For a moment, without love or fear
in the eyes of either, the white girl and the brown gazed at each
other across the intervening water mirror and spoke no word. Then,
slowly, the former approached the brink, looked in the direction
indicated by the little dingy index and saw nothing to warrant the
recall. Moreover, she was annoyed to think that all this time,
perhaps, the Indian girl had been lurking in that sheltering grove and
stealthily watching her. Once more she turned away, this time with a
toss of her head that sent the russet-brown tresses tumbling about her
slim back and shoulders, and at once the hand-clap was repeated, low,
but imperative, and Tonto, the biggest of the two big hounds, uplifted
one ear and growled a challenge.
"What do you want?" questioned the white girl, across the estranging
waters.
For answer the brown girl placed her left forefinger on her lips, and
again distinctly pointed to a little clump of willows a dozen rods
below, but on the westward side.
"Do you mean--someone's coming?" queried the first.
"Sh-sh-sh!" answered the second softly, then pointed again, and
pointed eagerly.
The soldier's daughter glanced about her, uncertainly, a moment, then
slowly, cautiously made her way along the sandy brink in the direction
indicated, gathering the folds of her long skirt in her gauntleted
hand and stepping lightly in her slender moccasins.
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