The sleigh had as suddenly been reined in. The driver, an Irish trooper, crossed himself, for, on the hush of the breathless winter night, there rose and fell--shrill, quavering, now high, now low, in mournful minor, a weird, desolate, despairing chant, the voice of a heart-broken woman, and one and all they knew at once it was Nanette, after the manner of her mother's people, alone on the lofty height, alone in the wintry wilderness, sobbing out her grief song to the sleeping winds, mourning to the last her lost, her passionately loved brave. Then, all on a sudden, it ceased. A black form started from under the scaffolding to the edge of the bluff. Then again, weird, wild, uncanny, a barbaric, almost savage strain burst from the lips of the girl. "Mother of Heavin!" cried the driver. "Can no one shtop that awful keen. It's her death song she's singin'!" Two young officers sprang from the sleigh, but at the instant another cry arose. Another form, this one of horse and rider, appeared at the crest, silhouetted with the girl's against the stars. They saw the rider leap from saddle, almost within arms' length of the singer; saw her quickly turn, as though, for the first time, aware of an intruder. Then the wailing song went out in sudden scream of mingled wrath, hatred and despair, and, like the Sioux that she was at heart, the girl made one mad rush to reach the point of bluff where was a sheer descent of over eighty feet. A shriek of dread went up from the crowded sleigh; a cry of rejoicing, as the intruder sprang and clasped her, preventing her reaching the precipice. But almost instantly followed a moan of anguish, for slipping at the crest, together, firmly linked, they came rolling, sliding, shooting down the steep incline of the frozen bluff, and brought up with stunning force among the ice blocks, logs and driftwood at the base. They bore them swiftly homeward,--Field senseless and sorely shaken,--Nanette's fierce spirit slowly drifting away from the bruised and broken tenement held there, so pityingly, in the arms of Esther Dade. Before the Christmas fires were lighted in the snowbound, frontier fort, they had laid all that was mortal of the brave, deluded girl in the little cemetery of Fort Frayne, her solemn story closed, on earth, forever. L'ENVOI