Sunset Ranch: A Story of a Boy's Adventures in the West — page 155: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Taking French Leave. 143 So the days crept on, and Cuthbert began to make secret preparations for quitting the Sioux lodges. He believed he could comprehend what a task there was set before him. It might have tried an old ranger like Silas Gregg, let alone a boy who only a year back had been an utter greenhorn. When his flight should be discovered, doubtless a hot pursuit would be made. Standing Elk had especially desired Karl for adop- tion, but he seemed ready to make the best of a bad bargain, and to have contented himself with a lesser light. Cuthbert had all along been looked upon with jealous eyes by the Indian youths of about his own size and age. They seemed to think he was a usurper—that he had no business among them, especially in so ex- alted a position as son and possible heir to the great chief, Standing Elk. Consequently these dusky lads never lost an op-. portunity to challenge him to a duel of some sort. Now it was a contest of skill with the rifle, in which, of course, Cuthbert easily excelled—anon he was called upon to meet the champion wrestler of the youthful tribe, before whom all had gone down as dead grass in the teeth of the prairie fire. By nature Cuthbert had been endowed with a pe- culiarly sturdy frame, although he had never reached the perfection of agility and power until he had been coached by Karl, and spent these long months among the cowboys. He tackled the Indian wrestler, but the redskin’s style of fighting, together with his almost naked, slippery figure, baffled the white lad for quite a time, so that they struggled like two cottonwoods shaken by the blasts of winter. At length, however, Cuthbert managed to dis- Comicloe® iS C©