In the distance, perhaps a quarter of a mile away, Hans Mueller was still in sight, skirting the base of a sharp incline. Through the trembling heat waves he seemed a mere moving dark spot; like an ant or a spider on its zigzag journey. The grass at the base of the rise was rank and heavy, reaching almost to the waist of the moving figure. Rowland watched it all absently, meditatively; as he would have watched the movement of a coyote or a prairie owl, for the simple reason that it was the only visible object endowed with life, and instinctively life responds to life. The words of his wife just spoken, "It is too late," with the revelation they bore, were echoing in his brain. For the first time, to his mind came a vague unformed suggestion, not of fear, but near akin, as to this lonely prairie wilderness, and the red man its child. In a hazy way came the question whether after all it were not foolhardy to remain here now, to dare that invisible, intangible something before which, almost in panic, the others had fled. To be sure, precedent was with him, logic; but--of a sudden--but a minute had passed--his arms tightened; involuntarily he held his breath. Hans Mueller had been moving on and on; another half minute and he would have been behind the base of the hill out of sight; when, as from the turf at one's feet there springs a-wing a covey of prairie grouse, from the tall grass about the retreating figure there leaped forth a swarm of other similar dark figures: a dozen, a score--in front, behind, all about. Apparently from mother earth herself they had come, autochthonous. Almost unbelieving, the spectator blinked his eyes; then, as came swift understanding, instinctively he shielded the woman in his arms from the sight, from the knowledge. Not a sound came to his ears from over the prairie: not a single call for help. That black swarm simply arose, there was a brief, sharp struggle, almost fantastic through the curling heat waves; then one and all, the original dark figure, the score of others, disappeared--as suddenly as though the earth from which they came had swallowed them up. Look as he might, the spectator could catch no glimpse of a moving object, except the green-brown grass carpet glistening under the afternoon sun. Yet a moment longer the man stood so; then, his own face as pale as had been that of coward Hans Mueller, he leaned against the lintel of the door. "Yes, we're too late now, Margaret," he echoed. CHAPTER II FULFILMENT