"I cannot find it in my heart to dampen the new-lighted hope which this turn of the affair seems to give that poor, wretched wife and mother. But, to my mind, all this makes it doubly certain that the Elwoods have met with foul play. It looks exactly like one of Gaut's devilish schemes of finesse, to cause this canoe to be sent down the rapids, and be so found as to lead folks to suppose the owners were drowned, and to put the public on a false scent. Yes, friends, you may depend there has been foul play,--I dare not guess how foul. I have felt it the last fortnight, as if same unseen hand was writing the dreadful secret on my heart. I feel it still, now stronger than ever. And I call God to witness my resolution, that I will know no rest or relaxing till I see the dark deed laid open to day, and its infernal author brought to justice. Will you all join me in the work, without flinching or flagging?" The low but firmly-responded "Yes, yes, all of us," told the hunter that he would know no lack of efficient aid in carrying out his resolution. "Let us, then," he said, "leave the women and boys, a few minutes, and retire back here a few rods, out of their hearing, to determine on the first steps to be taken." In accordance with this suggestion, the men withdrew, by themselves, to a convenient place on the site of an old camping-ground, within the forest, a few rods farther up the lake, leaving Mrs. Elwood and her female attendants slowly retracing their steps back to her house, from which they had accompanied her to this spot, and the boys amusing themselves in seeing who could throw a stone farthest into the lake. The men, now relieved from the fear of causing Mrs. Elwood needless alarm, and of having their remarks reported by others of the mingled company,--to the injury, perhaps, of the investigation on hand,--at once gave vent to their smothered convictions, and feelings of indignation and horror, in an exciting debate; which soon resulted in the determination to dispatch, the next morning, four men in two canoes up the lakes, in search of the missing, or such traces of them as might lead to a discovery of their fate; while the rest should remain in the settlement, to watch for new indications there and keep a vigilant eye on the movements of the bold but wary villain, whom they all believed to be the perpetrator of the supposed outrage. But, before they had fully settled the details of their plan, their attention was arrested by a shouting from the boys, who announced that a strange canoe was approaching them from the other part of the lake. Hearing this, and thinking the new-comer might have perhaps arrived from the upper lakes, and could give them important information, the men immediately suspended their consultation, and came out to the landing to hail him, or to await his approach. They soon discovered that the rower was an Indian, and it was not long before the trapper began