Mr. Heywood and the Frenchman exchanged looks of surprise;
they could not account for the action of Ephraim Giles,
for although it was his office to cross the river daily
for the purpose he had named, it had never been at that
period of the day. How the Indians could suffer his
departure, if their intentions were really hostile, it
was moreover impossible for them to comprehend; and in
proportion as the hopes of the one were raised by this
circumstance, so were those of the other depressed.

Mr. Heywood began to think that the suspicions of the
Canadian were unfounded, and that their guests were,
after all, but a party of warriors on their way to the
Fort, either for purposes of traffic with the only merchant
residing in its vicinity, or of business with the officer
commanding. It was not likely, he reasoned, that men
coming with hostile designs, would have suffered first
the boy to be despatched on a mission which, obscurely
as he had worded his directions, must in some measure
have been understood by the chief; and, secondly, permitted
Ephraim Giles to leave the house in the manner just
seen--particularly when the suspicion entertained by him
as well as by Le Noir and himself, must have been apparent.

But the Canadian drew no such inference from these facts.
Although he could not speak the Winnebago language, he was
too conversant with the customs of the Indians, to perceive,
in what they permitted in this seeming confidence, anything
but guile. He felt assured they had allowed the boy to