strong," said the boy. "If you
don't take it I'll go home with you, and it's so late father won't
let me come out again to-night."

"Well, I'll take it," Madelon said, wearily, and she passed out of
the ball-room with the knife in her hand, under her cloak.

When she got out in the cold night air she sped along fast over the
creaking snow, still holding the knife clutched fast in her hand. She
began to lilt again as she went, and again Burr and Dorothy danced
together before her eyes. She passed Parson Fair's house, and the
best-room windows were lighted. She thought that Burr was there, and
she lilted more loudly the Virginia reel.

After Parson Fair's house was some time left behind, and she had come
into the lengthy stretch of road, she saw a shadowy figure ahead. She
could not at first tell whether it was moving towards or from
her--whether it was a man or a woman; or, indeed, whether it were not
a forest tree encroaching on the road and moving in the wind. She
kept on swiftly, holding her knife under her cloak. She had stopped
singing.

Presently she saw that the figure was a man, and coming her way; and
then her heart stood still, for she knew by the swing of his
shoulders that it was Burr Gordon. She threw back her proud head and
sped along towards him, grasping her knife under her cloak and
looking neither to the right nor left. She swerved not her eyes a
hair's-breadth when she came close to him--so close that their
shoulders almost touched in passing in the narrow path.

Suddenly there was a quick sigh in her ear--"Oh, Madelon!" Then an
arm was flung around her waist and hot lips were pressed to her own.

The mixed blood of two races, in which action is quick to follow
impulse, surged up to Madelon's head. She drew the hand which held
the knife from under her cloak and struck. "Kiss me again, Burr
Gordon, if you dare!" she cried out, and her cry was met by a groan
as he fell away from her into the snow.

Chapter IV

Madelon stood for a second looking at the dark, prostrate form as one
of her Iroquois ancestors might have looked at a fallen foe before he
drew his scalping-knife; then suddenly the surging of the savage
blood in her ears grew faint. She fell down on her knees beside him.
"Have I killed you, Burr?" she said, and bent her face down to
his--and it was not Burr, but Lot Gordon!

The white, peaked face smiled up at her out of the snow. "You haven't
killed me if I die, since you t