"Her mother a white woman!" exclaimed Lord H----.

"Aye; didn't you know that?" said Woodchuck. "Just as white as Miss Prevost, and quite a lady, too, she was, to look at, or to speak to--though she was not fond of speaking with white men, and would draw back into the lodge whenever she saw one. I did speak to her once, though, when she was in a great fright about Black Eagle, who had gone to battle against the French; and I, happening to come that way, gave her some news of him. But we are getting astray from what's of more matter than that. The girl will save him, take my word for it, if there's strength enough in that little body to do it. But let me see--you talk of Indian runners; where is one to be found who can be trusted? They're generally a bad set, the scum of the tribes; no real warrior would take up on such a trade. However, what's to be done? No white person can go; for they'd scalp him to a certainty, and he would give his life for Walter's, that's all. On my life, it would be as well to give the dangerous errand to some felon, as I have heard say they do in despotic countries--give criminals some dangerous task to perform; and they, if they succeed and escape, so much the better for them; if they die, so much the better for the community. But I'm getting wandering again," he continued, rising. "Now, my lord, this is no use. Give me a few hours to think--tomorrow, at noon, if you will--and then I'll come and tell you what my opinion is."

As he spoke, he turned abruptly toward the house, without any ceremonious leave-taking, and only looked round to put one more question:

"At the fort, I suppose?" he said.

Lord H---- assented, and Brooks entered the house and at once sought his own chamber.

CHAPTER XIII

In a small room, under a roof which slanted out in a straight line, but made an obtuse angle in the midst of descent, lighted alone by a horn lantern, such as was used on board the river boats at night, sat the stout man whom we have described under the name of Brooks. Little furniture of any kind did the room contain. There was a small half-tester bed with its dull curtains of a broad red and white checkered stuff; there was the little table at the side of the room, jammed close against the wall; there was the solitary chair; the washstand, with its basin and its ewer, both somewhat maimed; there was the little looking-glass hanging from a nail driven in the wall, with its narrow, badly gilt frame, and its plate so distorted that when one looked in it the reflection seemed to be making faces at the original. Dull with imbibing many a year's loaded atmosphere, were those faded walls; and many a guest had written upon them, in pencil, his own name or the name of his sweetheart--permanent memorials of transitory tenants, long-cherished memories of affections gone to the grave. There were two or three distiches, too, and a quatrain somewhat more polished.

But the man who sat there noted none of those things. The dim light, the gloomy aspect of the room, might sink in upon his spirit, and render the darkness within more dark; the strange, ill-looking double arch of the ceiling, the obtrusive two straight lines instead of one, with the blunt, unmeaning angle between them, giving an aspect of brokenness to the roof, as if it were ready to bulge out and then crash down, might irritate, without his knowing why. But still lie noted them not with anything like observation. His mind was busy with things of its own--things in which feeling took a share, as well as thought--and he was, if not dead, sleeping to the external world. Even his beloved woods and streams, and fresh air, and open skies, were forgotten for the time.

He argued with himself a case of conscience hard to solve.

He was as brave a man as ever lived; habituated all his life to perils of many kinds, and had met them all fearlessly. Wake him in the woods at midnight, you would find him ready. Deafen his ear with the drum or the war-whoop, you could not make him start. He blinked not at the cannon flash, or the blaze of the lightning; and would have faced the fiery-mouthed platoon without a wavering step.