a hideous
picture of the conventional horned and hoofed devil. The picture was
originally meant to be comic, but it now set Jim to running for dear
life.

"_Oui, c'est le diable! le diable! le diable!_" cried the frantic _bois
brules_, breaking off their invocations to the Virgin most abruptly,
and fleeing pellmell down the hill after Jim, falling over one another
as they ran. Quick as a flash Edwards threw about him a sheet which he
had ready, and pursued the fleeing Frenchmen. Jim had already seized
the reins, and, on the plan of "the devil take the hindmost," was
driving at a pace that would have done him credit in the Central Park,
up the trail toward Gager's, leaving the half-breeds to get on as best
they could. Bourdon stumbled and fell, and Edwards lavished some blows
upon him that must have satisfied the _bois brule_ that ghosts have a
most solid corporeal existence.

Then Edwards returned and captured the keg of powder. He assured the
Lindsleys that the superstitious half-breeds would never again venture
within five miles of a house that was guarded by the Holy Virgin and
the devil in partnership. And they never did. Even the Indians were
afraid to approach the place, pronouncing it "Wakan," or supernaturally
inhabited. They regarded Lindsley as a "medicine-man" of great power.

But what a night that was! For Edwards stayed two hours, and made the
acquaintance of Lindsley and his daughter. And how he talked, while
Emilia thought she had never known how heaven felt before; and the old
man forgot his inventions, and did not broach more than twenty of his
theories in the two hours. He was so much interested in the tall
trapper that he forgot the rest. Edwards ate a supper set out by the
hands of Emilia, and left at three o'clock. He was at Pelican Lake next
morning, and no man suspected his share in the affair except Gager, who
had sense enough to say nothing. And Emilia lay down and dreamed of
angels about the house. One was like Thorwaldsen's "Morning," and the
other wore long hair and beard, and was very tall.

This abortive attempt to make a skyrocket out of Lindsley's cabin
wrought only good to Emilia at first. The father was now wholly in love
with the trapper. He praised him at all hours.

"He is a philosopher, my daughter. He understands chemistry. He lives
in the arcana of nature and reads her secrets. No foolish study of the
heathen classics; no training after mediaeval fashion in one of our
colleg