She was not long in seeking Jeanie out, and she quickly drew her to one side. “I want to show you something, Jeanie. Come over here.” She was so dimpling with repressed amusement that Jeanie followed, wondering. “Do you see that man over by the sycamore tree?” she asked. “The one talking to Sam Gilfillan, I mean.” “Yes, I see him. It is David Campbell. How do you come to know him?” “I don’t know him. He’s the one, Jeanie.” “The one? What?” “That you are to marry. Isn’t he just as I described?” “Oh, Agnes!” Jeanie turned scarlet. “You naughty girl.” “Well, then, he is. Not so very tall, sandy hair, blue eyes, quiet. What have you to say?” “That you are a witch.” “And you’ll lend me nothing if I come to borrow.” “I’ll lend you anything.” “Except David Campbell; I may want to borrow him sometimes.” Jeanie was about to speak, but just then the minister appeared, and a decorous line of worshippers entered the little meeting-house. What it was that Jeanie meant to say Agnes did not find out; but it was quite true that during the long service Jeanie stole more than one glance at David Campbell. CHAPTER VI JEANIE’S SECRET The summer would have passed happily enough but for a rumor that there had been seen some hostile Indians in the next settlement; and this information so affected Fergus Kennedy that he became stricken with a continual fear, and was powerless to do anything but cower, rifle in hand, in the corner of the cabin. Brave man that he had always been, this condition seemed the more pitiful to his friends who had known him in his strength. “It’s not like father,” Agnes told Polly, “and I don’t know what we shall do. The M’Cleans want us to leave here and go over to them, but who then will look after our clearing?” “Jerry Hunter ’ud do it.” “Maybe he would, but I don’t like to leave here just as we are fairly settled.” “It ’ud be safer; we’re no so near to neighbors, and your fayther so distracted.” Polly pinched her chin thoughtfully. “Then there’s the childer. I’d shoot down the redskins, and shed my last drop of blood for ’em; but would it save ’em if the beasts came?” “Then you think we ought to go to the garrison house?” “It would be safer. I don’t care for mysel’, Nancy; but when I think of Jimmy’s childer, I can’t peril them; for what would he say when he comes back, and finds them gone because of their mother’s foolhardiness?” “But I don’t like the fort with the cabins so close together, and the blockhouses so threatening and ugly. I do love the freedom of our own clearing. I don’t believe the Indians have an idea of coming here; the settlement is too big, and it is only a rumor that they have been seen in the neighborhood. I think we might wait awhile and enjoy our freedom.”