owed head. Zeisberger calmly whittled a stick,
and Jim stood bolt upright, with a hard light in his eyes.

Nell leaned against the side of a heavy table. Wonderful was the
change that had transformed her from a timid, appealing,
fear-agonized girl to a woman whose only evidence of unusual
excitement were the flame in her eyes and the peculiar whiteness of
her face.

Benny was gone!

Heckewelder's glance returned to the visitors. He thought he had
never seen such brutal, hideous men.

"Wal, I reckon a preacher ain't agoin' to lie. Hev you seen any
Injun Christians round here?" asked Girty, waving a heavy
sledge-hammer.

"Girty, we have hidden no Indians here," answered Heckewelder,
calmly.

"Wal, we'll hev a look, anyway," answered the renegade.

Girty surveyed the room with wolfish eyes. Deering was so drunk that
he staggered. Both men, in fact, reeked with the vile fumes of rum.
Without another word they proceeded to examine the room, by looking
into every box, behind a stone oven, and in the cupboard. They drew
the bedclothes from the bed, and with a kick demolished a pile of
stove wood. Then the ruffians passed into the other apartments,
where they could be heard making thorough search. At length both
returned to the large room, when Girty directed Deering to climb a
ladder leading to the loft, but because Deering was too much under
the influence of liquor to do so, he had to go himself. He rummaged
around up there for a few minutes, and then came down.

"Wal, I reckon you wasn't lyin' about it," said Girty, with his
ghastly leer.

He and his companion started to go out. Deering had stood with
bloodshot eyes fixed on Nell while Girty searched the loft, and as
they passed the girl on their way to the open air, the renegade
looked at Girty as he motioned with his head toward her. His
besotted face expressed some terrible meaning.

Girty had looked at Nell when he first entered, but had not glanced
twice at her. As he turned now, before going out of the door, he
fixed on her his baleful glance. His aspect was more full of meaning
than could have been any words. A horrible power, of which he was
boastfully conscious, shone from his little, pointed eyes. His mere
presence was deadly. Plainly as if he had spoken was the
significance of his long gaze. Any one could have translated that
look.

Once before Nell had faced it, and fainted when its dread meaning
grew clear to her. But now she returned his gaze w