But, if such was the effect of the unfortunate occurrence in question, on the community at large, how much more deeply would the effect be naturally felt by the parties immediately concerned? By the loss of their stock of furs, three families, at least, were deprived of the means on which they had relied for supplying them with a large part of the necessaries of life, through the ensuing winter; while, besides this, many a wife and child were doomed to sad disappointment, in being thus deprived of the fondly-anticipated purchases of articles of dress, books, and various other little comforts, which had been promised them on the division and sale of the peltries. Nor were these the only interests and feelings affected by the event and its concomitants. Friendships were broken, and even more tender relations were disturbed, if, indeed, their further existence were not to be terminated. By the open, and as was supposed irreconcilable, quarrel between Mark Elwood and the terribly vindictive Gaut Gurley, their children, Claud and Avis, who were understood to be under mutual engagement of marriage, were placed in a position at once painful and embarrassing in the extreme. And Claud, especially, although he had carefully abstained from all accusations of Gaut, had taken no part in getting up the prosecution, and purposely absented himself from the trial, yet felt very keenly the perplexing dilemma into which he would be thrown, by continuing the connecting link between two such deadly foes as he now found his father, whom he could not desert, and Gaut Gurley, whom he felt conscious he could not defend. And for this reason he had, from time to time, deferred the visit to Avis, which he had designed, and which she would naturally expect on his return from the expedition. But still he could not see how a quarrel between the fathers discharged him from his obligations to her; and he grew more and more doubtful and uneasy in the position he found himself occupying. He was soon, however, to be relieved. One day, a short time after the trial, while he was anxiously revolving the subject in mind, a boy, who had come as a special messenger from the Magalloway settlement (for the purpose, as it appeared), brought him the following letter: