And as Sandy, half starting to his feet, stared, and held his breath, he saw a figure he knew only too well come limping into the lighted arena. It was Blue Jacket! CHAPTER XXI TIT FOR TAT YES, it was Blue Jacket, but apparently a wreck of the young Indian whom Sandy had last seen under the friendly roof of the new Armstrong cabin. He was blackened with smoke, his buckskin garments showing holes that the forest fire had burned; the proud feather that had once adorned his scalp-lock hung low over his ear, and broken; he seemed hardly able to drag himself past the wondering squaws, and reach the centre of the triple ring of warriors. But it was Blue Jacket, alive and in the flesh, for all that. "Glory! he has come home just in time to save me!" Sandy kept saying to himself, as he stared. "And that terrible old medicine man was going to seal my fate! Glory! could there be any greater luck? And didn't dear old Bob say the bread we cast upon the waters might return ere many days? Yes, it has come back, principal and interest!" Every eye was fastened upon the figure of the young brave. Not one present at the council fire but knew he had a story to tell that would thrill their souls. Even the squaws, seldom allowed to listen to the serious councils around the sacred fire, bent forward, the better not to lose a single word. Blue Jacket began to speak. At first his manner was sedate. He was telling of how he had fought in that night battle, of the wound that had left him on the field and how he crept away, hoping to return to his lodge among his people. Then Sandy, who could fairly interpret from his manner, knew that he spoke of finding himself alone, weakened from loss of blood, and unable to even call for assistance. Expecting to become the prey of wild beasts during the night, he had, with the stoicism of the red man, awaited the end calmly. Then came the paleface boys. His bronzed face lighted up as he told how they tenderly carried him to the brow of the hill overlooking the river, and cared for his wounds. Now he became dramatic in his recital, and held his hearers spellbound. Surely he was speaking of that white mother now, telling how she advised that he be cared for and made well. It was such a revelation, so entirely different from all that the savage Indian nature understood, that the old men wagged their heads from time to time, and looked at one another helplessly. Blue Jacket went on. Now he was telling of one paleface warrior who had sought his life, and how those boys stood between. Sandy guessed this. He was hanging on the excited words of the young Shawanee just as though he could fully grasp the full sense of the harangue. Suddenly Blue Jacket ceased. Striding forward as well as his lame leg would permit, he threw a protecting arm across the shoulders of Sandy, as he faced once more the throng of red men. "My brother!"