At this unexpected revelation the girl's features were convulsed, her voice failed her, her eyes seemed ready to start from their sockets, her body was agitated by a convulsive tremor; for an instant she tried to utter a shriek, but then suddenly broke into sobs, and fell into Margaret's arms, exclaiming, with a piercing accent,—
"My mother! My mother!"
"At last," the She-wolf said, deliriously, "I have found you again, and you are really mine."
For some moments mother and daughter, yielding to their tenderness, forgot the whole world. Natah Otann tried to profit by the opportunity, and seize the chance of safety which accident offered him. He noiselessly began rolling over to gain the top of the enclosure; but the young girl suddenly noticed him, and sprang up as if a serpent had stung her.
"Stop, Natah Otann!" she said to him.
The chief remained motionless: he imagined, from the girl's accent, that he was lost, and he resigned himself to his fate with that fatalism which forms the base of the Indian character.
Still he was mistaken.
Prairie-Flower, with burning eyes and pallid brow, turned a haggard glance from her mother on the man extended at her feet, asking her heart if she had a right, after all the kindness he had shown her, to avenge her father's death upon him. She felt that her arm was too weak, her heart too tender for such a deed. For several seconds the three actors of this terrible scene remained plunged in a gloomy silence, which was only interrupted by the dull and mysterious noises of the night.
Natah Otann did not fear death; but he trembled at leaving uncompleted the glorious task he had taken on himself; he was ashamed at having fallen into so clumsy a snare, set by a half insane woman. With his head stretched out, and frowning brow, he anxiously read on the girl's face the feelings in turn reflected on it as in a mirror, in order to calculate the chances of saving a life so precious to those he wished to render free. Though resigned to his fate, like all great men, he did not despair, but struggled to the last moment. Prairie-Flower at length raised her head; her lovely face had assumed a strange expression her brow glistened, her gentle blue eyes seemed to flash forth flames.
"Mother," she said, in her melodious voice, "give me those pistols you have in your hand."