foresaw the danger now at hand, but this was the tribute of the lower race to the higher and-who could tell? White men had left their Indian wives, but had come back again, and for ever renounced the life of their own nations, and become great chiefs, teaching useful things to their adopted people, bringing up their children as tribesmen- Bringing up their children! There it was, the thing which called them back, the bright-eyed children with the colour of the brown prairie in their faces, and their brains so sharp and strong. But here was no child to call Dingan backonly the eloquent, brave, sweet face of Mitiahwe. . . . If he went! Would he go? Was he going? And now that Mitiahwe had been told that he would go, what would she do? In her belt was—but, no, that would be worse than all, and she would lose Mitiahwe her last child, as she had lost so many others. What would she herself do if she were in Mitiahwe's place? Ah, she would make him stay somehow-by truth or by falsehood; by the whispered story in the long night, by her head upon his knee before the lodgefire, and her eyes fixed on his, luring him, as the Dream lures the dreamer into the far trail, to find the Sun's Hunting-ground where the plains are filled with the deer and the buffalo and the wild horse; by the smell of the cooking-pot and the favourite spiced-drink in the morning; by the child that ran to him with his bow and arrows and the cry of the hunterBut there was no

child; she had forgotten. She was always recalling her own happy early life with her man, and the clean-faced papooses that crowded round his knee-one wife and many children, and the Old Harvester of the Years reaping them so fast, till the children stood up as tall as their father and chief. That was long ago, and she had had her share-twenty-five years of happiness, but Mitiahwe had had only four! She looked at Mitiahwe, standing still for a moment like one rapt, then, suddenly, she gave a little cry. Something had come into her mind, some solution of the problem, and she ran and stooped over the girl, and put both hands on her head.

'Mitiahwe, heart's blood of mine,' she said, 'the birds go south, but they return. What matter if they go so soon, if they return soon? If the Sun wills that the winter be dark, and he send the Coldmaker to close the rivers and drive the wild ones far from the arrow and the gun, yet he may be sorry, and send a second summerhas it not been so, and Coldmaker has hurried away-away! The birds go south, but they will return, Mitiahwe.'

'I heard a cry in the night while my man slept,' Mitiahwe answered, looking straight before her, and it was like the cry of a bird-calling, calling, calling.'

'But he did not hear-he was asleep beside Mitiahwe. If he did not wake, surely it was good luck. Thy breath upon his face kept him sleeping. Surely it was good luck to Mitiahwe that he did not hear.'

She was smiling a little now, for she had thought of a thing which would, perhaps, keep the man here in this lodge in the wilderness, but the time to speak of it was not yet. She must wait and

see.

Suddenly Mitiahwe got to her feet with a spring, and a light in her eyes. 'Hai-yai !' she said, with plaintive smiling, ran to a corner of the lodge, and, from a leather bag drew forth a horseshoe, and looked at it murmuring to herself.

The old woman gazed at her wonderingly. 'What is it, Mitiahwe?' she asked.

'It is good luck, so my man has said. It is the way of his people. It is put over the door, and if a dream come it is a good dream; and if a bad thing come, it will not enter; and if the heart prays for a thing hid from all the world, then it brings good luck. Hai-yai! I will put it over the door, and then- All at once her hand dropped to her side, as though some terrible thought had come to her, and, sinking to the floor, she rocked her body backwards and forwards for a time, sobbing. But presently she got to her feet again, and, going to the door of the lodge, fastened the horse-shoe above it with a great needle and a string of buckskin.

'Oh, great Sun,' she prayed, 'have pity on me and save me. I cannot live alone. I am only a Blackfoot wife, I am not blood of his blood. Give me, O great one, blood of his blood, bone of his bone, soul of his soul, that he will say, This is mine, body of my body, and he will hear the cry and will stay-O great Sun, pity me!'

The old woman's heart beat faster as she listened. The same thought was in the mind of both. If there were but a child, bone of his bone, then perhaps he would not go; or, if he went, then surely he would return, when he heard his papoose calling in the lodge in the wilderness.

As Mitiahwe turned to her, a strange burning light in her eyes, Swift Wing said, 'It is good. The white man's Medicine for a

VOL. XXV.-NO. 145, N.S.

4

white man's wife. But if there were the red man's Medicine too—'

'What is the red man's Medicine?' asked the young wife, as she smoothed her hair, and put a string of bright beads around her neck, and wound a red sash round her waist.

The old woman shook her head, a curious half-mystic light in her eyes, her body drawn up to its full height, as though waiting for something. It is an old Medicine, it is of winters ago as many as the hairs of the head. I have forgotten almost, but it was a great Medicine when there were no white men in the land. And so it was that to every woman's breast there hung a papoose, and every woman had her man, and the red men were like leaves in the forest-but it was a winter of winters ago, and the Medicine Men have forgotten; and thou hast no child! When Long Hand comes, what will Mitiahwe say to him?'

Mitiahwe's eyes were determined, her face was set, she flushed deeply, then the colour fled. 'What my mother would say, I will say. Shall the white man's Medicine fail? If I wish it, then it will be so; and I will say so.'

'But if the white man's Medicine fail?'-Swift Wing made a gesture towards the door where the horse-shoe hung. It is Medicine for a white man, will it be Medicine for an Indian ? ' 'Am I not a white man's wife?'

'But if there were the Sun Medicine also, the Medicine of the days long ago? ??

Tell me.

If you remember-Kai! but you do remember-I see it in your face. Tell me, and I will make that Medicine also, my mother.'

To-morrow, if I remember it-I will think, and if I remember it, to-morrow I will tell you, my heart's blood. Maybe my dream will come to me and tell me. Then, even after all these years, a papoose

go also

'But the boat will go at dawn to-morrow, and if he 'Mitiahwe is young, her body is warm, her eyes are bright, the songs she sings, her tongue-if these keep him not, and the Voice calls him still to go, then still Mitiahwe shall whisper, and tell him

,

'Hai-yo-hush,' said the girl, and trembled a little, and put both hands on her mother's mouth.

For a moment she stood so, then, with an exclamation, suddenly turned and ran through the doorway, and sped towards the river

and into the path which would take her to the Post where her man traded with the Indians and had made much money during the past six years, so that he could have had a thousand horses and twenty lodges like that she had just left. The distance between the lodge and the Post was no more than a mile, but Mitiahwe made a détour, and approached it from behind, where she could not be seen. Darkness was gathering now, and she could see the glimmer of the light of lamps through the windows, and as the doors opened and shut. No one had seen her approach, and she stole through a door which was open at the rear of the warehousing room, and went quickly to another door leading into the shop. There was a crack through which she could see, and she could hear all that was said. As she came she had seen Indians gliding through the woods with their purchases, and now the shop was clearing fast, in response to the urging of Dingan and his partner, a Scotch half-breed. It was evident that Dingan was at once abstracted and excited.

Presently only two visitors were left, a French half-breed called Lablache, a swaggering, vicious fellow, and the Captain of the steamer Ste. Anne, which was to make its last trip south in the morning-even now it would have to break its way through the young ice.

Dingan's partner dropped a bar across the door of the shop, and the four men gathered about the fire. For a time no one spoke. At last the Captain of the Ste. Anne said, 'It's a great chance, Dingan. You'll be in civilisation again, and in a rising town of white people-Boise'll be a city in five years, and you can grow up and grow rich with the place. The Company asked me to lay it all before you, and Lablache here will buy out your share of the business at whatever your partner and you prove it's worth. You're young, you've got everything before you. You've made a name out here for being the best trader west of the Great Lakes, and now's your time. It's none of my affair, of course, but I like to carry through what I'm set to do, and the Company said, "You bring Dingan back with you-the place is waiting for him, and it can't wait longer than the last boat down." You're ready to step in when he steps out, ain't you, Lablache?'

Lablache shook back his long hair, and rolled about in his pride. 'I give him cash for his share to-night-someone is behin' me, sacré, yes! It is worth so much, I pay and step inI take the place over. I take half the business here and I work

with Dingan's partner. I take your horses, Dingan, I take your lodge, I take all in your lodge-everyt'ing!'

His eyes glistened, and a red spot came to each cheek, as he leaned forward. At his last word, Dingan, who had been standing abstractedly listening as it were, swung round on him with a muttered oath, and the skin of his face appeared to tighten. Watching through the crack of the door, Mitiahwe saw the look she knew well, though it had never been turned on her, and her heart beat faster-it was a look that came into Dingan's face whenever Breaking Rock crossed his path, or when one or two other names were mentioned in his presence, for they were names of men who had spoken of Mitiahwe lightly, and had attempted to be jocular with Dingan about her.

As Mitiahwe looked at him now unknown to himself, she was conscious of what that last word of Lablache's meant. Everyt'ing meant herself. Lablache-who had the good qualities of neither the white man nor the Indian, but who had the brains of the one and the subtilty of the other, and whose only virtue was that he was a successful trader, though he looked like a mere woodsman with rings in his ears, gaily-decorated buckskin coat and moccasins, and a furtive smile always on his lips! Everyt'ing!' Her blood ran cold at the thought of dropping the lodge-curtain upon this man and herself alone. For no other man than Dingan had her blood run faster, and he had made her life blossom. She had seen in many a half-breed's and in many an Indian's face the look which was now in that of Lablache, and her fingers gripped softly the thing in her belt that had flashed out on Breaking Rock such a short while ago. As she looked, it seemed for a moment as though Dingan would open the door and throw Lablache out, for his eyes ran from the man to the wooden bar across the door in quick reflection.

'You'll talk of the shop, and the shop only, Lablache,' he said grimly. 'I'm not huckstering my home, and I'd choose the buyer if I was selling! My lodge ain't to be bought, nor anything in it—not even the broom to keep it clean of any half-breeds that'd enter it without leave.'

There was malice in the words, but there was greater malice in the tone, and Lablache, who was bent on getting the business, swallowed his ugly wrath and determined that, if he got the business, he would get the lodge also in due time; for Dingan, if he went, would not take the lodge-or the woman-with him, and