game to drive him mad with jealousy.

"Let him go," he said thickly. "I will run the mill myself!"

So long as the wheels revolved smoothly and the stream of creamy flour
issued from the mouth of the machine the miller had a sinecure.
Ambrose scowling and grinding his teeth scarcely saw what his eyes were
turned on. His mind was busy outside.

He was sharply recalled to his job by a tearing sound from within the
machinery. The flour came out mixed with bran. The wheels jammed and
stopped.

Ambrose threw out the clutch, and doggedly attacked the problem. It
was cruelly hard to concentrate his mind on machinery while a damnable
little voice in his brain persisted in asking over and over:

"Where are they? What are they doing? How far will rage carry her?"

He contrived to remove the torn frame without much difficulty, but how
to clean out the mass of stuff that clogged every part of the mechanism
defied his ingenuity. Apparently the thing must be taken apart. How
could he hope to put it together by lantern light?

There was a stir at the door, and Duncan Greer slouched in with a
hang-dog scowl. Never in his life had Ambrose been so glad to see a
man. He was careful to mask his joy. He glanced at the boy carelessly
and went on with his work. Duncan came directly to him.

"I'm your man," he muttered. "For keeps, if you want me."

"Sure," said Ambrose, very offhand. "Help me get this thing going,
will you?"

As they worked side by side in the lantern light, Ambrose perceived a
red welt across the boy's forehead and cheek that was momentarily
growing darker. He smiled grimly. Duncan, finding his eyes fixed on
it, flushed up painfully.

"Women are the devil!" he muttered.

A great unholy joy filled Ambrose's breast. In his relief he could
have hugged the boy, and laughed.

"Don't abuse the women, my son," he said grimly. "They have to fight
with what weapons they can. You were warned. You only got what was
coming to you!"

When the machine was running smoothly again, Ambrose went to the door
to reconnoiter.

"They've gone," he said. "I don't think they'll trouble us again
before morning. You can all sleep."

Daybreak and the following hours found Ambrose and his party on the
_qui vive_ for a renewed demonstration from the other side. None was
made.

Neither Macfarlane, Gordon Strange, nor Colina could have mustered a
corporal's guard of the natives to their aid. The breeds in the