n shrugged their shoulder and turned away, the half-breed going
back to his own camp. The missionary called his two men to him, and they
fell into prayer. Stockard and Bill attacked the few standing pines with
their axes, felling them into convenient breastworks. The child had
fallen asleep, so the woman placed it on a heap of furs and lent a hand
in fortifying the camp. Three sides were thus defended, the steep
declivity at the rear precluding attack from that direction. When these
arrangements had been completed, the two men stalked into the open,
clearing away, here and there, the scattered underbrush. From the
opposing camp came the booming of war-drums and the voices of the priests
stirring the people to anger.

"Worst of it is they'll come in rushes," Bill complained as they walked
back with shouldered axes.

"And wait till midnight, when the light gets dim for shooting."

"Can't start the ball a-rolling too early, then." Bill exchanged the axe
for a rifle, and took a careful rest. One of the medicine-men, towering
above his tribesmen, stood out distinctly. Bill drew a bead on him.

"All ready?" he asked.

Stockard opened the ammunition box, placed the woman where she could
reload in safety, and gave the word. The medicine-man dropped. For a
moment there was silence, then a wild howl went up and a flight of bone
arrows fell short.

"I'd like to take a look at the beggar," Bill remarked, throwing a fresh
shell into place. "I'll swear I drilled him clean between the eyes."

"Didn't work." Stockard shook his head gloomily. Baptiste had evidently
quelled the more warlike of his followers, and instead of precipitating
an attack in the bright light of day, the shot had caused a hasty exodus,
the Indians drawing out of the village beyond the zone of fire.

In the full tide of his proselyting fervor, borne along by the hand of
God, Sturges Owen would have ventured alone into the camp of the
unbeliever, equally prepared for miracle or martyrdom; but in the waiting
which ensued, the fever of conviction died away gradually, as the natural
man asserted itself. Physical fear replaced spiritual hope; the love of
life, the love of God. It was no new experience. He could feel his
weakness coming on, and knew it of old time. He had struggled against it
and been overcome by it before. He remembered when the other men had
driven their paddles like mad in the van of a roaring ice-flood, how, at
the critical