ays nobody knows, but all the tribes which
have migrated out of the woods into the prairie country have become
"pony-men."

Na-tee-kah could not remember another time when she, daughter of a
chief, had been compelled to carry so much, even for a short distance.
She knew how to pack a pony capitally well, for that is one of the first
arts of Nez Perce house-keeping. When and where should they ever get
some more ponies? Her father was a renowned horse-thief, and so were
several others of the best warriors in the band, and there was hope in
that thought; still there is a double difficulty before a man who sets
out to steal horses without having one of his own to ride.

"Two Arrows will steal horses some day," she said to Ha-ha-pah-no,
confidently.

"Big chief: steal a heap. No boy any more. Big Tongue find a horse; say
he stole him. No brave. Pony come somehow."

Nobody else in that band could have guessed how the mind of Long Bear
himself was busy with plans concerning that very matter. He thought of
all the horses of all the tribes at any kind of difference with the Nez
Perces, and he thought of the white traders and their rich droves of
quadrupeds of all sorts. He had won his rank fairly, as his son was
likely to do after him, and he had a great deal of courage and ambition;
just at present, however, he was a dismounted horse-thief, and he felt
the disgrace of it even more than the inconvenience. It was a sad thing
to be afoot at his time of life, and he brooded over it like some great
white merchant who had suddenly failed in business. He feared that it
would take some time to set up that band again, without any four-footed
capital to begin on.

It was pleasant to find the trail so good, at all events, and before
dark they made out to reach the very spot where Two Arrows had camped.
They had been more than twice as long in getting there, but the first
brave who pushed on into the open space found the dead embers of a fire
and began to study them. Not far behind him were Na-tee-kah and
Ha-ha-pah-no, and it was hard to say which of them was the first to
point at the black coals and ashes, and exclaim, "Two Arrows!"

The word was echoed from lip to lip until it came to Long Bear and his
wife. For a wonder he was walking beside her, which was as near as he
could come to carrying her load for her. She was only the step-mother of
Na-tee-kah and her brother, and had a pappoose of her own as part of her
burden, but she