wry faces,
at the same time looking around for moccasins or boots
or something that would enable it to pay its master out
with interest, and not be so difficult to swallow when
it came to the reckoning.

The dwarf went to the door, and, putting one hand on it,
and his head to one side, cried--

"Hello, there! _Qui vive?_ Who are you, and what do you
want?"

"All right, Pepin, it's me--Katie."

The door was thrown open, and the half-breed woman entered.
At her heels came a man who was so muffled up as to be
almost unrecognisable. But Dorothy knew him, and the next
moment was in her father's arms. The dwarf hastened to
close the door, but before doing so he gazed out
apprehensively.

"You are quite sure no one followed you?" he asked Katie,
on re-entering the room.

"No one suspected," she replied shortly. "Jean Lagrange
has gone to look out for the others. I fear it will go
hard with the shermoganish unless you can do something,
Pepin."

Dorothy had been talking to her father, but heard the
Indian word referring to the Police.

"I wonder if Mr. Pasmore has got through to the Fort,
dad!" she said suddenly.

"I was just about to tell you, my dear, what happened,"
he replied. "I was going quietly along, trying to find
some trace of you, when a couple of breeds came up behind
and took me prisoner. I thought they were going to shoot
me at first, but they concluded to keep me until to-morrow,
when they would bring me before their government. So they
shut me up in a dug-out on the face of a bank, keeping
my capture as quiet as possible for fear of the mob taking
the law into its own hands and spoiling their projected
entertainment. I hadn't been there long before the door
was unbarred and Pasmore came in with Katie here. He told
me to go with her, and, when I had found you, to return
to where we had left the sleighs, and make back for the
ranche by the old trail as quickly as possible. He said
he'd come on later, but that we weren't to trouble about
him. Katie had made it right, it seems, with my jailers,
whom I am inclined to think are old friends of hers."

"But why couldn't he come on, dad, with you?"

There was something about the affair that she could not
understand.

"I suppose he thought it would attract less attention to
go separately. I think the others must have got safely
into the Fort. It seems that since they have discovered
that some of the English are trying to get through their
lines th