ough road, with her bandaged arm, for beads! It did
not sound reasonable to Susie, but since Smith was accounted for, and her
mother would return that night, there seemed no cause for worry. Susie
could not remember ever before having come home without finding her mother
somewhere in the house, and now, as she fidgeted about, she realized how
much she would miss her if that which she most feared should transpire to
separate them.

She walked to the door, and while she stood idly kicking her heel against
the door-sill she saw Ralston, who was passing, stoop and pick up a scrap
of paper which had been caught between two small stones. She observed that
he examined it with interest, but while he stood with his lips pursed in a
half-whistle a puff of wind flirted it from his fingers. He pursued it as
though it had value, and Susie, who was not above curiosity, joined in the
chase.

It lodged in one of the giant sage-brushes which grew some little distance
away on the outer edge of the dooryard, and into this brush Ralston
reached and carefully drew it forth. He looked at it again, lest his eyes
had deceived him, then he passed it to Susie, who stared blankly from the
scrap of paper to him.

XIX

WHEN THE CLOUDS PLAYED WOLF

The Indian woman was restless; she had been so from the time they had lost
sight of the town, but her restlessness had increased as the daylight
faded and night fell.

"You're goin' to bust this seat in if you don't quit jammin' around,"
Meeteetse Ed warned her peevishly.

Meeteetse was irritable, a state due largely to the waning exhilaration of
a short and unsatisfactory spree.

The woman clucked at the horses, and, to the great annoyance of her
driver, reached for the reins and slapped them on the back.

"They're about played out," he growled. "Forty miles is a awful trip for
these buzzard-heads to make in a day. We orter have put up some'eres
overnight."

"I could have stayed with Little Coyote's woman."

"We orter have done it, too. Look at them cayuses stumblin' along! Say, we
won't git in before 'leven or twelve at this gait, and I'm so hungry I
don't know where I'm goin' to sleep to-night."

"Little Coyote's woman gifted me some sa'vis berries."

"Aw, sa'vis berries! I can't go sa'vis berries," growled Meeteetse.
"They're too sweet. The only way they're fit to eat is to dry 'em and
pound 'em up with jerked elk--then they ain't bad eatin'. I've et 'most
ev'ry thing in my da