oodshed
provided him with a tomahawk.

Keith had no time to arrange feathers. He had taken off his flannels in
order to put on an old striped bathing-suit, which he had found in the
attic and stored away, intending to use it for swimming in the pond when
the weather should grow warm enough. It had no sleeves, and the short
trousers had shrunk until they did not half-way reach his knees. Its red
and white stripes had faded and the colour run until the whole was a
dingy "crushed strawberry" shade. As Malcolm had emptied all the tubes
of red paint in his Aunt Allison's box, Keith had to content himself
with some other colour. He chose the different shades of green,
squeezing the paint out on his plump little legs and arms, and rubbing
it around with his fore finger until he was encircled with as many
stripes as a zebra. Although the day was warm for the early part of
April, the sudden change from his customary clothes and spring flannels
to nothing but the airy bathing suit and war-paint made him a trifle
chilly; so he completed his costume by putting on a pair of scarlet
bedroom slippers, edged with dark fur.

With the dropping of their civilised clothing, the boys seemed to have
dropped all recollections of their professed knighthood, and acted like
the little savages they looked.

"We're going to shoot with your things awhile, Ginger," shouted Keith,
coming suddenly upon her with a whoop, and snatching her bow out of her
hands. "You are the squaw, so you have to do all the work. Get down
there now behind that rock and make a fire, while we go out and kill a
deer. You must build a wigwam, too, by the time we get back. Hear me?
I'm a big chief! 'I am Famine--Buckadawin!' and I'll make a living
skeleton of you if you don't hustle."

Virginia was furious. "I'll not be a squaw!" she cried. "And I'll not
build a fire or do anything else if you talk so rudely. If you don't
give me back my bow and let me be a chief, too, I'll--I'll get even with
you, sir, in a way you won't like. I have short hair, and my clothes are
more Indian than yours, and I can shoot better than either of you,
anyhow! So there! Give me my bow."

"What will you do if I won't?" said Keith, teasingly, holding it behind
him.

"I'll go up to the barn and get a rope, and lasso you like I did that
calf, and drag you all over the place!" cried Virginia, her eyes
shining with fierce determination.

"She means it, Keith," said Malcolm. "She'll do it sure,