Annette - The Metis Spy

While the Indian was suffering the sunset clouds to fill him, now

with enthusiasm, and again with dread, Annette and Julie were keeping

their ponies at their fleetest pace to regain sight of the party.

"Do you know, Julie, I feel a presentiment that an opportunity for

the rescue will come to-night. The captors will not dream of pursuit

so far from the frequented grounds and known trails, and they will be

off their guard. See! yonder they camp;" and while she was yet

speaking, a pyramid of scarlet flame, scattering showers of sparks,

shot up from a recess in the bluff lying directly before them.

"Rein in, Julie, we must find a bluff a safe distance off for our

horses. Should they get scent or sight of the ponies in yonder camp,

and whinny, all would be lost."

So swerving to the left, and taking a course at right angles to

their late one, they rode slowly and silently till a bluff rose from

the prairie, a short distance in front, like a hill.

"We shall tether our horses here, Julie; but I believe our stay will

not be a long one." And the pair dismounted, tied their tired beasts,

and swiftly raised the white sides of their tent.

"Ee-e-e-e!" it was Julie who gave the shriek. The thicket was

swarming with soft, noiseless wings, and a bird with burning eyes had

brushed the face of the maiden with its pinion. "What is it, ma

maitresse? It has two bright eyes, and it touched my face. Ee-e-e. O!

There it is again."

"What is the matter, Julie? Do you want to bring Jean and his

Indians here, with this pretty screaming of yours?"

"But it brushed me in the face twice, mademoiselle."

"These are only night hawks, Julie; they gather sometimes like this

in our own poplar-grove."

"O-o that's what it was? Pardonnez-moi. What a simpleton I am, my

mistress. Do you think they heard me?" and her sweet voice was now so

low, that the locust, dozing among the spray of the golden-rod, could

scarcely have heard her tones. The thicket was literally swarming

with these noiseless birds; and wondering they flew round and round

the figures of the intruders, but most of all did they marvel at the

great mound of white that had been raised amongst them. Some of them,

in alarm, rose high above the bluff, wheeling and darting hither and

thither, and the girls could hear their c-h-u-n-g as if some hand,

high up in the air, had smote the bass chord of a violoncello. But

when the flame from the camp fire arose, terror seized every

feathered thing in the bluff, and they all flew, in wild haste, away

from the bewildering light.

Annette was now away wandering through the grove, gathering dry and

fallen limbs for the fire; and as Julie bustled about through the

long prairie grass, preparing the meal, she was startled with a

little cry.