but she would not. So
they discussed together in their own tongue and neither would allow
the other to venture below, and still no smoke issued from the
chimney.

At last Amalia started and pressed her hand to her heart. What did she
see far along on the trail toward the desert? Surely, a man with two
animals, climbing toward the turn. Her eyes danced for gladness as she
turned a flushed face toward her mother.

"Look, mamma! Far on,--no--there! It is--mamma mine--it is 'Arry
King!" The mere sight of him made her break out in English. "It is
that I must go to him and tell him of the Indian in the cabin before
he arrive. If he come on them there, and they kill him! Oh, let me go
quickly." At the thought of him, and the danger he might meet, all her
fears of the men "rouge" returned upon her, and she was gone, passing
with incredible swiftness over the rough way, to try to intercept him
before he could reach the cabin.

But she need not have feared, for the Indians were long gone. Before
daybreak they had passed Harry where he rested in the deep dusk of the
morning, without knowing he was near. With swift, silent steps they
had passed down the trail, taking as much of Larry Kildene's corn as
they could carry, and leaving the bloody pelt of the sheep and a very
meager share of the mutton in exchange. Hungry and footsore, yet eager
and glad to have come home successfully, Harry King walked forward,
leading his good yellow horse, his eyes fixed on the cabin, and
wondering not a little; for he, too, saw that no smoke was issuing
from the chimney.

He hastened, and all Amalia's swiftness could not bring her to him
before he reached his goal. He saw first the bloody pelt hanging
beside the door, and his heart stood still. Those two women never
could have done that! Where were they? He dropped the leading strap,
leaving the weary horses where they stood, and ran forward to enter
the cabin and see the evidence of Indians all about. There were the
clean-picked bones of their feast and the dirt from their feet on
Amalia's carefully kept floor. The disorder smote him, and he ran out
again in the sun. Looking this way and that, he called and listened
and called again. Why did no answer reach him? Poor Amalia! In her
haste she had turned her foot and now, fainting with pain, and with
fear for him, she could not find her voice to reply.

He thought he heard a low cry. Was it she? He ran again, and now he
saw her, high above him,