The mountain man nodded. “If that’s what you want. We’ll be getting to a settlement tonight—or at least the only kind of settlement they have out here. You can drop off there if you want to. I think Standing Bear would be right proud to have you stay awhile—”

“Standing Bear?” Francis cut in. “Who’s he?”

“He’s the head of the settlement. I was thinking earlier of swinging by there and picking up a horse for you. Of course now that you want to stop, we’ll just drop in and forget about the horse …”

“What kind of a settlement is it?”

“Well, it’s not really a settlement. More like what you’d call a camp. Out here we call it something else.”

“What do you call it?”

“A village,” the mountain man answered, chuckling. “Out here we call it a Sioux village. You sure do pick the funniest places to want to stay, Mr. Tucket.”

———— Chapter Nine ————

FRANCIS TRIED not to be afraid when the Sioux village came into view. He had seen only one type of Indian so far, the mean type. And he knew that the Pawnee tribe was the not-too-distant cousin of the Sioux. Thoughts of recapture took the place of his faith in Mr. Grimes’s judgment, and Francis went cold all over.

“Easy, Mr. Tucket,” the mountain man said without turning. “This is like a show. You saw me come into the Pawnee village—we do the same thing here. Act easy.”

Francis took his cue from Mr. Grimes. He stiffened his back and tried to remember something not related to where he was now. His mind settled on the birthday cake his mother had made, arid looking straight ahead—neither down nor left nor right—he pictured it in exact detail.

The clamor in the village was deafening. Chief Standing Bear’s group had an even noisier bunch of dogs than the Pawnees, and the children’s howling was earshattering. Francis marveled at the sorrel and the mules. They paid no more attention to the screaming than did their master except that once a mule took aim and nearly drove a dog’s head through his rear end with a rear hoof.

Finally, when they had woven their way to about the center of the village, Mr. Grimes pulled lightly on the reins and stopped.

“Standing Bear,” the mountain man called.

Francis watched as a small channel opened in the crowd to the right and an Indian, who limped, came through. He was short, bowlegged, and stocky, but he moved with a smoothness that made Francis think immediately of a cat. It must be Standing Bear, Francis thought, and he was not smiling. When he was five feet from the sorrel, his right hand came up slowly, and with as much grace as he used walking.

Mr. Grimes shrugged, said something in Sioux to the chief, received an answer, and laughed.