“I’ll bet I can tell whose work this is!”

In an awed, half-frightened tone, as he looked upon the terrible scene, John spoke.

Ree was already on his knees in the snow trying to learn if there was not some spark of life remaining. There was none. The body was cold and in places the flesh was frozen hard.

“The lone Indian’s,” he slowly answered John’s remark. “Poor Quilling. The only wonder is that the wolves have not been here before us. It was Quilling who cried out for help, last night, John.”
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“I suppose we will never know just what did happen, but it looks more and more as if a trap of some kind had been laid for us, now doesn’t it? And while Quilling and Dexter waited, perhaps, that prowling Redskin shot him. I only wish it had been Duff who was killed.”

As though they had talked the matter all over and agreed what they should do, though scarcely a word was spoken, the boys tramped up the hill to their cabin. With an axe and shovel they returned to where the body of Quilling lay. At the foot of a beech tree which they proposed to save, as the clearing of their land progressed, they laboriously dug a shallow grave.

“I would rather Mr. Hatch should know nothing about this, he is always so broken up by such things,” Ree said thoughtfully, as he leaned on his shovel, “but it does seem a pity to bury the poor fellow without a prayer or anything. Shall we tell the Quaker?”
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A suggestion from Ree was sufficient always, for John. Theodore Hatch was informed of what had taken place. With tears in his eyes he repeated a few solemn words of the scriptures and bowed his head in silent prayer.

Deeply impressed, and on the verge of breaking out in sobs, though this man whose clay they buried, that wild animals might not tear the body to pieces, had been their enemy, the brave boys who performed for him the last deed of kindliness they could upon this earth, filled in the frozen mold around and above the corpse. So passed from the sight of men, far in the forest’s fastnesses, all that was mortal of Henry Quilling, and the ploughshares of later days have long since mingled his dust with the soil.

“It is another warning to us to watch out for that sneaking savage,” John remarked for the fourth or fifth time as the three returned slowly to the cabin.

“We must not forget our Delaware friends,” spoke Ree more briskly, hoping to turn the thoughts of the Quaker in a new channel; for the old gentleman was deeply depressed by what had occurred. “Do you think we better pay them another visit to-day, Mr. Hatch?”
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“Verily, it is a sad business,” said the Quaker, “but our first duty always must be to the living. Yea, we must go to the Delawares.”

So it was agreed, John, however, taking Ree’s place in the journey.

The Quaker and Ree had had trouble, indeed, the day before, in getting through the drifted snow to the Delaware town, but he and John had still more difficulty this day, for the snow was deeper and the great banks were in many places breast high against their horses. And such was the old gentleman’s solicitude for his mare that, as they toiled slowly along, he more than once would have turned back, had not the dapple-gray shown a perfect willingness to bear him through the very deepest drifts to the best of its ability. John, mounted on Neb, fell behind, and let the Quaker’s horse break the path.
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“It is not the difference in the strength, but in the intelligence of the beasts,” was the comment Mr. Hatch made. “Thy horse is stronger than my own, but Ph?be understands precisely what is desired of her—sweet Ph?be,” and he patted the mare’s shoulder lovingly.

The Indian town was reached at last and John shook hands with Gentle Maiden cordially as though she were an old and very dear friend. She had not seen him for long and though, according to the Indian custom, she showed no surprise or especial pleasure at the meeting, it was easily seen that she was pleased.

Still, when the girl engaged in conversation with the Quaker, John left them and picked his way through the snow to different huts of the village, rallying the boys and girls with a smile and a pleasant word and giving even the old squaws to understand that he felt perfectly at home among them. Seeing a bow and arrows hanging on a forked pole in one of the bark cabins, John took them down and called to an Indian lad, ten or twelve years of age, to show him how well he could shoot. The bow was about four and a half feet in length, and made of seasoned hickory, about an inch in thickness at the middle and a quarter of an inch or less, the narrow way, near the ends. About the parts where the greatest strain came on the bow at either side of the center, the wood was tightly wound with strong strips of deer or some other skin.
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John had often seen the bows and arrows of the Indians, though most of the savages were now supplied with firearms, but he examined this bow very carefully. The arrows, too, he looked at with critical eyes, really surprised to note how cleverly they were made. The shaft of each was light but strong and straight, nearly, if not quite, three feet in length. In the larger and heavier end, arrow heads, or points, of varying size, laboriously chipped out in flint, were fastened by splitting the shaft and binding the flint tightly in the opening so made with fine, strong cords of rawhide. Similarly a feather, or in some cases two or three feathers, were fastened at the small end of the shaft to make the arrow fly true to the archer’s aim. The bow and especially the arrows, with their sharp, heavy points, were such dangerous looking weapons that John inquired of the Indian boy, partly in Delaware, partly in English:
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“Can you not kill turkeys or deer with the bow, since your warriors are away and your people have no meat?”

“No shoot bows more—shoot guns,” the lad said.

“Yes, I know,” John answered, “but when you have no guns, why not use the bow?”

“Little Wolf, he shoot bow—heap good,” said the Indian lad, whose own name, John afterward discovered, was Flying Fish.

“Let’s see him shoot,” the white boy replied, and Little Wolf, who was even then peeking in at the door of the hut, while he held a bearskin about him for warmth, quickly disappeared. In a half minute, however, he returned bringing, as John correctly guessed, his own bow and arrows. They were like those Flying Fish had, only quite elaborately ornamented with colors dyed in the wood, showing that Little Wolf had much pride in the weapons.
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Without a word the lad, who was of about the same age as the other Indian boy, laid off the bearskin he wore, leaving his shoulders bare to the biting cold. (His lower limbs and waist were clothed in leggins and trousers.) He threw back his head, shaking his long hair away from his face and eyes, and while John intently watched him, pointed to a leaf on ............