n he saw Breaking Rock,
his son, staring at the big lodge which was so full of happiness, and
so full also of many luxuries never before seen at a trading post on
the Koonce River. The father of Mitiahwe had been chief, but because his
three sons had been killed in battle the chieftainship had come to White
Buffalo, who was of the same blood and family. There were those who said
that Mitiahwe should have been chieftainess; but neither she nor her
mother would ever listen to this, and so White Buffalo, and the tribe
loved Mitiahwe because of her modesty and goodness. She was even more to
White Buffalo than Breaking Rock, and he had been glad that Dingan the
white man--Long Hand he was called--had taken Mitiahwe for his woman.
Yet behind this gladness of White Buffalo, and that of Swift Wing, and
behind the silent watchfulness of Breaking Rock, there was a thought
which must ever come when a white man mates with an Indian maid, without
priest or preacher, or writing, or book, or bond.

Yet four years had gone; and all the tribe, and all who came and went,
half-breeds, traders, and other tribes, remarked how happy was the white
man with his Indian wife. They never saw anything but light in the eyes
of Mitiahwe, nor did the old women of the tribe who scanned her face as
she came and went, and watched and waited too for what never came--not
even after four years.

Mitiahwe had been so happy that she had not really missed what never
came; though the desire to have something in her arms which was part of
them both had flushed up in her veins at times, and made her restless
till her man had come home again. Then she had forgotten the unseen for
the seen, and was happy that they two were alone together--that was the
joy of it all, so much alone together; for Swift Wing did not live with
them, and, like Breaking Rock, she watched her daughter's life, standing
afar off, since it was the unwritten law of the tribe that the wife's
mother must not cross the path or enter the home of her daughter's
husband. But at last Dingan had broken through this custom, and insisted
that Swift Wing should be with her daughter when he was away from home,
as now on this wonderful autumn morning, when Mitiahwe had been singing
to the Sun, to which she prayed for her man and for everlasting days
with him.

She had spoken angrily but now, because her soul sharply resented the
challenge to her happiness which her mother had been making. It was
her ow