 
 cing than ever this year. I hoped there was going to 
 be less." 
 
 Ahsaniak played with the baby's fingers awhile; 
 then she said, " I know a good deal more about it than 
 
A COUNCIL OF STATE 228 
 
 you do, Onoqua. I used to hear bad men talk when 
 they thought all my heart was like theirs. They 
 don't dance just for amusement, there's worse than 
 that. They mean to get in every educated Indian 
 here, and not sometimes, but all the time. They 
 taunt us that the white people won't have us, we're 
 not good enough for them, they despise us ; we must 
 come back to our own. And the white people really 
 don't want us, and it's so hard to be all alone ; I know 
 how that feels. We haven't enough whites here to 
 count, and the Indians despise us because the whites 
 don't help us. I shall never go back again, but I ex 
 pect to live and die in the pain of this struggle. 
 Onoqua, I don't want anybody hurt or swept away, 
 but, 0, how I wish in some way Christ would come." 
 
 And Ahsaniak's head suddenly bent low over the 
 baby in her lap and remained bent down until her 
 trembling lips had steadied themselves. 
 
 As Cetangi came in, Onoqua noticed a heavier 
 shadow on his face. " Do you know about this coun 
 cil ? " he asked Ahsaniak. 
 
 " I only know there is one. They won't tell Ho- 
 waxte and me anything." 
 
 " True," he said. " Nor us." 
 
 " Certainly, not you," she answered him. And Ce- 
 
224 ONOQUA 
 
 tangi met a keen glance of warning. He was in 
 danger, then ? Yet, after all, what could he do ? 
 This was his home. The Lord would keep him in 
 life until it came time to die ; and fear was not one 
 of Cetangi's faults. 
 
 December came. 
 
 Signs of trouble were like snow-flakes in the air 
 when all the heavens are dark with storm. For, added 
 to biting cold, there was felt by many the keener bite 
 of hunger. More than the darkness of winter was 
 closing in. In the blackness they could not see the 
 dawning of that Star in the East for which they 
 watched so eagerly. 
 
MAUKEENEET'S NEWS 225 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 MAUKEENEET'S NEWS 
 
 " YOU'VE something to tell me. What is it, Mau- 
 keeneet ? " 
 
 " It's only for Onoqua's sake, and yours for her I 
 stay Naumatin's daughter. I'm disgusted with watch 
 ing signs and listening to plots. I like to draw and 
 paint, and be with you and Onoqua." 
 
 " Then, why don't you stay ? She's asked you 
 again and again." 
 
 " Why ? You ask why, Cetangi, when you know 
 how Naumatin loves you both. You know it's for the 
 same reason that I won't go away to school, because 
 Naumatin's vowed something will happen to you if I 
 do j and she keeps her word. The whole air is full of 
 storm ; this will burst very soon. And, Cetangi, a 
 bolt is meant for you. They've been too crafty for 
 me to have got hold of words to prove it, but I've 
 overheard what I know in my heart means this. 
 There's to be a move, perhaps to-night ; and this'll 
 be the time for them to act. I've sent off Onoqua 
 
226 ONOQUA 
 
 this afternoon on purpose to warn you. Don't answer 
 me as if you could risk everything, for if they kill 
 you, it will kill her." 
 
 "'They,' Maukeeneet? Do all the people here 
 hate me ? " 
 
 "Pejito and Naumatin make 'they'; and if some 
 of the young men don't care what they do when 
 they're mad with dancing, you're all the worse off. 
 What will you do ? " 
 
 " What can I do ? " 
 
 There followed a long silence. In it Maukeeneet's 
 quick wit ran through every device possible to fugi 
 tives, and rejected them all. If Cetangi should flee to 
 the woods, she knew that in the search for cattle he 
 might be discovered, and then there would be no 
 mercy. She knew, moreover, that he would never 
 leave Onoqua. The eagerness in her face turned to 
 despair as she stood with bent head and silent lips. 
 At last she looked up. The rare tears stood in her eyes. 
 
 " There isn't anywhere to hide, except in God, Ce 
 tangi." 
 
 A flash in the young man's eyes answered her. 
 
 " And it's safe enough there, Maukeeneet. And be 
 sides," he added, " you don't know this thing, you're 
 only afraid of it, and your care for us may make you 
 
MATJKEENEET'S NEWS 22? 
 
 imagine a little. And now tell me all you know 
 about these movements. Are they really going to 
 join the Sioux ? " 
 
 " I don't know how many. Some are certainly go 
 ing off from this very dance before they've time to 
 cool. If Naumatin didn't watch me so closely, I 
 could find out much more. But I do well, after all, 
 to get the better of her and Pejito together." And 
 with a flash of triumph in her eyes, the dimples came 
 out suddenly in Maukeeneet's face and vanished 
 again as abruptly. " Naumatin goes with them," she 
 said. And she went on to give what details she had 
 been able to gather. " The reservation will be better 
 off without them, Cetangi." 
 
 "That depends on the trail they leave. Winder 
 doesn't think the ghost dances will amount to any 
 thing. It's as well he doesn't. He couldn't get help ; 
 for he couldn't claim that we'd had any disturbance 
 here. It's just the time to have faith, Maukeeneet." 
 
 The baby stirred, and the girl took him up. 
 
 Cetangi watched her as she soothed him. He knew 
 well enough that the check he had held over Pejito 
 would hold no longer if war came. His own part now, 
 a waiting that seemed supine, was the hardest lot that 
 could have been given to him. 
 
228 ONOQUA 
 
 He took the child from Maukeeneet and walked up 
 and down with it, with the feeling that it was a 
 treasure from which he might at any moment he 
 snatched. " Let me toss him," he said. " He likes it." 
 
 And in its crowing he found comfort. 
 
GHOST DANCERS 229 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI 
 
 GHOST DANCERS 
 
 ONOQUA, returning from carrying food to a woman 
 lying ill, took the trail home past the ghost dancers, 
 for this was the shorter way, and it was late, and she 
 must get home to her baby. The spectacle was none 
 the less repugnant to her because she knew that those 
 who belonged to her were among these. Yes, there 
 was Mahaka. If he would only work as he danced, 
 what happy things he could bring about. And Ce- 
 tangi was right ; if her brother had had the chance, he 
 would have done it at one time. She could not tell if 
 it would ever be now, and what was the use of wonder 
 ing ? For the work was as far away as ever ; to-day 
 it looked impossible. There was Waha, not so active 
 as the young men, but, evidently, taking a leading 
 part. She saw Wanigiska most prominent. His pres 
 ence always made her most uncomfortable, for she re 
 membered his prediction against her husband, and 
 felt that he must hate Cetangi because this had not 
 been fulfilled. Very many others there she knew; 
 and there were some who a year ago she could not 
 
230 ONOQTTA 
 
 have been persuaded would ever have joined in a bar 
 barous rite. She thought that they would not then 
 have believed it of themselves. And what hope was 
 there for Mahaka ? For, as she looked further, there 
 was Haneeyet, his wife, leaping, shouting like a mad 
 woman, and beginning to gash herself so that the 
 blood was running. She would dance until she could 
 see her brother who had died the winter before, or un 
 til some vision of wonder was revealed to her, or she 
 should fall down in a fit brought on by her wild 
 whirling. Onoqua would have run to her, but she 
 feared to make her do greater harm to herself. 
 Trembling with pain and horror she sat watching as 
 if spellbound. 
 
 Pejito's lynx eyes discovered her early. But this 
 did not disturb him now, nor lessen his agility. His 
 squaw was the proud witness of this, and he had be 
 come convinced that he should not have known what 
 to do with Onoqua's ideas, for they seemed more en 
 during than the ground that he was stamping on so 
 furiously at times. 
 
 To the watcher, all the wild convolutions, all the 
 grotesqueness, all that was barbaric and monstrous, 
 was lost sight of as a spectacle in the consciousness of 
 this rite. It was for a purpose so sacred, and it was 
 
GHOST DANCERS 231 
 
 more opposite than the poles from every teaching 
 and principle of Him whose favor it was to call down. 
 Suddenly, she caught sight of Matoska. Her father 
 here, and among the wildest, her kind, good father ! 
 The hot tears rushed to her eyes. Ah, but Christ 
 knew that, however wrongly they implored, there was 
 need of imploring. He knew that they had bitter 
 wrongs, that many times their friends had been found 
 among those who say and do not, and their enemies 
 among those whose deeds outrun their swift words 
 of menace. He knew how little they understood, how 
 much they suffered. As the mad rite rose into more 
 and more fierceness, into impious calls and deeds, 
 there rose in her heart that prayer of Christ upon the 
 Cross : " Father, forgive them, for they know not 
 what they do," that prayer which oversweeps all 
 others, which is the deepest condemnation of ignor 
 ance that the world has known and calls upon men to 
 drive it from the earth as the murderer of the divine. 
 
 Her eyes were dim with tears as she turned away. 
 
 All at once she drew in her horse, and stood as if 
 rooted to the spot. 
 
 For, there, behind the dancers, swinging with them 
 with every movement, his eyes fastened upon the 
 wildest of them, his limbs playing in perfect and de- 
 
232 ONOQUA 
 
 lighted imitation of their contortions, his little face 
 aglow with eagerness to imitate, his eyes already 
 beginning to kindle in the ecstasy that would end in 
 frenzy, was a little boy scarcely four years old ! 
 This was his first school ; he was an apt scholar. As 
 the dance grew fiercer, hotter and hotter grew the 
 light in the little face. 
 
 With eyes too strained now for tears, Onoqua 
 watched. Her lips were parched, her hands clenched. 
 All the peril, all the horror had flashed upon her. She 
 no longer saw her father and her brother, her whole 
 world was filled with the boy. She no longer saw 
 pathos in this scene; all its savagery, its distortion 
 and defilement stamped themselves upon her soul. 
 And this boy in the midst of all, drinking in the 
 knowledge with terrible voracity ! God only knew if 
 it would not poison his soul forever. This boy, a 
 baby ! Why not her boy, her baby ? This was the 
 child of the woman whom she had just left. What if 
 Onoqua were to be ill, to die ? 
 
 She came up to the child, and spoke to him. 
 Wouldn't he like to go home with her? Or she 
 would take him to his own home. He should ride 
 with her. And she took the little fevered hand in 
 hers. 
 
GHOST DANCERS 233 
 
 But the boy plunged away with an angry cry, not 
 turning his fascinated eyes from the dance. "Let 
 him alone ! " called out Pejito. Onoqua turned away. 
 The fire of a mother's fury was in her eyes. 
 
 Behind her the dance went on faster and faster. 
 
 Maukeeneet, left alone, amused herself by making 
 a sketch of the baby as he lay asleep in his little nest 
 on the bed. She had for the moment forgotten her 
 anxieties in her occupation. She was pleased with 
 her sketch as she held it off and surveyed it. The 
 mouth was not very good, baby's mouth was too 
 lovely to imitate, but the forehead and nose were per 
 fect. On the whole, it was a success. She began to 
 grow impatient for her sister's appearance, and her 
 delighted comments. 
 
 At last she heard the sound of hoofs, and then some 
 one came in. Maukeeneet did not turn her eyes from 
 her sketch. Of course it was Onoqua, she had seen her 
 pass the window. " Come and look at this, Onoqua," 
 she cried. 
 
 No answer. A figure passed her and went toward 
 the bed. She glanced up in surprise. 
 
 Onoqua with set lips and flashing eyes was stand 
 ing there, her hair fallen out of coil and tossed 
 about in the wind by the speed at which she had 
 
234 ONOQUA 
 
 come, her cheeks flushed, her whole figure trem 
 bling . 
 
 Maukeeneet sprang up. Had it come, then ? 
 
 But as she tried to moisten her parched lips to 
 speak, Onoqua sank on her knees by the bedside and 
 clasped her child in her arms. 
 
 " 0, come to us, Thou Helper of the helpless," she 
 cried. "Turn the hearts of the white men toward 
 us. Let them help us make our land like theirs. 
 My baby! my baby!" she moaned. "0 God, help 
 us to bring him up with Christian faith about him. 
 Keep him from these terrible ways." In uncontrol 
 lable sobbing, her head sank on her child. 
 
 An hour later Cetangi came in. 
 
 "Are they going to-night ? " asked Maukeeneet. 
 
 "I don't know. You're not going back to 
 Naumatin ? " 
 
 " I shouldn't find her, unless I went to the dance," 
 she answered. "I'm never going back to stay. I 
 shall be about there sometimes, when there's any 
 thing to be heard." 
 
 At midnight, a knock at the door. Cetangi opened 
 it. 
 
 Matoska and Mahaka stood there. 
 
MAHAKA'S APPEAL 235 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII 
 MAHAKA'S APPEAL 
 
 " WE go off to-night/' began Matoska. " The new 
 time is beginning, the good time for the Indians ; we 
 want to be there. You come, too, Onoqua, you and 
 Cetangi. ' Twill be better for you." 
 
 " How will it be better for them ? " cried Mau- 
 keeneet with quick suspicion. 
 
 Her father turned upon her as guileless a face as 
 ever mortal wore, and expressing as guileless a heart. 
 Plainly, if there were mischief, he knew nothing of 
 it. " He'll have a share in the new government by the 
 Indians who are going to rule their own people as in 
 the old days," he answered. " We shall have plenty 
 to eat and the white people will not trouble us ; there 
 will be no white people." 
 
 " Have the whites you've known all been so cruel 
 you want them all destroyed ? " asked Cetangi. 
 
 Matoska said no, but what could he do, he added, 
 against what the Christ had promised ? The Indians 
 were obeying him. Sitting Bull had matters all 
 planned, he knew the right thing to do, the others 
 
236 ONOQUA 
 
 had only to go on as they were told. It was in vain 
 that Cetangi warned him that these Indians had not 
 the power they professed to have, that the whites 
 would not be all swallowed up, that Christ came to 
 save, and not to destroy. "How can you know as 
 much as Wanigiska?" was Matoska's invariable 
 answer. 
 
 But after Onoqua, sad at heart, had watched her 
 father down the hill, Mahaka lingered. 
 
 "What makes you speak so about the things 
 Wanigiska has told us ? " he questioned Cetangi. 
 
 "Wanigiska is deceiving you, Mahaka. He has 
 never seen Christ. We none of us shall here ; we can 
 only feel him in our hearts." 
 
 " But the old times back again will be better than 
 these. We all know that, Cetangi," returned the 
 young man. 
 
 "What do you know about those old times, Ma 
 haka ? " The other stood silent. " You've travelled 
 many miles through this country in going back and 
 forth from school," continued Cetangi. " You know 
 that the white men are like the blades of grass on the 
 prairies, or like the trees of the forest for number. 
 You can't believe they'll all be destroyed. But 
 supposing you could bring back the old Indian days 
 
MAHAKA'S APPEAL 237 
 
 of a hundred years ago, supposing the buffalo came 
 again, what would you gain ? Don't you like houses 
 better than tepees ? Don't you like food cooked 
 better than raw ? Don't you like clothes better than 
 skins ? And then, do you think that in the old times 
 the Indians were always warm and well fed ? Did 
 they always find the buffalo ? Didn't they know 
 hunger and cold? Didn't disease come and sweep 
 them away ? Didn't war take the best of their young 
 men ? Tell me now, Mahaka, if you had your anvil, 
 and plenty of work to keep your forge fires roaring, 
 don't you know you'd make a better living than you 
 ever could buffalo hunting ? Why don't you try it ? " 
 The young man stood with bent head. It seemed 
 to him that he was standing once more in the midst 
 of his schoolmates, that the anvils were ringing, the 
 hammers beating, and that now and then in the pauses 
 came the quick word, the gay response. How real 
 the fun had been after work. And then, in the 
 short time that he had lived among white people, 
 how pleasant their praise had been, how kind their 
 friendship. And should he ever forget the day when 
 he had goue to the bank and had his interest on his 
 bank account computed and put on his book ? What 
 possessor of millions had ever felt so rich ? How he 
 
238 ONOQUA 
 
 had planned to save and save, and what he would do 
 when he had plenty of money. And where was it all 
 now ? Only a memory more bitter than even Cetangi 
 dreamed of, or he would have spared him a little. 
 
 He raised his head defiantly. 
 
 "Where are the anvils round here? Where are 
 the shops ? Where's the work ? When I'm among 
 white men, I do as the white men do ; when I'm 
 among Indians, I do Indian. What else can I do ? 
 On the reservation I'm reservation Indian." He sud 
 denly stopped, and after a moment went on with in 
 creased vehemence, " Tell me what else there is for 
 us, Cetangi ? Where is the work you talk about ? 
 Where are the people that care about us, that will 
 help us ? Those that want to can't do it ; and the 
 others forget us. If this was like the white man's 
 land, if we could get work and money and live like 
 white people, that would all be different. But we 
 have to do something to help ourselves, and what 
 else can we do ? If I can't swing my hammer, I have 
 to shoulder my gun ; and perhaps it's just as well," 
 he added with a sombre look. "We're a different 
 race. They forget us, only when they come to shoot 
 us. We forget them, we take care of ourselves. 
 We've waited a good while for them. The old days 
 
MAHAKA'S APPEAL 239 
 
 when we thought about something like white men, 
 they will no more come back than last summer." 
 
 Onoqua had come up to her brother, and was stand 
 ing with her arms about him, her head upon his 
 shoulder. He looked down at her, and his voice 
 grew husky. " Onoqua," he said, " you and Cetangi 
 believe in the white men. Why don't you tell them 
 how it is with us ? Then, if they want to help us, 
 they will. You tell them about me, and how I came 
 to be a wild Indian again. Yes, tell them about me," 
 he repeated. 
 
 In another moment he had gone. 
 
240 ONOQUA 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII 
 
 REVENGE 
 
 AHSANIAK could not sleep. She was full of appre 
 hension without knowing any reason for special 
 anxiety. Howaxte had not been near the dancers, 
 and she had not Naumatin from whom to gather up 
 hints. She sat looking out upon a landscape which 
 the brilliant moonlight showed almost as clearly as if 
 it were in sunlight. She saw Matoska hurry by, and 
 soon after Mahaka pass with slow step and downcast 
 face ; then, suddenly, lift his head and stride on. 
 
 What did this mean ? She wondered over it, until 
 the unanswered repetition of her question made her 
 drowsy. 
 
 All at once she started wide awake. 
 
 Who was that coming across the fields ? 
 
 He was trying to avoid the open spaces. But, 
 surely, she knew him. 
 
 Was he coming to Howaxte ? She hid herself 
 behind the window and fastened her eyes upon the 
 advancing figure. 
 
 Nearer and nearer to the house it came, skirting 
 
REVENGE 241 
 
 round under the trees. Howaxte was fast asleep. 
 Ah&aniak was about to speak to him without daring 
 to turn away her eyes, when the man outside passed 
 by the house without more than a stealthy glance at 
 it to see if he were observed. He had to cross a 
 broad, open space, and here the moonlight on his face 
 showed Ahsaniak that she had recognized him in the 
 distance. Her heart stood still, for that man could 
 mean only mischief. Where was he going ? 
 
 In an instant she gave a low cry of terror. 
 
 The Indian went on with swift and cautious steps 
 until he came to Cetangi's cottage. The house was 
 still lighted. 
 
 Crouching in the shadow, he watched and waited, 
 until by the moving of the figures across the window 
 the one for whom he was watching should come 
 within range. 
 
 At last Cetangi stood there, the light of the lamp 
 behind him. The eyes of the Indian outside gloated 
 on his triumph. This time nothing could save his 
 enemy. 
 
 He took aim. 
 
 A swift, sharp blow struck up the gun which went 
 off into the air, a cry rang out, hands grasped his 
 wrist a voice said to him, "Kasde, you've done 
 
242 ONOQUA 
 
 evil enough. I, Ahsaniak, who vowed never to speak 
 to you again, beg you to spare him because he belongs 
 to Onoqua. I " 
 
 But Kasde wrenched himself free. How had 
 Ahsaniak followed him without his finding it out, but 
 by the very methods he himself had taught her? 
 She was glad enough to make use of Indian ways 
 when they served her purpose. What appeal were 
 her wrongs and her sufferings ? She had saved his 
 enemy. It should be at the cost of her own life. 
 But why should he shoot again through the still 
 night ? 
 
 With one hand he held her powerless; with the 
 other, swift as his wrath, the death weapon was 
 raised. 
 
 His descending arm lost its aim, and the gun fell 
 heavily on her shoulder and threw her on the ground. 
 
 Kasde did not raise it again for the fatal blow. 
 He himself was gasping for breath, held by the 
 throat by a grasp that had all at once made him as 
 helpless as an infant. With voice gone, life going, he 
 lifted his struggling hands for mercy. 
 
 "You want another chance to beat down Ahsa 
 niak, or to send a bullet through me," retorted 
 Cetangi without loosening his hands. 
 
REVENGE 243 
 
 "I swear by the sacred honor of an Indian," 
 signed Kasde, his very fingers by this time almost 
 refusing their office. 
 
 "You will not forego your revenge," the other 
 answered. 
 
 " This is your revenge," he returned. " I swear, 
 Cetangi, Ahsaniak." 
 
 He was free. 
 
 He lifted his gun from the ground, cast a look of 
 hatred upon both his watchers, and turned with 
 swift foot down the hill. 
 
 Cetangi looked after him with a grim laugh. 
 
 " When we adopt the white man's ways, Ahsaniak, 
 there's one Indian custom I hope we shall still keep. 
 There's not a white man in the world with a character 
 like Kasde's that I wouldn't have pointed his own 
 gun at as long as he was in sight. If the white man 
 had kept to what he swore to our people as an Indian 
 keeps his word when he swears like Kasde, things 
 would be different now with our people. Are you 
 hurt, poor child ? " he asked suddenly. And he 
 drew her toward the house. , 
 
 In another moment her head was on Onoqua's 
 shoulder. 
 
 "Why, I owed you all my life, all my honor and 
 
244 ' ONOQUA 
 
 joy," she answered simply to the whispered words 
 that met her ear. " God sent me to help you. I 
 could die for that." 
 
 Through the frosty stillness came the sound of 
 movement. They could hear the distant tramp of 
 hoofs and snorting of cattle. Men, women and 
 children were going on this march. Where ? To 
 what fate ? 
 
 And yet, what had they left? Could the future 
 be worse than the past, than the present? The 
 galling bitterness of his position and his life had 
 never seemed so unbearable to Cetangi. He heard 
 the sounds for the moment as if the men there were 
 marching to freedom. In a different sense he was no 
 more willing than Sitting Bull to be an agency Indian. 
 But if he had joined these people of his own race, 
 could he have saved them from any overt act, have 
 guided and taught them ? 
 
 "Wanigiska is behind Kasde," said Onoqua. "If 
 Kasde would, he couldn't keep you from him, and 
 from " she hesitated without looking at Ahsaniak. 
 
 "And from Pejito," finished the latter. " It's true, 
 Onoqua." 
 
 Cetangi's dream was over. It was true at present. 
 He must wait for better days. 
 
KEVENGE 245 
 
 Pejito was with the Indians who were going to join 
 the Sioux to make ready for the time of triumph that 
 was coming to them ; and not only was he with them, 
 but foremost in marshalling this force that Waha 
 commanded. 
 
 But through all his haste he saw Kasde return, and 
 soon he beckoned him. " Is it all right ? " he asked, 
 a blaze of triumph lighting up his face. 
 
 "All wrong," answered Kasde; and he told his 
 story. 
 
 Pejito's rage was beyond bounds. But the men 
 were in need of efficient leading, for already he feared 
 disaffection. If he should give the heat of the dance 
 time to cool, he should lose some of his choicest fol 
 lowers. No ; it was impossible now to make Kasde's 
 blunder good, even if it were not certain that Cetangi 
 would be on his guard. He went on with his mar 
 shalling of men and stock, for the camp was to be a 
 few miles from there. 
 
 But once as he passed Kasde, he whispered to him, 
 " He shall still have Pejito's farewell." 
 
 Braves splendidly mounted, riding recklessly, older 
 men more slowly, droves of cattle, the cream of the 
 reservation, and a good deal of the milk also since 
 the departing Indians left few hoofs behind them, 
 
246 ONOQUA 
 
 boys on horseback acting as drivers, horses treading 
 with restless steps after their slower predecessors, 
 squaws riding, some burdened with camp equipage, 
 others carrying babies strapped upon their backs, 
 young girls on horseback and boys helping with the 
 tents, all these made up the motley procession 
 marching to their camping ground. The moonlight 
 threw into relief everything strange and grotesque in 
 figures and accoutrements. 
 
 Mahaka rode among the braves, and received from 
 Wanigiska and Pejito notice enough to fill him with 
 a sense of his importance and to clear the cloud from 
 his face. 
 
 Matoska plodded on in the rear, smiling to himself 
 at the good times to come. 
 
 Pejito lingered and let the procession go past him. 
 
 " Go on," he said to Kasde. " I'll join you in camp. 
 Only Pejito's own hand shall give Pejito's farewell." 
 
 The other hesitated, lingered, and then, as if struck 
 by a sudden thought, cried, "Nobody shall say I 
 did it." 
 
 And turning his horse, he galloped madly after the 
 bucks. 
 
 A great light aroused Mr. Griswald. 
 
REVENGE 247 
 
 Clouds of smoke were bursting into the sky, and 
 on the western horizon shone a mass of ruddy light, 
 from which jets of flame shot up into the zenith. 
 
 He and Winder and others rushed to help. 
 
 But they could do nothing. The fire had been 
 lighted in many places at once ; and the straw and 
 hay and grain under their roofs of bark had been 
 bursting with flames before the kindler of them had 
 given rein to his horse and flown over the trail to the 
 camp. 
 
 The owner stood looking on in gloomy helplessness. 
 
 The morning showed him that all his stock had 
 been driven off, while of provision for the winter 
 there was only smoking ashes. 
 
 Pejito had not failed to emphasize his farewell. 
 
 Cetangi was ruined. 
 
248 ONOQTJA 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV 
 ONOQUA'S DECISION 
 
 THE dreary day wore on. Cetangi searched the 
 hills in vain for cattle of his overlooked or strayed 
 back again ; not a hoof was left behind. 
 
 As he came home Onoqua looked up with an 
 attempt at a smile. 
 
 " How good they all are to us," she began. " Mr. 
 Griswald came first, and then Mrs. Griswald and Mrs. 
 Winder, and after them Mr. Winder. They were all 
 so sorry. He was very kind, and said he'd do all he 
 could for us." 
 
 " Has he any work for me ? Did you ask him ? " 
 
 "I did ask him, Cetangi. He has nothing at 
 present." 
 
 " That means through the winter," returned the 
 young man gloomily. 
 
 There was a silence. At last Onoqua said softly, 
 
 " God will help us to live, Cetangi. Not one of the 
 Indians here now but will share the last morsel with 
 us." 
 
 " And you want their last morsel to be shared with 
 
ONOQUA'S DECISION 249 
 
 us, do you, Onoqua ? I'm a young, able-bodied man 
 with a trade, by which I can earn a good living for 
 us, all and save money besides ; and you want me to 
 take the food out of the mouths of these poor crea 
 tures who will be half starved if they keep all they 
 have ? I've given you my promise. If you like to 
 do this, you must. But never say God wants us 
 to be so unjust and mean. For my part, it seems to 
 me it would be His way to have me try to help 
 them, since if I did it, we should have all we needed ; 
 while if they helped us, it would be because they were 
 going hungry. Which seems like religion to you, 
 Onoqua ? Or, don't you believe in that part of the 
 Bible that says we must not be slothful in business ? " 
 
 There was so long a silence that Cetangi was about 
 to speak again, when Onoqua said, 
 
 " But if you can't find work ? " 
 
 " Then, since the rations don't drop down here at 
 our door, we ought not to go and get them ? Is that 
 what you mean ? " 
 
 "It's different. How can we desert our people 
 now ? " 
 
 " You'd rather live on them than go away and earn 
 something that we could send back to help them ? I 
 gave you my promise to stay here when I married 
 
250 ONOQUA 
 
 you, Onoqua. It holds now. You must decide going 
 or staying. But before you decide it, think of one 
 thing. If the baby in your arms that looks so fat 
 and happy now, should fade away in hunger this 
 winter, don't say that you know it was God's will to 
 take him. Say you know that God might have taken 
 him away with all our care, but you know, too, you 
 had so much Indian tribal notion clinging to you that 
 it made you forget that a mother has 'a duty to her 
 child. If I were asking you to desert or neglect your 
 people, it would be different. I'm asking a chance to 
 give to them instead of taking from them. Sometimes 
 I think you forget that they're my people, too. But 
 tell me this : Since for two centuries we've been 
 travelling the breadth of the land for the white man's 
 benefit, why can't we do it for our own ? " 
 
 But, " 0, my boy ! my darling ! " Onoqua had cried, 
 raining tears and kisses on the little face. Then 
 lifting her eyes to her husband, she said, "You're 
 right, Cetangi. It would be the best way of remem 
 bering our people to help them instead of taking the 
 food out of their mouths. We ought never to take 
 advantage of their generosity. We will go." 
 
 " We shall have to sell the house to buy horses and 
 wagon to go with," he answered. " But that won't 
 take long." 
 
ONOQTJA'S DECISION 251 
 
 " Sell our house ! But aren't we coming back ? " 
 cried Onoqua. 
 
 " If we go away Fll never come back here until I 
 have enough money not to starve if the crops fail, as 
 they're always failing. If we had workshops and 
 factories here, I should be sure of getting something. 
 Then, there'd be no ghost dances," he added. " But 
 if the Lord prospers us, I may some day build up a 
 business somewhere, and give work to some of our 
 people in it. I can't do it here, now ; perhaps never 
 here. It must come wherever I can do it. Don't you 
 think, Onoqua, you and baby and I can be happy 
 anywhere ? " 
 
 The ring of assurance had gone from his voice ; it 
 was anxious. 
 
 Onoqua read it. Cetangi thought she did not love 
 him enough to be happy anywhere with him ! In her 
 love for her own race, she had not thought of the 
 rights of her child, and of her husband. She owed it 
 to him to let him use his faculties, all of them, to 
 encourage him to do it. Instead of this, she had 
 trodden his needs and his ambitions under foot. Yet, 
 husband, wife, child, here was the family, here was 
 individual life, here was the only way out of Indian 
 tribal bondage. The future lay in the family, and 
 
252 ONOQUA 
 
 not in the tribe. The -family was complete in itself, 
 could found a home anywhere, could belong to any 
 place, any country. And she saw also that through 
 this first duty the other would be fulfilled ; for to 
 make the best of themselves was to do the best for 
 their people, to open new opportunities. 
 
 Love had revealed that the world was open to her. 
 
 Her beautiful eyes rested upon her questioner. 
 
 " My husband," she said softly, " wherever you are 
 is our home. Baby and I are ready." 
 
 He caught her to his heart. 
 
 " It's not giving up our own," he said. " It's only 
 adding to it. It's remembering that we are Ameri 
 cans." 
 
 " Yes, I know it," she answered him. 
 
THROUGH THE HOSTILE COUNTRY 253 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV 
 
 THROUGH THE HOSTILE COUNTRY. 
 
 IT was a week later that they set out to find among 
 the white men's industries the bread that had failed 
 them here. 
 
 In their open wagon they had such protection from 
 the weather as they could collect from their scanty 
 furnishings, and these were shared with Maukeeneet 
 to whom Naumatin had left nothing when she had 
 gone off with the hostiles. 
 
 That terrible journey through a country so poor 
 and desolate that their hearts ached with the sights 
 that met their eyes, a land where poverty and suffer 
 ing and patience were the rule and not the exception, 
 made a deep impression upon them. 
 
 With this broader experience of Indian needs 
 Cetangi's noble ambition grew. 
 
 These Indians could not learn industries and arts 
 in a land where there were none. 
 
 " We need plenty of white men here," he said to 
 Onoqua. " Good farming and churches and schools 
 and workshops spring up where they are as if they 
 
254 ONOQUA 
 
 grew up from the ground, or dropped down from the 
 skies. Why don't our young men do like the white 
 young men ? That's what being an American means. 
 The young people help the old by going off and earn 
 ing money for them. I noticed those things at 
 school." 
 
 "I'll sell my pictures some day," said Maukeeneet; 
 " and I won't forget my dear old Matoska. He'll like 
 the white people then." 
 
 Maukeeneet was so wild with delight at the pros 
 pect of going to school that she neither felt the suf 
 ferings nor realized the dangers of the way as the 
 others did. 
 
 To Onoqua during that terrible journey every 
 valley might be the hidingplace of a foe ; every hill 
 made Cetangi a better mark ; any tree trunk might 
 hold in ambush Pejito, or one of his emissaries. And 
 these were no childish fears, for it was a time when 
 private revenge was little likely to receive its punish 
 ment, especially when the victim was an Indian. 
 And if Cetangi were shot down, to the white people 
 of that region and at that time, this would seem only 
 another foe out of the way. 
 
 At last, after many circuits made to avoid the 
 hostiles in the Sioux country, they came up with a 
 
THROUGH THE HOSTILE COUNTRY. 255 
 
 party of friendlies, and went on with them to the 
 agency, to wait there a few days, until travel should 
 be safer. 
 
 All the country remembers the condition of affairs 
 in the latter part of December, 1890 ; how the news of 
 the continuance of peace fluctuated with rumors of 
 war, the latter growing more and more threatening 
 with every move of the white men, and every acces 
 sion of strength to the camp of the hostiles. Ce- 
 tangi, full of sympathy for the Indians, yet fearing a 
 fatal step through their leaders, chafed under inactiv 
 ity. He must go forth to his battle for them, his 
 work. 
 
 And yet, in this unsettled country, for the sake of 
 the others, he must wait. 
 
 Then came the news of the slaughter at Wounded 
 Knee Creek. 
 
 " I must go, Cetangi, I must. My father was surely 
 among them, and Mahaka. I cannot bear it not to 
 know about them. 'Twill not be the same to have 
 you tell me, I must go myself." 
 
 "And I shall go," announced Maukeeneet. 
 
 The whole story of the unplanned conflict is known 
 
256 ONOQTJA 
 
 in every home in America. The scenes in the im 
 provised hospital were described to the world with 
 such vividness of truth that the needed supplies 
 poured in from every part. And yet it was only 
 those who, like the three, were looking for their own 
 among the wounded or the dead, who could really 
 know the pathos of that history. 
 
 Cetangi passed from bed to bed, his wife and 
 Maukeeneet following him, now seeing the dead or 
 dying face of a stranger, yet one of his own race, now 
 finding those for whom there was hope of life. Twice 
 he greeted some one he knew. 
 
 " They're not here," he turned to say to Onoqua at 
 last, when he saw that she had run forward to meet 
 the men who were bringing in another wounded 
 Indian. 
 
 " Father ! " she cried, her look fixed in terror on the 
 motionless face. 
 
 Matoska's eyes opened, and he tried to smile. 
 "The shirts couldn't keep off the bullets, Onoqua," 
 he said. " Perhaps we didn't dance long enough, 
 Where's Talmas ? " 
 
 His daughters shook their heads over the last 
 question, and stood by, silent, while Matoska's 
 wounds were examined. The physician, a young 
 
THROUGH THE HOSTILE COUNTRY 257 
 
 Indian whom the blood of his race baptized into his 
 life service, at last looked up at them with a smile, 
 and assured them that their father's wounds were 
 not dangerous. 
 
 When they had seen that he was as comfortable as 
 he could be made, they went on to find Mahaka. Not 
 far from the hospital they met Tahnas, and turned 
 her sorrow into joy as they sent her on to Matoska. 
 But nowhere among the wounded whom they passed 
 as these were being brought in, did they find the 
 brother of Onoqua and Maukeeneet. 
 . Had he escaped ? 
 
258 ONOQUA 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI 
 
 BEARING ONOQUA'S MESSAGE 
 
 " IF these men and women had been white," said 
 Cetangi bitterly, as they came in sight of the battle 
 field, " all the world would have praised their fighting 
 for freedom. If I'd not believed in a better way of 
 getting it, I'd have fought with them here. But I 
 know it's ours if we will take it with a strong and 
 peaceful hand. How strange it is," he mused after a 
 pause, " how there seems to have to be bloodshed for 
 everything. It's always so in history. After people 
 had died to gain freedom, it came to those that were 
 left. Perhaps it's because Christ died, and men have 
 in some way to follow Him, if they don't understand 
 it. I don't know." 
 
 As they came upon the battle ground a silence 
 almost as deep as that of the sleepers there fell upon 
 the three. Without regarding others scattered about 
 the field, they separated as they went from one dead 
 form to another, dreading to find the one that they 
 were looking for. Cetangi took the lead, and 
 sometimes by a motion of the head or hand turned 
 
BEARING ONOQUA'S MESSAGE 259 
 
 his companions from some ghastly sight which would 
 not have helped their search. 
 
 At last he came toward them abruptly. 
 
 "Come away," he said. "We've had enough of 
 this. You shall not look any longer. Onoqua, you 
 can't bear any more. And if he were here, how 
 could you help him ? " 
 
 " He is here, you've found him," cried Onoqua. 
 
 And Maukeeneet hurrying back on Cetangi's steps, 
 stood looking down into the upturned face of her 
 brother. He had been shot through the heart, and 
 must have died instantly. 
 
 The rest of the field faded from the sight of the 
 watchers as they lived over in memory the life that 
 Mahaka had shared. Onoqua's intense loyalty to her 
 kin had bridged over the years when she had been 
 absent from him, and she had been as fond of him as 
 he had been proud of her and tender to her. Many a 
 time he had saved Maukeeneet from Naumatin's wrath, 
 had laughed at her wit, and in every way done his 
 simple best for her. There was no one for whom 
 Mahaka had not done his best, except himself. To 
 his friendship, and its results, Cetangi owed the hap 
 piness of his life. He remembered as he stood there 
 that there had been no evil record against Mahaka's 
 
260 ONOQUA 
 
 school-days. He had been too ready to follow j but 
 with the leadership there, this had not proved bad. 
 No evil in his life, or in his heart, had brought him 
 to the frozen death-bed on which he lay. He had 
 only been true to his nature, and followed. There 
 were many like him. Some of them lay near him. 
 They had been sent far off from civilization to fight 
 alone, before they had learned the science of war 
 against savagery, or been equipped to meet it ; and 
 their friends had not followed them up with reserve 
 forces. Leadership was not in such as Mahaka. He 
 had been the prey of the nearest, of savagery. 
 
 "He died of idleness," said Cetangi at last with a 
 bitter force in his tone. "And so did all here. I 
 rather think Pejito and Wanigiska and the rest of 
 them have kept their skins whole." 
 
 With a sob Onoqua said, " If I had let you keep on 
 with your work, Cetangi, we could have brought out 
 Mahaka to us. He'd have gone anywhere if any one 
 had helped him to it. And he would be living to 
 day. And you'd have led him there, as you did at 
 school." 
 
 " He wouldn't have needed leading if he'd got steady 
 work. Ghost dances are only misused activity, Ono 
 qua. Give those very Indians a chance to make money 
 
BEARING ONOQUA'S MESSAGE 261 
 
 directly, if only a little, and they'll send Wanigiska 
 flying. / know it. I'm going to try to make the 
 opportunity for them." 
 
 Then he looked down at the dead face. 
 
 " Mahaka," he said, " I will carry your message, 
 why you turned wild Indian, to the white men. 
 There shall be no place where I shall not be ready to 
 speak it. I will do what I can to bring the Indian out 
 into American life, until side by side with the white 
 man, he helps to make in Congress, yes, in Con 
 gress, the laws for both, the same laws. Then we 
 shall be represented, like other Americans. This 
 doesn't come about on reservations. It will come." 
 
 A cry from Maukeeneet who this time had found 
 without searching, showed that she had discovered 
 what Cetangi had tried in vain to keep from her. A 
 few rods away from Mahaka lay Haneeyet, dead. 
 On her face were marks of struggle. The gunshot 
 wound in her neck had not been immediately fatal. 
 
 " The baby ! " cried Onoqua with parched lips, and 
 went forward as Maukeeneet in trembling haste was 
 unfastening the strappings that held the child to its 
 mother. 
 
 But the baby was dead. 
 
 Maukeeneet would have made her moan in the 
 Indian way. 
 
262 ONOQUA 
 
 But Onoqua stopped her, and stood with her hand 
 on her sister's, struggling with a grief beyond tears. 
 
 At last Maukeeneet touched her, and pointed with 
 out speaking. 
 
 The men who were gathering up the dead were 
 coming to that part of the field. They would reach 
 Mahaka soon. 
 
 As these took up the body of Mahaka, Cetangi with 
 set lips, Onoqua her eyes dim with tears, but with her 
 hand in her husband's and holding her baby to her 
 heart, Maukeeneet with a child's faith in the future, 
 turned away from the sad and terrible past, through 
 the open door into the broad American life, where, by 
 the blessed law of compensation, these of the race 
 that had known only the worst of the white men 
 should now learn something of the best, and where 
 the ready hands outstretched in kindness would meet 
 the grasp of answering hands. For by such means, 
 by opportunities opened, by the spirit of the people, 
 the Indians who have been robbed of all, shall have 
 no less than all returned to them together with that 
 more than compound interest, the improvements of 
 Christian civilization. 
 
 " Some day I'll come to see you," smiled Matoska 
 as they bade him good-by. " And don't be afraid, 
 
BEARING ONOQUA'S MESSAGE 263 
 
 Onoqua. I'll be like the white men. I shall wear 
 my hat." 
 
 " You see how it will be," said Cetangi as they 
 turned away. " The father and mother whose son is 
 doing a good business and is well treated among the 
 white men won't dance ghost dances to have the 
 white men swept off the land." 
 
 "We know how parents feel," Onoqua answered 
 him. 
 
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