nder if scalping hurts as much
as they say."

"I'll wave the flag again," said Anthea. "If they stand back, we'll run
for it."

She waved the towel, and the chief commanded his followers to stand
back. Then, charging wildly at the place where the line of Indians was
thinnest, the four children started to run. Their first rush knocked
down some half-dozen Indians, over whose blanketed bodies the children
leaped, and made straight for the sand-pit. This was no time for the
safe easy way by which carts go down--right over the edge of the
sand-pit they went, among the yellow and pale purple flowers and dried
grasses, past the little bank martins' little front doors, skipping,
clinging, bounding, stumbling, sprawling, and finally rolling.

Yellow Eagle and his followers came up with them just at the very spot
where they had seen the Psammead that morning.

Breathless and beaten, the wretched children now awaited their fate.
Sharp knives and axes gleamed round them, but worse than these was the
cruel light in the eyes of Golden Eagle and his followers.

"Ye have lied to us, O Black Panther of the Mazawattees--and thou, too,
Squirrel of the Moning Congos. These also, Pussy Ferox of the Phiteezi,
and Bobs of the Cape Mounted Police,--these also have lied to us, if not
with their tongues, yet by their silence. Ye have lied under the cover
of the Truce-flag of the Pale-face. Ye have no followers. Your tribes
are far away--following the hunting trail. What shall be their doom?" he
concluded, turning with a bitter smile to the other Red Indians.

"Build we the fire!" shouted his followers; and at once a dozen ready
volunteers started to look for fuel. The four children, each held
between two strong little Indians, cast despairing glances round them.
Oh, if they could only see the Psammead!

"Do you mean to scalp us first and then roast us?" asked Anthea
desperately.

"Of course!" Redskin opened his eyes at her. "It's always done."

The Indians had formed a ring round the children, and now sat on the
ground gazing at their captives. There was a threatening silence.

Then slowly, by twos and threes, the Indians who had gone to look for
firewood came back, and they came back empty-handed. They had not been
able to find a single stick of wood for a fire! No one ever can, as a
matter of fact, in that part of Kent.

The children drew a deep breath of relief, but it ended in a moan of
terror. For bright knives were being bran