le with self.

When she finally roused herself she found her mother had put the rooms
to rights, and besides her own work, had done all the little tasks
Lilian had been used to assume.

This made her remorseful. She got her books and began to study. But
somehow the brilliant sunshine kept drawing her to the window to look
out.

The sky was of an intense blue that was almost purple. The blue-jays
were flitting and calling. A few stray crows hovered over a distant
corn-stubble--these were all the signs of life she saw.

She stood tapping a tune on the window panes. Presently she noticed, on
the far crest of one of the snow billows, some moving black figures.

They were mere specks against the intense blue beyond, but they fixed
her attention. Almost as soon as she saw them, however, they disappeared
in an intervening valley.

"That is on the Hardin road," she said, trying to fix the direction. "It
can't be the boys, for Uncle Abner's road is to the south."

[Illustration:
THE CHIEF GAVE A WHOOP OF DELIGHT AT SIGHT OF THEM.
HE SPRANG TO HER SIDE AND OPENLY BEGAN PUTTING THEM IN HIS POCKET.]

Almost immediately her curiosity was stimulated again by the
re-appearance of the figures on the next rise. She could not distinguish
numbers, but she felt certain it was horsemen.

Again they vanished from the crest into the lower-lying space between
the land-billows. And so she watched them until they were near enough
for her to see it was indeed horsemen.

"Mother," she called, "come here! There's somebody coming along the
Hardin road."

Her mother came.

"Who can it be?"

"One, two, three, four, five, six, seven," counted Lilian. "There are
seven of them! Perhaps they will turn at the Climbing Hill Corners. They
can't be coming here."

"Get the glass," said Mrs. Wyman. "See if we can make them out before
they strike the valley."

Lilian ran after the glass. She adjusted it and raised it to her eyes.
She had only one glimpse, however, before the descending riders were
again hidden by an intervening ridge.

"They ride so wildly, mother!" she said, in a kind of breathless wonder.

"They must be skirting that hill along the creek," said Mrs. Wyman.
"We'll see in a minute if they come up from the Corners."

It seemed a long time before they came again in sight. Lilian had just
said, "They've turned on the Climbing Hill road," when they burst into
full view on a not-distant summit and halted.

Lilian could disti