room like a beaten rabbit with the hounds close
on its trail. No avenue of hiding suggested itself, no possible hope of
protection. The cold perspiration broke out afresh on his forehead, at
the roots of his hair, and in absent impotency he mopped it away with
the back of a fat, grimy hand.

In pity motherly Mrs. Rowland returned to her seat, indicated another
vacant beside the board.

"You'd best sit down and eat a bit," she invited. "You must be hungry as
a coyote."

"Eat, now?" Swiftly, almost fiercely, the old terror-restless mood
returned. "God Almighty couldn't keep me here longer." He started
shuffling for the door. "Stay here and be scalped, if you think I lie.
We're corpses, all of us, but I'll not be caught like a beaver in a
trap." Again he halted jerkily. "Which way did they go!"

Lower and lower sank Rowland's great chin onto his breast.

"They separated," impassively. "Part went south to Sioux City; part west
toward Yankton." Involuntarily his lips pursed in the inevitable
contempt of a strong man for one hopelessly weak. "You'd better take a
lunch along. It's something of a journey to either place."

Swift as the suggestion, Mrs. Rowland, with the spontaneous hospitality
of the frontier, was upon her feet. Into a quaint Indian basket of
coloured rushes went a roast grouse, barely touched, from the table. A
loaf of bread followed: a bottle of water from the wooden pail in the
corner. "You're welcome, friend," she proffered.

Hans Mueller hesitated, accepted. A swift moisture dimmed his eyes.

"Thanks, lady," he halted. "You're good people, anyway. I'm sorry--" He
lifted his battered hat, shuffled anew toward the doorway. "Good-bye."

Impassive as before, Rowland returned to his neglected dinner.

"No wonder the Sioux play us whites for cowards, and think we'll run at
sight of them," he commented.

Mrs. Rowland, standing motionless in the single exit through which
Mueller had gone, did not answer.

"Better come and finish, Margaret," suggested her husband.

Again there was no answer, and Rowland, after eating a few mouthfuls,
pushed back his chair. Even then she did not speak, and, rising, the man
made his way across the room to put an arm with rough affection around
his wife's waist.

"Are you, too, scared at last?" he voiced gently.

The woman turned swiftly and, in action almost unbelievable after her
former unemotional certainty, dropped her head to his shoulder.

"Yes, I think I am