s came with the full tide of the springtime--innumerable
flowers and voices, the flowers filled with glowing color, the voices
with music and delight. Waves of song swept over the limitless meadows.
They went on and on as if they traveled a shoreless sea in a steady wind.
Bob-whites, meadow-larks, bobolinks, song sparrows, bluebirds, competed
with the crowing of the meadow cocks. This joyous tumult around the
Traylor cabin sped the day and emphasized the silence of the night.

In the midst of this springtime carnival there came also cheering news
from the old home in Vermont--a letter to Sarah from her brother, which
contained the welcome promise that he was coming to visit them and
expected to be in Beardstown about the fourth of May. Samson drove across
country to meet the steamer. He was at the landing when _The Star of the
North_ arrived. He saw every passenger that came ashore, and Eliphalet
Biggs, leading his big bay mare, was one of them, but the expected
visitor did not arrive. There would be no other steamer bringing
passengers from the East for a number of days.

Samson went to a store and bought a new dress and sundry bits of finery
for Sarah. He returned to New Salem with a heavy heart. He dreaded to
meet his faithful partner and bring her little but disappointment. The
windows were lighted when he got back, long after midnight. Sarah stood
in the open door as he drove up.

"Didn't come," he said mournfully.

Without a word, Sarah followed him to the barn, with the tin lantern in
her hand. He gave her a hug as he got down from the wagon. He was little
given to like displays of emotion.

"Don't feel bad," he said.

She tried bravely to put a good face on her disappointment, but, while he
was unharnessing and leading the weary horses into their stalls, it was a
wet face and a silent one.

"Come," he said, after he had thrown some hay into the mangers. "Let's go
into the house. I've got something for ye."

"I've given them up--I don't believe we shall ever see them again," said
Sarah, as they were walking toward the door. "I think I know how the dead
feel who are so soon forgotten."

"Ye can't blame 'em," said Samson. "They've probably heard about the
Injun scare and would expect to be massacreed if they came."

Indeed the scare, now abating, had spread through the border settlements
and kept the people awake o' nights. Samson and other men, left in New
Salem, had met to consider plans for a stockade