But
either because he thought the invitation should have come from himself
as the leader of the band, or because he was a little jealous of our
interest in White Quiver, Ongyatasse tossed me a word over his shoulder,
'We play with no crop-heads.'
"That was not a true word, for the Lenni-Lenape do not crop the head
until they go on the war-path, and White Quiver's hair lay along his
shoulders, well oiled, with bright bits of shell tied in it, glittering
as he walked. Also it is the rule of the Tellings that one must feed the
stranger. But me, I was never a Name-Seeker. I was happy to stand fourth
from Ongyatasse in the order of our running. For the rest, my brothers
used to say that I was the tail and Ongyatasse wagged me.
"Whether he had heard the words or not, the young Lenape saw me stutter
in my invitation. There might have been a quiver in his face,--at my
father's gesture he had turned toward me,--but there was none in his
walking. He came straight on toward our fire and _through_ it. Three
strides beyond it he drank at the creek as though that had been his only
object, and back through the fire to his father. I could see red marks
on his ankles where the fire had bitten him, but he never so much as
looked at them, nor at us any more than if we had been trail-grass.
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