yes and ears with strange beast."

"I understand you, Serpent, and I understood Hist. Sometimes I think I'm
not half as feeble minded as they say I am. Now, do you look up at the
roof, and I'll tell you all. But you frighten me, you look so eager when
I speak of Hist."

The Indian controlled his looks, and affected to comply with the simple
request of the girl.

"Hist told me to say, in a very low voice, that you mustn't trust the
Iroquois in anything. They are more artful than any Indians she knows.
Then she says that there is a large bright star that comes over the
hill, about an hour after dark"--Hist had pointed out the planet
Jupiter, without knowing it--"and just as that star comes in sight, she
will be on the point, where I landed last night, and that you must come
for her, in a canoe."

"Good--Chingachgook understand well enough, now; but he understand
better if my sister sing him ag'in."

Hetty repeated her words, more fully explaining what star was meant, and
mentioning the part of the point where he was to venture ashore. She now
proceeded in her own unsophisticated way to relate her intercourse with
the Indian maid, and to repeat several of her expressions and opinions
that gave great delight to the heart of her betrothed. She particularly
renewed her injunctions to be on their guard against treachery, a
warning that was scarcely needed, however, as addressed to men as
wary as those to whom it was sent. She also explained with sufficient
clearness, for on all such subjects the mind of the girl seldom failed
her, the present state of the enemy, and the movements they had made
since morning. Hist had been on the raft with her until it quitted the
shore, and was now somewhere in the woods, opposite to the castle, and
did not intend to return to the camp until night approached; when she
hoped to be able to slip away from her companions, as they followed
the shore on their way home, and conceal herself on the point. No
one appeared to suspect the presence of Chingachgook, though it was
necessarily known that an Indian had entered the Ark the previous night,
and it was suspected that he had since appeared in and about the castle
in the dress of a pale-face. Still some little doubt existed on the
latter point, for, as this was the season when white men might be
expected to arrive, there was some fear that the garrison of the castle
was increasing by these ordinary means. All this had Hist communicated
to Hett