"Yet it was told to us that your men were projecting a great war against us; that even from your other land beyond the deep waters warriors were being sent forth who should come and slay us all. That strange implements of war were being devised for our certain destruction, and that all of us were to be slaughtered and our lands and wives taken from us." "Then," I replied, "you were told a base lie." "Ay," exclaimed Buck from behind, "and I'll bet a guinea I know who told it." The chief's eyes fell on him and rested on his face; then he spoke again, bidding him, since he said he knew who 'twas, to name the person. "Name him," said Buck, "name him. Ay, that can I in the first guess. Why, 'twas that cursed, cringing hound, Roderick St. Amande, who fled from my pretty mistress's house when her father smote off his ear for daring to insult her. That's who it was, my noble chief." "Smote off his ear!" exclaimed Anuza, while in his face there came the nearest approach to astonishment that I saw there during the time I was brought into contact with him. "Smote off the ear of the Child of the Sun. Yet he told us--he--is this the word of truth?" "If that cursed impostor is the Child of the Sun--the Child of the Devil, ho, ho!--then 'tis most certainly the truth. Here's my lady who can tell you 'tis true. She saw it done. And, noble chief, is _that_ the one, that poor, miserable hound, who told you of the attack that was to be made on you and yours?" The chief replied not but rode on by our side, his eyes bent on his horse's mane and he seemingly wrapped in thought. But he spake no more to us that day, and we knew that he was meditating on how he and all his tribe had been imposed on by the wretch Roderick. So we journeyed on until at last we stood at the foot of the mountains, and with, before us, the town of the Shawnees. 'Twas a strange sight to our eyes!