the Wildcat rolled his
eyes. Now and then when the Indian's sense of humour got the best of
him he varied his Chinook jargon with Wild shrieks of laughter.

"Sounds like dem crazy folks in dat car comin' from Chicago. Seems like
de whole worl' done got crowded wid fools. What you laffin' at, boy?"

In a little while the party landed at Memloose Island. Before them,
rising sharply against the evening sky, drooping cottonwoods lifted
high above an undergrowth of willows. The party marched down a little
trail for half the length of the island, and then, at a point where the
trail divided into the sombre interior of the wooded terrain, they left
the sunlight.

After a march of a hundred yards they came upon a clearing. About the
clearing in the fringing woods were fifty rickety structures lifted on
poles. On each of these, with its grinning skull lying towards the
east, lay a skeleton.

The Wildcat began to sweat. He counted a dozen skeletons and added a
few dozen prayers to his perspiration. In a green alcove opening from
the wider clearing seven skeletons stood erect in a ring about a flat
stone.

His captors carried the Wildcat to this stone and held him. A little
apart from him Running Bear opened the services with a yell which
echoed like a chorus from the inferno.

The Wildcat gave up hope.

"They sho' got me. What dey is I don' know. Lemme go, boys."

The smoke from a dozen fires lifted in the clearing. Staggering in from
half a dozen paths came as many painted warriors, each bearing on his
back a salmon nearly as long as its red-skinned carrier.

Running Bear abandoned the vernacular for a moment and dropped into
English.

"The Gods of the waters have sent the salmon. The black man can feast
with his red brothers."

"Them words sure sounds noble. How come you pester me talkin' voodoo
talk?"

"After the feast the fires of sacrifice will be lighted. It is written
that one of our number shall be burned at the stake."

To the Wildcat's ears this sounded homelike, but not reassuring.

"Lemme go! Lemme go!"

He leaped from the rock and plunged through the fringing skeletons.
Running Bear and a dozen of his companions loped along after the
Wildcat. The galloping party covered the length of the island. Running
Bear and his companions deployed in open order, to permit the Wildcat
to double on his trail; but that panic-stricken individual had fixed
his course, and he sailed true to it.

He headed for a t