Still, while exempt from danger on this score, another,
scarcely less perplexing, became at every instant more
obvious; for, as they drew nearer to the point which the
female sought to gain, the dim light of the half-slumbering
fires fell so immediately upon their path, that had a
single human eye been turned in that direction, their
discovery was inevitable. It was with a beating heart,
to which mere personal fear, however, was a stranger,
that Captain de Haldimar performed this concluding stage
of his adventurous course; but, at a moment when he
considered detection unavoidable, and was arming himself
with resolution to meet the event, the female suddenly
halted, placing, in the act, the trunk of an enormous
beech between her companion and the dusky forms within,
whose very breathing could be heard by the anxious officer.
Without uttering a word, she took his hand, and, drawing
him gently forward, disappeared altogether from his view.
The young man followed, and in the next moment found
himself in the bowelless body of the tree itself; into
which, on the side of the encampment, both light and
sound were admitted by a small aperture formed by the
natural decay of the wood.

The Indian pressed her lips to the ear of her companion,
and rather breathed than said,--"The Saganaw will see
and hear every thing from this in safety; and what he
hears let him treasure in his heart. Oucanasta must go.
When the council is over she will return, and lead him
back to his warriors."