her. They build
their homes and they never go back. Do you wonder then that the warriors
wish your help?"

Francisco Alvarez smiled again. It was a cold but satisfied smile and he
rubbed one white hand over the other.

"Your logic is good," he said, "and these reasons have occurred to me,
also, but my master, Bernardo Galvez, the Governor, is troubled. We love
not England and there is a party among us--a party at present in
power--which wishes to help the Americans in order that we may damage
England, but I, if I could choose the way would have no part in it. As
surely as we help the rebels we will also create rebels against
ourselves."

"You are far from New Orleans," said Braxton Wyatt. "It would take long
for a messenger to go and come, and meanwhile you could act as you think
best."

"It is so," said the Spaniard. "Our presence here is unknown to all save
the chiefs and yourself. In this wilderness, a thousand miles from his
superior, one must act according to his judgment, and I should like to see
these rebel settlements crushed."

He spoke to himself rather than to Wyatt, and again his eyes narrowed.
Blue eyes are generally warm and sympathetic, but his were of the cold,
metallic shade that can express cruelty so well. He plucked, too, at his
short, light beard, and Braxton Wyatt read his thoughts. The renegade felt
a thrill of satisfaction. Here was a man who could be useful.

"How far is it from this place to the land of the Miamis and the
Shawnees?" asked Alvarez.

"It must be six or seven hundred miles, but bands of both tribes are now
hunting much farther west. One Shawnee party that I know of is even now
west of the Mississippi."

Francisco Alvarez, frowned slightly.

"It is a huge country," he said. "These great distances annoy me. Still,
one must travel them. Ah, what is it now?"

He was looking at Braxton Wyatt, as he spoke, and he saw a sudden change
appear upon his face, a look of recognition and then of mingled hate and
rage. The renegade was staring Northward, and the eyes of Alvarez followed
his.

The Spaniard saw a man or rather a youth approaching, a straight, slender,
but tall and compact figure, and a face uncommon in the wilderness, fine,
delicate, with the eyes of a dreamer, and seer, but never weak. The youth
came on steadily, straight coward the Spanish camp.

"Paul Cotter!" exclaimed Braxton Wyatt. "How under the sun did he come
here!"

"Some one you know?" said Alvarez who