re fine
and straight, and the skin pure copper, like the statues in some old Florentine gallery. At Elijah's side rode Siskadee on her white Cayuse. The tiny, glove-fitting moccasins were laced high up the ankle. As Elijah talked the expression of her oval, oriental face changed like the play of wind on a meadow.
"When we come with the cattle I will build you a house like the white man's," he was saying. "Then we shall be married like white people. I spoke to Jason Lee and he promised. And I shall never let you carry burdens; the white men never do. You shall ride always on a pony and be my klootchman [wife]."
"And take me with you everywhere?" asked Siskadee, "as Dr. Whitman does his klootchman? "
"Yes," said Elijah.
The tall rye grass, high over their horses' heads, sometimes tangled the path, and Elijah pressed on ahead, clearing the way to an opening. The autumnal sun was past midday before the girls turned back.
"I will return when the camas blooms," said Elijah, at parting.
With Indian calls, and farewells, and gypsy laughter, the maidens galloped home. The young men followed the trail, east of the Cascades, to Spanish California. The dreaded Klamaths, the warlike Shastas, were passed in safety. Several weeks of steady travel brought them eight hundred miles over the Sierras to Sutter's fort on the Sacramento.
Six years Elijah had been to school at the Methodist mission. He could read and write and speak the English well, better even than Ellice, the accomplished head chief of the Nez Percys.
Siskadee, daughter of Tiloukaikt, was a typical maiden of the upper Columbia fifty years ago, closely
