The lieutenant’s face was red, as he angrily warded off the hands that clutched at his pistols and gun and horse’s bridle. “Stand firm, men!” he called. “Don’t let loose of a thing――don’t let them get behind us!” “Kape your distance, you red rascals!” rasped Tom Dougherty, as they hustled him about. “Steady! Steady!” Sergeant Meek cautioned. “By thunder, they’d like to strip us,” the doctor exclaimed. Even Stub objected vigorously, in Pawnee. The Grand Pawnees were indeed rascals. Guns were being cocked――click, click; several of the Pawnees, angry themselves, leveled bended bows. It was likely to be a fight between the sixteen Americans and the sixty Pawnees; and Stub sat alert, ready to pluck an arrow as quick as lightning. “Guard those packs, men!” the lieutenant kept shouting. But the two chiefs were working hard, shoving the warriors back, clearing a space. The head chief spoke to the lieutenant, and signed. “He says: ‘Let us talk,’” Baroney interpreted. “Very well. Tell him we will talk or we will fight,” replied the lieutenant. “We won’t be robbed. If it is peace, we will give him presents.” They all sat down in a ring, with the lieutenant and Baroney and the two chiefs in the center. The Americans sat under the American flag, the Pawnee warriors sat under the Grand Pawnee flags. The doctor, however, stood up, watching everything. The Pawnee head chief took out a pipe and tobacco, for a peace smoke. That looked good. But before filling the pipe, the two chiefs made speeches. “They ask what presents you will give them. They say they are poor,” Baroney translated. And that was what they had said. “Bring half a bale of tobacco, a dozen knives, and flints and steels enough for all, sergeant,” the lieutenant ordered. The head chief made another speech. He was refusing the presents. He asked for corn, powder and lead, blankets, kettles――all kinds of stuff. “Tell him that there are our presents. We have nothing else for him,” the lieutenant answered. “We are ready to smoke with him.” The chief did not lift the pipe. He and the other chief sat, with bad spirit showing in their eyes. The warriors commenced to hoot, and handle their guns and bows again. “He will not smoke such poor presents,” Baroney reported. “I think they mean trouble. A little tobacco, lieutenant; maybe a little tobacco and powder.” “You had best look out, lieutenant,” warned the doctor. “I don’t like their looks.” “Tell the chief he will get nothing else. He can take those presents or leave them,” bade the lieutenant, to Baroney. Baroney hated to do it, but he had to obey. The head chief scowled. Then he signed, and an old man lugged in a kettle of water, as a return present. Stub heard the Pawnee warriors talking scornfully. “See what manner of men these white men are, with their rags and their poor gifts,” they said. “They do not travel like the Spanish. They look like beggars.”