A startled look came into the lad's big brown eyes. He peered about in the growing dusk, then he said: "You will not tell? Maman says she will kill me if I tell. Maman is not my mother. She had eyes like flowers and papa, he was _gentilhomme_, would carry her in his arms when she was sick. He was tall like Ahneota, only his eyes were not so black. Mamma called him her soldier." "Where is he now?" asked Rodney, thoroughly interested. "He went away after mamma died and I went to live with _grandmere_ above Lachine. Marie, that's Maman, she says I must call her that, she was a servant for _grandmere_, who died last harvest. She was not sick a long time like mamma, but only a few days. Marie said it was small-pox, and we must go away and find papa, but we have not found him. I want to see my papa," and Louis threw himself sobbing on the ground. Rodney stroked his long yellow hair and called him "Yellow Locks," but the little chap peevishly exclaimed, "I like Louis better. I don't want to be called 'Yellow Locks.'" A faint noise behind caused Rodney to turn quickly. There stood Marie, the half-breed! How much had she heard? the boy asked himself; but he was learning to control his feelings, and he said pleasantly enough, "Good evening, Maman. Louis is tired and I reckon wants to be in bed." "I want to sleep here," exclaimed the child. "Not to-night," replied Rodney. "You are too tired and the bed in Maman's lodge is softer." She took the little chap up in her arms and carried him away. It was evident she was fond of him, which might account for her having stolen him, as it appeared she had; also for her jealousy. What would be the end of the muddle? Rodney asked himself. He thought of the stake and the frenzied villagers dancing around the fire with blood-curdling yells. Would he be able to endure the torture? He hoped so, for the boy was proud of his race. But why borrow trouble? All around him were signs of peace and savage contentment. The little camp-fires twinkled in the gathering dusk. Some of the squaws sang bits of a wild lullaby to their children and he could hear, in droning refrain: "Wau, wau, tee, say. Wau, wau, tee, say," sung as a lullaby by one of the squaws, who had slung the wicker-work frame, into which the papoose was strapped, across the limb of a tree and swung it back and forth while she sang, as one would rock a cradle. "Poor little mummy," thought Rodney. "No wonder Indians can endure pain. Tied into that framework straight as an arrow and unable to brush away a mosquito or help themselves, they ought to learn to endure anything." CHAPTER IX A WHITE BOY ADOPTED BY THE INDIANS It already has appeared that Conrad's wish that he might be adopted by the Indians, a thought which comforted him as he lay bound on the first night of his captivity, had been realized; also that he had been adopted by the old chief, Ahneota, who now wished to adopt Rodney.