ing fearlessly up into my face. I turned her palms upward and
placed the naked knife across them; she bent her head, then
straightened up, looking me full in the eyes.

Still smiling, I laid both my hands on the collar of my hunting-shirt,
baring throat and chest; and, as the full significance of the tiny
tattoo dawned upon her, she shivered.

"Tharon!" she stammered. "Thou! What have I done!" And, shuddering,
cast the knife at my feet as though it had been the snake that rattles.

"Little sister----"

"Oh, no! no! What have I done! What have I dared! I have raised my hand
against Him whom you have talked with face to face----"

"Only Tharon has done that," I said gently, "I but wear his sign.
Peace, Woman of the Morning. There is no injury where there is no
intent. We are not yet '_at the Forest's Edge_.'"

Slowly the color returned to lip and cheek, her fascinated eyes roamed
from my face to the tattooed wolf and mark of Tharon crossing it. And
after a little she smiled faintly at my smile, as I said:

"I have drawn the fangs of the Wolf; fear no more, Daughter of the
Sun."

"I--I fear no more," she breathed.

"Shall an ensign of the Oneida cherish wrath?" I asked. "He who bears a
quiver has forgotten. See, child; it is as it was from the beginning.
Hiro."

I calmly seated myself on the floor, knees gathered in my clasped
hands; and she settled down opposite me, awaiting in instinctive
silence my next words.

"Why does my sister wear the dress of an adolescent, mocking the False
Faces, when the three fires are not yet kindled?" I asked.

"I hold the fire-right," she said quickly. "Ask those who wear the mask
where cherries grow. O sachem, those cherries were ripe ere I was!"

I thought a moment, then fixed my eager eyes on her.

"Only the Cherry-Maid of Adriutha has that right," I said. My heart,
beating furiously, shook my voice, for I knew now who she was.

"I am Cherry-Maid to the three fires," she said; "in bud at Adriutha,
in blossom at Carenay, in fruit at Danascara."

"Your name?"

"Lyn Montour."

I almost leaped from the floor in my excitement; yet the engrafted
Oneida instinct of a sachem chained me motionless. "You are the wife of
Walter Butler," I said deliberately, in English.

A wave of crimson stained her face and shoulders. Suddenly she covered
her face with her hands.

"Little sister," I said gently, "is it not the truth? Does a
Quiver-bearer lie, O Blossom of Carenay?"

Her