this was more
easily disposed of. Then I managed to lift myself, but with the first
attempt her arm was about my shoulders.

"No; not alone--let me help you. Do you really think you can stand!
Why, you are hurt, dear; this is a knife wound in your side. It looks
ugly, but is not deep and bleeds no longer. Are there other injuries?"

"My head rings, and this left arm appears paralyzed, from blows, no
doubt, and there are spots on my body which feel like burns. No, I am
not in bad shape. Now let me stand alone; that's better. Good God,
what a scene!"

The fire, by this time blazing brightly, gave us a full view of the
entire dismantled interior. The cabin was a complete wreck, the roof
practically all gone and the upper logs of the side walls either fallen
within or dangling in threat. Above clung jagged sections, trembling
with their own weight; the lower walls were blackened by powder and
stained with blood; the floor was strewn with dead bodies, disfigured
and distorted, lying exactly as they fell, while littered all about
were weapons, dropped by stricken hands. Clearly enough it had been
the sudden plunge of heavy timbers and the dislodgment of those upper
logs, which accounted for this havoc of death. There were dead there
pierced by bullets and brained by rifle stocks, but the many had met
their fate under the avalanche of logs, and amid the burning glare of
exploding powder.

Only between arched timbers and sections of fallen roof could we move
at all, and beneath the network of this entanglement the majority of
the bodies lay, crushed and mangled. I saw Kirby, free from his bonds,
but dead beneath a heavy beam. His face was toward us and the flicker
of flame revealed a dark spot on his forehead--his life had never been
crushed out by that plunging timber which pinned him there; it had been
ended by a bullet. My eyes sought hers, in swift memory of my last
order, and she must have read my thought.

"No," she said, "not that, Steven. It was the boy who shot him. Oh,
please, can we not go? There is light already in the sky
overhead--see. Take me away from here--anywhere, outside."

"In a moment; all these surely are dead, beyond our aid, and yet we
must not depart foodless. We know not how far it still may be to
Ottawa. Wait, while I search for the things we need."

"Not alone; I must be where I can touch you. Try to understand. Oh,
you do not know those hours I have spent in agony--I