Alan Sullivan

“ For answer there was only the crackle of the brushwood fire.
"Ahjeek," repeated Jock, with a lift in his voice, "I have that which I would say."
The deerskin curtain hanging across the door of the biggest tepee was pushed slowly aside, and Ahjeek the Otter stood framed against the dark interior. He wore a long leather coat embroidered with quills and fringed with bright and multi-coloured beads. On his head was the great head-dress of a chief, topped with eagle feathers and hanging almost to his waist. His legs were encased in buckskin. ”

“ The bullet was fired at too short a range to expand, and this, he realised, was Munroe's salvation. Plugging the wound, he drew the helpless man clear of the glade and into the cover of the nearest timber. This done, he sat rigid, his rifle across his knees, and waited for dawn.
It was a long night. Munroe lay quietly, sighing a little as the pain took him, but breathing without difficulty. Beside him, Jock's thoughts turned to the coming day. His job was to arrest Ahjeek and bring him back, and with him forty Piegan ponies. ”

“ Now, of what followed during the next few days, of the rapid healing of Munroe's wound, of the feasting, hunting, and sleeping, of the tales that were repeated in the lodges of Ahjeek's camp, of the sudden and marvellous appearance of the Piegan horses, fat as butter, and herded by a dozen fighting men, it is not necessary to write; but of the talks between Ahjeek and Trooper MacTier, during which a new interpretation of the white man's law drifted into that copper-covered soul, it may be well to speak. ”

“ They thought also that perhaps the men of Ahjeek had found them. This is the thing that the chief of the troopers told me, and I, his servant, bring it to you."
"I had not known there were Piegans on the Smoky River," said Ahjeek, with the ghost of a smile, "and why should the men of my tribe find the horses? Are there not Crees and Yellowknives between Hunter's Peak and Fort McMurray? My friend has come too far with a foolish question."
"It is not the habit of the men who wear my coat to ask foolish questions. Perhaps my brother does not understand?" ”

“ There are not many who can carry a sick man thirty miles, and not open his wound."
"But of the horses of the Piegans my brother has not heard? I thought perhaps that the bird which flies by night might have whispered in his ear where the horses are, and that he would lend me his braves to drive them home again."
Again Ahjeek smiled. "The white man has strange dreams. Perhaps he, too, is sick." ”

“ Munroe, waking from his uneasy sleep, had gained the door of his tepee, and was staring at the two with pain-racked gaze. Jock dared scarcely to breathe while the pendulum of life quivered ere it swung. Then, jerkily, Ahjeek's voice sounded again, ragged with uncertainty, and as he spoke a thrill ran through Trooper MacTier.
"And if I do this thing?"
"There will be good-will between the Blackfeet and the Piegans, and your tribe will grow stronger. You will be friends with all men, and with the Piegans there will be hunting and feasting and giving in marriage. ”

“ Ahjeek was, as well, curiously like a child. He responded to childish arguments, was moved by things simple and elemental, and was puzzled over much that had drummed itself into the white man's brain.
So it happened that in these talks Trooper MacTier betrayed a high and noble interpretation of his duty. Gently, but with unvarying firmness, he brought Ahjeek to admit that the way of the transgressor is, even on the slopes of the Rockies, a way of discomfort and unending anxiety. Thus it was that a fortnight later they set their faces toward the east and began the return patrol. ”

“ There is no man that may give you shelter and find sleep for himself, unless," he added quietly, "the horses of the Piegans are found, and Ahjeek thinks well to ride with me to the chief of the troopers and lay his hand in the chief's hand and swear by his fathers to obey the law. ”

“ John, a hundred miles north-east on the Peace River. That it should come along the slope of the mountains from due south would be unanticipated. They talked this over time and again, till it seemed at last unassailable.
"You'll understand," said Jock, fixing his eyes on the ragged horizon that now lifted brokenly in the west, "that there'll be no shooting if we can help it. If that starts, we're done. I take it that at the bottom Ahjeek is a coward, for a man who's a thief is most always a coward, too. ”

“ How natural it was that he should discern in trapper, trader, and explorer only those who wanted something for nothing, and who plunged carelessly ahead, however they might violate that most dear to the free peoples of the West. ”

“ It's a new-fangled tumpline, made out of our belts and a few things that every man can spare and still look like a soldier. And, what's more, since you'll be facing south, you'll carry your carbine across your knees and attend to anything there may be on that side of you, and I'll look after the rest. ”

“ Leaving Fort McMurray on August the fifth, the patrol arrived at the Piegan camp on August the twenty-fifth, where details of the horses were procured. Continuing thence the following day, the patrol entered Ahjeek's camp on September the third, Trooper Munroe having in the meantime been shot through the shoulder from ambush. ”