I can feel it now!" Her eyes were darkening
again, as the sun darkens when a thunder cloud passes under it. "I
wanted to make Tara understand what he must do after that, so I stole
some of Brokaw's clothes and carried them up to a little plain on the
side of the mountain. I stuffed them with grass, and made a ... what do
you call it? In Indian it is _issena-koosewin_...."
"A dummy," he said.
She nodded.
"Yes, that is it. Then I would go with it a little distance from Tara,
and would begin to struggle with it, and scream. The third time, when
Tara saw me lying under it, kicking and screaming, he gave it a blow
with his paw that ripped it clean in two! And after that...."
Her eyes were glorious in their wild triumph.
"He would tear it into bits," she cried breathlessly. "It would take me
a whole day to mend it again, and at last I had to steal more clothes. I
took Hauck's this time. And soon they were gone, too. That is just what
Tara will do to a man--when I fight and scream!"
"And a little while ago you were ready to jump at me, and fight and
scream!" he reminded her, smiling across their rock table.
"Not after you spoke to me," she said, so quickly that the words seemed
to spring straight from her heart.
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