There was a cold rabbit
patty, the pot of beans, light loaves of sweet rye bread, and a pat of
golden butter. To these he added a generous pitcher of milk, and
beside Gaspar's own plate he placed both a pumpkin and a dried-apple
pie.

"I'd begin with these, if I was you, sonny. Baked beans come by
nature, seems to me, but pies are a gift of grace. Though I must say
my wife don't stint 'em when she takes it into her head to go
gallivantin' an' leaves me to housekeep. 'Pears to think then I must
have somethin' sort of comfortin'. I'd start in on pie, if I was a
little shaver, an' take the beans last."

This might not have been the best of advice to give a lad whose fast
had been so long continued as Gaspar's, but it suited that young
person exactly. Indeed, in all his life he had never seen so well
spread a table, and he lost no time in obeying his entertainer's
suggestion. But he noticed with regret that his foster-mother did not
touch the proffered food, and that she ministered even gingerly to
Kitty's wants.

Yet there was nobody, however austere or unhappy, who could long
resist the happy influence of the little girl, and least of all the
woman who so loved her. As the Sun Maid's color returned to her face,
and her stiffened limbs began to resume their suppleness, something of
the anxiety left Wahneenah's eyes, and she condescended to receive a
bowl of milk and a slice of bread from Abel's hand.

The fact that she would at last break her own fast made all
comfortable; and as soon as Gaspar's appetite was so far appeased that
he could begin upon the beans, the settler demanded:

"Now, sonny, talk. Tell me the whole endurin' story from A to Izzard.
Where'd you come from now? Where was you bound? What's your name? an'
her's? an' the little tacker's? My! but ain't she a beauty! I never
see ary such hair on anybody's head, black or white. It's gettin' dry,
ain't it; an' how it does fly round, just like foam."

"I'm not 'sonny,' nor 'bubby.' I'm Gaspar Keith. I was brought up at
Fort Dearborn. After the massacre, I was taken to Muck-otey-pokee.
I--"

But the lad's thoughts already began to grow sombre, and he became so
abruptly silent that Abel prompted him.

"Hmm, I've heard of that--that--Mucky place. Indian settlement, wasn't
it? Took prisoner, was you?"

"No. I wasn't a prisoner, exactly. I was just a--just a friend of the
family, I guess."

"Oh? So. A friend of an Indian family, sonny?"

"If you'd rathe