Strange shrugged.  “I can’t be sure of what is going on,” he said.  “I don’t want to alarm you unnecessarily.  But I have a reason to suspect danger.”

Colina turned pale.  “Tell me exactly what you mean,” she said.

“The Indians have learned by now how easy it was to seize the mill,” he said with admirable gravity.  “It seems to me that to the Indian mind looting the store will next suggest itself.  We know they are incensed against your father.  His long weakness makes them bold.”

“But these are merely surmises!"’ cried Colina.

“There is something else.  Their minds work obliquely.  They never come out straight with anything.  I have received a kind of warning.  It was an invitation to spend the night with Marcel Charlbois down the river.  But it came from the other side.”

“Why should they warn you?” asked Colina.

“Some man among them probably has compunctions,” said Strange.  “Watusk, the head man is a decent sort.  Perhaps this is his way of letting me know that he cannot keep his people in hand.”

“What do you expect will happen?” she asked.

“I think there will be an attack to-night,” he said quietly.  “It is my duty to tell you.  If it doesn’t come, no harm done.”

Strange’s quiet air was terribly impressive.  Colina sat pale and silent, letting the horror sink in.  She was no weakling, but this was a prospect to appal the strongest man.

“We are so helpless!” she murmured at last.

A spark, one would have said of satisfaction, shot from beneath Strange’s demurely lowered eyelids.  “We cannot depend on our breeds,” he went on soberly, “and Greer has gone over to the other side.”

Colina winced.

“That leaves us four men and yourself and your father.  If we had a stone building we could snap our fingers at them but everything is of wood.  And fire is their favorite weapon.  There are two courses open to us.  We can go before they come, or we can stay and defend ourselves.”

Colina stared before her, wide-eyed.  “Father would never let us take him away without an explanation,” she murmured.  “And if we told him what we feared, he would flatly refuse to go—­”

Strange maintained a discreet silence.

Colina suddenly flung up her head.  “We stay here!” she cried.

Strange’s dark eyes burned—­but with what kind of a feeling Colina was in no state to judge.  “You’re brave!” he cried.  “That’s what I wanted you to say!”

“What must we do to prepare?”

“There is little we can do.  We must abandon the store.  There is no way to defend it.  Perhaps they will be satisfied with looting it.  We will all take up our station in the house.  At the worst, I do not fear any harm to any of us, except perhaps—­”

“Father?” murmured Colina.

“They have been wrought up to a high pitch against him,” Strange said deprecatingly.