tick, dug a hole in the
soft dirt. In the bottom of the hole she laid the letter and covered it
with earth, patting and smoothing it until it was level. Before she left
she sprinkled a few leaves over the spot.

She looked old and ugly when she went into the house, seeming, for the
first time, the woman of middle-age that she was. Quietly, purposefully,
she drew out a chair, and, standing upon it, took down from the rafters
the plant which Little Coyote's woman, the Mandan, had given her. It had
hung there a long time, and the leaves crumpled and dropped off at her
touch. She filled a basin with water and put the plant and root to soak,
while she searched for a sharp knife. Turning her back to the room and
facing the corner, like a child in mischief, she peeled the outer bark
from the root with the greatest care. The inner bark was blood-red, and
this too she peeled away carefully, very, very carefully saving the
smallest particles, and laid it upon a paper. When she had it all, she
burned the plant; but the red inner bark she put in a tin cup and covered
it with boiling water, to steep.

"Don't touch dat," she warned Ling.

The afternoon was waning when she went again to the willows, but the air
was still hot, for the rocks and sand held the heat until well after
nightfall. In the willows she cut a stick--a forked stick, which she
trimmed so that it left a crotch with a long handle. Hiding the stick
under her blanket, she stepped out of the willows, and seemed to be
wandering aimlessly until she was out of sight of the house and the
bunk-house. Then she walked rapidly, with a purpose. Her objective point
was a hill covered so thickly with rocks that scarcely a spear of grass
grew upon it. The climb left her short of breath, she wiped the
perspiration from her face with her blanket, but she did not falter.
Stepping softly, listening, she crept over the rocks with the utmost
caution, peering here and there as if in search of something which she did
not wish to alarm. A long, sibilant sound stopped her. She located it as
coming from under a rock only a few feet away, and a little gleam of
satisfaction in her sombre eyes showed that she had found that for which
she searched. The angry rattlesnake was coiled to strike, but she
approached without hesitancy. Calculating how far it could throw itself,
she stood a little beyond its range and for a moment stood watching the
glitter of its wicked little eyes, the lightning-like