Presently, when she had thought over the
announcement, she turned round to him, frankly meeting his gaze for the
first time. "That's funny," she said. "Why, last year, all the way up
from Texas, there wasn't an Indian bothered us!"

"Last summer, before you came, the soldiers at Brannon did not dare go
more than a mile outside the lines to hunt. It will be the same this
summer. There is that stockade full of prisoners, and four of them are
condemned to be hanged. Before long the Indians will be circling the
post."

She looked away at the ox-team. They were being taken from the plow and
put to a wagon.

Then, again, she turned squarely. "What about Shanty Town?" she said
with meaning.

He understood. "Shanty Town goes when the troops go.
But"--hesitatingly--"Matthews does not. He will stay at Brannon to act
as interpreter."

"He will!" she said, and coloured.

He coloured, too, feeling himself reproved. But from under the wide,
battered felt that had supplanted the nubia, his eyes shone with no
resentment, only fatherly tenderness.

"You wonder why I do not remain," he began, "so that Matthews could be
sent away. I shall tell you."

She let the reins fall to the drag. "That isn't it," she answered
quickly. "We have no right to ask you to do anything after the way dad
treated you. But the Colonel sent you over to tell us to look out.
Didn't he? And he keeps a man over there--pays him to stay--and that man
is a sight worse than an Indian!"

"I could have that man dismissed," he said slowly. "Please let me tell
you why I don't. In the first place, the Indians are beginning to act
badly--very badly. They are invading Crow territory, and stealing from
peaceful bands. They are molesting whites wherever they can find them,
and murdering. So we can judge that there will be hard fighting. For the
troops will seek to pay them up.

"Oh, Dallas, how I pray to see trouble stop! I am going to the Indians.
I know their leaders--have known them for ten years or more. I shall ask
them to consider the good of their squaws and children and property, and
ask them to accept reservation life. If they won't, I shall beg a few of
them to come in with me and at least talk treaty.

"That is the first reason for my going. The second is the Jamiesons. If
I find those poor women, and tell their captors that the four chiefs
here are in danger, I know mother and daughter will be handed over to
me----"

"You're right! You can save them