"But she--is in the opposite direction," the shoemaker was just going to blurt out, when he was stopped by an emphatic dig in the ribs from Becher; and when he turned angrily towards the latter, he made such desperately quieting faces that the shoemaker was quite taken aback, and held his peace without concluding the sentence. Wolfgang, Hehrmann, and Von Schwanthal, mounted the horses to go in search of the poor girls; and the remaining settlers, with very few exceptions, followed on foot, to cross the woods in all directions, and, if possible, to get on their track. Schmidt strode on manfully before them towards the spot where he had seen the two men with Hehrmann's daughters for the last time. * * * * * "If we can but find the poor little thing!" said Louisa, timidly, when they had entered right into the woods, and were gliding forward, in Indian file, along a narrow track. "Is it much further?" asked Bertha, shyly, who began to feel ill at ease in the dark shadows of the woods in the company of the two men, neither of whom had spoken a word since they lost sight of the houses. "No, Miss Bertha," answered the American, with a smile, "_we are nearly there_. Do you see yonder regularly formed circular hillocks?--the poor little creature lies between them." "Hark!" said Louisa; "I hear shouting and the cracking of whips--they've certainly arrived with the cows and calves. Oh, if we had but waited a little longer!" "We can be back within a quarter of an hour," said the American, cheerfully, to her. "According to my reckoning, we must be almost at the place." "But the ground is so damp here," said Bertha, "and mother has particularly cautioned us against getting wet feet--and you too, Doctor." The doctor was silent, and cast an anxious uneasy glance towards his comrade. Bertha looked up in astonishment at the men, and now first observed in their whole behaviour something strange and unfamiliar--and, like a dash of cold through heart and marrow, the idea of treachery arose in her mind. "We will turn back," she said, suppressing her fears with all the power of which her strong heart was capable. "We will turn back--Mr. Trevor must have missed the direction; no deer-calf could lie hereabouts, the ground is wet and swampy." "Where lies the boat?" whispered Normann to his comrade; "are we far from it?" "Over yonder--scarce a hundred yards from this." "But what shall we do with the girls?" "We must bind them," said Turner. "Scipio will come running with the ropes, as soon as I give the signal." Bertha had seized the hand of her sister convulsively--and the latter looked up to her timidly, but still without any foreboding of what was in agitation. "Why do the men whisper so together?" she asked her sister. "Cannot they find the spot? But, Bertha, what's the matter--why, you are as pale as a corpse! Oh, Doctor!"