Besides, the man was funny. He would just walk into an enemy camp and offer himself up for torture as if torture were a joke.

Then Slow Tree, who was rarely polite, pointed a pipe he was smoking at Famous Shoes and made an ugly speech.

"If you came into my camp I would hang you upside down and put a scorpion in your nose," he said. "When the scorpion stung you it would kill your brain. Then you could wander around eating weeds, for all I care. I don't like Kickapoos." Famous Shoes ignored the old man, though he decided on the spot to avoid the country where Slow Tree hunted until the old chief was finally dead. He had never heard that a scorpion bite could kill a brain, but it might be true, especially if the scorpion stung you inside your nose. The nose was not far from the brain--the poison of the scorpion would not have far to travel.

"I was on the Washita looking for my grandmother," Famous Shoes said, thinking it would be wise to change the subject. "There are many deer in the Washita country. If you are wanting deer, that is where I would go." Blue Duck stood nearby, strutting and playing with a hatchet he wore in his belt. He wanted the band to know that he was responsible for bringing in the Kickapoo. If his father didn't appreciate it, maybe Slow Tree would. It was clear that the great chief Slow Tree had no fondness for Kickapoos.

Buffalo Hump was engaged in the delicate task of being polite to Slow Tree, a man he neither liked nor trusted. He didn't need an irritating boy standing nearby, playing with a hatchet. Blue Duck wanted people to think he had captured someone important, but Famous Shoes wasn't important. He was just an eccentric Kickapoo.

"Why did you bring this man here?" he asked, looking at his son coldly. "You should have left him to eat his duck. If you see him again, leave him alone." He did not want to mention the fact that Famous Shoes had helped tend his grandmother while she died. The business with his grandmother was between himself and Famous Shoes; it was not a matter he wanted to discuss with everyone.

Blue Duck was shocked that his father would speak to him so, in front of Slow Tree and the worthless Kickapoo. He turned away at once and caught his horse. Then he gathered up his weapons, and a robe to protect him from the cold, and left the camp.

Buffalo Hump made no comment. Soon they saw the angry boy winding up the trail out of the canyon.

"If he was my son I would let him hang you upside down and put the scorpion in your nose," Slow Tree said to Famous Shoes.

Famous Shoes didn't answer--why respond to such a stupid comment? Blue Duck was not Slow Tree's son. He thought he would probably go up the other side of the canyon when he left, though. It would be good to have the great Palo Duro Canyon between himself and the rude, angry boy.

There was silence, for a time. Slow Tree was annoyed because Buffalo Hump was ignoring everything he said. Buffalo Hump listened in a polite manner, but he made no move to take Slow Tree's advice. He wasn't even interested in torturing a Kickapoo, which most Comanches would do immediately, without waiting for a chief's permission.

"My wives will feed you and then you can go," Buffalo Hump said, to Famous Shoes.

"I had that fat duck, I don't need to eat," Famous Shoes said. "I had better go look for Big Horse Scull before he gets lost." "Kicking Wolf is following him now too," Buffalo Hump remarked casually. "He wants to steal the Buffalo Horse." "I better go," Famous Shoes said. The news he had just heard shocked him badly. Big Horse Scull had been following Kicking Wolf, but now it was the other way around. Of course Kicking Wolf was already a famous horse thief, but stealing the Buffalo Horse would be a powerful act. If Kicking Wolf could steal the Buffalo Horse his people would sing about him for many years.

Famous Shoes changed his mind about eating, though. One fat duck wouldn't last him forever, and Buffalo Hump's wives had made a stew with a good smell to it. He squatted and ate a big bowl full, while Buffalo Hump sat patiently on his robe, listening to old Slow Tree brag about how happy he made his wives.

Jake came in the door, avoided Felice's eye, turned into the hall, and started up the stairs only to find old Ben Mickelson planted squarely in his way.

Jake despised old Ben, for being a disgusting, profane, purple-lipped old drunkard, but he .was the Sculls' butler and it was necessary to be polite to him.

It was necessary but it wasn't easy: old Ben was looking at Jake with a mean gleam in his watery blue eyes.

"Not today, you don't, you damned lout!" Ben Mickelson said.

Jake thought he must have misheard. Every day for three weeks he had hurried up to the Scull living quarters and been welcomed ardently by the lady of the house. Yesterday she had been particularly ardent--Inez Scull straddled him on the chaise longue and bounced so vigorously that the chaise broke. Then she dragged Jake onto the couch and continued no less vigorously. By the time Madame Scull quieted down, every piece of furniture that had a flat surface had been made use of in their sport.

So why was old Ben Mickelson barring his access to the stairs?

"Mind your ^ws, Ben, if you don't want a licking," Jake said--it occurred to him, for a moment, that the Captain might be back, but if the Captain was back the boys would be back too, and he hadn't seen them.

"Not today, you ain't going up, and not tomorrow and not the next day and not the next week and not the next month and not ever!" old Ben said, the ^ws bursting out of his mouth like gobbets of bile.

"But what's wrong?" Jake asked, confused.

"Nothing's wrong--y just be gone now. We don't need to be seeing the likes of you around the big house again." Jake wanted to grab the old man by his scrawny neck and shake him good, but he didn't quite dare. Something .was wrong, he just didn't know what. Yesterday Madame Scull had called him "Jakie," and could hardly wait to get out his little pricklen, as she called it. But today Ben Mickelson stood on the stairs looking at him in a gloating way.

"Begone," Ben said, again. "I'll be calling the sheriff on you if you don't. The sheriff will know what to do with a lout like you, I guess." Jake was confused and disappointed. He knew the old butler hadn't just decided to dismiss him on his own authority, because he had no authority. He might curse the kitchen girls and pinch them under the stairs, but he was only a butler.

Jake knew that if he wasn't allowed up it was because Madame Scull didn't want him up--but why? He had tried to be cooperative, no matter what wild game Inez Scull suggested; and some of her games went far beyond the bounds of anything he had ever supposed he would be doing, in his life. But he had done them, and Madame Scull had yelled and kicked with pleasure. So why was the old butler now planted in his way?