at instead of making it up I was _recollecting_."

As she paused, Angus' ear caught a faint sound from without. To him it
resembled the faint creak of a board beneath a stealthy footstep. For an
instant his body tensed.

"What's the matter?" Faith asked. "Have you nerves, too?"

"Not that I know of. Turn in now and get a good rest, and don't dream of
things."

But when she had gone to her room he yawned, stretched himself, wound
the clock and passed into the hall leading to the kitchen. There hung
his belt with holster and gun. He took the gun, went swiftly through the
kitchen and outside. He circled the house, but neither saw nor heard
anything, and so he went in again. But when he turned in, having
extinguished the light, he laid the gun on the floor beside the bed, and
in the morning smuggled it out without Faith's knowledge. Before she had
risen he examined the ground around the house, but found no footprints
other than their own. And so he came to the conclusion that whatever he
had heard had not been a footstep.

He pottered around all morning, and in the afternoon decided to ride in
to town and see Judge Riley. The latter might have some news.

"Well, I won't go," Faith decided. "I have bread to bake, and it's too
far, anyway. I'll have supper ready when you get back."

But when Angus reached the judge's office it was closed. In the post
office he found a note from him, consisting of four words: "Want to see
you," and upon inquiry he learned that the lawyer had driven out with
Dr. Wilkes to see a rancher named McLatchie who being taken suddenly ill
had sent for legal as well as medical assistance. Angus decided to wait.
As he strolled down the street he met Rennie emerging from Dr. Wilkes'
office.

"Hello," he said. "What's the matter with _you_?"

"Nothing with me," Rennie returned. "I was just doin' an errand. But
they tell me the doc's out."

"What is it?" Angus asked, for Rennie's face was troubled.

"You ain't heard? Well, Mary, that granddaughter of old Paul Sam, has
been missin' some days, and to-day they find her--drowned."

"Good Lord!" Angus exclaimed. "How did it happen?" Rennie's face
darkened.

"I dunno. They say she drowned herself. They say some white man is mixed
up in it. She was a notch or two above the ordinary klootch, and so--oh,
well, it's just the same old rotten mess!"

"Poor girl!" Angus said after a moment of silence. "This will be hard on
old Paul Sam. Do the Indians kn