For a moment she smoothed out her tresses on her knee, passing a palm over them caressingly. Tears fell and mingled with the gold. Her bosom was heaving. Catching up the long strand in a mass, she held it to her lips and kissed it passionately. But then her weeping ceased with a little gulp of determination, and she held out the curling ends to Eleanor. “Hold them thus,” and she raised the poniard quickly to her head. In an instant the tumbling cascade had become a river of gold on the ground, glimmering in the light of the outer embers. With deft fingers Gyll twisted the locks tightly, but left both ends loose as they had fallen. Then she passed the coil over the Indian’s head until it reached his throat. Next she twined it above and beneath the stout, depending branch that formed his pillow. At the nape of his neck she braided the loose strands firmly together, while in and out amid the tresses she intertwined the galloon of ribbon which had previously decked her head. Finally she made fast this strange bond with a hard knot in the ribbon whose scarlet ends were at last bound high above him to an overhanging vine. Then, with a signal to Eleanor, who was now lost in the excitement of the moment, being not a whit behind the other in courage, Gyll stepped across the barrier, and, with the poniard and birch bow in her hands, led the way to the glade’s entrance. In a moment they had regained the trail. Here they paused, listening, undecided whether to hide in the dense jungle or to follow the pathway. Towaye, however, only snored in sleep. He had moved slightly on feeling the ringlets touch his throat, but the wine still possessed him. Night and day met. The intermediate hour of dawn brought a dim gray light to the tree-tops. Like a silver-green ocean the high surface of birch and willow foliage, stirred by the whisper of a morning breeze, murmured response from its distant border where the surf of leaves broke slowly into spray. The sun rose and fathomed the forest obliquely where it could. By the slant of its rays the women gained some knowledge of their position, and, keeping the sun on their right, followed the trail in a northerly direction. For an hour they went on without stopping or turning to look behind. But at last they came to a sudden halt, hearing a step even lighter than their own just beyond a bend in the trail ahead of them. Drawing to one side behind a wild hedge-row in the forest, they waited, breathless. The low rustle ceased. The person approaching them had evidently come to a stand-still. Then, through the brambles, they saw a figure, dusky and bare save for a girdle of deerskin. The head was hidden by an oak-branch. Gyll’s lips came close to Eleanor’s ear. “’Tis Towaye!” “No; he is too tall.” The man stepped forward a pace and stood like a stag, listening. Eleanor grasped Gyll’s arm, compelling silence, while Gyll herself nervously tightened her hold on the dagger’s handle.