That occupant was the renegade’s Indian wife, and the blood that oozed from a hole over her heart declared her dead! The young She-wolf was gone! Turkey-foot stared into Girty’s face so thoroughly astounded as to be unable to utter a word. Without the cabin, yells of rage and disappointment burst from the Indians’ throats. When the renegade recovered from his astonishment he rushed from the structure. “I’ll have her heart’s blood for this if it takes me a lifetime!” he cried. “Where’s ’Watha?” and his eyes wandered inquiringly around the throng. “Where’s the White Fox? Kenowatha! Kenowatha!” He shouted at the top of his voice; but no Kenowatha answered him. Where was his adopted boy--his “pale spawn” as he, in his angry moments, was wont to call him? [2] An Indian name for the Maumee. CHAPTER III. EFFIE ST. PIERRE. Near the bank of the Maumee, and almost within rifle-shot of Fort Miami, stood the trading-post of Mitre St. Pierre. It had been erected by the speculating Frenchman, a decade prior to the opening of our story, and the old fellow had grown rich from the investment. Possessing the shrewdness and tact of his people, he gained the confidence of the savages, who patronized him to the dismay of other and rival posts along the river. Mitre St. Pierre was near sixty years of age; but his eyes flashed with the light of younger years. He possessed a massive frame, and his little head--entirely out of proportion to the rest of his body--seemed buried between broad shoulders, so entirely devoid of neck it was. He kept no assistance at the Post--commonly denominated “St. Pierre’s Den;” he did the work ofttimes of ten men in curing the skins the Indians exchanged with him for fire-water, and various other arduous duties. His household consisted of his half-breed wife, and a _protege_--the latter a young brunette, as beautiful as the wild flowers that kissed the limpid waters of the Maumee, and as gentle as the tame fawn that ate from her delicate hands. He did not keep secret the fact that she was not his child; he told her that, one day, he had found her in the forest not far from a settler’s cabin, pillaged by the Indians. All this, old St. Pierre would say, happened in Kentucky. How often would Effie wander down to the river, and there, seated among the flowers, wonder whose child she was, and whether the story the old trader had uttered so often, was true. She was happy in the trading-post, for her adopted parents--notwithstanding the disreputable names they bore beyond the stockade--treated her with kindness, and she never wanted for male companionship, for the handsome red-coated officers of his Majesty, stationed in Fort Miami, often found their way to the Post, and lingered long in her presence. They brought her books, which proved as dear friends to the Angel of the Maumee, as their uniformed donors.