They drew around me in a circle, which was left open at one side to admit a man whom I guessed at once by his bearing, as well as the deference they paid him, to be some sort of chief to them. He was of a singular and appealing beauty, so that his bodily excellence was a garment to him, and adorned the simplicity of his dress. There was that in his way of standing which moved one to go up and lay hand on him as on the stem of a young cedar. But something stood within him that protected him more than a weapon from such impersonality. As he waited to hear the account of me which the red man gave, I felt I had never such a wish to have a man think well of me, nor been so much at a loss how to begin it. At the same time he seemed to be hearkening to something within himself, something that, when he asked a question of the women (which passed from one to another of them with something of denial and disclaimer), seemed to speak more loudly. The question appeared to refer to something which should have settled my business then and there. The neglect of it devolved upon a woman, comely and perplexed, as though given to too great a sense of responsibility, and much overcome at being found at fault. “No matter,” he said to her excuses, and bending a troubled look on me, the doubt in him spoke out openly. “It was of this, I think, _she_ spoke to me.” At that slight emphasis the dark man who had the smith’s tools on him, looked at me with so sharp and surprising an interest that it distracted me from noticing who it was behind me asked with some eagerness: “Of what did she speak?” “That there was one walking toward us on the trail, bearing trouble. On the morning of our leaving, she waked me early to say it. I am thinking this is the one. If you have forgotten the cup, Evarra, it is an omen.” The interest of all the wood folk reawakened. They began to regard me with so much distrust that I was relieved when the chief made a sign to Noche to take me a little to one side. Thus they talk more freely, looking at me from time to time, sometimes seeming to blame the woman, and sometimes to praise her. Noche was that same old man who had brought me from the neighborhood of Broken Tree, whose mild blue eyes, set rather shallowly in a broad face, continued to reassure me. He sat off a considerate distance, and busied himself with plaiting of leather thongs. All his features were rugged, the mouth wide, the nose broad and open at the nostrils, but blunted all as if by some yielding humor in him which fitted oddly with the knotting of his muscles. Now and then he turned toward me with chuckling, slow laughter which served in place of comforting speech.