“You increase my interest in you,” said Red Hand. “But it shall be as you wish. Are there any white men in this country?” “Yes, sir; now and then a white hunter has wandered in here, and down the gorge a mile is the grave of one who lost his life here several years ago.” Red Hand started, and glanced searchingly into the girl’s face. A strange expression flitted across his own, as he asked: “How long have you known of that grave in the valley?” “I first saw it three years ago. I was hunting in the valley, wounded a deer, and he fell near the tree. Did you ever see the grave?” “Yes, I passed it half an hour ago: you will not let me see your home, then?” “No; your life might be the forfeit, and I would not have harm come to you. Good-by.” Without another word the girl threw her rifle across her arm, gave a quick, earnest glance into the face of Red Hand, and walked rapidly up the gulch to soon disappear behind a large bowlder, while Red Hand silently and in wonder gazed after her retreating form. CHAPTER XXV. AN UNEXPECTED ENCOUNTER. So mystified was Red Hand by all he had seen and heard that he was tempted to break his word and follow on after the girl, that he might solve the puzzle of her existence there in the midst of the Black Hills. Had her language and appearance been different, had she been some bold, rude girl of the frontier, he might have believed her the daughter of some reckless borderman, who, tiring of the society of his fellow men, had sought a home in that far-away country; or, he might have fancied her to be the waif of an Indian camp, stolen from some settlement during a redskin raid, and raised in the wigwam of a chief. But her looks, her language, all belied these suppositions. “Well, I’ll never solve the mystery standing here,” he muttered. “I’ll go back to camp, and perhaps, as she said, we may meet again.” So saying, Red Hand slung his rifle across his arm, and stepped forward, when there came the sharp crack of a rifle, the whir of a bullet, and he staggered backward and fell, a crimson stream bursting from his left temple. As Red Hand fell to the ground a tall form suddenly came down the steep hillside, his rifle, still smoking, in his hand. It was no Indian that had thus turned his rifle upon Red Hand, to avenge his slain comrades, but a man of his own race, though the upper part of his face was darkly bronzed, almost to the hue of the redskin, and the lower part of his face was concealed beneath an iron-gray beard, that fell in masses below his waist. His eyes were dark, fiery, constantly restless, and his hair white and worn long, though age could have scarcely thus frosted hair and beard, and left the form strong and upright.