Since their supply of meat was almost all used, Great Bear decided he
should get a buffalo. While Great Bear was gone, Little Bear busied
himself around the camp. He took the ropes with which the Pawnee horses
had been hobbled and spliced them to make two long ropes. The long ropes
could be used to tie packs onto the backs of horses. He was just
finishing when Grandfather returned to camp.
Grandfather had killed and butchered a fat buffalo cow. He had the meat
tied in two large bundles, each bundle wrapped in half of the buffalo
hide. They used one of the ropes Little Bear had spliced and tied the
packs securely on the back of one of the captured horses.
“We shall ride west until time to make camp,” Great Bear decided.
“Tomorrow we shall go south and west to see if we can find our enemy’s
trail.”
As both of them were tired from the long, hard day’s ride, they stopped
early to make camp. Great Bear selected a small valley in which there
was a large grove of trees. Wood was plentiful and as they were so deep
within Sioux territory, it was safe to build a fire. When the fire died
down to embers, Great Bear roasted buffalo tongue over the coals. Little
Bear gorged himself on the delicious meat.
They made an early start the next morning. It was a cloudy, damp day and
Little Bear began to wonder if he had made a mistake, urging Grandfather
to return to pursuit of the Crow. Spirit-of-Water-That-Falls had
promised a victory over the Crow. But the Spirit had allowed a victory
over the Pawnees. Perhaps one victory was all the Spirit intended for
them to win.
“It looks as though the Great Spirit will send more rain to hide the
Crow’s trail again,” Grandfather said, interrupting Little Bear’s
thoughts.
“We must be getting near the Crow.” Little Bear spoke encouragingly.
“We should be,” Great Bear agreed. “After the big rain, the Crow must
have seen signs of the Pawnees. He would lose much time hiding his trail
from them.”
“We’ll catch him,” Little Bear insisted stoutly.
By noon, when they stopped to rest their horses and cook food for
themselves, the rain Great Bear had expected began to fall. It was only
a light mist, but a light breeze from the southeast drove it into their
faces. Little Bear noticed Grandfather was constantly casting anxious
glances towards the north.
“Why do you watch the north?” Little Bear asked.
“I am afraid Old-Man-of-the-North is getting ready to send snow,” Great
Bear explained.
“Not this early,” Little Bear protested. “We have had no ice yet.”
“Sometimes Old-Man-of-the-North is unreasonable,” Great Bear answered.
“It seems all of the spirits have been working to protect the Crow. I
feel Old-Man-of-the-North is sending snow.”
“Then let’s lose no time,” Little Bear urged. “We must find the Crow’s
trail before snow covers it.”
Grandfather nodded.
“We are now on Crow hunting grounds,” he said. “We cannot go much
farther.”
When they started again, Little Bear took charge of the captured horses
so that Grandfather could give all of his attention to looking for the
Crow’s trail. The rain was becoming heavier, but it was warm rain. Great
Bear’s fears that Old-Man-of-the-North was sending snow seemed foolish.
Little Bear’s spirits rose. He knew Grandfather was sure they were near
the Crow. Otherwise the old warrior would not take the time to follow so
zig-zag a course. So Little Bear was not greatly surprised when
Grandfather pulled his horse to a stop and triumphantly pointed to the
ground.
“Here’s the Crow’s trail,” Great Bear announced.
Little Bear rode alongside. Both of them dismounted and studied the
marks left by the horses.
“I don’t see a track made by the horse with a stone bruise,” Little Bear
said doubtfully.
“He could be at the head of the string,” Great Bear pointed out, “or
since the ground is soft from so much rain, the bruise may have healed
quickly. I am sure this is the Crow’s trail.”
Little Bear knew Grandfather’s ability at reading signs on a trail too
well to doubt his explanation.
“The trail is new,” Little Bear suggested. “The Crow cannot be far
ahead.”
“You are learning to read trail signs.” Grandfather nodded approvingly.
“We must go carefully so that the Crow will not know we are near. You
stay behind with our horses. I will scout ahead.”
Little Bear waited until Grandfather was many paces ahead before he
started with the horses. The trail followed the low lands where the Crow
could travel easily. Evidently he was so sure no one was following him
that he didn’t even stop on high ground to watch the trail behind him.
Occasionally while Grandfather was carefully making his way to high
ground to get a better look ahead, Little Bear would dismount and study
the Crow’s trail. Even if Old-Man-of-the-North did send the snow
Grandfather feared, the Crow wouldn’t escape. Grandfather was sure to
lead a raid against the Crow’s camp tonight.
[Illustration: _With a fire in front it made a comfortable shelter_]
Without warning the wind switched to the north. Strong gusts whipped
rain into Little Bear’s face. It wasn’t long until the rain carried an
icy sting and flakes of snow were floating among the rain drops. In a
surprisingly short time the rain had completely changed to driving snow.
Grandfather waited for Little Bear in the shelter of a clump of trees.
“We must make camp,” Great Bear told him. “These early storms are often
bad in this country.”
Little Bear jumped from his horse and quickly pulled the bundles off the
pack horse. He turned the horses loose to graze before snow could cover
the grass. Both he and Great Bear worked rapidly making camp. There were
many dry branches under the trees. These they heaped in a pile for
firewood.
They had just turned to the work of cutting green poles to use in
building a lean-to shelter when the snow quit falling. The wind died
down, and there was a rift in the clouds to the west letting the sun
shine through.
“It’s over,” Little Bear exclaimed. “Now we can get back on the trail.”
“It’s only a lull,” Great Bear warned without stopping work. “It will be
worse in a few minutes.”
Great Bear was proved right almost at once. The wind came up again,
driving icy snow into their faces. The trees with their low branches
offered some protection, but even here the swirling snow made it
difficult for Little Bear and his grandfather to see. They worked as
rapidly as possible. They drove two large poles into the ground and
lashed a third pole to those two. Great Bear laid smaller poles with one
end against the cross pole and the other on the ground. Little Bear
helped pile branches against the poles until the shelter was completed.
The finished shelter was a lean-to, closed to the north and open to the
south.
Grandfather started a fire on the south side of the lean-to where some
of the heat would reflect back into the shelter. Little Bear went to a
near-by pine tree and broke off great armfuls of small branches. He
shook the snow from these and piled them in the lean-to. He spread the
buffalo robes over the branches. With a fire in front the lean-to made a
comfortable shelter.
Great Bear took enough meat from one of the packs for a couple of meals.
He rerolled the pack and hung it and the other pack of meat in a tree.
“Animals can’t get our food there,” he said.
Little Bear shivered as he thought of the kind of camp they would have
had to make if the snow had caught them on the prairie. Out on the
plains with no protection from the wind, it would have been almost
impossible to make a camp and find fuel. Still Little Bear knew that if
he hadn’t coaxed Grandfather to continue in pursuit of the Crow, the two
of them might now be safe in the main Sioux camp.
“It is my fault Old-Man-of-the-North caught us here with his snow,”
Little Bear admitted.
Great Bear looked at him thoughtfully.
“It doesn’t matter whether we are here or far to the north,” Great Bear
answered. “Old-Man-of-the-North would have found us with his snow. The
Crow has strong medicine. The spirits are protecting him.”
“Yet we are nearer to him than we have been before,” Little Bear pointed
out. “He can’t run from us until the storm stops and then he will leave
a plain trail.”
“That is true,” Great Bear agreed hopefully. “Perhaps his medicine is
not as strong as I thought.”
For a time they sat in silence. The wind rose, and the drifting snow
seemed to close them off from the rest of the world. If the storm
continued this way much longer, drifts would be piled so high the horses
would not be able to wade through them. A short time before, Little Bear
had been eager to keep Great Bear searching for the Crow. The storm
showed him they should start for the Sioux winter camp as soon as
possible.
“Will the storm be over so we can start for camp tomorrow, Grandfather?”
he asked.
Great Bear raised his eyes from the fire.
“Not tomorrow,” he replied. “Perhaps the day after. But we are not
starting back without the horses that Crow stole from our herd.”
Little Bear gave him a surprised look.
“The Crow’s trail will be covered,” Little Bear protested.
“We may not need to find the trail,” Grandfather said thoughtfully.
“Tell me about that dream you had at the place of water-that-falls.”
Little Bear related what seemed to have happened in his dream. Great
Bear listened closely as his grandson told about the part where he and
the warrior had ridden the roan horse and especially to the part where
they had walked to the Crow’s camp during a snowstorm.
“It must have been a message.” Great Bear nodded at the end. “It is the
very place the Crow would pick to camp until this storm is over.”
Little Bear began to take new hope.
“Do you have a plan, Grandfather?” he asked excitedly.
“If it is still snowing in the morning, we may be able to surprise the
Crow and get the horses,” Great Bear said. “If it stops snowing before
morning, we will get the horses tomorrow night.”
“Wouldn’t it be better to get them tonight?” Little Bear urged. “We know
the Crow will be in camp now. In this storm he won’t expect a raid.”
“There are several reasons why we couldn’t get them tonight,” Great Bear
pointed out. “It would be difficult to find our way. Besides, we might
not be able to get the horses to move out of the valley in the dark and
the storm.”
“How shall we be able to get them in daylight?” Little Bear wondered.
“I believe the place where the Crow is camped is a small canyon like
Buffalo Trap Canyon,” Great Bear explained. “It has only one entrance
and the Crow won’t be camped there. He will find a protected place
behind some trees. The horses will be at the north end of the canyon
where high cliffs will protect them. If we are careful, we may be able
to get all of the Crow’s horses without his seeing us.”
“Tomorrow we will get the horses,” Little Bear vowed.
There was no sign of the storm’s lessening. To Little Bear it seemed the
wind was blowing harder than before. As darkness deepened, the fire
lighted up a space of only a few feet in each direction. Before he
crawled into his buffalo robe, Great Bear rolled two large branches on
the fire.
“These will hold fire until morning,” he said.