; "and after this I will be different, dear, and try and make
it up to you. I was selfish and did not think, but I loved you all the
time. I never forgot you. Forgive me, Stephanie! Stephanie,
Stephanie!" And so it went on, until, exhaustion brought quiet.

No one noticed him much or was much interested in him. But Peter
Many-Names, after a few weeks, was counted a valuable addition to the
tribe; and the pony was the swiftest of the herd.

The days passed, and the prairies lay a vast field of white beneath the
radiant blue of the skies. Then the snow blew off the higher mounds
and ridges, and only the hollows and sloughs were white. So the season
advanced, through all its changes of cold, through all its shifting
winds, and brilliant sun and sudden tempest. And still the old squaw
tended Dick, filling him with fearful herb-drinks, feeding him nobly,
wrapping him close in soft skins. It was a fancy of hers that Death
should not have the white boy; and once having become possessed with
the idea, she nursed Dick as if he had been her own son, to the wonder
of the tribe. And at last her care was rewarded, and the clouds
cleared from his brain, though he had little hold on life for a time.

But the days of weakness passed, and with them passed the last shadow
of hesitation in Dick's mind. He had had long hours in which to repent
and think as he lay in the corner of the smoky tepee--long hours in
which to realise the fulness of that mercy which had shielded him in
danger and saved him from death. And he went out into the sunshine
again, resolved that as soon as he was strong enough to travel he would
go back to that life in which his lot had been cast. He would go
south, back to the Settlements, to work, and to Stephanie. And the
wilds should thereafter call him in vain.

CHAPTER XI.

Back to Stephanie.

That long winter spent among the Indians was a bitterly hard one to
Dick, and taught him patience and humility in no very gentle fashion.
He was anxious to put his good resolves to the test of action; but it
would be some time before his strength became sufficient for the long
journey back to the Settlements. And accustomed as he was to the
possession of perfect health, he fretted under the knowledge, and
chafed against the sense of helplessness which was so new to him. "But
what's the use of fidgeting over it?" he told himself over and over
again. "What's the use of thinking of it even, when I '