saved him. Landless heard, turned, saw Patricia
dragged from the shelter of the rocks, leaped to his feet, leaving his
work undone, and rushed upon the knot of savages with whom she was
struggling. A moment saw him beside her with the Indian who had held her
dead at his feet. Behind them was the great boulder which had formed the
front wall of their chamber of defense. He put his arm around her, and
drew her back with him until they stood against this rock, then faced
the advancing savages with uplifted knife.

So determined was his attitude, so terribly had they proved his power,
so certain it was that before he should be taken one at least of their
number would taste that knife, that the Ricahecrians paused, swaying to
and fro, yelling, working themselves into a fury that should send them
on like maddened brutes, blind and deaf to all things but their lust for
blood.

"I hear a sound of footsteps over the leaves," said Patricia.

"The wind rustles in them, or the deer pass," answered Landless. "Oh, my
life! are you content?"

She answered with a low, clear laugh. "I hold happiness fast," she said.
"It cannot escape us now."

"They are coming," he said. "The last kiss, heart of my heart."

Their lips met, and their eyes with a smile in them met, and then he put
her gently behind him, and turned to again face Luiz Sebastian.

With his eyes fixed upon the yellow face, he had raised his hand to
strike at the yellow breast, spotted and barred with the black of the
war paint, when an Indian, gliding between, struck up his arm, and sent
the knife tinkling down upon the rocks. With a yell of triumph the
savage snatched up the weapon, and brandished it, showing it to his
fellows, who, seeing their work accomplished, and the two whom they had
tracked so far actually in their hands, made the forest ring with their
exultant shouts. A few closed in around the devoted pair, directing at
them fiendish cries and no less fiendish laughter, and menacing them
with knife and tomahawk, but the majority streamed down the steep and
into the forest at its base.

"They go to gather wood," said the still smiling Luiz Sebastian. "By and
by we are to have a bonfire. Senor Landless has often carried wood, I
think, in those old times when he was a slave, and when the pretty
mistress behind him there treated him as such--unless she gave him
favors in secret. But, Mother of God! now that she has made him master,
we must carry the wood for