"He had been christened Spooks," began the evangelist as if repeating an
oft-told tale, "because his last owner mistook him, one night, for a
ghost. I could not bear to call the faithful animal by that name, and,
day after day, thought over all the names I had ever heard, striving to
find one suitable. That summer something happened that decided for me.
Spooks and I awoke to find ourselves surrounded by a prairie fire. And
I, having hitched up and then gotten down into the bottom of the wagon,
my good horse was forced to meet the wall of flame alone. He came out
unscorched. I knew at once what his name should be. Henceforth, I called
him Shadrach."
The light of returning knowledge--of blessed total recall--illumined the
face of the listening section-boss. He gave the fire a glad poke that
sent the burning chips to every side, thrust out his chest proudly and
pinned the other with a triumphant eye. "Wal, how 'bout Meshach and
Abednego?" he demanded.
David Bond studied a moment, knitting his brows until their heavy
archings met in a single hoary line. "I take their place," he said at
last, with dignity.
Following supper, which Dallas prepared, all gathered before the cheery
blaze. There, the evangelist, anxious over the welfare of the people
among whom he had preached and taught, promptly began to question Squaw
Charley.
"You have not told me of your capture," he said, "or of the fight that
came before it. Were you taken in the north--in the country of the White
Mother--or in Dakota?"
The Indian nodded.
"Dakota?"
Swiftly, the pariah's whole aspect altered. A moment before, satisfied
as to food, happy and comfortable, he had squatted down in his blanket.
But, now, his shoulders bent, his chin sank to his breast, his eyes grew
dull and sullen.
"Were you in the Mauvaises Terres?" queried the evangelist.
Squaw Charley shook his head.
"On the Powder?"
There was a silent assent.
"The soldiers pursued; maybe they surprised you--which?"
To answer, the Indian rose slowly. With one of Lancaster's crutches he
raked out some ashes and levelled them upon the hearth-stones. Next,
across them, stooping and using a finger, he drew a varying line that
showed the trend of a stream. Far up toward its source, in a bend, he
placed bits of bread from the table to indicate the lodges of his
tribesmen. Slivers from a stick showed that the tepees had been set
thickly in a grove of tall cottonwoods. White beans, from a filled pan
on the floor near by him, stood for the warriors that had fought. His
fingers moved more quickly as, by means of a handful of corn that Dallas
had put in his leather pouch, he planted the United States troops on
three sides of the Indian campground, and moved them forward to the
attack.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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