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“He is mine,” Nee-kah hissed. “I will take him to my husband. Not you!”
“One day you will trust white people too much,” Wise Owl said, then turned and strode away.
“Come with me,” Nee-kah said, leading Mariah on to the larger wigwam. “And do not let Wise Owl’s harsh words frighten you. His heart is in the right place. He is one of my husband’s most devoted braves.”
Stepping up to the larger wigwam, Mariah glanced over at Nee-kah, trying to get reassurances again from her that she would be treated fairly, but Nee-kah was no longer paying heed to her fears. She was raising the moose-skin entrance flap, and soon stepped aside for Mariah to enter.
Swallowing back her fear, Mariah went inside the conical dwelling, immediately seeing Chief Silver Wing. He was sitting beside the firepit, attaching colorful feathers on the bowl of his pipe. She was quickly in awe of this man, as she had been before. He wore only a breechclout, revealing to her a man of over six feet, surely packing two hundred pounds of brawn on his massive frame. The only things about him that came close to revealing his age were the wrinkles grooved into his wise face and some threads of gray woven through his shoulder-length raven-black hair. A bear-claw armlet on his right arm proved him to be a man of distinction.
“My husband?” Nee-kah said, setting her basket of herbs aside. She went and sank onto her knees beside Chief Silver Wing. “I have brought you a young lad whose horse threw him and left him stranded not far from our village. I have offered him assistance. Was I wrong to?”
Chief Silver Wing gazed up at Mariah, his keen and piercing eyes roving slowly over her. “And why were you so close to my village?” he finally asked, his kind face solemn.
“I was on my way to Fort Snelling,” Mariah said, fearing having to tell him more than she wanted to.
“You, alone, were going to Fort Snelling?” Chief Silver Wing asked, his jaw tightening. “It is not a normal thing for a boy your age to be riding alone.” He set his pipe aside and folded his arms across his chest. “Where are those who were riding with you? Are they also near my village? Do they come to do us harm?”
“I was riding alone,” Mariah said, fear gripping her insides when she realized that he saw her as an enemy. “There was no one riding with me when my horse threw me.”
Chief Silver Wing looked over at Nee-kah. “My wife, why is it that you brought the white lad to me, instead of Wise Owl?” he asked, his eyes accusing. “Did you again turn your back on my orders? Did you go into the forest alone?”
“I do not like to search for medicinal herbs with a brave always there, spoiling my concentration,” Nee-kah said softly. “And I did not travel that far, my husband.”
“What am I to do with you, my young wife?” Chief Silver Wing said, a gentle smile tugging at his lips.
Then he became solemn again. “This time your escapade caused you no mishap. But what of the next?”
The scolding sent Nee-kah’s gaze to the floor, humbled by her husband’s words and by his sincere love for her.
Then she looked quickly up as Chief Silver Wing rose to his feet, clapping his hands. Two braves soon came into the wigwam and took their places on each side of Mariah.
“Take him away!” Chief Silver Wing said in a snarl. “He will be our prisoner until we see if what he says is true. If we discover that he was riding alone, then we will release him, lend him a horse, and let him go on his way. If we find others close by, then we will know that he has lied, and he will suffer for such a lie!”
“I am not lying,” Mariah cried, wincing when the braves grabbed her wrists painfully and began dragging her away. “Please listen to me! Please!”
She looked frantically at Nee-kah. “Nee-kah!” she begged. “Tell your husband that I am not your enemy! Tell him again, Nee-kah, that I do not even carry a weapon!”
“Young lad with the shrill voice of a woman, your words are wasted on my wife,” Chief Silver Wing said, drawing Nee-kah next to him possessively. “She, too, knows the dangers of the white people’s words, which are so often said with forked tongues!”
Forcing herself not to cry, wanting to look brave in the eyes of this stubborn Indian chief, Mariah quit struggling and was allowed to walk peacefully between the two braves to a small wigwam set back from the others.
When she was taken inside and shoved to the floor, she expected to be tied and gagged, and was relieved when they did neither. They soon left her alone in the small cold dwelling, the fire in the firepit having burned down to only smoldering ashes.
She wanted to busy herself, to try to bide time until the chief decided to believe her, now wishing that she had been brave enough to tell him the full truth. That might have been better for her, if she could have convinced him that she had had only the Chippewa people’s welfare at heart all along.
Moving to her knees, crawling to the firepit, she gathered up some loose twigs scattered on the floor beside the firepit and laid them on the glowing embers. Leaning low over them, she began to blow on them, sighing with relief when her efforts stirred up some sparks that soon turned into flames burning along the twigs.
And when a pleasant fire was burning, she looked more closely at the wigwam. It was neat and clean. Cedar boughs were spread on the floor, with mats spread over them for comfort. On a sleeping platform at one end of the dwelling were more mats and coverings, rolled up into bundles. Toboggans and snowshoes hung on the walls.
She crawled across the soft mat floor and took one of the bundles from the platform. Unrolling the furs, she spread them on the floor beside the fire, then sat down close to the warmth and tried to see something positive in that the chief had not ordered his men to kill her or to tie and gag her. She could not tell whether or not he had heard of the massacre in the neighboring village, or if he was cautious every time any strangers came near, without reason.
“Whatever,” she whispered to herself, “I am an Indian captive!”
Just as she was trying to think of a way to escape, a noise at the entrance flap made a quick fear grab at her heart. She sighed and smiled when Nee-kah came into the wigwam, all sweetness and smiles.
“I have brought you nourishment,” Nee-kah said, handing Mariah a makuk, a dish made of thick bark, filled with rabbit stew. She then filled another makuk with a cold drink made of raspberries and water, and placed this on a mat before Mariah.
“Did your husband give you permission?” Mariah asked, eyeing the stew hungrily, its rich smell causing her stomach to growl.
