But another sound accompanied them. It made the Sport snatch the bugle from his own lips and turn about.
“Here!” came a voice from a spot not far away. “You are white, and to me you must be a friend. Heaven must have directed you to the trumpet. My weak hands could hold it no longer.”
Golden George was advancing with rapid strides upon the as yet unseen speaker, and almost suddenly he came upon a girlish figure.
“I am a friend to the helpless,” he said. “What! a girl, by my life! Heaven must have guided me hither.”
The next moment they met, and Golden George took the outstretched hands of the suddenly-discovered one.
“Ah! your face is white!” cried the girl, with joy, as he bore her toward his horse waiting for him in the moonlight. “I blew with the faint hope that a friend would hear, and you came. Oh! many thanks for this deliverance. I am not to go back to the Indian lodges. I have a protector now. No! I am not an Indian girl. They dyed my skin—they—”
“I know you!” he interrupted, looking down upon her. “You are the little lady who stole the hearts of the young blue-coats at Fort Sully a few days ago.”
“Mr. Antill—”
“They call me Golden George beyond the Missouri—I mean west of the river.”
A cry of despair welled from Dora's heart.