“‘I could not help but notice her,’ he said, ‘on the first night I stayed in her father’s lodge.... I learned the language easily, quickly, yet I never spoke to her nor she to me, for, as you know, the Blackfeet think it unseemly for youths and maidens to do so. “‘One evening a man came into the lodge and began to praise a certain youth with whom I had often hunted; spoke of his bravery, his kindness, his wealth, and ended by saying that the young fellow presented to Lone Walker thirty horses, and wished, with Ap-ah’-ki, to set up a lodge of his own. I glanced at the girl and caught her looking at me; such a look! expressing at once fear, despair and something else which I dared not believe I interpreted aright. The chief spoke: “Tell your friend,” he said, “that all you have spoken of him is true; I know that he is a real man, a good, kind, brave, generous young man, yet for all that I can not give him my daughter.” “‘Again I looked at Ap-ah’-ki and she at me. Now she was smiling and there was happiness in her eyes. But if she smiled I could not. I had heard him refuse thirty head of horses. What hope had I then, who did not even own the horse I rode? I, who received for my services only twenty pounds a year, from which must be deducted the various articles I bought. Surely the girl was not for me. I suffered. “‘It was a little later, perhaps a couple of weeks, that I met her in the trail, bringing home a bundle of fire-wood. We stopped and looked at each other in silence for a moment, and then I spoke her name. Crash went the fuel on the ground, and we embraced and kissed regardless of those who might be looking. “‘So, forgetting the bundle of wood, we went hand in hand and stood before Lone Walker, where he sat smoking his long pipe, out on the shady side of the lodge. “‘The chief smiled. “Why, think you, did I refuse the thirty horses?” he asked, and before I could answer: “Because I wanted you for my son-in-law, wanted a white man because he is more cunning, much wiser than the Indian, and I need a counselor. We have not been blind, neither I nor my women. There is nothing more to say except this: be good to her.” “‘That very day they set up a small lodge for us, and stored it with robes and parfleches of dried meat and berries, gave us one of their two brass kettles, tanned skins, pack saddles, ropes, all that a lodge should contain. And, not least, Lone Walker told me to choose thirty horses from his large herd. In the evening we took possession of our house and were happy.’