Buffalo Hump did not want to discuss this possibility with Kicking Wolf. He wanted only one more piece of information: he wanted to know about Quanah, the young chief of the Antelope band, the Comanches who lived the farthest west, in the barren llano. These Comanches had never sat down with the whites. They survived in their harsh land even when the buffalo didn't come. The Antelope Comanches would live on roots and grubs, on weeds and prairie dogs and bulbs they dug from the earth. Buffalo Hump himself had only been among the Antelope Comanches once or twice in his life; they lived too far away, and were not friendly--the fact that they were not friendly was something he had come to admire. They lived in their own place, in the old way, hunting, moving as the game moved, finding enough water to survive in a place where no one else could find water. The Antelope rarely fought the whites, because the whites could not find them. When the whites came the Antelope merely retreated deeper and deeper into the long space of the llano. Always, the whites ran out of food and out of water before they could attack them. Antelope knew their country and could survive in it; the whites didn't know it, and feared it. Even Famous Shoes, the Kickapoo who went everywhere, did not try to follow the Antelope Comanches to their watering holes.

Even he found the llano too hard a test.

Now Buffalo Hump had heard that there was a young chief of the Antelope band--his name was Quanah. Though scarcely more than a boy he was said to be a great fighter, decisive and terrible in battle, a horseman and hunter, one who had no fear either of the whites or of the country. The talk was that Quanah was half white, the son of Peta Nocona and the captive Naduah, who had been with the Comanche for many years. She had been taken in a raid near the Brazos when Buffalo Hump himself had been young. Naduah had been with the People so long that she had forgotten that she was a captive--now her son led the Antelope Comanches and kept his people far from the whites and their councils.

When Buffalo Hump asked about Quanah, Kicking Wolf did not answer immediately. The subject seemed to annoy him.

"I took him four good horses but he didn't want them," he said, finally.

"Did you try to fool him?" Buffalo Hump asked. "I remember that you used to try and trade me bad horses. You only wanted to trade the horses there was something wrong with. Maybe Quanah is too smart for you. Maybe he knew those horses had something wrong with them." Kicking Wolf immediately rose and prepared to leave.

"There was nothing wrong with the horses I took him, or with the horses I traded you, either," he said. "Someday Quanah will wish he had horses as good as those I took him." Then he walked away, to the embarrassment of Heavy Leg and Lark, who had been preparing to offer him some of the coon--t was the polite thing to do. When Buffalo Hump visited Kicking Wolf he always politely ate a little of what Kicking Wolf's wives had prepared. He was a good guest--he did not simply get up and leave just as the meal was ready. Lark and Heavy Leg were afraid they might have done something to offend their guest. Perhaps he was forbidden to eat coon? They didn't know what to think, but they were fearful. If they had erred, Buffalo Hump would surely beat them--since his sickness he was often in a bad temper and beat them for the smallest errors in the management of the lodge. They knew that the beatings mainly came about because Buffalo Hump was old and ill, but they were severe beatings anyway, so severe that it behooved them to be as careful as possible.

This time, though, Buffalo Hump merely ate his food; he said nothing to his wives. It amused him that Kicking Wolf was annoyed with Quanah, the young war chief of the Antelopes, just because he was a good judge of horseflesh. It only impressed Buffalo Hump more, that Quanah had refused to trade with Kicking Wolf. Living where he lived, on the llano, where the distances to be travelled were great and the forage sparse, a war chief could not afford to make mistakes about horses. If a horse's feet were poor it might imperil the success of a hunt, and the P's survival depended on the hunt.

Of course, Kicking Wolf was notorious--and had been throughout his whole career as a thief--for attempting to trade off horses that looked like fine horses but that had one hard-to-detect flaw. Perhaps a given horse was deficient in endurance, or had no wind, or had hooves that were prone to splitting. Kicking Wolf was skilled at glossing over flaws that only a man with an experienced eye could see. There was a way of knowing that some men had and some men didn't. Kicking Wolf could watch a horse graze for a few minutes and know whether he was watching a good horse. But fewer and fewer could do that. Buffalo Hump had never been an exact appraiser of horseflesh himself. What he knew was that Kicking Wolf was tricky and that he ought to be wary of the horses that Kicking Wolf praised the most.

It amused him to think that this boy, this half-white war chief, Quanah, might know the same thing: that Kicking Wolf was sly, too sly to be easily trusted when it came to horses.

Naduah was nursing the child when the other women began to scream. She had been dreaming while the little girl nursed, dreaming of the warm lodge they could build if Peta was successful in the hunt and brought some good skins for her to clean and tan. The men had left early, to hunt--only an hour before, Peta had been there.

There were a few slaves in the camp, young Kickapoos who had been caught only a week before. The white men charging at them on the horses were shooting the young slaves, thinking they were warriors. Before Naduah could run, the Texans were all around her. Her little girl, Flower, was a speedy child; she was almost two years old and could run as fast as any of the little children in the camp.

Before Naduah could flee, Flower dropped the breast and ran, crazed with fear of the Texans.

She almost ran under one of the charging horses, but the rider pulled up just in time. The wind was up--dust swirled through the camp. In the confusion, with the dust blinding them, the Texans were shooting at anyone who ran, whether woman or slave. Naduah only wanted to catch her child before one of the horses injured her. Her hope was that Peta and the other hunters would hear the shooting and come back to attack the Texans.

Just as Naduah caught up with her little girl she turned and saw two men aiming rifles at her. They were going to shoot her down. The wind blew her clothes away from her legs. She held tightly to Flower, regretting that there was no time to hide her. If she could just hide the child well, then even if she herself were killed the men would return and find her. Flower would live.

Naduah thought death was coming, but the first man suddenly lifted his rifle and put out his hand to keep the other Texan from shooting. The first rider jumped off his horse and grabbed Naduah, to pull her aside so that none of the Texans would ride her down or shoot her. Some of the other women had been killed, and others were fleeing with their children. Naduah tried to pull free and run, but the man who held her was strong; though she fought and scratched she could not break free.