"I have that to say," exclaimed her mother, in her strangely musical language, "that must be said speedily. If I am seen we are all doomed. But listen, and listen intently. You are free if you are fortunate. Liberty is at hand. Your friends are twenty miles down stream in camp. Down the stream of Bitter Waters. Ride this way to-morrow, and when far enough away take Weenah in your saddle, and gallop for your life into the forest. Weenah will be your guide."
So quickly did the woman vanish that for a few moments our heroine half believed she must have been dreaming.
But she pulled herself together at once, and now rode back to meet Kaloomah.
She was all smiles too.
"Why waits poor Kaloomah here?" she said, in her softest sweetest tones.
Kaloomah placed his hand on the saddle pommel, and panted somewhat. But Kaloomah was in the seventh heaven.
"Say--say--say 'poor Kaloomah' again," he muttered.
"Poor Kaloomah! Poor dear Kaloomah!"
She could even afford to place emphasis on the "dear", she was so happy.
"Oh--ugh!" sighed the savage; "but to-morrow it may be 'poor dear Kalamazoo!'"