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 that this man, Falcon, saved your life. Maybe that's true, but he did it to save his own skin. If the Cherokees had seen you standing there, they'd have rushed you, and they'd have got his scalp as well as yours."

Falcon's cool, insolent smile broadened.

"I have already pointed that out to Mr. O'Sullivan," he said quietly. "Mr. O'Sullivan owes me nothing."

"That's settled, then," continued Almayne, with evident satisfaction. "In that case, I shall ask Captain Falcon to let me have his sword, after which he can go for a little walk in the woods with Striking Hawk and Little Mink."

Jolie failed for an instant to catch the meaning of the hunter's words. Suddenly their grim significance came to her, and her breath quickened. Sick with horror, she glanced at Almayne and saw the deadly purpose in his eyes. Hitherto she had not once looked at Falcon. Now her eyes, as though some irresistible fascination compelled them, sought his face.

His smile had faded. Perhaps from his tanned, florid cheeks a little of the blood had drained. The half-contemptuous, half-whimsical insolence was gone from his eyes. Yet while she watched, the smile came back and the dark eyes under their over-hanging brows gleamed with sudden fire.

"I thank you, friend Almayne," he said dryly in his deep voice, "but I am not in the humour for a woodland ramble from which I should never return.