Well, so he had, but not so heavily as the Captain imagined.
At that very moment he was leading through the homeward pass just about half of his original war-party--all that "had come out of the attack on that village."
The village itself was in a high state of fermentation that morning. There was mourning in some of the lodges over braves who had fallen in that brief, sharp battle with the Lipans, but there were only five of these in all, so great had been the advantage of superior numbers in the fight, and of holding the ground of it afterward.
The bitterest disgrace of To-la-go-to-de and his warriors had been their failure to carry off the bodies of their friends who had fallen. At least twenty of the Apaches had been more or less wounded, and every man of them was as proud of it as if he had been "promoted." A scar received in battle is a badge of honor to an Indian warrior, and he is apt to make a show of it on every fair opportunity.
There was no need, therefore, of throwing away any pity on those who had been cut by the lances or "barked" by the bullets of the Lipans. Red Wolf himself had concealed a smart score of a lance-thrust along his left side, for fear he might be forbidden going on that second war-path. Even now he refused to consider it as amounting to anything, and his sister's face glowed with family pride as she said to Rita,
"Red Wolf is a true Apache. He's a warrior already. He will be a great chief some day. The Knotted Cord is white. He has no scars. He has never been on a war-path."
She was speaking in her brother's hearing, and Steve was at no great distance at that very moment, talking, in a low, earnest tone, with Murray.
Rita replied, "He is young. Send Warning is a warrior--" But Red Wolf broke in, very honestly, with,
"Knotted Cord is my brother. Only his skin is white. Not his heart. He is a warrior. He has been on war-paths. He has seen the Lipans, the Comanches, the Pawnees, the Mexicans. He is not a boy."
Ni-ha-be's little "pet" was blown away by that, and she looked once more admiringly at the strong and handsome young pale-face. If he had only been so fortunate as to be born an Apache, what might not have been expected of him!
The girls had many questions to ask concerning the events of the night before, and Red Wolf was in an accommodating frame of mind that morning. It was right, too, in his opinion, that the squaws of his family should be able to boast among the other squaws of the mighty doings of their father and brother. That was the way the reputations of warriors were to be made and kept up, aided now and then by the good things they might see fit to say about themselves.