if she shot _him_, I don't see why, for she knows
that we are friends. However, I'm going down to see what the matter is."

He started toward the river at a brisk walk. It was ten miles distant,
but he knew that the mysterious shot had been fired not far away.

By and by his walk resolved itself into the dog-trot of the Indian, and
he hastened through the woods as if a regular path stretched before him.

The dew lay on the grass pressed by his dingy moccasin, and, save now
and then the snapping of a twig, his progress sent forth no noise.

All at once, as he reached the summit of a wooded knoll, he was brought
to a stand.

At his feet, as it were, was a space of ground over which a hurricane
had at some time swept with relentless fury. The results of its work,
broken trees and fallen ones, were apparent to the eye. Into this place
the starlight fell, and the rays of the moon, soon to bathe herself in
the waters of the Maumee, penetrated like shafts of silver.

The scene that presented itself to the outlaw was enough to startle him.

He saw two figures in the light--two living ones, we mean--but not far
remote, with face upturned to the stars, lay a giant form, motionless as
the earth itself.

A second look told the renegade the author of the midnight shot. She
stood beside a young girl, and these words in a well known voice greeted
his ears:

"White girl tired, but Areotha will save her if she will go."

"Go?" cried the one addressed, and her voice sent a thrill of pleasure
to the heart beating wildly on the top of the knoll. "Go, Areotha? You
cannot name a place whither I will not fly with you at this hour. I
wonder if they do not believe me dead already. My God! I see through the
treachery of that man," and she glanced at the body on the ground.
"Girl, is every one in these parts like him? He came to our home and
persuaded father to fly to Wayne, offering to guide us; but he meditated
treachery all the time. I see it now."

"He makes no more bloody boats on the big river," Little Moccasin said
with triumph. "He was bold to steal white girl alone."

"No, no, girl. An Indian called Oskaloo assisted, but he was killed in
the boat by some one on the shore--Mr. Catlett, perhaps. He was on
guard."

Little Moccasin's eyes gleamed with pride at the mention of the young
scout's name.

"He good hunter," she said with growing enthusiasm. "Areotha will take
the white girl back to him."

"Yes, yes, and then I wil