grandmother were massacred by the Indians,"
Saxon contributed. "His father was a little baby boy, and lived with the
Indians, until captured by the whites. He didn't even know his name and
was adopted by a Mr. Roberts."

"Why, you two dear children, we're almost like relatives," Mrs. Mortimer
beamed. "It's a breath of old times, alas! all forgotten in these
fly-away days. I am especially interested, because I've catalogued and
read everything covering those times. You--" she indicated Billy, "you
are historical, or at least your father is. I remember about him. The
whole thing is in Bancroft's History. It was the Modoc Indians. There
were eighteen wagons. Your father was the only survivor, a mere baby
at the time, with no knowledge of what happened. He was adopted by the
leader of the whites."

"That's right," said Billy. "It was the Modocs. His train must have ben
bound for Oregon. It was all wiped out. I wonder if you know anything
about Saxon's mother. She used to write poetry in the early days."

"Was any of it printed?"

"Yes," Saxon answered. "In the old San Jose papers."

"And do you know any of it?"

"Yes, there's one beginning:

"'Sweet as the wind-lute's airy strains Your gentle muse has learned
to sing, And California's boundless plains Prolong the soft notes
echoing.'"

"It sounds familiar," Mrs. Mortimer said, pondering.

"And there was another I remember that began:

"'I've stolen away from the crowd in the groves, Where the nude statues
stand, and the leaves point and shiver,'--

"And it run on like that. I don't understand it all. It was written to
my father--"

"A love poem!" Mrs. Mortimer broke in. "I remember it. Wait a minute....
Da-da-dah, da-da-dah, da-da-dah, da-da--STANDS--

"'In the spray of a fountain, whose seed-amethysts Tremble lightly
a moment on bosom and hands, Then drip in their basin from bosom and
wrists.'

"I've never forgotten the drip of the seed-amethysts, though I don't
remember your mother's name."

"It was Daisy--" Saxon began.

"No; Dayelle," Mrs. Mortimer corrected with quickening recollection.

"Oh, but nobody called her that."

"But she signed it that way. What is the rest?"

"Daisy Wiley Brown."

Mrs. Mortimer went to the bookshelves and quickly returned with a large,
soberly-bound volume.

"It's 'The Story of the Files,'" she explained. "Among other things, all
the good fugitive verse was gathered here from the old newspaper files."
Her eyes ru