It seemed but half a minute had passed, and Mason was about to rise up from his place of concealment and follow on the giant's trail, when half a dozen Indians burst into the lodge to see what damage had been done here. Hoskins would never steal another horse, he had gone to that bourne from whence no traveler e'er returns; in a word he was dead. Pedro came crawling out of the dark corner with a hole in him large enough to let the life out of any common man, but which did not appear to inconvenience him at all. For several moments they jabbered away in a tongue unknown to our hero, much to his disgust, for he was impatient. When they at length left the lodge, Pedro securing the gold his late companion possessed before doing so, Mason gave a sigh of relief, and made haste to throw off the warm furs in which he had been wrapped. Then he boldly stalked from the lodge, walking as if he had a perfect right in the village. Several times he came across braves, and on such occasions grasped hold of a revolver, ready for service, but his bearing must have deceived the red-skins, for he was not molested. After gaining the outskirts of the village, Mason struck at once for the river. He knew that it was too late to reach the place where the canoe had been left before the giant, and had resolved to wait for it at a point below. The wisdom of his course was soon made apparent, for his sharp eyes caught sight of a dark object moving slowly down the river near the other bank. It was Red Goliath's canoe. CHAPTER XII. WHITE THUNDER ON THE RAMPAGE. When Bolly Wherrit left the great Indian camp behind him, and headed for the distant hills, he had no intention of leaving the vicinity. An object had attracted him hither, which, though backed by a golden reward, had something else behind it as an invigorator that proved far more potent with the old ranger than the money involved. His own words had proclaimed that the cause of his hastening north, leaving his chum Pandy Ellis in the thick of some business that concerned them both, was a beautiful woman's tears. Bolly always was weak as regarded the other sex, and knowing this reverence of his, which can hardly be called a failing, it has been a continual wonder to me why the ranger never married, especially as he must have been a fine-looking fellow in his younger days, judging from the grand old face he possesses at the present writing. I strongly suspect, however, that in his youth Bolly had loved and been deceived, and although he never ceased caring for the ladies, he regarded them with suspicion when he came to the point. As he rode along Bolly was engaged in various conjectures, the main subject of which was the rescue of Adele, for the reader must know by this time that this was the object that had sent Bolly from New Orleans to this northern province in such haste. The sun was sinking down in the western sky, and the shadows were growing very long, when Bolly reached the hills.