the girl lowered
the weapon. The outlaw was spared to scourge the region of the Maumee a
while longer.

Areotha put herself into his power when she lowered the rifle. With one
of those panther-like bounds for which he was famous, Girty could have
sprung upon her and removed her forever from his path. But he restrained
himself; he even put up the knife, and did not seek to detain her when
he heard her say:

"My father, I am going!"

With a look that spoke volumes, Little Moccasin turned on her heel, and
plunged into the forest, leaving the renegade to his own reflections.

"I think a mighty sight of her!" was all he said.

He might have killed her, but he would not.

CHAPTER XI.

KATE MERRIWEATHER'S PROGRESS.

Girty, the renegade, remained in his cabin door until the footsteps of
Little Moccasin died away in the forest, and silence again pervaded the
spot.

There was a cloud on the outlaw's brow, and the longer he listened the
more impatient and perplexed he became.

The minutes resolved themselves into hours, and when he believed that
the ghostly hour of one had arrived, an oath fell from his lips, and he
turned into the cabin. But he soon reappeared with a short-barreled
rifle, and left the hut as if bent upon hunting for some one whom he had
been expecting.

"Something unlooked for may have transpired," he murmured. "Wolf Cap and
that young fellow may have disarranged my plans by appearing suddenly at
the camp; but I am sure that Wells will never get the message which they
left in the tree."

Girty smiled as he recalled the theft of Harvey Catlett's message from
the forest letter box, and congratulated himself that Wells and
Hummingbird (a famous chief and spy in Wayne's employ) would find the
tree empty when they should reach it. The self-congratulations still
lingered in his heart when the report of a distant rifle, faint, but
clear enough, nevertheless, struck his practiced ear.

He stopped suddenly and listened.

"A rifle, but no death cry," he said, addressing himself. "But too far
off for that, perhaps."

Then he stooped and put his ear to the ground, in which attitude he
remained for several moments. But the stillness of death brooded over
the vicinity. When Girty rose it was with a perplexed look; the shot
seemed to revolve itself into a mystery, to which he attached the utmost
importance.

"There is one person in these parts whose bullets never make a death
cry," he said; "but