aps he did not desire to avail himself
of the added fluency of explanation which the Cherokee language would
have afforded him, and which Corporal O'Flynn evidently understood. "Go
Chote--Old Town. Buy fur--man--packhorse," he added, pointing across the
woods in the direction in which Alexander MacLeod was presumably still
wearily tramping.

The corporal for the moment forgot how good-looking he was. He
concentrated his whole attention on Willinawaugh's disingenuous
countenance, and then turned and cast a long, searching look upon
Odalie. The eyes that met his own were swimming in tears, and with an
expression of pleading insistence that fairly wrung his heart, although
he hardly understood it. If she were English, why then she was free as
the air. If French--well, bedad, thin, Corporal O'Flynn wished himself
at the bottom of the Tennessee River, for a French lady in grief and
under arrest had no right to be so good-looking at all, at all. Here was
something wrong, he could but perceive, and yet because of
Willinawaugh's diplomacy he could not fix upon it.

"What's your name, my lad?" he said abruptly to Hamish.

Hamish had his eyes on the water. His fortitude, too, had given way in
the sudden relaxation of the strain of suspense. He could not, would
not, lift his face and let that boat's crew of stalwart soldiers resting
on their oars, the two ranks gazing at him, see the tears in his eyes.

"Hamish MacLeod," he made shift to say, and could say no more.

"A good English name, bedad, for a Scotch one, and an English accent,"
Corporal O'Flynn mentally commented, as he looked curiously at the boy,
standing with downcast face, mechanically handling the paddle.

"Now by the powers," said the young soldier to himself with sudden
resolution, "Captain Stuart may undertake the unraveling o' this tangle
himself."

"English!" he exclaimed aloud. Then with much courtesy of manner,
"Captain Stuart desires his compliments, and begs the English party to
do him the honor to lie at Fort Loudon to-night and pursue their
journey at their convanience." He glanced up at the sky. "It grows late
and there are catamounts out, an' other bletherin' bastes, an' their
howlin' might frighten the leddy."

Odalie, remembering the real dangers that had beset her and catching his
serious, unconscious glance as he animadverted on the possibly
terrifying vocalizations, burst into momentary laughter, and then into a
torrent of tears.

At which