hich had expanded into
the prairie, or the prairie which had crowded into the tepee. Dusty Star
crouching behind the parfleches could not tell which. All he knew was
that the wild dance of the prairie was tingling in his feet, and the
voices of the prairie calling in his head.

Suddenly, with a ringing cry, he leaped from his hiding-place, and
landed on hands and knees in the middle of the tepee. Then, with head
thrown back, and eyes glittering, he gave the hunting-call of the
wolves.

If the Thunder-bird itself had suddenly alit with flapping wings in
their midst, the medicine-men could not have been more utterly taken by
surprise. The dance came to an abrupt stand-still. Even Lone Chief
stopped his drumming, and stared in astonishment. Sitting-Always, not
being able to see clearly, because of her position, thought a wolf had
entered the tepee, and screamed aloud with fear.

Before any one could move, Dusty Star, now barking like a coyote, began
to run on hands and feet round the fire. Quicker and quicker he went,
barking and leaping up and down as if all the madness of the Mad Moon
were in his blood, and he were forgetting to be Indian, and remembering
to be wolf.

If Lone Chief had given the order, Nikana would have seized her son; but
Lone Chief was disturbed. Dusty Star as the grandson of his patient was
one thing, but Dusty Star as this leaping madness crying like a wolf,
was totally another. He did not approve; yet he did not dare to
interfere. What he had felt vaguely in the afternoon, he knew for a
certainty now. There was medicine in the boy. It was the true
medicine--the medicine of the lonely barrens; of the lairs in the glooms
of the spruce forest; and of the wolfish crags where the air throbbed
with the thunder of the streams. Great Medicine-man though he was, it
was a power he would have given many buffalo robes to possess. He knew
himself to be in the presence of a medicine more mighty than his own.
And because he knew it, he did not dare to answer the expectancy of his
companions by ordering that Dusty Star should be turned out of the
tepee.

As for Dusty Star himself, he knew nothing at all about possessing
"medicine." All he knew was that he felt very splendidly mad, with an
uncontrollable desire to throw his body in the air, and cry wolf calls
with his throat. And the fact that none of these important medicine-men,
nor even his mother, made any effort to stop him, encouraged him to an
adventur