there sha'n't be any social
sensation about her advent into the family. I hardly know whether this
wealth they talk of will be a help or a hindrance; a help, I suppose. And
there need not be any hitch in the whole affair if the girl is only
reasonable and this autocratic ranger can be ignored or bought over to
silence. It would be very annoying to have such family affairs talked
of--annoying to the girl, also, when she lives among people who object to
scandals. Gad! how her face did strike me! I felt as if I had seen a
ghost. And that cursed Indian!"

Altogether, Mr. Haydon had considerable food for reflection, and much of
it was decidedly annoying; or so it seemed to Akkomi, who lay in the
shadow and looked like a body asleep, as were the others. But from a fold
of his blanket he could see plainly the face of the stranger and note the
perplexity in it.

The first tender flush of early day was making the stars dim when the
doctor met Overton between the tents and the cabins, and surveyed him
critically from his slouch hat to his boots, on which were splashes of
water and fresh loam.

"What, in the name of all that's infernal, has taken possession of you,
Overton?" he demanded, with assumed anger and real concern. "You have not
been in bed all night. I know, for I've been to your tent. You prowl
somewhere in the woods when you ought to be in bed, and you are looking
like a ghost of yourself."

"Oh, I guess I'll last a day or two yet, so quit your growling; you think
you'll scare me into asking for some of your medicines; but that is where
you will find yourself beautifully left. I prefer a natural death."

"And you will find it, too, if you don't mend your ways," retorted the man
of the medicines. "I thought at first it was the care of 'Tana that kept
you awake every hour of every night; but I see it is just the same now
when there are plenty to take your place; worse--for now you go tramping,
God only knows where, and come back looking tired, as though you had
been racing with the devil."

"You haven't told me how she is," was all the answer he made to this
tirade. "You said--that by daylight--"

"There would be a change--yes, and there is; only a shadow of a change as
yet, but the shadow leans the right way."

"The _right_ way," he half whispered, and walked on toward her cabin. He
felt dizzy and the tears crept up in his eyes, and he forgot the doctor,
who looked after him and muttered statements damaging to