er, which an occasional mis-step would send splashing
over her great awkward boots, she saw a man approaching the spring. It
was Ketchum; and, as she recognized him, her breath came quicker and
she hurried onward and upward. She had nearly reached the top of the
hill when she heard him calling out,

"Hello there, boy!"

She turned round, sat down her bucket and stood in a listening
attitude.

"I say boy, who lives yonder?"

"I du," she replied in exact imitation of backwoodsman twang, and,
taking a step or two downward, she stooped forward and appeared to be
attentively eyeing her new acquaintance.

"Be you the man they're looking fur?" she at length drawled out.

"Who's looking fur?" said he with a start.

"Them men at our house."

"No, you fool of a boy."

The last she saw of Ketchum he was hurrying off with all his might.

Antoinette fairly ran into the house and closing and barring the door
she fell upon her knees, and, from her full heart went up to Heaven a
song of thankfulness. Blessings multiply when gratitude reigns in the
soul; so while Antoinette still knelt a change came over Little Wolf
and consciousness returned.

"Where am I?" she faintly articulated, as her watchful and tender
nurse arose and approached the bed.

"You are safe, thank God," said Antoinette bursting into tears.

Antoinette now felt new courage, and, when Little Wolf was able to
bear it, she related to her that part of their flight of which the
illness of the other prevented her having any recollection; but
carefully avoided any allusion to her own personal history.

Little Wolf longed to penetrate the mystery that hung over her
benefactress, and she would often say to herself, as she sat propped
up with pillows watching Antoinette's quiet movements about the house,
"how I wish I knew more about her; what a romance!"

But as her strength increased, other desires shared her thoughts more
largely.

"How are we to get out of this place?" she frequently exclaimed, and,
as often, Antoinette would meekly reply, "The Lord will provide a
way."

"Well why don't the Lord provide a way to get us away from here?" she
said one day rather impatiently as she sat by the window looking out
into the sunshine, "I'm sure I'm well enough to travel now, and winter
is coming on and, when once the snow falls, we shall freeze and starve
shut up here."

"We shall hardly freeze with that big wood pile at the door, or starve
with a cellar full