fter a powwow.

Three days later Cameron rode back into Fort Calgary, sore but content,
for at his stirrup and bound to his saddle-horn rode the Sioux Chief,
proud, untamed, but a prisoner. As he rode into the little town his
quick eyes flashed scorn upon all the curious gazers, but in their
depths beneath the scorn there looked forth an agony that only Cameron
saw and understood. He had played for a great stake and had lost.

As the patrol rode into Fort Calgary the little town was in an uproar of
jubilation.

"What's the row?" inquired the doctor, for Cameron felt too weary to
inquire.

"A great victory for the troops!" said a young chap dressed in cow-boy
garb. "Middleton has smashed the half-breeds at Batoche. Riel is
captured. The whole rebellion business is bust up."

Cameron threw a swift glance at the Sioux's face. A fierce anxiety
looked out of the gleaming eyes.

"Tell him, Jerry," said Cameron to the half-breed who rode at his other
side.

As Jerry told the Indian of the total collapse of the rebellion and the
capture of its leader the stern face grew eloquent with contempt.

"Bah!" he said, spitting on the ground. "Riel he much fool--no good
fight. Indian got no Chief--no Chief." The look on his face all too
clearly revealed that his soul was experiencing the bitterness of death.

Cameron almost pitied him, but he spoke no word. There was nothing that
one could say and besides he was far too weary for anything but rest.
At the gate of the Barrack yard his old Superintendent from Fort Macleod
met the party.

"You are wounded, Cameron?" exclaimed the Superintendent, glancing in
alarm at Cameron's wan face.

"I have got him," replied Cameron, loosing the lariat from the horn of
his saddle and handing the end to an orderly. "But," he added, "it seems
hardly worth while now."

"Worth while! Worth while!" exclaimed the Superintendent with as much
excitement as he ever allowed to appear in his tone. "Let me tell you,
Cameron, that if any one thing has kept me from getting into a blue funk
during these months it was the feeling that you were on patrol along the
Sun Dance Trail."

"Funk?" exclaimed Cameron with a smile. "Funk?" But while he smiled he
looked into the cold, gray eyes of his Chief, and, noting the unwonted
glow in them, he felt that after all his work as the Patrol of the Sun
Dance Trail was perhaps worth while.

CHAPTER XXI

WHY THE DOCTOR STAYED

The Big Horn River, fed by