Father cleaned the gun, and hours and hours we waited.
"About ten o'clock the next day they came, forty braves in war paint and feathers.

I counted until I was too sick to see, then I took the baby in my arms and climbed to the loft, with our big steel knife in one hand.

If your father fell, I was to use it, first on Elizabeth, then on myself.

The Indians stopped at the woodyard, and the chief of the band came to the door, alone.

Your father met him with his gun in reach, and for a whole eternity they stood searching each other's eyes.
I was at the trapdoor where I could see both of them.
"To the depths of my soul I enjoyed seeing Leon take the fence and creek: but what was that, child, to compare with the timber that stood your father like a stone wall between me and forty half-naked, paint besmeared, maddened Indians?
Don't let any showing the men of to-day can make set you to thinking that father isn't a king among men.