In due course of time they reached the rendezvous. The Crows encamped in the valley, and Bad Eye, with the Blackfoot and his white friends, entered the inclosure that surrounded the post which had been erected at that place.
Martin Laurie was greatly surprised at the arrival of Flora, in such company, and with such an escort; but he was very glad to see her, or pretended to be, and treated her with the greatest deference. In accordance with her wishes, he fitted up a room in the fort for Silverspur, and the wounded man was made as comfortable as possible. The Scotchman remained very obedient to Flora--servilely so, indeed--until he perceived her intimacy with Benning, and was informed of the relations that had been established between them. Then he thought it was time for him to drop the mask, and his demeanor became unbearably insolent, as if he desired a rupture with the daughter of his late employer. Benning wished to chastise him; but was withheld by Flora, who remembered her father’s respect for the man.
The rupture soon came, nevertheless. He entered Silverspur’s room, where the young lady was seated, with Benning and White Shield and the Crow chief. His behavior was so overbearing, that she was forced to tell him that she had borne his insolence as long as she could, and must give him notice that he was no longer wanted there.
“I don’t know that you have to say any thing about it, Miss,” replied Laurie.
“I suppose you are; but that don’t give you any say-so about his property. I am in trust here under the directions of Mr. Robinette, and I may have to continue in trust under the law. It is certain that you will have no right to the property until you marry, and it is very doubtful whether you will have any right to interfere with it then.”
“That fellow there? Very well. Under your father’s will, half of his property will go to the man who recovers his scalp from the Indians, and you will have to marry that man, whoever he may be, or you will get nothing but the income of the other half. I am of the opinion that I will have to remain in charge here, under the law, until we hear from Paul Robinette’s scalp.”
“Here it is,” said George Benning, unwrapping a cloth that he had taken from his breast, and showing the gray scalp.