The Denison review. [volume] (Denison, Iowa) 1867-current, 1898-09-23
Never . said the Weasel, with sad

y
orderly just the same; promise"
"Just the same, said the Weasel.
But when she came back she was no
longer Toonie, the child. She was Miss
Adair, no further opposed to being
called Judith-indeed preferrirg it to
the loving pet name Of her babyhood,
which, she said, was silly. The Indian
was back on the plains, very tall and
straight, in neat garments Of civilta-
ton. He had passed through the school
with much honor and was now to act
as missionary among his own people.
The colonel was amusedly proud Of
him, as of fine dog Of his own breed
ing. He sent for him on the night Of
Judith Adair's arrival.
Here's your old orderly, my dear, I"
said he.
| She looked up from the chair where
she was reading some letters looked at
him with smile Of curiosity.
well, 1 never, papa!" she said.
He looks quite civilized. am glad to
hear you get on so WE'LL, she added.
with nod to the Weasel, and resumed
her reading.
The Indian went out silently, nor
looked so tall and straight and happily
expectant as when he entered.
he had ridden in from the mission.
ten miles from the post, where he was
| CHARTERED. The moon was up when he
silently left the post after that chilling,
Indifferent greeting. The clouds that
scurried low between earth and moon
cast Pickering, hasty shadows on the
uneven plain, but the shadow that had
fallen on his life never lifted. Before
him, as he rode, stretched the simmer
ing, shallow river, darkly fringed by
those low bushes whence the rattlesnake
had darted-so short time ago. It
had seemed to him so short time, .un-
til tonight. Now he realized that an
| age had passed. Perhaps it had never
happened; it was dream. Itmust have
been dream, or the chill young lady
in the parlor he had left, who had told
him SO carelessly he was quite civil
lized, would have remembered.
He was civilized. For years he had
lived with white people. He barely re-
membered the baby days of tepees and
squaws and ponies and bows and ar
rows. She had civilized him, she and
the long. happy thoughts of her in the
days at school and college when his
own blood brothers had been things Of
pity to him, because they had never
been blessed by friendship with her,
when his teachers had wondered at his
towering ambition and his intense in
dustry. His horse, unhindered, fell to
walking leisurely. The Indians head
dropped. Swiftly there came to him
conviction Of the wrong done him. Over
all those great plains there were two
peoples, two great families-the white
and the red. Each member Of these had
his brother, his father, close ties of
kinship. In all the breadth of the land
he stood utterly alone and apart. He
was civilized-half and half, neither
one thing nor the other. He.had turned
away from his brothers at the beck Of
his teachers. He had done his task, he
had succeeded. He had been held up as
shining light, an example Of what
might be done with one Of his race.
There it stopped. He had dreamed Of
being white among the whites, whose
creed had been dinned in his ears-ssall
men are equal" Only tonight had she,
by glance and word, let him realize
how he had deceived himself. To please
her he had obeyed as child, studied
as boy, labored at college To please
her.
"Well, I never! He looks quite civil
lized. am glad to hear you are getting.
on SO we'll, " she had said.
He would not go back to the post nor
to the mission. He cared nothing for
their good will if he was not to be one
of them. What then?
At crossing of trails he met an old
Indian freighter going to the post to
sell watermelons to the soldiers. The
Weasel stopped him and gave him some
money and made a bargain, and the old
frelghter went on his way with good
suit OF clothes from the east, and the
Weasel dashed into the darkness, where
hid far, far away the Indian reserva-
ton, and on his legs and feet were
fringed and beaded moccasins, and
round him was wrapped a gaudy blan-
ket.
He had chosen his family, his peo-
pie, among whom he would be an equal
at least He had refrigerated, lapsed in
to savagery. One of the chief delights
of his eastern teachers when showing
off their star pupil to congressman and
inquiring philanthropists had been to
dwell upon the fact that the lad belong
ed to one of the most unruly and hope
lessly savage tribes on the plains-a
tribe which was constantly restless an
ANIMAL 70, 1,oT To-
addicted to sun dances, ghost dances,
raiding and other symptoms of incura.
BILE Indian fever. Just at this time they
were disturbed unusually by the promi-
nence among them Of a certain young
buck who aspired to leadership and was
lnciting his comrades to all mahner Of
Indian deviltry.
His heart was sore. He had been
merely an interesting plaything for
philanthropists, the old colonel and her.