“To this maiden of another tribe, I give, as a token of my good will to her and her people, one of my best horses. It is the pinto, ridden by my wife and which took second prize in today’s race. My gift!”
Cogewea’s heart bounded with gladness but Indian etiquette forbade any outward demonstration of gratitude. It was for her to reciprocate in a subsequent friendship dance.
The Nez Perce Chief, who had danced with the “shy girl,” took from his shoulder a splendid “King George” blanket and passing it to the gift-exchanger, through him spoke:
“Members of the different tribes meet here and are no longer strangers. This robe, which has sheltered me from the winter storms, carries with it the warmth of the Nez Perce’s heart for this girl and her people. It is good to be friends!”
Jim gave to Stemteemä a blanket of rare design, which he had purchased from another Indian for that purpose, and from whom he had secured a dancing costume. At that moment he ingratiated himself in the old heart, far more than he ever realized. That gift, received in stoic silence, was bread cast in the van of a fast gathering flood destined to break, dark and turbulent on the border shores of both their lives.
The sun bending to the western horizon, Mrs. Carter and Mary, with Stemteemä, prepared for the home going. Bob could not be found, and John Carter who had been detained in Polson for the past three days on a cattle deal, was obliged to drive the hack on the return trip.
The moon was peeping over the great Rockies, before Jim and Cogewea rode out of the little town. They were both well content despite the unpleasant episode of the races but he noticed that she was in an unusual hurry; at last they were started. The girl was thinking of her patient at the ranch. While busy celebrating, she had almost forgotten Densmore, but now his face came before her. Jim would have ridden slower, but she urged a faster pace. Where the road permitted, an easy swinging lope was maintained by the mile. More to break a monotonous silence, the Westerner spoke:
“Sis! you comin’ tomorrow for more of the big doin’s?”
“I do not care to. One day is enough for me to celebrate; although I suppose the Indians will carry this on for the next week.”
“Guess they’re goin’ have ten more days of it. I bet we don’t get none of our boys back for a week. Bob was lost this evenin’ and they all will not be satisfied till they go broke. It’s time ’nough then, they figure, to come home and tame down. Last I see of Bill and Rodeo, was at the Kootenai camp a playin’ monte with La-siah and them; a keepin’ hid from the Government ossifers. They was a hittin’ the jug heavy, too.”
With a chuckle, Jim touched his horse with a blunt rowel and they galloped over the long slope homeward. His surmise proved correct. It was seven days later before any of the riders returned. Bill and Rodeo each carried a black eye, while Bob’s nose was very much in evidence. There was not a dollar left among the trio.
“Well, yo’ know durn well how it is; when yo’ hit them there jugs how thin’s go,” explained Celluloid Bill. “Yo’ jus’ can’t quit till th’ money’s all gone. If me an’ Rodeo have a pair of bad lookers, it’s ’cause we fought like men with them there long haired Kootenais. We hadter have th’ darn thin’ out an’ out with ’em.”
“I hater have my nose a feelin’ so bad; I hater have th’ blame thin’ a pintin’ North,” soliloquized Silent Bob, as he tenderly caressed his swollen proboscis.
Jim made good his promise of a present to Cogewea for winning the squaw race. It was a handsome silver mounted bridle.
IX
Under the Whispering Pines
To love the softest hearts are prone,
The Giaour
But such can ne’er be all his own;
Too timid in his woes to share,
Too meet to meet, or brave despair;
And sterner hearts alone may feel
The wound that time can never heal.
Two weeks had passed since the incident of Densmore’s riding; everything drifting along the usual channel. The hot July days were beginning to heat the great Clay Banks of the Pend d’Oreille, but under the dark pines lining its shore, were found spots cooled by the breeze from the stream. It was here that the injured man was spending the morning alone with a book. Cogewea, his nurse, had gone for a ride, an errand to a distant neighbor’s. He had exhausted an hour in a vain attempt at becoming interested in the pages that he turned to no purpose.
At last: he would lay aside the volume and study nature. He noted the many colored flowers which perfumed the air; the squirrels and chipmunks frisking among the boughs overhead, or scurrying along the ground. The birds caroling in the thicket, and the fishes swimming lazily in the waters where the shadows fell dark.
But he grew more restless. There was a disturbing element to his meditations. The wild life interested him no more than did the book. That “breed” girl came ever before him. It was vain that he tried to blot her from memory, to banish her from vision. She peeped from every flower; those flashing black eyes reflected from the pebbles glinting in the sunshine. Her tresses streamed on the eddying current, and her voice was in the notes of birdsong and the chipmunk’s chatter.
Alfred Densmore, the cold, calculating business man out from the East for adventure and money, was half in love with
