Who is Rick from The Tracker and what is their importance?

Brown meets Rick one day when they are little boys. Both are on a stream bed looking for fossils. Rick is Native American, and has a wonderful grandfather called Stalking Wolf. This grandfather adopts Brown and gives both boys the education of a lifetime. Rick is smaller than Brown, more compact. Brown says that Rick is a better stalker, while he is a better tracker. Eventually Rick leaves to go into the military, a great sadness for Tom Brown.