just as she had done on a similar
occasion.

"I wish I had some men's clothes," said Natalie stoutly; frowning as
girls always do, when they see themselves in that character. And in
the very act of wishing it, she forgot; and drove home her femininity.
Tipping a palmful of mooseberries into her mouth, "Wouldn't I look
nice!" she said with a sidewise sparkle.

Garth, swallowing a sigh, smiled, and allowed that she would.

They speculated on what Mary Co-que-wasa's errand might be; neither of
them was experienced in villainy. There, in the matter-of-fact daylight,
and, as Natalie said, on Sunday, August the fifth _now_, it was impossible
for the thought of one silent old woman to cause them much uneasiness;
besides, they presently expected to join forces with the Bishop's ample
party. Nothing nearly so simple and devilish as the actual truth occurred
to them; and it was brought home with the force of a blow, when they
reached the Warehouse.

About eleven, a final descent brought them to the shore of a demure
little river flowing softly between high banks--Musquasepi, that they
were to know so well. Off to the left it merged into the muddier waters
of the "big" river. On the further shore stood the Warehouse they had
heard of so often.

"Oh!" said Natalie. "Only another little log shack! Why I imagined
a--a----"

"Five-story stone front?" suggested Garth.

"Well, I don't know," she said, "but not that!"

On the hither side was a solitary cabin; and in the doorway stood a
breed, outwardly of a different pattern from any they had seen--but
after all not so different. He was clad in decent Sunday blacks minus
the coat; and wore heavy-rimmed spectacles which he took off when he
really wished to see. On the table within was ostentatiously spread an
open Bible--the sharp-eyed Natalie took note that it was upside down.
This young man had a heavy expression of conscious responsibility,
before which the insouciant Pake visibly quailed. Pake indicated to
Garth that Ancose Mackey stood before him.

"Where is the Bishop?" Garth demanded impatiently.

Ancose blandly ignored the question for the present. "How-do-you-do,
sir," he said, like a mechanical doll, at the same time politely
extending his hand.

Garth, shaking it hastily, repeated his question--but the young man was
not to be hurried over any of his self-pleasing formalities.

"How-do-you-do, sir," he repeated to Natalie in precisely the same tone,
gravely shaki