"Mebbe," said Pete, noncommittal.
"Were you down there?"
"I never kill a man with a knife," said Pete; "that ain't my belief."
He left an opening that tempted, but I thought it wise to ignore that
for the moment.
"You an old man, Pete?"
"Mebbe."
"How old?"
"Oh, so-so."
"You remember a long time ago--how long?"
He drew a square in his cleared patch of earth, subdivided it into
little squares, and dotted each of these in the centre before he spoke.
"When Modocs have big soldier fight."
"You a Modoc?"
"B'lieve me!"
"When Captain Jack fought the soldiers over in the Lava Beds?"
"Some fight--b'lieve me!" said Pete, erasing his square and starting a
circle.
"You fight, too?"
"Too small; I do little odd jobs--when big Injin kill soldier I skin um
head."
I begged for further items, but Pete seemed to feel that he had been
already verbose. He dismissed the historic action with a wise saying:
"Killing soldiers all right; but it don't settle nothing." He drew a
triangle.
Indelicately then I pried into his spiritual life.
"You a Christian, Pete?"
"Injin-Christian," he amended--as one would say
"Progressive-Republican.
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