“More war, O Mayaro, my brother?” I asked in a bantering voice.  “Every day you prepare for battle with a confidence forever new; every night the army snores in peace.  Yet, at dawn, when you have greeted the sun, you renew your war-paint.  Such praiseworthy perseverance ought to be rewarded.”

“It has already been rewarded,” remarked the Indian, with quiet humour.

“In what manner?” I asked, puzzled.

“In the manner that all warriors desire to be rewarded,” he replied, secretly amused.

“I thought,” said I, “that the reward all warriors desire is a scalp taken in battle.”

He cast a sly glance at me and went on painting.

“Mayaro,” said I, disturbed, “is it possible that you have been out forest-running while I’ve slept?”

He shot a quick look at me, full of delighted malice.

And “Ho!” said he.  “My brother sleeps sounder than a winter bear.  Three Erie scalps hang stretched, hooped, and curing in the morning sun, behind the bush-hut.  Little brother, has the Sagamore done well?”

Straightway I whirled on my heel and walked out and around the hut.  Strung like drying fish on a willow wand three scalps hung in the sunshine, the soft July breeze stirring the dead hair.  And as soon as I saw them I knew they were indeed Erie scalps.

Repressing my resentment and disgust, I lingered a moment to examine them, then returned to the hut, where the Siwanois, grave as a catamount at his toilet, squatted in a patch of sunshine, polishing his features.

“So you’ve done this business every night as soon as I slept,” said I.  “You’ve crept beyond our outer pickets, risking your life, imperilling the success of this army, merely to satisfy your vanity.  This is not well, Mayaro.”

He said proudly:  “Mayaro is safe.  What warrior of the Cat-People need a Sagamore of the Siwanois dread?”

“Do you count them warriors then, or wizards?”

“Demons have teeth and claws.  Look upon their scalp-locks, Loskiel!”

I strove to subdue my rising anger.

“You are the only reliable guide in the army today who can take us straight to Catharines-town,” I said.  “If we lose you we must trust to Hanierri and his praying Oneidas, who do not know the way even to Wyalusing as well as you do.  Is this just to the army?  Is it just to me, O Sagamore?  My formal orders are that you shall rest and run no risk until this army starts from Lake Otsego.  My brother Mayaro knew this.  I trusted him and set no sentry at the hut door.  Is this well, brother?”

The Sagamore looked at me with eyes utterly void of expression.

“Is Mayaro a prisoner, then?” he asked quietly.

Instantly I knew that he was not to be dealt with that way.  The slightest suspicion of any personal restraint or of any military pressure brought to bear on him might alienate him from our cause, if not, perhaps, from me personally.