you may be said to keep the best company, for even old Duncan of Lundie
is glad to see you, and you pass hours in his society. Of all the guides, he
confides most in you.«
    »Ay, even greater than he is, have marched by my side for days, and have
convarsed with me as if I were their brother; but, sarjeant, I have never been
puffed up by their company, for I know that the woods often bring men to a
level, who would not be so in the settlements.«
    »And you are known to be the greatest rifle shot that ever pulled trigger in
all this region.«
    »If Mabel could fancy a man for that, I might have no great reason to
despair; and, yet, sarjeant, I sometimes think that it is all as much owing to
Killdeer, as to any skill of my own. It is sartainly a wonderful piece, and
might do as much in the hands of another!«
    »That is your own humble opinion of yourself, Pathfinder, but we have seen
too many fail with the same weapon, and you succeed too often with the rifles of
other men, to allow me to agree with you. We will get up a shooting match, in a
day or two, when you can show your skill, and then Mabel will form some judgment
concerning your true character.«
    »Will that be fair, sarjeant? Every body knows that Killdeer seldom misses,
and ought we to make a trial of this sort, when we all know what must be the
result?«
    »Tut - tut, man; I foresee I must do half this courting for you. For one who
is always inside of the smoke, in a skirmish, you are the faintest-hearted
suitor I ever met with. Remember Mabel comes of a bold stock, and the girl will
be as likely to admire a man, as her mother was before her.«
    Here the serjeant arose, and proceeded to attend to his never ceasing
duties, without apology, the terms on which the guide stood with all in the
garrison, rendering this freedom quite a matter of course.
    The reader will have gathered from the conversation just related one of the
plans that Serjeant Dunham had in view, in causing his daughter to be brought to
the frontier. Although necessarily much weaned from the caresses and
blandishments that had rendered his child so dear to him, during the first year
or two of his widower-hood, he had still a strong, but somewhat latent, love for
her. Accustomed