CHAPTER XIII.

A WARNING.

One evening, as Gretchen was sitting outside of the lodge, she saw the figure of a woman moving cautiously about in the dim openings of the fir-trees.  It was not the form of an Indian woman—­its movement was mysterious.  Gretchen started up and stood looking into the darkening shadows of the firs.  Suddenly the form came out of the clearing—­it was Mrs. Woods.  She waved her hand and beckoned to Gretchen, and then drew back into the forest and disappeared.

Gretchen went toward the openings where Mrs. Woods had so suddenly and strangely appeared.  But no one was there.  She wondered what the secret of the mysterious episode could be.  She returned to the lodge, but said nothing about what she had seen.  She passed a sleepless night, and resolved to go to see her foster-mother on the following day.

So, after school the next afternoon, she returned to her old home for a brief visit, and to gain an explanation of the strange event of the evening before.

She found Mrs. Woods very sad, and evidently troubled by some ominous experience.

“So you saw me?” was her first salutation.  “I didn’t dare to come any further.  They did not see me—­did they?”

“But, mother, why did you go away—­why did you come to the lodge?”

“O Gretchen, husband has been at home from the shingle-mill, and he has told me something dreadful!”

“What, mother?”

“There’s a conspiracy!”

“Where?”

“Among the Injuns.  A friendly Injun told husband in secret that there would be no more seen of the log school-house after the Potlatch.”

“Don’t fear, mother; the chief and Benjamin will protect that.”

“But that isn’t all, Gretchen.  Oh, I am so glad that you have come home!  There are dark shadows around us everywhere.  I can feel ’em—­can’t you?  The atmosphere is all full of dark faces and evil thoughts.  I can’t bear to sleep alone here now.  Gretchen, there’s a plot to capture the schoolmaster.”

“Don’t fear, mother.  I know Umatilla—­he will never permit it.”

“But, Gretchen, the Injun told husband something awful.”

“What?”

“That the schoolmaster would one day perish as Dr. Whitman did.  Dr. Whitman was stricken down by the Injun whom he regarded as his best friend, and he never knew who dealt the blow.  He went out of life like one smitten by lightning.  O Gretchen!”

“But, mother, I do not fear.  The Indians thought that Dr. Whitman was a conjurer.  We make people true, the master says, by putting confidence in them.  I believe in the old chief and in Benjamin, and there will no evil ever come to the schoolmaster or the log school-house.”

“Gretchen, are you sure?  Then I did not bring you away out here for nothing, did I?  You may be the angel of deliverance of us all.  Who knows?  But, Gretchen, I haven’t told you all yet.”