Read Jubal Sackett (1985) for Free Online Page A

sky. We simply allowed the current to take us along, using the paddles only to maintain direction.
    Once a great cloud of pigeons flew up, darkening the sky for a full two minutes as they swept by, a dusty brown screen between us and the sun. Further along we encountered three buffaloes swimming the river, but we had plenty of buffalo meat and had killed three wild turkeys earlier in the day.
    This was my world and I was at ease with it--with the river, its waters still strong from melting snow, and with the dark, mysterious walls of the forest on either hand. I had never known the ease of cities or the trading and haggling of the marketplace. What I now had was what I wanted, to know the wilderness at first hand, to wander its lonely paths, to discover, to see, to feel, to search out the unknown and meet it face to face.
    "You have been to the Far Seeing Lands?" I asked Keokotah.
    "I have. Others of my people have. We Kickapoo are great wanderers."
    This he had said before and I acknowledged it, for so I had been told in the lodges of the Cherokees.
    "No people lived there," he said, "until now. A few came, then more, but they are very few even in this day."
    "Where do they come from?"
    "North, they come from the north, always there are people coming down from the north. And some from the east. There are people like you who sell guns to Indians. The Indians who have guns make war against Indians who have none, and the Indians without guns come westward to escape. These Indians push against other Indians until finally some have had to go out into the Far Seeing Lands."
    It made sense. We had heard that the Dutch at Hudson's River were trading guns to the Indians. One thing more I had learned: more than any other Indians the Kickapoos, because of their inclination to wander, knew most about other tribes.
    The Indian did not own land. A tribe might claim an area for hunting and gathering, but a stronger tribe might push them out, or they themselves might move when game became scarce.
    Other things I learned from the casual talk of Keokotah, and one of these was that only those Indians who were present when an agreement was made need abide by its terms. A chief was so by prestige alone, a prestige won by his greatness as a warrior, his success as a leader, or his wisdom in council.
    That night we camped on the bank of a creek emptying into the Hiwasee. It was a grassy shore with forest all around, fuel enough, and a good place to hide our fire. We talked much, and as we talked Keokotah's tongue loosened and words forgotten returned to him. His English friend had taught him well, obviously impressed by Keokotah's quick intelligence.
    Once during the night I caught a faint sound from the forest, not a sound of wind among the trees, not a sound of an animal moving, but of something else, someone or something. I lay wide-eyed, listening. Keokotah seemed asleep but with him one never knew.
    Our fire was down to a few coals, our canoe bottom up on the shore, our weapons at hand. All was still, and I heard no further sounds, yet I had heardsomething.
    Morning came and Keokotah said nothing. Had he heard the sound in the night? Did he not think it important? Or was it a sound he had expected? How could I know there were not other Kickapoos about? So I said nothing of what I had heard.
    It was a lazy, easy, sun-filled morning. We watched the river for other Indians but saw none. Hiwasee could not be far away down the river, and many Indians would be there.
    "What game is further west?" I asked him.
    He shrugged. "Like here." There were deer of several kinds, one his English friend called wapiti. "I do not know what is wapiti. Much buffalo west. More than here. Bears, ver' large bears. A bear with silver hair almost as large as a small buffalo."
    "A bear? As large as a buffalo?"
    "Not so great. Nearly. He has a hump on his back and he is hard to kill. You see this bear you go away before he sees you. He ver' fierce bear."
    He dipped his