Page:B M Bower - Heritage of the Sioux.djvu/297

PEACE TALK hide the fact that behind his pride at being able to read print he was unhappily aware also of his limitations in the accomplishment. Along the scare-head Luck had indicated, his dirty forefinger moved slowly while he spelled out the words. "A-a-bank rob!" he read triumphantly, and repeated the statement in Spanish. After that he mumbled a good deal of it, the longer words arresting his finger while he struggled with the syllables. But he got the sense of it nevertheless, as Luck and Miguel knew by the version he gave in Spanish to the old Indian, with now and then a Navajo word to help out.

When he came to the place where Ramon Chavez and Luis Rojas were named as the thieves, he gave a grunt and looked up at Luck and Miguel, read in their faces that these were the men they sought, and grinned.

"Me, I know them feller," he declared unexpectedly. "Dat day I seen them feller. They go—"

The old Indian touched him on the shoulder, and Juan turned and repeated the statement in Spanish. The old man's eyes went to Luck understandingly 285