With three long steps Rawley was beside him, his hand on the rifle barrel, touching the trembling, sinewy hand of Johnny Buffalo. But the old man would not yield the gun. His eyes neither softened nor lowered themselves before the steadfast blue eyes that were the heritage of the Kings. “You better get back to bed,” Rawley warned him, half-laughing. “If Peter comes and finds you up, there’ll be the devil and all to pay. I guess we won’t massacre anybody, Johnny,--at least not to-night.” “I heard the half-breed make a mock of Peter and of you. I heard him say that Peter is your father. When he said that, he laughed. His laugh was evil. Now he shall kneel upon his knees and beg the forgiveness of Peter and of you. He shall say that he spoke a lie from his black heart that would like to see others vile, because he is vile. If he does not say that he lied, I shall kill him. And that half-breed cousin, Anita, shall own her sin and her son. It is not good that Peter should be thought the son of that old vulture, when we know that he is the son of my sergeant. He is not your father. He is your uncle. I will tell them so, and we will see then if they laugh!” If unshakable dignity can rave, then Johnny Buffalo was raving. Rawley tried again to take the rifle gently from the Indian’s grasp; but the brown fingers seemed to have grown fast to the barrel. Rawley hated to do it, but his word had been given to Peter and this unforeseen uprising must be quelled; he therefore took Johnny Buffalo firmly by the shot shoulder. The old man wilted in his grasp. Rawley leaned the rifle against the table and helped Johnny Buffalo back to his bed. Subdued but knowing no surrender, Johnny Buffalo lay glaring up at Rawley, even while his lips were twisted with pain. With a singularly motherly motion, Rawley adjusted the pillows and smoothed the sheet. “That’s a nice way to act--start out gunning for my adopted family the minute I get one!” he scolded with mock severity. “Can’t leave you a minute but you jump the reservation and go on the warpath. And here I thought you were civilized!” He grinned, but in Johnny Buffalo’s eyes the fire did not die. His thin, old lips would not soften to a smile. The immobility of his face reminded Rawley of what his Uncle Peter had just said about Indians: that it is impossible to pry an idea out of their minds, once it is firmly fixed there. Nevertheless, he sat down beside the bed and repeated to Johnny Buffalo all that Peter had said concerning Young Jess’s charge. He was wise enough, however, to refrain from any attempt to rouse sympathy in Johnny’s heart for that pathetic culprit, Anita. Rather, he flattered himself by declaring that Peter was pleased because the tribe of Cramer believed him Rawley’s father, and he emphasized the need of protecting Peter’s influence over the two men, and his and Nevada’s interest in the river gold. The mocking laughter of Young Jess, he declared, was not worthy a second thought.