d's
horse lower its head and dash out, with a whip of its tail like a
defiance of her authority. Then in a moment everything was still out
there, with a fearful suddenness.

She flung herself into the cloud of smoke that hung in the door,
sobbing Macdonald's name; she stumbled into the fresh sweet air,
almost blind in her anxiety, and the confusion of that quickly enacted
scene, her head bent as if to run under the bullets which she
expected.

She did not see how it happened, she did not know that he was there;
but his arm was supporting her, his cool hand was on her forehead,
stroking her face as if he had plucked her drowning from the sea.

"Where are they?" she asked, only to exclaim, and shrink closer to him
at the sight of one lying a few rods away, in that sprawling limp
posture of those who fall by violence.

"There were only four of them--there the other two go." He pointed
down the little swale where the tall grass was still green.
Macdonald's horse had fallen to grazing there, his master's perils and
escapes all one to him now. It threw its head up and stood listening,
trotted a little way and stopped, ears stiff, nostrils stretched.

"There's somebody coming," she said.

"Yes--Chadron and a fresh gang, maybe."

He sprang to the dugout door, where Frances' horse stood with its head
out inquiringly.

"Jump up--quick!" he said, bringing the horse out. "Go this time,
Frances; don't hang back a second more!"

"Never mind, Alan," she said, from the other side of the horse, "it's
the cavalry--I guess they've come after me."

Major King was at the head of the detail of seven men which rode up,
horses a lather of sweat. He threw himself from the saddle and hurried
to Frances, his face full of the liveliest concern. Macdonald stepped
around to meet him.

"Thank heaven! you're not hurt," the major said.

"No, but we thought we were in for another fight," she told him,
offering him her hand in the gratefulness of her relief. He almost
snatched it in his eagerness, and drew her toward him, and stood
holding it in his haughty, proprietary way. "Mr. Macdonald--"

"The scoundrels heard us coming and ran--we got a glimpse of them down
there. Chadron will have to answer for this outrage!" the major said.

"Major King, this is Mr. Macdonald," said she, firmly, breaking down
the high manner in which the soldier persisted in overlooking and
eliminating the homesteader.

Major King's face flushed; he drew back