ptorily, and he rode off. Then the child turned to her mother.

"What did you mean about the Indians, mamma?"

But the mother did not answer; she was watching her husband, who had just
joined the others, and she saw that all three were watching something that
looked like smoke on the northwestern horizon.

"Don't Indians eat people, mamma?" asked the child presently.

Her mother laughed shortly, and answered, "No." The answer came a little
more sharply than she usually spoke. Suddenly she leant forward and
touched the driver on the shoulder. He turned round instantly.

"What is that smoke on the horizon, Jim?" she asked.

The man looked into her steady gray eyes. Then he glanced down at the
beautiful child at her side, and, in a moment, his gaze came back to the
handsome dark face of the mother; but instantly he turned back to the
horses.

"Don't know," he threw back brusquely over his shoulder.

And the woman who learned so much without asking questions knew that he
lied.

The vehicle creaked on. The steady jog of the horses kept the neck-yoke
rattling in the harness with a sound that was almost musical. The sun was
very hot, and the sweat was caked in white streaks all over the
hard-working animals' flanks. Mother and child sat on in silence. Those
two pairs of lovely eyes were looking out ahead. The child interested, and
the mother thinking hard and swiftly. Curiously that smoke on the horizon
had set her thinking of her husband and child, but mostly of the child.
The driver chirruped at his horses as he had done from the start. He
munched his tobacco, and seemed quite at his ease. Only every now and then
his keen eyes lifted to the smoke. He was an old prairie hand.

The horsemen on ahead had halted where a higher billow of grass-land than
usual had left a sharp, deep hollow. A hundred yards to the right of the
trail there was a small clump of undergrowth. The men had dismounted. When
the wagon came up the husband stepped to its side.

"We are going to camp here, Alice," he said quietly. "There is good water
close by. We can spare the time; we have come along well."

Alice glanced at the faces of the others while he was speaking. One of the
men was a long-haired prairie scout; his keen black eyes were intent upon
her face. The other was a military "batman," a blue-eyed Yorkshireman. His
eyes were very bright--unusually bright. The teamster was placidly looking
round his horses.

"Very well," she answer