topped all of a sudden, and I saw that
she had gone home.

"After that" continued Paul, hurrying on as if the memory of the event
was too much for him, "havin' nothin' to keep me in England, I came off
here to the gold-fields with you, an' brought the will with me,
intendin', when you came of age, to tell you all about it, an' see
justice done both to you an' to your brother, but--"

"Fath--Paul," said Betty, checking herself, "that brown parcel you gave
me long ago with such earnest directions to keep it safe, and only to
open it if you were killed, is--"

"That's the will, my dear."

"And Edwin--does he think that I am your real daughter Betty?"

"No doubt he does, for he never heard of her bein' dead, and he never
saw you since you was quite a little thing, an' there's a great change
on you since then--a wonderful change."

"Yes, fath--Oh! it is so hard to lose my father," said Betty, almost
breaking down, and letting her hands fall listlessly into her lap.

"But why lose him, Betty? I did it all for the best," said Paul, gently
taking hold of one of the poor girl's hands.

She made a slight motion to withdraw it, but checked herself and let it
rest in the man's rough but kindly grasp, while tears silently coursed
down her rounded cheeks. Presently she looked up and said--

"How did Edwin find out where you had gone to?"

"That's more than I can tell, Betty, unless it was through Truefoot,
Tickle, and Badger. I wrote to them after gettin' here, tellin' them to
look well after the property, and it would be claimed in good time, an'
I raither fear that the postmark on the letter must have let the cat out
o' the bag. Anyhow, not long after that Edwin found me out an' you know
how he has persecuted me, though you little thought he was your own
brother when you were beggin' of me not to kill him--no more did you
guess that I was as little anxious to kill him as you were, though I did
pretend I'd have to do it now an' then in self-defence. Sometimes,
indeed, he riled me up to sitch an extent that there wasn't much
pretence about it; but thank God! my hand has been held back."

"Yes, thank God for that; and now I must go to him," said Betty, rising
hastily and hurrying back to the Indian village.

In a darkened tent, on a soft couch of deerskins, the dying form of
Buxley, alias Stalker, lay extended. In the fierceness of his self-will
he had neglected his wounds until too late to save his life. A look of