OFTEN, during the days that followed, Jolie sat above the brow of the great precipice at the summit of Sani'gilagi and gazed down at the Cherokee town in the vale of Sequilla far below; and often she heard faintly the throbbing of the war drums there. A feeling of wonder would come to her then, a vague sense of unreality. Around her as far as her eye could see spread the blue and purple panorama of the mountains. Day after day the serene loveliness of it sank into her soul. It was beauty inconceivable; it was peace beyond understanding. Surely it was past belief that this blue and purple paradise swarmed with savage and relentless foes.
Yet she knew that it was so. Morning and midday and evening she heard the war drums throb. On the second day Almayne was gone for hours, not on Nunda the Moon-Face this time, but on foot; and when he returned, he brought word that the forest all around Sani'gilagi was alive with enemies.
From the towns of the Smokies and beyond; from Tellico, from Choti, from Nikwasi and the towns of the Tlanuwa Rock and of War Woman Valley; from Cullowhee and Tanasi and Waginsi and Kanuga and Notteley; from the towns of Ocona Lufta and the
