paper. "Red Moon," he said at
last, motioning the pariah forward, "do you know what I am saying to
you?"

Squaw Charley nodded.

"Good! good! This is fortunate. Now we can have a talk with these
Sioux." He addressed the Indian again. "And you speak English?" he
asked.

There was a second grave nod.

"You shall be my interpreter, Red Moon. You shall have a log house near
the scouts, and the Great Father at Washington will pay you. You shall
have double rations for yourself and your squaw, and more, if you have
papooses. What do you say to that?"

Squaw Charley had not taken his eyes from the other's face for an
instant while he was talking. Now, for answer, he shook his head slowly
and sadly from side to side.

"Don't want to?" cried the colonel.

"I'll tell you, sir," interposed Lieutenant Fraser, studying the paper,
"I don't believe he ever speaks. You'll notice that it says here: '_but
he has never_.' I can't be sure, but I think the next word is
'_spoken_.'"

"Vow of silence?"

"Something of the kind. Captain Oliver has been telling me about these
bucks that are degraded; and I don't believe that, even if this fellow
spoke, the rest of the tribe would treat with us through him."

"That's probably true."

"They've made a squaw of him, sir."

Deep humiliation instantly showed in the pariah's eyes and posture. He
looked at Lieutenant Fraser imploringly, and drew his blanket still more
closely about him. Then, as, with a sign, he was bidden to put it off,
he suddenly let it drop to the floor.

"Great Scott!" cried the colonel. "He's _dressed_ like one!"

"His punishment, sir. And he won't be taken back as a warrior till he
does some big deed."

"What does that paper say again? _'Out of the weakness of the flesh he
wept under the tortures of the sun-dance.'_ So _that's_ the cause of his
trouble! What did they do to you, Red Moon?"

To reply, Squaw Charley quickly divested himself of the calico waist and
turned about. And Colonel Cummings, uttering his horror, traced with
tender finger the ragged, ghastly seams that lined the pariah's back.

"Muscles torn loose," he said. "Not old wounds, either." As Squaw
Charley resumed waist and blanket, he looked on pityingly.

"I'll give him his freedom," he said, when the outcast stood ready to
depart. "He can come and go in the post as he likes. Robert, see that
the adjutant understands my order. Now, let him get something to eat in
the kitchen."

When Squ