; but Dusty Star saw it and took the alarm. When, an
instant later, an Indian broke cover and came bounding towards him like
a buck, Dusty Star was already on the run.

One swift glance behind, showed him that his foe was coming at full
speed. As he came, he uttered a shrill whoop as a signal to his
companions that their quarry was in sight. The cry sent a thrill of
terror through the boy's veins. From the start, he felt that unless he
put forth his utmost strength, he was doomed.

And now he fled between the trees as if his moccasins were wings. His
running power was marvellous. The prairies and the wolves between them,
had given him that. If the antelopes went like the wind, Dusty Star went
like the antelopes. Even his pursuers, as relentless and almost as
tireless as the wolves themselves, and who passed their lives among
winged and footed swiftnesses, were astonished at such running, the like
of which they had never seen. To their amazed eyes he seemed less to be
running than _floating_ out of their sight. There was "medicine" in his
feet!

What his own running looked like, Dusty Star did not know. But he knew
what the forest looked like. It ceased to stand still. The trees raced
to meet him, in a hurry to be past! And as they came, he seemed to cast
them behind him, tree by breathless tree; hemlock and fir, sycamore and
maple--it was as if he flung the whole rushing forest in the teeth of
the pursuit!

After the first terrified glances to measure the distance, he did not
dare to look behind. All his sight was needed for the ground immediately
ahead. To fall--even to stumble--might cost him his life. Yet he knew
that, so far, he was keeping ahead. The knowledge gave him courage. If
only his strength would hold out! The pace was killing. He knew he could
not keep it up for very much longer. Even now he fancied he was running
less quickly. He was beginning to realize that he got his breath with
more and more effort. And to lose his breath was the beginning of the
end. For a considerable distance, his greater speed would enable him to
out-distance all pursuit; but in a long race, it is endurance which
counts; and while his pursuers were full-grown men, he was, after all,
only yet a boy. Yet with breath going, and courage failing, Dusty Star
fled on.

If there is a Good Spirit which carries its mysterious warning to the
children of the wilderness when danger threatens, it would seem
sometimes as if there were an e