Jules ground his teeth, but there was nothing for him but obedience. Shaking his head, he went back into the cabin, while Jan looked after the traps which were near at hand, and took out the beaver which he found there. He did not go far away, however. Late in the afternoon they mounted the hill to look out upon the prairie. Jan forced his prisoner to go in front, and they reached the summit, whence Millicent cast a sweeping glance over the broad plain. As she did so, she saw Bentley, mounted on the white horse of the trapper, pushing him forward at his best speed toward the little stream which ran through the prairie. The horse rose to the leap with all his might and landed safely on the other side. Not far behind him came Ben Miffin, at full speed, with two Indians close at his heels. CHAPTER IX. MIFFIN’S LEAP. The trapper had not been long in finding the Indians. They were merely a hunting party who had come out upon the plains for buffalo, and who had turned aside for the purpose of rooting out the men who had dared to invade their hunting-grounds. The arrow had been sent, the warning given, and there was nothing for them to do but to destroy the insolent intruders. The trapper approached the Indian camp warily. It was pitched upon the wooded prairie, not far from one of those growths of timber which rise like oases in the desert, in the prairie country. Ben tied his horse in a thick clump a quarter of a mile away from the camp, and crept cautiously forward, like a born scout as he was. Silent as death, not even stirring a leaf, his moccasined feet passed on, until the woods hid him from view. But for the fact that a high peak intervened between the hill on which Millicent took her station to watch, and the ground upon which the camp stood, she might have seen the entire transaction. The moment he had entered the woods he felt safer. Pressing forward to the extreme verge of the thicket, he climbed a tree, from which he had a view of the encampment. It was about noon, and the Indians were in great commotion. Nearly every warrior was gathered about Whirling Breeze, who was haranguing them in a loud voice. Some portions of the speech Ben could comprehend. “Be not impatient, warriors of the Blackfeet. Have faith in the chief. These white men shall be given into our hands. There is a maiden among them fairer than snow; she shall dwell in the lodges of my people. Warriors and chiefs, it is well that some of the white men should come among us. They have many arts, of which we know nothing, by the power of which the Indians are fading away, as the snow melts when the sun is high. He shall teach us these things. When we know them, we can meet the white men with their own weapons, and sweep them away. Let us wait the good time.” Who the “he” here referred to, Ben could not for his life comprehend.