THING WORSE THAN A GOLD CRISIS.

"What is the matter with your friend?" asked Overton, as Lyster stood
staring after Mr. Haydon, who walked alone down the way they had come from
the boats. "Is one glimpse of our camp life enough to drive him to the
river again?"

"No, no--that is--well, I don't just know what ails him," confessed
Lyster, rather lamely. "He went in with me to see 'Tana, and seems all
upset by the sight of her. She does look very low, Dan. At home he has a
daughter about her age, who really resembles her a little--as he does--a
girl he thinks the world of. Maybe that had something to do with his
feelings. I don't know, though; never imagined he was so impressionable to
other people's misfortunes. And that satanic-looking old Indian helped
make things uncomfortable for him."

"Who--Akkomi?"

"Oh, that is Akkomi, is it? The old chief who was too indisposed to
receive me when I awaited admittance to his royal presence! Humph! Well,
he seemed lively enough a minute ago--said something to Haydon that nearly
gave him fits; and then, as if satisfied with his deviltry, he collapsed
into the folds of his blanket again, and looks bland and innocent as a
spring lamb at the present speaking. Is he grand chamberlain of your
establishment here? Or is he a medicine man you depend on to cure
'Tana?"

"Akkomi said something to Mr. Haydon?" asked Overton, incredulously.
"Nonsense! It could not have been anything Haydon would understand,
anyway, for Akkomi does not speak English."

Lyster looked at him from the corner of his eyes, and whistled rather
rudely.

"Now, it is not necessary for any reason whatever, for you to hide the
accomplishments of your noble red friend," he remarked. "You are either
trying to gull me, or Akkomi is trying to gull you--which is it?"

"What do you mean?" demanded Overton, impatiently. "You look as though
there may be a grain of sense in the immense amount of fool stuff you are
talking. Akkomi, maybe, understands English a little when it is spoken;
but, like many another Indian who does the same, he will not speak it. I
have known him for two years, in his own camp and on the trail, and I have
never yet heard him use English words."

"Well, I have not had the felicity of even a two-hour acquaintance with
his royal chieftainship," remarked Lyster, "but during the limited space
of time I have been allowed to gaze on him I am confident I heard him use
five English words, and use them