, for
he was squaring away at the Indians, who were a couple of dozen yards
away.

"What did he go knocking her about for? Yah! Mas'r Harry, they're a
rotten lot out here, and the country's a thousand times too good for
them!"

By degrees I got Tom cooled down, and into the house, and on returning I
found Lilla standing watching for me at the window, but only to gaze at
me with a strange, troubled look, half pain, half pleasure, and before I
could speak she had fled.

But an hour had not passed before I came upon her again, speaking
anxiously to Tom. They did not see me approach, and as I was close up I
was just in time to hear Tom exclaim:

"But he did, Miss, and stuck to you when all the rest had got ashore--
the Don and all."

Lilla gave a faint shriek as I spoke; and then darting at me a look of
reproach, she hurried away, leaving me excited and troubled; for she had
learned a secret that I had intended should not come to her ears.

"How dare you go chattering about like that?" I cried fiercely to Tom,
for I was anxious to have some one to blame.

"Don't care, Mas'r Harry," he said sulkily. "Miss Lilla asked me, and I
never told her only the truth. They are a cowardly set of hounds, the
whole lot of 'em; and I'll take any couple of 'em, one down and t'other
come on, with a hand tied behind me."

"We shall have to go, Tom," I said bitterly. "What with your brawls and
the mischief you have made, this will be no place for us."

I spoke with gloomy forebodings in my mind, for I could not but think
that trouble was to be our lot. Poor and without prospects, and with a
rich and favoured rival, what was I to hope for? Indeed I felt ready to
despair.

"Say, Mas'r Harry," said Tom penitently, "'tain't so bad as that, is
it?"

"Bad! Yes, Tom," I said gloomily, and I turned and left him.

It was a day or two after. I had only seen Lilla at meals, to find her
shy and _distraite_. She hardly seemed to notice me, but I had the
satisfaction of seeing that Garcia fared no better.

But he smiled pleasantly, evidently to conceal the rage that burned
within him, and more than once there was a hateful glare in his eye that
evidently boded no good to those who crossed his path; and it seemed as
if I had not only crossed his path, but now stood right in his way.

We had just finished the mid-day meal. Garcia had been with us, and on
Lilla rising he had followed her to the door; but she had turned from
him