g mistress. The more she thought, the more she
felt how utterly hopeless would be any attempt that she could make,
either by force or stratagem, to pluck her from the grasp of one so
strong and subtle as Keona. At length she resolved to give up thinking
of plans altogether and take to prayer instead.

On reaching the highest ridge of the mountains, Keona suddenly stopped,
placed Alice on a flat rock and went to the top of a peak not more than
fifty yards off. Here he lay down and gazed long and earnestly over the
country through which they had just passed, evidently for the purpose of
discovering, if possible, the position and motions of his enemies.

Poopy, whose wits were sharpened by love, at once took advantage of her
opportunity. She crept on all fours towards the rock on which Alice
lay, in such a manner that it came between her person and the savage.

"Missy Alice! Oh! missy Alice! quick, look up, it's me--Poopy," said
the girl, raising her head cautiously above the edge of the rock.

Alice started up on one elbow, and was about to utter a scream of
delight and surprise, when her sable friend laid her black paw suddenly
on the child's pretty mouth and effectually shut it up.

"Hush! Alice; no cry. Savage hear and come back--kill Poopy bery much
quick. Listen. Me all alone. You bery clibber. Dry up eyes, no cry
any more. Look happy. God will save you. Poopy nebber leave you as
long as got her body in her soul."

Just at this point, Keona rose from his recumbent position, and the
girl, who had not suffered her eyes to move from him for a single
instant, at once sunk behind the rock and crept so silently away that
Alice could scarcely persuade herself that she had not been dreaming.

The savage returned, took the child's hand, led her over the brow of the
mountain, and began to descend by a steep rugged path to the valleys
lying on the other side of the island. But before going a hundred yards
down the dark gorge--which was rendered all the darker by the approach
of night--he turned abruptly aside; entered the mouth of a cavern and
disappeared.

Poopy was horrified at this unexpected and sudden change in the state of
things. For a long time she lay closely hid among the rocks within
twenty yards of the cave's mouth, expecting every moment to see the
fugitives issue from its dark recesses. But they did not reappear. All
at once it occurred to the girl that there might possibly be an exit
fro