CHAPTER XXVIII

THE NOMAD OF THE FIRE-WHEEL

It had been an unforgettable day, this day in the pine woods. Diane
had forded shallow streams and followed bright-winged birds, lunched by
a silver lake set coolly in the darkling shade of cypress and found a
curious nest in the stump of a tree. Now with a mass of creeping
blackberry and violets strapped to her saddle she was riding slowly
back through the pine woods.

Though the sun, which awhile back had filled the hollow of palmetto
fronds with a ruddy pool of light, had long since dropped behind the
horizon, the girl somehow picked the homeward trail with the unerring
instinct of a wild thing. That one may be hopelessly lost in the
deceptive flatwoods she dismissed with a laugh. The wood is kind to
wild things.

It was quite dark when through the trees ahead she caught the curious
glimmer of a cart wheel of flame upon the ground, hub and spokes
glowing vividly in the center of a clearing. Curiously the girl rode
toward it, unaware that the picturesque fire-wheel ahead was the
typical camp fire of the southern Indian, or that the strange wild
figure squatting gravely by the fire in lonely silhouette against the
white of a canvas-covered wagon beyond in the trees, was a vagrant
Seminole from the proud old turbaned tribe who still dwell in the
inaccessible morasses of the Everglades.

The realization came in a disturbed flash of interest and curiosity.
Though the Florida Indian harmed no one, he still considered himself
proudly hostile to the white man. Wherefore Diane wisely wheeled her
horse about to retreat.

It was too late. Already the young Seminole was upon his feet, keen of
vision and hearing for all he seemed but a tense, still statue in the
wildwood.

Accepting the situation with good grace, Diane rode fearlessly toward
his fire and reined in her horse. But the ready word of greeting froze
upon her lips. For the nomad of the fire-wheel was a girl, tall and
slender, barbarically arrayed in the holiday garb of a Seminole chief.
The firelight danced upon the beaten band of silver about her brilliant
turban and the beads upon her sash, upon red-beaded deerskin leggings
delicately thonged from the supple waist to the small and moccasined
foot, upon a tunic elaborately banded in red and a belt of buckskin
from which hung a hunting knife, a revolver and an ammunition pouch.

But Diane's fascinated gaze lingered longest upon the Indian girl's