prayed that we might all be
taken care of, and I'm not afraid one bit now, are you?"

Melville tried to speak, but his voice choked him. His eyes filled, and,
lifting the precious one in his arms, he pressed her to his breast and
kissed her again and again.

The chieftain said nothing, but he too raised the child in his arms and
touched his lips to hers. Not only that, but he filled her with delight
by saluting Susie in the same manner.

Who shall try to make known the emotions which stirred that savage
heart? He had often turned in scorn from the words of the good
missionaries who had come to his country; but there was something in the
faith of the sweet child which touched his nature as it had never been
touched before.

Having set the little one on her feet, the Sioux stepped across the main
room to the window from which most of their observations had been made
on that floor. Melville followed him, and noticed that the smoke had
vanished, so that the sentinel on the hill was in sight again.

Red Feather thrust his hand through the windows, so that his fingers
projected slightly beyond. This was done to ascertain the direction of
the wind.

"Oogh!" he muttered, with a curious expression on his countenance "_wind
blow oder way!_ Great Spirit hear what pappoose say."

"Can it be possible?" asked the awed Melville.

There was no doubt of it; the slight breeze, which had been coming
directly from the barn toward the house had changed, and was now blowing
in exactly the opposite direction.

The chief and the youth passed into the smaller apartment which was
nearest the chimney. The former pressed his ear against the logs to help
his hearing. Had they caught the flames from the barn, which was still
burning furiously, he could not have failed to detect the fact. A
moment's attention told him that up to the present the building was
safe.

But it was not in the nature of things that the Sioux should refrain
because their first effort failed. They were not the ones to give up on
a single trial.

Several noteworthy things took place during the latter part of this
eventful afternoon. First of all, there was such a decided lowering of
the temperature that a fire would have felt comfortable to the occupants
of the building. It looked indeed to Melville as though one of those
fearful storms known in the west as "blizzards" was approaching.

This was hardly possible, for it was summer-time, but the plains of
Texas an