"I'd begin with these, if I was you, sonny. Baked beans come by nature, seems to me, but pies are a gift of grace. Though I must say my wife don't stint 'em when she takes it into her head to go gallivantin' an' leaves me to housekeep. 'Pears to think then I must have somethin' sort of comfortin'. I'd start in on pie, if I was a little shaver, an' take the beans last." This might not have been the best of advice to give a lad whose fast had been so long continued as Gaspar's, but it suited that young person exactly. Indeed, in all his life he had never seen so well spread a table, and he lost no time in obeying his entertainer's suggestion. But he noticed with regret that his foster-mother did not touch the proffered food, and that she ministered even gingerly to Kitty's wants. Yet there was nobody, however austere or unhappy, who could long resist the happy influence of the little girl, and least of all the woman who so loved her. As the Sun Maid's color returned to her face, and her stiffened limbs began to resume their suppleness, something of the anxiety left Wahneenah's eyes, and she condescended to receive a bowl of milk and a slice of bread from Abel's hand. The fact that she would at last break her own fast made all comfortable; and as soon as Gaspar's appetite was so far appeased that he could begin upon the beans, the settler demanded: "Now, sonny, talk. Tell me the whole endurin' story from A to Izzard. Where'd you come from now? Where was you bound? What's your name? an' her's? an' the little tacker's? My! but ain't she a beauty! I never see ary such hair on anybody's head, black or white. It's gettin' dry, ain't it; an' how it does fly round, just like foam." "I'm not 'sonny,' nor 'bubby.' I'm Gaspar Keith. I was brought up at Fort Dearborn. After the massacre, I was taken to Muck-otey-pokee. I--" But the lad's thoughts already began to grow sombre, and he became so abruptly silent that Abel prompted him. "Hmm, I've heard of that--that--Mucky place. Indian settlement, wasn't it? Took prisoner, was you?" "No. I wasn't a prisoner, exactly. I was just a--just a friend of the family, I guess." "Oh? So. A friend of an Indian family, sonny?" "If you'd rather not call me Gaspar, you can please say 'Dark-Eye.' That's my new Indian name; but I hate those other ones. They make me think I am a baby. And I'm not. I am a man, almost." "So you be. So you be," agreed Abel, admiring the little fellow's spirit. "I 'low you've seen sights, now, hain't you?" "Yes, dreadful ones; so dreadful that I can't talk about them to anybody. Not even to you, who have given us this nice food and let us warm ourselves. I would if I could, you see; only when I let myself think, I just get queer in the head and afraid. So I won't even think. It doesn't do for a boy to be afraid. Not when he has his mother and sister to take care of."