“You damned fools! They’ll send troops from St. Paul.”
“It was an emergency, Tib—we acted the best way we knew how.”
He explained the situation but Tib was unsympathetic.
“If anybody shanghaied me I’d rather be shot than do what they wanted.”
“Didn’t you do a little body-snatching for Mosby in your day?”
“There’s no comparison. What do you reckon that girl thinks of me now?”
“That’s a pity, Tib, but—”
Gradually as he talked of the imminent danger the image of Josie temporarily receded from Tib’s mind.
“Pilgrim’s a stubborn man,” he said. “Does he know I’m one of you?”
“I thought you wouldn’t want that mentioned.”
“Well, it seems I’m in it now. Maybe I can do something. Tell him there’s another patient wants to see him—that and nothing more.”
Dr. Pilgrim had braced himself resolutely against persuasion—and when Tib came to the door a tirade was on his tongue. But the words were not spoken—his jaw dropped and he stared as his visitor said quietly:
“I’ve come to see you about my thumbs.”
Then Dr. Pilgrim’s eyes fell upon what a pair of gloves had hidden in Chicago.
“An odd sight,” said Tib. “I found it an inconvenience at first. But then discovered I could think about it two ways, as a battle wound, or as something else.”
The doctor tried to summon up the moral superiority so essential to his self-respect.
“In other days,” continued Tib, “It would have been quite simple. These Indians out here would understand. They have a torture that isn’t very different—put thongs through a man’s chest and hang him up till he collapses.” He broke off. “Dr. Pilgrim, up to now I’ve tried to consider my thumbs as a war wound, but out here closer to nature I begin to think I was wrong. Perhaps I ought to collect my bill.”
“What are you going to do to me?”
“That depends. You did a cruel thing. And you don’t seem to feel any regret about it.”
“It was perhaps an extreme measure,” admitted the doctor uneasily. “To that extent I am sorry.”
“That’s a lot from you, but it isn’t enough. All I asked of you that day in Maryland was to pull that Frenchman’s tooth. That wasn’t so terrible, was it?”
“No, it wasn’t. I tell you I do regret the incident.”
Tib got to his feet.
“I believe you. And to prove it you’ll come along with me and pull another tooth. Then we’ll call the account square.”
The doctor was trapped, but in his moment of relief he could find no words of protest. Irascibly he picked up his bag and a few minutes later a little party started for the Indian village through the twilight.
At the outpost they were delayed while a message went to Red Weed; word came to pass them through. Arrived at the chief’s wigwam Dr. Pilgrim, accompanied by an interpreter, stepped inside.
Five minutes later a triumphant yell arose from the squaws and children who lined the street—the Fargo stage, surrounded by braves in war paint, drove up with four disarmed soldiers and half a dozen civilians inside.
VI
Instinctively Tib ran to the side of the stage but at Josie’s expression his throat choked up and no words came. He turned to the cavalry corporal.
“Dr. Pilgrim is safe. At this moment he’s in the chief’s wigwam working on him. If we sit tight we’ll all get out of this.”
“What’s it all mean?”
Ben Cary answered him:
“It means things are about to break here but your Colonel wouldn’t listen to us because we’re Virginians.”
“I’m in this now,” Tib said to Josie, “but I didn’t know anything about it that night.”
From the wigwam issued a stream of groans followed by a wailing cry and the warriors crowded in around the tepee.
“He’d better be good,” said Cary grimly.
Ten minutes passed. The complaining moans rose and fell. The face of the interpreter appeared in a flap of the tent and he said something rapidly in Sioux, translating it for the benefit of the whites.
“Him got two teeth.”
And then to Tib’s wonder Josie’s voice called to him out of the dusk.
“It’s all right, isn’t it?” she said.
“We don’t know yet.”
“I mean everything’s all right. It doesn’t even seem strange to be here.”
“You believe me then?”
“I believe you, Tib—but it doesn’t seem to matter now.”
Her eyes with that bright yet veiled expression, described as starry, looked past the wailing Indians, the anxious whites, the ominous black triangle of the tepee, at some vision of her own against the sky.
“Whenever we’re together,” she said, “one place is as good as any other. See—they know it, they’re looking at us. We’re not strangers here—they won’t harm us. They know we’re at home.”
Hand in hand Tib and Josie waited and a cool wind blew the curls around her forehead. From time to time the light moved inside the wigwam and they could distinguish the doctor’s voice and the guttural of the interpreter. One by one the Indians had squatted on the ground and a soldier was taking a food hamper from the wagon. The village was quiet and there was suddenly a flag of stars in the bright sky. Josie was the only person there who knew that there was nothing to worry about now, because she and Tib owned everything around them now further than their eyes could see. She felt very safe and warm with his hand on her shoulder while Dr. Pilgrim kept his appointment across the still darkness.
