til Frank came, if he came that
day, or for telling her the following morning, when the function was
over. And the men prevailed.

Marion was much excited all day; she had given orders that Frank's room
should be made ready, but for whom she gave no information. While Lali
was dressing for the evening, something excited and nervous, she entered
her room. They were now the best of friends. The years had seen many
shifting scenes in their companionship; they had been as often at war as
at peace; but they had respected each other, each after her own fashion;
and now they had a real and mutual regard. Lali's was a slim, lithe
figure, wearing its fashionable robes with an air of possession; and
the face above it, if not entirely beautiful, had a strange, warm
fascination. The girl had not been a chieftainess for nothing. A look
of quiet command was there, but also a far-away expression which gave
a faint look of sadness even when a smile was at the lips. The smile
itself did not come quickly, it grew; but above it all was hair of
perfect brown, most rare,--setting off her face as a plume does a
helmet. She showed no surprise when Marion entered. She welcomed her
with a smile and outstretched hand, but said nothing.

"Lali," said Marion somewhat abruptly,--she scarcely knew why she said
it,--"are you happy?"

It was strange how the Indian girl had taken on those little manners of
society which convey so much by inflection. She lifted her eyebrows at
Marion, and said presently, in a soft, deliberate voice, "Come, Marion,
we will go and see little Richard; then I shall be happy."

She linked her arm through Marion's. Marion drummed her fingers lightly
on the beautiful arm, and then fell to wondering what she should say
next. They passed into the room where the child lay sleeping; they went
to his little bed, and Lali stretched out her hand gently, touching the
curls of the child. Running a finger through one delicately, she said,
with a still softer tone than before: "Why should not one be happy?"

Marion looked up slowly into her eyes, let a hand fall on her shoulder
gently, and replied: "Lali, do you never wish Frank to come?"

Lali's fingers came from the child, the colour mounted slowly to her
forehead, and she drew the girl away again into the other room. Then she
turned and faced Marion, a deep fire in her eyes, and said, in a whisper
almost hoarse in its intensity: "Yes; I wish he would come to-night."

She looked