A party of soldiers, wondering at the boy’s delay, had ridden out from the camp, and they were not a little surprised to see Tom galloping toward them, carrying what to them was a very odd looking burden. When, upon nearer approach, this object developed into a full-grown Apache Indian, their astonishment knew no bounds, and they hastened forward, lest the prisoner, in his fierce struggles, should escape them.
Ten minutes later, the Indian, bound hand and foot, was brought before the captain, and at the same time Tom handed over the all-important dispatches. As he did so, the boy’s spirits reacted from their strained condition and his sense of humor asserted itself.
“Well, captain,” he said, “I knew that you didn’t want me to be out alone, so I brought this Indian along, just to keep me company.”
If fortune, with a smiling face Strew roses on our way, When shall we stoop to pick them up? To-day, my friend, to-day. But should she frown with face of care, And talk of coming sorrow, When shall we grieve, if grieve we must? To-morrow, friend, to-morrow.
Mother Angelique’s anxious call rang out over the water, once, twice, many times. But, though she shaded her brows with her hands and strained her keen ears to listen, there was no one visible and no response came back to her. So she climbed the hill again and, reëntering the cabin, began to stir with almost vicious energy the contents of a pot swinging in the wide fireplace. As she toiled she muttered and wagged her gray head, with sage misgivings.
“For my soul! There is the ver’ bad hoorican’ will come, and the child so heedless. But the signs, the omens! This same day I did fall asleep at the knitting and waked a-smother. True, ’twas Meroude, the cat, crouched on my breast; yet what sent her, save for a warning?”
Though even in her scolding, the woman smiled, recalling how Margot had jeered at her superstition; and that when she had dropped her bit of looking-glass the girl had merrily congratulated her on the fact; since by so doing, she had secured “two mirrors in which to behold such loveliness!”
“No, no; not so. Death lurks in a broken glass; or, at the best, must follow seven full years of bad luck and sorrow.”
“Silly Angelique! When there is no such thing as luck, but all is of the will of God.”