“And who has made me so?” demanded the renegade, fiercely. “Your father! His act drove me from the white cabins to the wigwams of the savage; made me an outcast from my race; a white Indian. May the lightning of the Eternal strike me dead if I ever forget or forgive the injury that he has done me. Even now—after all these years—the memory of my wrong is as fresh in my brain as though it happened but yesterday.”
In a torrent of passion came the words from the lips of the angry man.
Virginia shuddered at his manner.
“You have no pity?” she cried.
“Pity? No!” he said, with fierce accent. “Can pity dwell in the heart of the wolf? Your father has made me what I now am. Let him blame himself if the wolf he has created rends his child.”
“I am entirely lost,” Virginia murmured, faintly.
“And now I go to take the war-path against the settlement—to crimson with blood the waters of the Ohio. I will give to the flames the cabins of the whites; the smoke of the burning dwellings shall mark my course and attest my vengeance. When I return, then—Well, my revenge will be made complete. Let no vain thought of escape cross your mind, for I shall leave you doubly guarded. There is no power on this earth that can save you from me. Prepare, then, to meet your fate with resignation. For the present, farewell.”
Then the miscreant left the lodge.