“I beg to be excused!  As sure as I’m alive, I saw an Indian run round towards the gate!” replied Joe.

“Foller me,” said Sneak, poising his spear in the air, and advancing.

“Thank Heaven, it’s you!” exclaimed the mysterious object, coming forward fearlessly, on hearing the men’s voices.

“Dod rot your cowardly skin!” said Sneak, after looking at the approaching form and turning to Joe, “how dare you to be frightened at sich a thing as that—­a female woman!”

“It was not me—­it was my pony, you great—­”

“What?” asked Sneak, sharply, turning abruptly round, as they paused at the gate.

“You great long buffalo tapeworm!” said Joe, alighting on the side of the pony opposite to his quarrelsome companion, and then going forward and opening the gate in silence.

“What brings thee hither at this late hour, Mary?” inquired Glenn, on recognizing the ferryman’s daughter.

“Nothing—­only—­I”—­stammered the abashed girl, who had expected only to see our hero and his man.

“Speak out, lass, if you have any thing important to say,” remarked Boone, when they entered the inclosure, placing his hand encouragingly on the girl’s head.

Mary still hesitated, and Boone was no little puzzled to conjecture rightly what it was she intended to impart; but he was convinced it must be something of no ordinary nature that would induce a maiden of reputed timidity to leave her father’s hut at a late hour of the night.

“Now tell me, Mary, what it was you wished to say,” remarked Glenn, addressing her in a playful tone, when they were seated in the house, and a lamp suspended against the wall was lighted.

“I did not expect to find Mr. Boone and Sneak with you—­and now—­”

“What?” inquired Glenn, much moved by her paleness, and the throbbing of her breast, which now seemed to be gradually subsiding.

“Nothing—­only you and Joe are both safe now,” she replied, with her eyes cast down.

“Were we in danger?  How are we safe?” inquired Glenn, regarding her words as highly mysterious.

“Everybody is safe where Mr. Boone is,” replied Mary.

“But what was the danger, my pretty lass?” inquired Boone, playfully taking her hand.

“Why Posin, one of father’s boatmen—­”

“Speak on, lass—­I know Posin to be an unfeeling wretch, and a half-blood Indian; but he is also known to be a great coward, and surely no harm could have been feared from him,” said Boone.

“But I heard him speaking to himself when I was filling my pitcher at the spring, and he was standing behind some rocks, where he couldn’t see me, and didn’t think any one was within hearing.”

“What said he?” inquired Glenn, impatiently, and much interested in the anticipated disclosure, for he had often remarked the satanic expression of Posin’s features.