“One night we was camped on the edge of a little town out west of Salina.  We always camped near a stream, and put up a little tent.  Sometimes we sold out of the Remedy unexpected, and then Chief Wish-Heap-Dough would have a dream in which the Manitou commanded him to fill up a few bottles of Sum-wah-tah at the most convenient place.  ’Twas about ten o’clock, and we’d just got in from a street performance.  I was in the tent with the lantern, figuring up the day’s profits.  John Tom hadn’t taken off his Indian make-up, and was sitting by the campfire minding a fine sirloin steak in the pan for the Professor till he finished his hair-raising scene with the trained horses.

“All at once out of dark bushes comes a pop like a firecracker, and John Tom gives a grunt and digs out of his bosom a little bullet that has dented itself against his collar-bone.  John Tom makes a dive in the direction of the fireworks, and comes back dragging by the collar a kid about nine or ten years young, in a velveteen suit, with a little nickel-mounted rifle in his hand about as big as a fountain-pen.

“‘Here, you pappoose,’ says John Tom, ’what are you gunning for with that howitzer?  You might hit somebody in the eye.  Come out, Jeff, and mind the steak.  Don’t let it burn, while I investigate this demon with the pea shooter.’

“‘Cowardly redskin,’ says the kid like he was quoting from a favorite author.  ’Dare to burn me at the stake and the paleface will sweep you from the prairies like—­like everything.  Now, you lemme go, or I’ll tell mamma.’

“John Tom plants the kid on a camp-stool, and sits down by him.  ’Now, tell the big chief,’ he says, ’why you try to shoot pellets into your Uncle John’s system.  Didn’t you know it was loaded?’

“‘Are you a Indian?’ asks the kid, looking up cute as you please at John Tom’s buckskin and eagle feathers.

“‘I am,’ says John Tom.  ‘Well, then, that’s why,’ answers the boy, swinging his feet.  I nearly let the steak burn watching the nerve of that youngster.

“‘O-ho!’ says John Tom, ’I see.  You’re the Boy Avenger.  And you’ve sworn to rid the continent of the savage redman.  Is that about the way of it, son?’

“The kid halfway nodded his head.  And then he looked glum.  ’Twas indecent to wring his secret from his bosom before a single brave had fallen before his parlor-rifle.

“‘Now, tell us where your wigwam is, pappoose,’ says John Tom—­’where you live?  Your mamma will be worrying about you being out so late.  Tell me, and I’ll take you home.’

“The kid grins.  ‘I guess not,’ he says.  ’I live thousands and thousands of miles over there.’  He gyrated his hand toward the horizon.  ’I come on the train,’ he says, ’by myself.  I got off here because the conductor said my ticket had ex-pirated.’  He looks at John Tom with sudden suspicion ‘I bet you ain’t a Indian,’ he says.  ’You don’t talk like a Indian.  You look like one, but all a Indian can say is “heap good” and “paleface die.”  Say, I bet you are one of them make-believe Indians that sell medicine on the streets.  I saw one once in Quincy.’