red and silent. Even Parker was
subdued by the grave face of the agent.

Lawson, with a curious half-smile, broke the silence. "There are times
when I wish I owned a Gatling gun and knew how to use it."

Curtis started up. "Well, it's all over but the shouting. I must return
to the office and set things in order once more."

"You ought to rest a little," said Elsie. "You must feel the strain."

"I am a little inert at the moment," he confessed, "but I'm Hamlet in
the play, you know, and must be at my post. I'll meet you all at lunch.
You need have no further worry."

The employes responded bravely to his orders. The cheerful clink of the
anvil broke forth with tranquillizing effect. The school-bell called the
children together, the tepees began to rise from the sod as before, and
the sluggish life of the agency resumed its unhurried flow, though
beneath the surface still lurked vague forms of fear. Parker returned to
his studio, Lawson sought his den, and there stretched out to smoke and
muse upon the leadings of the event, while Jennie planned a mid-day
dinner for a round dozen. "It will be a sort of love-feast to Captain
Maynard," she said, roguishly.

"Will he return so soon?" asked Elsie.

"Oh yes, he'll only go a little way. Jack Maynard can smell a good
dinner across a range of foot-hills. Didn't he look beautiful as he
smiled? I used to think he grinned, but to-day--well, he looked like a
heavenly cherub in the helmet of an archangel as he rode up."

Elsie was genuinely amused. "What is the meaning of this fervor. Has
there been something between you and Captain Maynard in the past?"

"Not a thing! Oh, I always liked him--he's so good-natured--and so
comical. Can you peel potatoes?"

"I never did such a thing in my life, but I'll try."

About one o'clock Maynard came jogging back, accompanied by a sergeant
and a squad of men, dusty, tired, and hungry.

Curtis met him at the gate. "Send your horses down to the corral,
Captain. You're to take pot-luck with us."

Maynard dismounted, slowly, painfully. "I've been wondering about those
girls," he said, after the horses were led away. "One is your sister
Jennie, of course; but who is the other? She's what the boys would call
a 'queen.'"

"You've heard of Andrew J. Brisbane?"

"You mean the erstwhile Senator?"

"Yes; this is his daughter."

"Great Himmel! What is she doing here?"

"She's an artist and is making some studies of Indians."

"I didn'