Page:Hendryx--Connie Morgan with the Mounted.djvu/73

penetrate the secret of its thick, clammy silence. Then, wailing forth the words of a weird chant, he began slowly to dance, lifting each bare foot in turn and bringing it down with a peculiar thud. Faster came the words of the chant, and faster thudded the feet upon the ground, while the man's long black hair switched about the grease-glistening shoulders like a black banner of death. The words of the chant died down, the dancing ceased and, with a weird and solitary incantation, before the fire, the medicine man opened a small buckskin pouch and, passing from one to another of the assembled Indians, touched each upon the forehead with an eagle's feather which he had produced from his medicine bag. This ceremony over, he grunted an order and four young bucks arose and passed into the tent, from which they emerged a few moments later bearing between them the form of a man trussed hand and foot with caribou-skin thongs. They deposited their burden at the feet of the medicine man and Connie caught the malevolent gleam of the glittering black eyes as the naked savage peered into the upturned face that returned the stare with a white man's laughing sneer. The man was Corporal Rickey, and for a