“And you know, Wonota, you cannot be sure—­”

“I saw him.  It was for but a moment, but I saw him,” said the Indian girl positively.

“Even at that, it would take corroborative testimony to convince the court,” mused Ruth.

“I do not understand paleface laws,” said Wonota, shaking her head.  “If an Indian does something like that to another Indian, the injured one can punish his enemy.  And he almost always does.”

“But we cannot take the law into our own hands that way.”

“Why not?” asked Wonota.  “Is a redman so much superior to a white man?  If the redman can punish an enemy why cannot a white man?”

“Our law does not leave it in our hands to punish,” said Ruth, quietly, though rather staggered by the Indian girl’s question.  “We have courts, and judges, and methods of criminal procedure.  A person who has been injured by another cannot be the best judge of the punishment to be meted out to the one who has harmed him.”

“Why not?” demanded Wonota, promptly.  “He is the one hurt.  Who other than he should deal out punishment?”

Ruth was silenced for the time being.  In fact, Wonota looked upon mundane matters from such a different angle that it was sometimes impossible for Ruth to convince her protege that the white man’s way was better.

However, this incident gave Ruth Fielding a warning that she did not intend to ignore.  A little later she told Mr. Hammond of the Indian girl’s suspicion that it was Fenbrook who had been the cause of Ruth’s slight injury.  It was too late then to set the police on the track of the showman, for on making private inquiry Mr. Hammond found that Dakota Joe’s show had already left Brooklyn and was en route for some city in the Middle West.

“But it seems scarcely probable, Miss Ruth,” the producer said, “that that fellow would take such a chance.  And to hurt you! Why, if he had tried to injure that Indian girl, I might be convinced.  She probably saw somebody in the car with a sombrero on—­”

“I noticed two men in that car with broad hats,” confessed Ruth.  “But I gave them only a glance.  It doesn’t seem very sensible to believe that the man would deliberately hurt me.  Yet he did threaten us when he was angry, there at the mill.  No getting around that.”

Mr. Hammond shrugged his shoulders and laughed.  “You will begin to believe that the making of moving pictures is a pretty perilous business.”

“It may be.”  She laughed, yet rather doubtfully.  “I am to be on the watch for the ‘hand in the dark,’ am I not?  At any rate when we are hear Dakota Joe again, I will keep a very sharp lookout.”

“Yes, of course, Miss Ruth, we’ll all do that,” returned Mr. Hammond, more seriously now, for he saw that Ruth was really disturbed.  “Still, whatever his intentions, I do not believe Fenbrook will have the power to do any real harm.  At any rate, keep your courage up, for we are forewarned now, and can take care of ourselves—­and of you,” he added, with a smile, as he left her.