Nearer and nearer he came, step by step, until at last he stood just on the other side of the mass of roots, and not ten feet from the boy.
With the same noiselessness, the crouching form bent over sideways and peered around the screen.

Then the dusky arm glided forward until the iron fingers clasped the barrel of the rifle leaning against the root, and the weapon was withdrawn.
He now had two guns, and Ben Ripley none.
Then the Seneca advanced, a weapon in either hand, and, presenting himself in front of the amazed group, exclaimed--"Huh! how do, bruder ?--how do sister ?" Ben Ripley sprang up as if shot, and his startled mother, with a gasp of affright, turned her head.
For one moment the boy meditated leaping upon the warrior, in the desperate attempt to wrench his gun from his grasp; but the mother, reading his intention, interposed.
"Do nothing, my son: we are in the hands of Heaven.".