When they were near the river, Great Bear got to his hands and knees and then stretched out on his stomach. Little Bear needed no signal to follow his example. They inched forward until they were near the river’s bank. Here they lay silently watching the opposite bank for any sign of their enemies. A big ant crawled across Little Bear’s shoulders, but he made no move to brush it off. Slowly the sun climbed high in the sky, and yet Great Bear continued to watch. Finally he began to edge back from the river bank. They crawled back many paces before Great Bear got to his feet.
“The Pawnees must have moved upstream,” he decided.
Little Bear thought of the Sioux hunting party riding upstream on their own side of the river.
“Shouldn’t we warn our hunters?” he asked.
“If they have scouts ahead and a sentinel behind as we agreed,” Grandfather explained, “they can’t be surprised.”
When they were well back from the river, Great Bear stopped. He took Little Bear’s bow and aimed an arrow at a sapling about twenty paces away. Little Bear watched closely. Great Bear pulled the bow string back and let the arrow fly. There was a sharp thud as the arrow struck. It split the sapling in two. Grandfather handed the bow to Little Bear.
“Put an arrow in that sapling next to the one I hit,” he directed.
The other sapling was larger than the one Great Bear had hit. Little Bear had used a bow and arrow before. He had owned a small bow as long as he could remember. This large bow was better made than his small one and would shoot much straighter. He fitted an arrow to the string and aimed just as Grandfather had done. He fired for the sapling. The arrow whizzed past it.
“That was close,” Grandfather encouraged him. “Let’s get the arrows and you can try again.”
It took some time to find the arrow Little Bear had shot. When they did find it, he started practicing again. Grandfather watched him and showed him better ways of holding the bow and taking aim. Although few of Little Bear’s arrows hit the sapling, most of them came close.
“Practice every time you have a chance,” Great Bear advised. “You are doing very well.”
The sun was almost straight overhead when they returned to camp. Little Bear wondered at Grandfather’s restlessness. Plainly he was worried about something. As soon as he had eaten, Little Bear started towards the meadow to see about their horses. The warriors had been sure no Pawnee would dare try to steal horses so near a Sioux camp and they had left no guards. Little Bear was sure the warriors were right, but he knew Grandfather would expect him to look anyway.