"When love is strong, the eyes are blind and the ears too open.
Brighteyes hears voices in the night air."
Having given utterance to this sage opinion with the sententious
solemnity of an oracle, or the portentous gravity of "an ass"--as modern
slang might put it--the youth resumed his pipe and continued the
stupefaction of his brain.
The woman was not sorry that her visitor took the matter thus, for she
had felt the imprudence of having betrayed any symptom of surprise,
whatever the sound might be. When, therefore, another whisper of
"Mother!" was heard, instead of looking intelligent, she bestowed some
increased attention on her work, yawned sleepily once or twice, and then
said--
"Is there not a council being held to-night?"
"There is. The warriors are speaking now."
"Does not the young brave aspire to raising his voice in council?"
"He does," replied the youth, puffing with a look of almost superhuman
dignity, "but he may not raise his voice in council till he has been on
the war-path."
"I should have thought," returned Brighteyes, with the slightest
possible raising of her eyebrows, "that a brave who aims so high would
find it more pleasant to be near the council tent talking with the other
young braves than to sit smoking beside a squaw."
The youth took the hint rather indignantly, rose, and strode out of the
tent in majestic silence.
No sooner was he gone than Moonlight darted in and fell into her mothers
arms. There was certainly more of the pale-face than of the red man's
spirit in the embrace that followed, but the spirit of the red man soon
reasserted itself.
"Mother," she said eagerly and impressively, "Rushing River is going to
be my husband!"
"Child," exclaimed the matron, while her countenance fell, "can the dove
mate with the raven? the rabbit with the wolf?"
"They can, for all I care or know to the contrary," said Moonlight--
impelled, no doubt, by the spirit of Little Tim. "But" she continued
quickly, "I bear a message to Bounding Bull. Where is he?"
"Not in the camp, my daughter. He has gone to the block-house to see
the preacher."
"And father. Is he here?"
"No, he has gone with Bounding Bull. There is no chief in the camp just
now--only the young braves to guard it."
"How well they guard it--when I am here!" said the girl, with a laugh;
then, becoming intensely earnest, she told her mother in as few words as
possible the object of her visit, concluding with the very pertinent
question, "Now, what is to be done?"
"You dare not allow Rushing River to enter the camp just now," said
Brighteyes. "The young men would certainly kill him."
"But I must not send him away," returned the perplexed Moonlight. "If I
do, I--I shall never--he will never more return."
"Could you not creep out of camp as you crept in and warn him?"
"I could, as far as the sentinels are concerned, for they are little
better than owls; but it is growing lighter now, and the moon will be up
soon--I dare not risk it. If I were caught, would not the braves
suspect something, and scour the country round? I know not what to do,
yet something _must_ be done at once."
For some minutes the mother and daughter were silent, each striving to
devise some method of escaping from their difficulty. At last
Brighteyes spoke.
"I see a way, my child," she said, with more than her wonted solemnity,
even when discussing grave matters. "It is full of danger, yet you must
take it, for I see that love has taken possession of my Moonlight's
heart, and--there is no withstanding love!"