The council lasted a long time, and was concluded with a feast of the dog-meat from a pot, and of buffalo meat and hominy and ground-potato. Buffalo meat was given to the white chiefs as a present. The Tetons claimed to be poor, but they weren’t. This was a powerful and rich village, as anybody might see. Before the dance that had been planned for the evening, the men were permitted to roam about a little. Peter and Patrick Gass and their party discovered a string of scalps hanging from a pole, and a number of Omaha squaws and children who appeared very miserable. Peter talked with them a little. They were prisoners. The Tetons had attacked their village down the river, and had burned forty lodges and killed seventy-five warriors. When dusk fell the dance was started, by the light of a fire, in the middle of the council house. The Sioux warriors danced, and the Sioux women danced; but at midnight the captains told the chief that everybody was tired and it was time to go to bed. “The chief he say: ‘Ver’ well. Now sleep. To-morrow more Sioux come, to talk with de great father.’ He want you to stay,” interpreted Drouillard. “We will stay and see these other Sioux,” answered Captain Lewis. “What do you think, Will?” “If you say so, Merne,” replied Captain Clark. “But there’s some trick in this. We mustn’t be caught off guard――and of course we mustn’t show that we’re afraid, either.” But no visiting Sioux turned up, although the boats waited all day. At night another dance was given. “We in bad feex,” asserted One-eyed Cruzatte. “Dose Teton, dey keep us. I t’ink dey plan mischief. I wish we go on.” Everybody was nervous. “Now I wonder if we’re in for a fight,” spoke Corporal Warfington. “Sure,” said Patrick Gass, “we can lick ’em.” Amidst the dusk ashore, while Peter, tired of the noise and dancing, was wandering a few steps, a low voice hailed him, in Oto. “Hist! You Oto?” It was one of the Omaha squaws. How could she have guessed that he had been an Oto? “No. White,” responded Peter. “Tell your chiefs the Sioux are bad. They will not let the big boats go. They play you a trick.” “I will tell,” responded Peter. “You speak Oto well.” “I am Omaha, but I was in Oto village once. I saw you.” And the squaw vanished. VI THE CAPTAINS SHOW THEIR SPUNK Peter believed that the Omaha woman spoke the truth. The captains ought to be told at once. But the dancing was still in progress in the lodge of Chief Black Buffalo, where sat the two captains and the chiefs, watching. A boy would not be admitted. So Peter sought out Sergeant John Ordway, who was in charge of the shore guard. John Ordway was not from Kentucky; he was from a place called New Hampshire, in the northeast of the United States. “You don’t say!” replied John Ordway, when Peter had told him of the warning from the Omaha woman. “Well, anybody might suspect as much. I’ll get word to the captains, first chance.”