It was the slightest imprint here and there on the earth of a moccasined foot which was the clue. Her brothers and sisters came to see her occasionally; but what purpose could one of them have in stealing her child? No hostile Indians any longer, thanks to the fear Powhatan's might and the English guns had spread among them, were ever seen in this part of the country; so while she hurried on she wondered whence this Indian kidnapper could have come. That it was an Indian she was certain, and that he bore the child she knew, because lying on a rock in the trail she had found a piece of the chain of chinquapins she had amused herself stringing together to place about little Thomas's neck. Now that she was on the right trail it did not enter her mind to return to her husband's men for help or to send a messenger to Jamestown to fetch him back. She knew well that she was far better fitted than any white man to follow swiftly and surely the way her child had gone. It might be, since the thief had several hours' advantage, that it would be days before she could catch up with him; but if it took years and she had to journey to the end of the world she would not falter nor turn back for help. As she travelled through the forest in the quick step that was almost a trot, the polish of her English life fell away from her as the leaves fell from the trees above her. She forgot the happenings of the two years since she had been the "Lady Rebecca," forgot her husband; and her baby was no longer the heir of the Rolfes about to be taken across the sea to be shown to his kinsmen; he was her papoose, and as she ran she called out to him all the pet names the Indian mothers loved. When she thought that he might be crying with terror or hunger she began to pray, prayers that came from the depth of her heart that she might reach him before he really suffered. But these prayers were not to the God of the Christians, but to the Okee her fathers had worshipped. Many times the trail was almost invisible. There was little passing of feet this way and in no place was there anything like a path. But Pocahontas's eyes, keener than even in the days when they had rivalled her brother's in following in play the trail the pursued did his best to cover up, were never long at fault. The ground, the bushes from which raindrops had been shaken, a broken twig--all helped her read the way she was to go. If she could only tell whether she were gaining! What she would do when she came face to face with the thief she did not know. If he were a strong man who defied her command to give up the grandson of Powhatan, how should she compel him? She had started off so hastily that she had not armed herself with any weapon. But she did not doubt that in some way or other she would wrest her child from him.