"Heaven grant it may be so, sir!" solemnly returned his subaltern; "but, in their present exasperated state, I fear the worst. Why, while we were in the hollow, I distinctly saw Mrs. Headley bring down two Indians with her rifle. They would not easily forget that." "And I, sir," said Sergeant Nixon deferentially, as if fearing to intrude, "saw Mrs. Elmsley's horse shot under her; and when an Indian came up and struggled with her, she threw her arm around his neck, and presented and fired a pistol at him, and then tried to get at his scalping knife which was suspended over his chest. What the result was, I could not make out; but the last I saw of her, she was seized by another Indian and carried in his arms across the very spot where we now stand. See, sir, that is her horse!" and he pointed to the animal, which lay only a few feet from the square, and which, among the dead bodies of soldiers, Pottowatomies, and Miamis, had hitherto escaped their attention. "See, sir, they are collecting in great force near the gate," observed the lieutenant--"I can distinctly see Pee-to-tum, who has joined them, motioning with his hand to advance." "Then is this the best position we could have chosen," returned Captain Headley; "courage, men! A taste of biscuit from your haversacks while you have time, a teaspoonful of rum, and then we must at it again. Mind, above all things, that you keep cool, and do not fire a shot without orders." From the moment that Ronayne had placed himself, with the colors, at the head of the little party when advancing up the sandhill, he had not spoken a word, but continued to gaze fixedly and abstractedly upon that part of the plain or prairie which led to the inner encampment of the Indians. His whole thought--his undivided attention was given to his wife, whose anxiety, nay, anguish, at hearing the sounds of conflict which denoted his imminent peril, he knew must be intense. True, he himself was spared the anxiety and uncertainty which filled the breasts of his comrades on seeing those they loved best on earth exposed to all the fearful chance of battle, but even in that there was an excitement which in some degree compensated for the risks they ran. The very fact of their presence had sustained them; but now that the final result seemed no longer doubtful, and that the annihilation of the whole party was to be momentarily expected, he felt that one last look, one last embrace of her he loved, would rob death of half its horrors. But this was but the momentary selfishness of the man. When Mrs. Headley and Mrs. Elmsley were known to have disappeared, he more than ever rejoiced in the circumstances which had removed his beloved wife from the horrors of the day, and placed her under so faithful a guardianship as that of the generous Wau-nan-gee.