She lit the fire with Donaldson's help, and broiled some deer's flesh for our breakfast, and whistled gently as she wrought, bringing into our wild business a breath of the orderly comfort of home.

I had seen her in silk and lace, a queen among the gallants, but she never looked so fair as on that misty morning, her hair straying over her brow, her plain kirtle soiled and sodden, but her eyes bright with her young courage.
During the last hours of that dark vigil my mind had been torn with cares.

If we escaped the perils of the night, I asked myself, what then?
Here were the seven of us, pinned in a hill-fort, with no help within fifty miles, and one of the seven was a woman! I judged that the Indian force was large, and there was always the mighty army waiting farther south in that shelf of the hills.

If they sought to take us, it must be a matter of a day or two at the most till they succeeded.

If they only played with us--which is the cruel Indian way--we might resist a little, but starvation would beat us down.