A few months ago, the Deer-killer had told Wenona that Wanska was noisy and tiresome, and that her soft dark eyes were far more beautiful than Wanska's laughing ones.

They were not at home then, for Wenona had accompanied her parents on a visit to some relations who lived far above the village of Shah-co-pee.
While there the Deer-killer came in with some warriors who had been on a war party; there Wenona was assured that her rival, the Merry Heart, was forgotten.
And well might the Deer-killer and Wenona have loved each other.

"Youth turns to youth as the flower to the sun," and he was brave and noble in his pride and power; and she, gentle and loving, though an Indian woman; so quiet too, and all unlike Wanska, who was the noisiest little gossip in the village.
Often had they wandered together through the "solemn temples of the earth," nor did she ever fear, with the warrior child for a protector.
She had followed him when he ascended the cliffs where the tracks of the eagle were seen; and with him she felt safe when the wind was tossing their canoe on the Mississippi, when the storm spirits had arisen in their power.

They were still children when Wenona would know his step among many others, but they were no longer children when Wenona left Shah-co-pee's village, for she loved with a woman's devotion--and more than loved.

She had trembled when she saw the Deer-killer watch Wanska as she tripped merrily about the village.