“Yes – yes, he is dead,” she said coldly, and her tones were so even no one would imagine it was her father she spoke of.
“Your mother, too?”
“My mother, too,” she assented. “But I told you I wasn’t going to talk any more about myself, and I ain’t. If I can’t go to your Sunday-school without a pedigree, I’ll stop where I am – that’s all.”
She spoke with the independence of a boy, and it was, perhaps, her independence that induced the man to be persistent.
“All right, ’Tana,” he said cheerfully. “You come along on your own terms, so long as you get out of these quarters. I’ll tell the dead partner story – only the partner must have a name, you know. Montana is a good name, but it is only a half one, after all. You can give me another, I reckon.”
She hesitated a little and stared at the glowing embers of the lodge fire. He wondered if she was deciding to tell him a true one, or if she was trying to think of a fictitious one.
“Well?” he said at last.
Then she looked up, and the sullen, troubled, unchildlike eyes made him troubled for her sake.
“Rivers is a good name – Rivers?” she asked, and he nodded his head, grimly.
“That will do,” he agreed. “But you give it just because you were baptized in the river this evening, don’t you?”
“I guess I give it because I haven’t any other I intend to be called by,” she answered.
“And you will cut loose from this outfit?” he asked. “You will come with me, little girl, across there into God’s country, where you must belong.”
“You won’t let them look down on me?”
“If any one looks down on you, it will be because of something you will do in the future, ’Tana,” he said, looking at her very steadily. “Understand that, for I will settle it that no one knows how I came across you. And you will go?”
“I – will go.”
“Come, now! that’s a good decision – the best you could have made, little girl; and I’ll take care of you as though you were a cargo of gold. Shake hands on the agreement, won’t you?”
She held out her hand, and the old squaw in the corner grunted at the symbol of friendship. Akkomi watched them with his glittering eyes, but made no sign.
It surely was a strange beginning to a strange friendship.
“You poor little thing!” said Overton, compassionately, as she half shrank from the clasp of his fingers. The tender tone broke through whatever wall of indifference she had built about her, for she flung herself face downward on the couch, and sobbed passionately, refusing to speak again, though Overton tried in vain to calm her.
CHAPTER III.
THE IMAGE-MAKER
The world was a night older ere Dan Overton informed Lyster that they would have an addition of one to their party when they continued their journey into the States.
On leaving the village of Akkomi but little conversation was to be had from Dan. In vain did his friend endeavor to learn something of the white squaw who swam so well. He simply kept silence, and looked with provoking disregard on all attempts to surprise him into disclosures.
But when the camp breakfast was over, and he had evidently thought out his plan of action, he told Lyster over the sociable influence of a pipe, that he was going over to the camp of Akkomi again.
“The fact, is, Max, that the girl we saw yesterday is to go across home with us. She’s a ward of mine.”
“What!” demanded Max, sitting bolt upright in his amazement, “a ward of yours? You say that as though you had several scattered among the tribes about here. So it is a Kootenai Pocahontas! What good advice was it you gave me yesterday about keeping clear of Selkirk Range females? And now you are deliberately gathering one to yourself, and I will be the unnecessary third on our journey home. Dan! Dan! I wouldn’t have thought it of you!”
Overton listened in silence until the first outburst was over.
“Through?” he asked, carelessly; “well, then, it isn’t a Pocahontas; it isn’t an Indian at all. It is only a little white girl whose father was – was an old partner. Well, he’s gone ‘over the range’ – dead, you know – and the girl is left to hustle for herself. Naturally, she heard I was in this region, and as none of her daddy’s old friends were around but me, she just made her camp over there with the Kootenais, and waited till I reached the river again. She’ll go with me down to Sinna; and if she hasn’t any other home in prospect, I’ll just locate her there with Mrs. Huzzard, the milliner-cook, for the present. Now, that’s the story.”
“And a very pretty little one it is, too,” agreed Mr. Max. “For a backwoodsman, who is not supposed to have experience, it is very well put together. Oh, don’t frown like that! I’ll believe she’s your granddaughter, if you say so,” and he laughed in wicked enjoyment at Overton’s flushed face. “It’s all right, Dan. I congratulate you. But I wouldn’t have thought it.”
“I suppose, now,” remarked Dan, witheringly, “that by all these remarks and giggles you are trying to be funny. Is that it? Well, as the fun of it is not visible to me yet, I’ll just keep my laughter till it is. In the meantime, I’m going over to call on my ward, Miss Rivers, and you can hustle for funny things around camp until I come back.”
“Oh, say, Dan, don’t be vindictive. Take me along, won’t you? I’ll promise to be good – ’pon honor I will. I’ll do penance for any depraved suspicions I may have indulged in. I’ll – I’ll even shake hands again with Black Bow, there! Beyond that, I can think of no more earnest testimony of repentance.”
“I shall go by myself,” decided Overton. “So make a note of it, if you see the young lady before to-morrow, it will be because she specially requests it. Understand? I’m not going to have her bothered by people who are only curious; not but that she can take her own part, as you’ll maybe learn later. But she was too upset to talk much last night. So I’ll go over and finish this morning, and in the meantime, this side of the river is plenty good enough for you.”
“Is it?” murmured Mr. Lyster, as he eyed the stalwart form of the retreating guardian, who was so bent on guarding. “Well, it would do my heart good, anyway, to fasten another canoe right alongside of yours where you land over there, and I shouldn’t be surprised if I did it.”
Thus it happened that while Overton was skimming upward across the river, his friend, on mischief bent, was getting a canoe ready to launch. A few minutes after Overton had disappeared toward the Indian village, the second canoe danced lightly over the Kootenai, and the occupant laughed to himself, as he anticipated the guardian’s surprise.
“Not that I care in the least about seeing the dismal damsel he has to look after,” mused Lyster. “In fact, I’m afraid she’ll be a nuisance, and spoil our jolly good time all the way home. But he is so refreshingly earnest about everything. And as he doesn’t care a snap for girls in general, it is all the more amusing that it is he who should have a charge of that sort left on his hands. I’d like to know what she looks like. Common, I dare say, for the ultra refined do not penetrate these wilds to help blaze trails; and she swam like a boy.”
When he reached the far shore, no one was in sight. With satisfied smiles, he fastened his canoe to that of Overton, and then cast about for some place to lie in wait for that selfish personage and surprise him on his return.
He had no notion of going up to the village, for he wanted only to keep close enough to trace Overton. Hearing children’s voices farther along the shore, he sauntered that way, thinking to see Indian games, perhaps. When he came nearer, he saw they were running races.
The contestants were running turn about, two at a time. Each victory was greeted with shrill cries of triumph. He also noticed that each victor returned