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"Danger!" cried Colina, elevating her eyebrows. "They would never dare! "Not of themselves but with a leader!" "Ambrose Doane?" said Colina quickly. Her intelligence instantly rejected the suggestion, but self-love snatched at it in justification. Wounded vanity makes incongruous alliances. "That would be devilish!" she murmured. Strange shrugged. "I can't be sure of what is going on," he said.
She had no idea who could be camping on the river at this place, but she instantly set off with her own confident assurance of finding aid. Ginger displayed no inclination to leave the particular patch of prairie grass he had chosen for his luncheon. As Colina approached the edge of the bank she heard a voice. She herself made no sound in the grass.
The tension relaxed. They slowly gathered around, looking at her with no friendly eye. Colina searched rapidly among them for one that might answer to the description of Nesis. There was no girl that by any stretch of the imagination could have been called beautiful. Not wishing to give them time to spirit her away, Colina suddenly raised her voice and cried: "Nesis!"
"Really, you'll have to go back to your aunt," he said grimly. "The responsibility of looking after you is too great!" Colina laughed out of sheer vexation. "The silly ideas fathers have!" she cried. "Nobody can look after me, not you, not my aunt, nobody but myself! Why won't you understand that! I don't know exactly what dangers you fancy are threatening me. If it is from men, be at ease!
"Miss Colina Gaviller." "I don't know you," she said. "I am Ambrose Doane, of Moultrie." "Where is Moultrie?" "On Lake Miwasa three hundred miles down the river." "Three hundred miles!" exclaimed Colina. "Have you come so far alone?" "I have Job," Ambrose said with a smile. "How much farther are you going?" she asked. "Only to Fort Enterprise." "Oh!" she said.
Colina, like a brave and hard-pressed general, considered the situation from every angle without minimizing the danger. She had really nothing but a moral weapon to use against the Indians. If that failed her, then what? Night was drawing on, and it would be difficult to intimidate them with eyes and voice after dark. Moreover, her horses were fatigued to the point of exhaustion.
Plaskett now believed that she had gone home with Germain, and Germain believed she had gone back to Plaskett. Marya had mounted on their pack-horse. They had not gone far in the trail, when she signified that they were to strike off to the left. Colina pulled up. "Cora," she said, "it's not true that I am going to get help from the police.
"Is it being yourself to act like a harum-scarum tomboy?" inquired Gaviller sarcastically. Colina laughed. "Yes!" she said boldly. "If that's what you want to call it? There's something in me," she went on seriously. "I don't know what it is some wild strain; something that drives me headlong; makes me see red when I am balked! Maybe it is just too much physical energy.
Colina lowered her head. Those near saw her struggling to control a shaken breast, saw two tears steal down her pale cheeks. "Do you wish to be excused?" asked the judge solicitously. She shook her head. "One moment," she was understood to whisper. An attendant handed up a glass of water. She finally managed to produce her voice again. "She could not speak," she said very low.
She was filled with a great tenderness for him, therefore she could jeer a little. Ambrose had not moved from the spot where she found him. "It's not fair," he went on. "You don't need that! It bowls a man over." This was the ordinary language of gallantry yet it was different. Colina liked it. "Come on," she said lightly, "father is like a bear when he is kept waiting for dinner!"
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