Uncle Dan had ordered a litter made and four men now entered with it, and reported that everything was ready for departure. Oleah was placed upon the litter, and Irene rode beside it, half the men preceding it and half following. Mrs. Jackson, at her earnest request, had been left at the cabin, and the guarded litter was not two miles on its way before her red-headed husband came from the woods, suave and smiling, and the two hurried away toward the gap between the Twin Mountains. When next heard of the Jackson family was at Colonel Scrabble's camp. The movements of Uncle Dan were necessarily slow, and it was late at night when they arrived at the plantation. Irene with Uncle Dan rode forward to prepare the planter and his wife for Oleah's coming, the others following slowly. We will not attempt to describe the scene that followed--their joy at Irene's return, their astonishment at her story, their anxious alarm when she told them of Oleah's condition. She had hardly ceased speaking, when they heard in the hall the slow, heavy tread of men who carried a helpless burden. A fever had set in, and Oleah was in a critical condition. A messenger was despatched to Snagtown for the family physician, and Uncle Dan left his prisoner and returned to his command at the Junction. For ten weary days and nights Oleah was unconscious or raving in the delirium of fever, and during all that time Irene was at his side, his constant attendant. When the fever had subsided and the man, once so imperious in his youthful strength, lay weak and helpless as an infant, but conscious at last, she was still at this post. It was on a cold, still Winter evening. The snow lay white over the landscape, but candlelight and firelight made all bright and warm within. As Irene returned from drawing the heavy curtains, he opened his eyes and fixed them on her, as he had done many times during his long illness but this was not a wild vacant stare, it was a look of recognition. His lips moved, but her ear failed to catch the feeble, fluttering sound. She eagerly bent her head. Again his lips moved. "Irene!" was the faint whisper. "Do you know me, Oleah, do you know me?" she asked, tears of joy shining in her eyes. Only his eyes answered her. Stooping she pressed a kiss on his pale lips. With a smile of perfect content he raised his weak arm and put it about her neck. But there were other anxious hearts to be relieved, and Irene left him for a moment, went swiftly through the hall, and her glad voice broke the silence of the room where sat father and mother and physician: "He will live! He will live! He knows me now." They hastened to the sick-room. The favorable change was plainly visible, though the patient could not speak above a whisper and only a few words at a time. The doctor issued peremptory orders to keep him quiet and to let him have as much sleep as he could get.