it was he who found us all alone—­you in a cabin on the Wilderness Road and me in a boat at Duff’s Fort—­and brought us in his own arms to Cedar House.  And you know as well as I do that he would have given us a home in his own house if it had not been so rough and bare a place, a mere camp.  And then there was no woman in it to take care of us, and we were only little mites of babies—­poor, crying, helpless morsels of humanity.  Where do you think we came from, David?  I wonder and wonder and wonder!” wistfully, with her gaze on the darkening river.

It was an old question, and one that they had been asking themselves and one another and every one, over and over, ever since they had been old enough to think.  The short story which Philip Alston had told was all that he or any one knew or ever was to know.  The boy silently shook his head.  The girl went on:—­

“Sometimes I am sorry that we couldn’t live in his house.  You would have understood him better and have loved him more—­as he deserves.  It is only that you don’t really know each other,” she said gently.  “And then I should like to do something for him—­something to cheer him—­who does everything for me.  It must be very sad to be alone and old.  It grieves me to see him riding away to that desolate cabin, especially on stormy nights.  But he never will let me come to his house, though I beg and beg.  He says it is too rough, and that too many strange men are coming and going on business.”

“Yes; too many strange men on very strange business.”

She did not hear or notice what he said, because the sound of horses’ feet echoing behind them just at that moment caused her to turn her head.  Two horsemen were riding along the river bank, but they were a long way off and about turning into the forest path as her gaze fell upon them.  She stood still, silently looking after them till they disappeared among the trees.

“Father Orin and Toby will get home before dark to-night.  That is something uncommon,” she said with a smile.

Toby was the priest’s horse, but no one ever spoke of the one without thinking of the other; and then, Toby’s was a distinct and widely recognized personality.

“But who is the stranger with them, David?  Oh, I remember!  It must be the new doctor,—­the young doctor who has lately come and who is curing the Cold Plague.  The Sisters told me.  They said that he and Father Orin often visited the sick together and were already great friends.  How tall he is—­even taller than Father Orin, and broader shouldered.  I should like to see his face.  And how straight he sits in the saddle.  You would expect a man who holds himself so to carry a lance and tilt fearlessly at everything that he thought was wrong.”