sought. I rested close within its shadow, striving to assure myself
there was no possibility of mistake. As my eyes lifted, I could trace
in dim outline the totem of the chief faintly sketched on the taut
skin: it was the same I had noted on the brawny breast of Little Sauk.

Never did I move with greater woodland skill, for I felt that all
depended upon my remaining undiscovered; a single false move now would
defeat all hope. Who might be within, concealed by that black
covering, was a mystery to be solved only by extremest caution.

Inch by inch I worked the skin covering of the tepee entrance up from
the ground, screwing my eye to the aperture in an effort to penetrate
the shrouded interior. But the glare of the sun was so reflected into
my eyeballs, that it left me almost blind in the semi-gloom beneath
that dark roof, and I could distinguish no object with certainty.
Surely, nothing moved within; and I drew myself slowly forward, until
half my body lay extended upon the beaten dirt-floor. It was then that
I caught a glimpse of a face peering at me from out the shadows,--the
face of Toinette; and, alas for my eager hopes of surprising her heart
and solving its secrets! the witch was actually laughing in silence at
my predicament. The sight made my face flush in sudden indignation;
but before I could find speech, she had hastily accosted me.

"Good faith, Master Wayland! but I greet you gladly!" she said, and her
soft hand was warm upon mine; "yet it truly caused me to smile to
observe the marvellous caution with which you came hither."

"It must have been indeed amusing," I answered, losing all my vain
aspirations in a moment under her raillery; "though it is not every
prisoner in an Indian camp who could find like cause for merriment."

Her eyes grew sober enough as they rested inquiringly on my face, for
all that they still held an irritatingly roguish twinkle in their
depths.

"It was the expression upon your face which so amused me," she
explained. "I am not indifferent to all that your coming means, nor to
the horrors this camp has witnessed. More than that, you appear to me
like one risen from the dead. I have truly mourned for you, John
Wayland. I lost all power, all desire tor resistance, when I saw you
stricken from your horse, and often since my eyes have been moist in
thoughts of you. No doubt 't was but the sudden reaction from seeing
you again alive that made me so forgetful of these dr