o the parlor.

They sat there a few moments, conversing still upon the same theme.

"You will hardly dare stay here at night now?" Elsie remarked.

"Yes; where else? I should feel very little safer from the Ku Klux in
the woods, and the malaria might rob us all of health and even life."

"Come to Ion," said both her visitors in a breath, "you will be most
welcome."

"A thousand thanks," she answered with emotion. "I do not doubt my
welcome; yet fear to give a clue to my husband's hiding place."

"There might be danger of that," Mr. Travilla said thoughtfully, "but
what better, my dear madam, can you do?"

"Stay here and put my trust in the Lord. He will take care of me and my
helpless little ones.

"I have been thinking of one of our noble pioneer women of the West,
whose husband was killed by the Indians, leaving her alone in the
wilderness with six small children, no white person within several
miles.

"Her friends urged her to leave the dangerous spot, but she said, 'No,
this farm is all I have for my own and my children's support, and I must
stay here. God will protect and help us.' And he did; the Indians,
though they knew she was alone, never attacked her. She lay sometimes
all night with a broadax in her hands, ready to defend her babes; but
though she could see the savages come into her yard and light their
pipes at her brushwood fire, they never approached the house?"

Elsie's eyes kindled with enthusiastic admiration, then filled with
tears. "Dear, brave Christian woman! and you will emulate her courage
and faith."

"I shall try; the hearts of the Ku Klux of to-day are no less in His
hands than those of the Indians of that day or this."

"That is certainly true and he never fails those who put their trust in
him," Mr. Travilla said, rising. "Now, wife, I will leave you here while
I go for Barton."

"Oh stay a moment, Edward," she exclaimed, "a thought has struck me: it
is not usual for you to go for the doctor yourself: might it not excite
suspicion? And can you not trust Uncle Joe as your messenger?"

"Your plan is best," he said with a pleased smile. "Let us then hasten
home and dispatch him on the errand at once."

Dr. Barton found the wound not dangerous, extracted the ball with little
difficulty, and left the patient doing well.

The attack on Fairview and the disappearance of its owner, caused
considerable excitement in the neighborhood; there was a good deal of
speculation as to what