We finished our work, coiling the rent harness and bindings from the travois. We slung them about our shoulders.

"I must leave the Isbu," said Cuwignaka.

"Why?" I asked.

"I am a shame to my brother," said Cuwignaka.

"This head will be heavy," I said. "If we are going to get it out of the draw, let us do so now."

"Yes," said Cuwignaka. We then, between us, carried the head up, out of the draw, and, some fifty yards or so from the draw, placed it on the level.

"Why are we doing this?" I asked.

"The kailiauk is a noble animal," said Cuwignaka. "Let the sun shine upon it."

"This is interesting to me," I said.

"What?" asked Cuwignaka.

"This business," I said.

"What business?" he asked.

"This business about the head," I said. "This was important, apparently, to both you and Hci, that it should be brought up from the draw, that it should be placed on the level, that it should be put, I gather, in the sun."

"Of course," said Cuwignaka.

"IN this, do you not see," I asked, "you are both Kaiila, you not less than he. In the end, you are both of the Isbu."

"But I am a shame to the Isbu," said Cuwignaka.

"How is that?" I asked.

"I have lost meat," he said.

"You did not lose meat," I said. "Hci is the one who lost the meat."

"I guess you are right," said Cuwignaka. "No one, though, will believe it."

"Hci is well known in the camp," I said. "You may be surprised who might believe you, and not him."

"Maybe you are right," smiled Cuwignaka.

"You should not be distressed," I said. "You should be proud."

"Why is that?" asked Cuwignaka.

"You have brought four loads of meat back to the village. I doubt that anyone has done as well."

"That is pretty good, isnt it?" said Cuwignaka.

"It is marvelous," I said.

"But men are stronger then women," said Cuwignaka. "They can cut meat better."

"But the men are needed for the hunt," I said.

"Yes," said Cuwignaka.

"And you are a man," I said.

"Yes," said Cuwignaka. "I am a man."

"Let us get the kaiila now," I said. "It is time to go back to the village."

"Four loads," said Cuwignaka. "That is pretty good, you know,"

"It is marvelous," I assured him.

"I am ready to go back to the camp now," said Cuwignaka.

"Good," I said.

"He beat me," wailed Winyela, running up to me. "He beat me!"

"You are in the presence of a free man," I said, indicating Cuwignaka.

Swiftly she fell to her knees, and put her red hair to the dust. Her hair, sometimes braided, was now, as usual, unbraided. She, like most other girls, whether of the red savages or not, wore it long and loose. Among the red savages, of course, free women commonly braid their hair. The lack of braiding, thus, usually, draws an additional distraction between slaves and free women of the red savages. The most common distraction, of course, is skin color, the slaves almost always being white and the free persons almost invariably being red. "Forgive me, Master," she said to Cuwignaka.

"All right," he said.

She straightened her body, but remained on her knees, before us. "He beat me!" she said. She was naked, except for Canka's collar. Her small wrists were bound before her body, with several tight loops of a rawhide thong.

"Stand," I said, "and turn, slowly.

She did.

"Kneel," I said.

She knelt.

"Yes," I said. "There is little doubt about it. You have been beaten."

"It is not funny," she said.

"Apparently with a kaiila quirt," I said.

"Yes," she said. Some of the braiding marks were still visible in her flesh.

"I thought he liked me," she said.

"You are still alive," I pointed out.

"He took away my clothes, and tied me to a whipping stake, on my knees!" she said.

"That is not uncommon in camps of the red savages, for white female slaves," I said. "Besides you would not want you clothes bloodied."

She looked at me, angrily.

"Your hair was thrown forward," I said.

"Yes," she said.

"That is so it will not cushion the blows which might fall on your back," I said.

"Doubtless," she said.

"Too," I said, "you would not want to get blood on your hair."

"Of course not," she said.

"Do you think that you are the first girl who has ever been whipped?" I asked.

"No," she said.

"Apparently you did not spend all of your time on your knees, your hair thrown forward, your head and belly down."

"No," she said. "I was struck from my knees by almost the first stroke. I twisted and cried out. I must have supplied much amusement to the women of the red savages who were watching."

"They hate white slave girls," I said. "They enjoy seeing them beaten."

"Then I could cry out no more," she said. "I must simply lie there-"

"And take your punishment-?"

"Yes, and take my punishment-"

"As a slave-?"

"Yes," she said, "-as a slave."

I smiled. This was apparently the first full beating to which the former Miss Millicent Aubrey-Welles, the former deutante from Pennsylvania, had ever been subjected. It had not only physically punished her, and well, but, too, obviously, she had felt it as keenly humiliating. It had not only hurt her, but had horrified and scandalized her.

"You seem outraged," I said.

"I am," she said.

"Why?" I asked.

"I was beaten," she said.

"Do you find yourself eager for a repetition of the experience?" I asked.

"No," she said. "No!"

"The experience, then, was instructive?" I said.

"Yes," she said.

"Why were you beaten?" I asked.

"I cut meat poorly, out on the prairie," she said.

"Wasnapohdi warned you," I said. "You would not let her help. You would not listen."

Winyela squirmed angrily, on her knees in the dust, her small wrists bound tightly before her.

"You were displeasing," I said. "Be pleased that your punishment was not more severe than it was."

Winyela looked up at me, tears in her eyes.

"You might have been fed to sleen," I said.

She shuddered.

"Do you not realize, pretty Winyela," I said, "that you are only a slave?"

"He did not even give me back my clothes," she said.

"These are holiday times," I said. "Surely you have seen more than one white female slave naked in the camp."

"He even left me bount," she said, lifting her secured wrists.

"That is perhaps a bit of extra discipline," I said.

"I am ashamed," she said. "I want to hide. Please let me go into your lodge."

I considered this.

"Beaten slave," said a white female, in a scandalously short shirtdress, and collar, a brunet slave of the Wismahi, sneeringly, to Winyela.

"You may enter the lodge," I said to Winyela.

"Thank you," she whispered, and crept within. Cuwignaka remained outside. He had pegged down three hides and, one after the other, alternating his efforts, was scraping them. All about the camp hides such as these, pegged down, and meat racks, heavy with sheets of kailiauk meat, were in evidence. These are common sights in summer camps. The meat is left two or three days in the sun, this being sufficient for its preservation. It is taken in at night to protect it from the night air.

Inside the lodge Winyela lay on her stomach, on the robes, and, her head lying on her bound hands, wept.

"Do you wish to be beaten again?" I asked.

"No," she said.

"Then, doubtless, you are resolving to be a better slave," I said.

She looked at me, tears streaming down her cheeks, her eyes red.

"Do not be so upset," I said. "You are only a slave."

"Canka struck me," she said. "He beat me."

"And well," I said.