"You talk with them!" repeated Mrs. Ripley; "what can you do?"
"Don't know—me try."
And without waiting for permission, Linna started on a light run toward the point whence came the report of the rifle that gave Bruin his death wound. Mother and son looked in each other's face in mute wonderment for a full minute after the departure of the girl.
"She's a remarkable child," finally said the mother; "she has done us more than one good turn, and, it may be, Heaven intends to make use of her again, though I cannot see how."
"The Iroquois will recognise her as one of their own race. Perhaps one or more of them belong to her tribe: they will know her as the child of Omas, and may listen to her pleadings."
"Alas! they will give little heed to them; my heart misgives me, son: I feel that the end is at hand."
Meanwhile, let us follow Linna, the Delaware, upon her strange mission.
CHAPTER ELEVEN: ALL IN VAIN
I am at some disadvantage in giving an account of the remarkable interview between the little Delaware girl, Linna, and the three hostile warriors who had trailed the Ripleys to the stream in the wilderness across which they had just leaped in the effort to continue their flight from Wyoming to the Upper Delaware.