As they turned to depart from the beautiful place, Nahma suddenly sprang upon his companion with such violence that Sacandaga was hurled to the ground and the young man fell with him. At the same moment an arrow was buried to its shaft in the trunk of a beech a few paces in front of them, where it stood quivering with the force that had sped it. Even as he fell Nahma bounded up, and an instant later, when the startled sachem also gained his feet, he saw the young warrior darting back in the direction from which they had just come.
At the same time a third figure hideously daubed with war-paint appeared in plain view. He stood directly in front of the rash youth with bended bow and a second arrow drawn to its head. Quick as thought Nahma dropped, and the feathered missile flew harmlessly above him. As he again leaped to his feet his assailant turned to fly, but ere he had taken half a dozen steps he sprang convulsively into the air and plunged headlong with outstretched arms. An arrow sped from Sacandaga's bow had passed through his body.
"Why did you kill him?" asked Nahma, regretfully, as the two stood together looking down on the still twitching body of their late foe.
"Is it not what my young brother would have done?" inquired Sacandaga, in surprise.
"No; I would have caught him and made him tell me things."
"What things?"
"Why he hid from us and tried to kill us, who he was, and what he was doing here. I do not remember seeing him among thy young men."
Sacandaga smiled grimly. "He seems to have escaped being seen until he came within range of Quick-eye's vision; but all thy questions may be answered in a word. He is a Huron."
"A Huron!" cried Nahma. "How may that be, when he looks like other men? I thought a Huron was a wolf. Surely my father has said so."
"A Huron is a wolf in spirit," replied Sacandaga, as he stooped and deftly removed the dead man's scalp, "but the wolfish spirit is concealed beneath the semblance of a man."