At that moment Mr. Rainwalker was seen to leave the station, mount his pony, and proceed down the dusty road toward the half-mile line. It had doubtless occurred to him that during past winters it had been necessary to eat, and he was coming forth to make peace with the groceryman. At sight of the approaching debtor, the lounging line of creditors sprang to its feet and stood at attention. The grocer, who spoke the Omaha tongue fluently and had a snug fortune laid away in consequence, walked rapidly in advance of the others and met Mr. Rainwalker at the line, followed by the straggling crowd of expectant creditors like a trailing cloud of hungry crows. Mr. Rainwalker had a large, round, pockmarked face that looked for the world like a pumpkin pie overbaked by a careless cook, with a monstrous nose in the centre of it. He sat placidly upon his pony, that had all the salient points of a starved cow, and dozed luxuriously at the shortest halt. The old chief seemed the visible body of an optimistic joke, sitting upon the bone heap of a tragedy! The grocer had barely collected the greater share of the old man’s check, when he became the centre of a noisy, gesticulating crowd of creditors. It was the chatter of the crows about the carrion. “You know you promised me that you would settle that note!” said the goatlike bank clerk in his bleating voice. “How about that rent money I advanced, Rainwalker?” roared the bear-like middleman. “I want my money for them wives I buried for you—_two of ’em_!” squeaked the scorpionlike undertaker, holding up two explanatory fingers and thrusting his thin, pale face into the mêlée. “Ugh!” the old man answered rather unsatisfactorily. “If you don’t pay me,” shrieked the incensed little undertaker, “I’ll go right out on the hill and _dig up them boxes, by God_!” “_Muska ningay!_” (no money) said the old man. “No pay ’em chil’n’s money tall. All time lie to us. Goan votem Dimmiticrat, guess.” And with this statement, bearing with it the fate of a national representative, the old chief kicked the tenacious slumber out of his pony and rode back to the Agency. “Eh?” ejaculated the politician; “Votin’ Democratic, eh? Well, I’ll be cussed! It’ll snow us under! Why in thunder do they refuse to pay the money to the minor children? I tell you, gentlemen, it’ll snow us under!” “Drat politics!” squeaked the little undertaker. “Wisht I’d a-buried ’em all afore now. Cussed if I don’t go right out on that there hill and dig them boxes up!” The day wore on with an alarming recrudescence of Democracy among the red men (who are not red, but chocolate). In the afternoon, the little undertaker chased White Horse, another leading man of the tribe, into the brush and returned with a broad grin upon his face. “Beats the devil!” ejaculated the thin politician, “where a body sometimes finds merriment! How’s he votin’, Comfort?”