"I have never understood about myself and--and that man," she said, "and I never will."
"I do," said the general gently, "and I understand you through my sister who was so like you. Erskine's father was as indignant as Harry is now, and I am trying to act toward you as my father did toward her." The girl pressed her lips to one of his hands.
"I think I'd better tell you the whole story now," said General Dale, and he told of Erskine's father, his wildness and his wanderings, his marriage, and the capture of his wife and the little son by the Indians, all of which she knew, and the girl wondered why he should be telling her again. The general paused:
"You know Erskine's mother was not killed. He found her." The girl looked up amazed and incredulous.
"Yes," he went on, "the white woman whom he found in the Indian village was his mother."
"Father!" She lifted her head quickly, leaned back with hands caught tight in front of her, looked up into his face--her own crimsoning and paling as she took in the full meaning of it all. Her eyes dropped.
"Then," she said slowly, "that Indian girl--Early Morn--is his half-sister. Oh, oh!" A great pity flooded her heart and eyes. "Why didn't Erskine take them away from the Indians?"
"His mother wouldn't leave them." And Barbara understood.
"Did you tell him to bring them here?" The general put his hand on her head.
"I hoped you would say that. I did, but he shook his head."
"Poor Erskine!" she whispered, and her tears came. Her father leaned back and for a moment closed his eyes.
"There is more," he said finally. "Erskine's father was the eldest brother--and Red Oaks----"
The girl sprang to her feet, startled, agonized, shamed: "Belongs to Erskine," she finished with her face in her hands. "God pity me," she whispered, "I drove him from his own home."
"No," said the old general with a gentle smile. He was driving the barb deep, but sooner or later it had to be done.
"Look here!" He pulled an old piece of paper from his pocket and handed it to her. Her wide eyes fell upon a rude boyish scrawl and a rude drawing of a buffalo pierced by an arrow:
"It make me laugh. I have no use. I give hole dam plantashun Barbara."
"Oh!" gasped the girl and then--"where is he?"