A Waif of the Plains

itically. Then suddenly starting upright in Mrs. Peyton's lap, she c

booree, dear?" a

down." And Susy sli

companied by the holding up of very short skirts, incessant "teetering" on the toes of small feet, the exhibition of much bare knee and stocking, and a

lling that the applause should lapse. "I kin sing.

" suggeste

the wrong key. "Sweet Alers, with hair so brown, who wept with delight when you giv'd her a

fear at your frown?

frown?" shrilled Susy. "I forg

," suggeste

ttendant in camp and prayer-m

ddenly rose on the swell of the third line. He was instantly followed by a dozen ringing voices, and by the time the last line was reached it was given with a full chorus, in which the dull chant of teamsters and drivers mingled with the soprano of Mrs. Peyton

yton retiring with Susy after offering the child to Clarence for a perfunctory "good-night" kiss, an

rence timidly, "I s

ked quickly, with the same look of doubting interrogatory

perception, he was able to describe the stranger accurately, and to impart with his description that contempt for its subject which he had felt

his?" said Peyton,

s,

her is Colonel Brant and is dead?

's lowering eyes. "I don'

said Peyton quietly. "But w

it before Susy and-h

er

eyton," said Cla

castically, "how ble

his subordinate. "The boy knows what he's about. But," he contin

of not waking Susy," said C

d w

ching what YOU were doin

wind'ard o' the boy he was off HIS scent and bearings. He was one of their rear scouts;

st," said Clarence,

a sign, too. Wolf don't go where wolf hez been, and coyote don't foll

left the wagon,

ven on ahead, or hanging on their flanks. These Inji

ce-a gesture which the boy noticed and wondered at. Then the conversation of the three men

watchin'. You see, if we hadn't turned off the straight road when we got that first scare from these yer lost children, we might hev gone on and walked plump into

e seemed to be nothing to sell, and the other wagons were filled with only the goods required by the party. He would have liked to ask Mr. Peyton who HE was, and have questioned HIM as freely as he himself had been questioned. But as the average adult man never takes into consideration the injustice of denying to the natural and even necessary curiosity of childhood that questioning which he himself is so apt to assume without right, and almost always without delicacy, Clarence had no recourse. Yet the boy, like all children, was conscious that if he had been afterwards questioned about THIS inexplicable experience, he would have been blamed for his ignorance concerning it. Left to himself presently, and ensconced between the sheets, he lay for some moments staring about him. The unwonted comfort of his couch, so different from the stuffy blanket in the hard wagon bed which he had shared with one of the teamsters, and the novelty, order, and cleanliness of his surroundings, while they were grateful to his instincts, began in some vague way to depress him. To his loyal nature it seemed a tacit infidelity to his former rough companions to be lying here; he had a dim idea that he had lost that independence which equal discomfort

would both together issue provisions and rations from the door of the wagon to the gathered crowds. He would be known as the "White Chief," his Indian name being "Suthin of a Pup." He would have a circus van attached to the train, in which he would occasionally perform. He would also have artillery for protection. There would be a terrific engagement, and he would rush into the wagon, heated and blackened with gunpowder; and Susy would put down an account of it in a book, and Mrs. Peyton-for she would be there in some vague capacity-would say, "Really, now, I don't see but what we were very lucky in having such a boy as Clarence with us. I begin to understand him better." And Harry, who, for purposes of vague poetical retaliation, would also drop in at that moment,

e of the dirty road in the air about him. There was a faint creaking of boards and springs, a slight oscillation, and beyond the audible rattle of harness, as if the train had been under way, the wagon moving, and then there had been a sudden halt. They had prob

he window he saw one of the teamsters run rapidly past him with a strange, breathless, preoccu

e nearer, with the dull be

f-suppressed, impatient voice, which Clare

," said the second voice, in

they were like, at o

Peyton's voice, joining t

opened on Mr. Peyton, dusty and dismounted,

s are in your t

ee,

arks o

eagerly: "'Off to Californi

d hold Clarence's with a sudden, stra

e you in all?

there was M

ther

N

cool and have your wits about you." He dropped his voice slightly. "Perhaps someth

feeling the same beating of his heart that he had felt when he was following the vanished train the day before. At last he could stand the suspense no longer, and opened the door. Everything was still in the motionless caravan, except-it struck him oddly even then-the unconce

tcher's sledge. Not far away there were the burnt and blackened ruins of a third, around which the whole party on foot and horseback seemed to be gathered. As the boy ran violently on, the group opened to make way for two men carrying some helpless but awful object between them. A terrible instinct made Clarence swerve from it in

the boy, with white lips, p

Peyton, "and one oth

e boy, struggling, and point

is grasp upon the boy's arm, "be a man! Look

tamped out, only what was ignoble and grotesque appeared to be left. There was nothing terrible in this. The boy moved slowly towards them; and, incredible even to himself, the overpowering fear of them that a moment before had overcome him left him as suddenly. He walked

searched it." But the boy, without replying,

tumbled with broken bones, cans, scattered provisions, pots, pans, blankets, and clothing in the foul confusion

dress!" he cried, and

nervously digging and clearing away the rubbish. Then one man uttered a sudden cry, and fe

God! lo

statue-like repose. He had often vexed her in her aggressive life; he was touched with remorse at her cold, passionless apathy now, and pressed timidly forward. Even as he did so, the man, with a quick but warning ges

d, too!