The Forest Runners: A Story of the Great War Trail in Early Kentucky

WHAT HAPPENED IN THE DARK

Shif'less Sol rose to a sitting position, and carefully cracked his joints, one by one.

"I wuz a bit afeard, Paul," he said, "that I had jest petrified, layin' thar so long. A tired man likes to rest, but thar ain't no sense in turnin' hisself into a stone image."

Sol seemed so careless and easy that Paul drew an inference from his manner.

"You are not expecting anything more from them just now, Sol?"

His nod toward the forest indicated the "them."

"No, not yet a while," replied Shif'less Sol. "I guess they'll lay by until night."

His face showed some apprehension as he spoke of night, but it was gone quickly. Shif'less Sol was not a man who took troubles to heart, else he never would have earned his name.

"We'll jest chaw a little more venison, Paul," he said. "I know you think a drink o' water would go pow'ful well with it, an' so do I; but since it ain't to be had, we'll jest do without it and say no more."

The remainder of the day passed undisturbed, but as the first wan shade of twilight appeared the men began to look closely to their arms. Horns were held up to the light in order that the powder line might show, bullets were counted, and flints examined. Paul knew what it all meant. The Shawnees would attack in the darkness, and there would be all the confusion of a midnight battle, when one might not be able to tell friend from friend nor foe from foe. The sense of weirdness and awe overcame him again. They were but the tiniest of atoms in that vast wilderness, which would be just the same to-morrow and the next day, no matter who won.

But Paul had in him the stuff of which heroes are made, and his strong will brought his mind back to present needs. He, too, measured his powder and counted his bullets, while he strove also to forget the hot thirst that tormented him.

The sun sank in the forest, the wan twilight deepened into shadow, and the shadow darkened into night. The trees where the Shawnees lay hidden were gone in the dusk, which hung so close that Paul could see but the nearest of his comrades. Only the murmur of night insects and the faint rustle of leaves came to his ears. The feeling of awe returned, and his blood grew chill. Then it was a relief to him to know that he had a comrade in this sensation.

"Ef an owl would only hoot once or twice now," whispered Shif'less Sol, "I think I'd jump right out o' my huntin' shirt."

Paul laughed and felt better.

"Now, Paul," continued Shif'less Sol, very gravely this time, "lemme give you a piece o' mighty good advice. When the muss comes on, don't move about much. Lay close. Stick to me an' Henry, an' then thar ain't so much chance to git mixed up with them that's lookin' fur you here."

"I'll remember what you say, Sol," replied Paul earnestly, as he girded his spirit for action. He knew that the attack would come very soon, as the Indians would choose the darkest period before the moon rose. Nor was he wrong. The battle in the night began only a half hour later.

Paul first saw a pink point appear in the darkness, but he knew that it was the flame from a rifle shot. It came from a place not far away, to which some Shawnee had crawled; but the hunters paid no attention to it, nor to a second, nor to a third, as all the bullets flew wild. Paul, forgetting for the moment that those bullets were sent to kill, became engrossed in the spectacle of the fireworks. He was always wondering where the next spurt of blue or pink flame would break through the darkness, and the popping of the shots formed a not unpleasant sound in the night.

"Comin' closer, comin' closer, Paul!" whispered Shif'less Sol. "One o' them bullets flyin' in the dark may hit somethin' putty soon."

Sol was a prophet. A hunter not far away uttered a low cry. He was struck in the shoulder, but after the single cry he was silent. Henry was the first to see one of the creeping brown bodies and fired, and after that the shots on either side increased fast. It was all confused and terrible to Paul. The darkness, instead of thinning to accustomed eyes, seemed to him to grow heavier. The pin points of light from the rifle fire multiplied themselves into hundreds, and the front of the foe shifted about, as if they were trying to curve around the defenders.

Paul could not definitely say that he saw a single savage, but he fired now and then at the flashes of light, and also tried to obey Sol's injunction about sticking close to him and Henry. But he was not always sure that the figures near him were theirs, the darkness remaining so intense. He heard occasional low cries, the light impact of bullets, and the shuffling sound of feet, but he was fast losing any ordered view of the battle. He knew now that the savages were very close, that the combat was almost hand to hand, but he knew little else. The night enclosed all the furious border conflict, and hid the loss or gain of either side from all but the keenest eyes.

Paul could never tell how long this lasted, but he felt confident that the area of conflict was shifting. Having first faced one side, they were now facing another, as the savages wheeled about them. He rose to his feet in order to keep with his friends. He had been loading and firing more rapidly than he knew, and the barrel of his rifle was hot to his touch. He stood a moment listening for the savages, and then turned to two indistinct figures near him.

"Sol," he said, "can you and Henry see them?"

The two indistinct figures suddenly became distinct, and sprang upon him. He was seized in a powerful grasp and hurled down so violently that he became unconscious for a little while. Why he was not killed he did not know that night, nor ever after—probably they wished to show a trophy. When he gathered his scattered senses he was being dragged away, and his hands were bound. He was too dazed to cry aloud for rescue, but he remembered afterwards that the battle behind him was waning at the time.

He was dragged deeper into the forest, and the shots on the hill became fainter and fewer. His sight cleared, but the darkness was so great that he could yet see little except the warrior who pulled him along. Paul made an effort and gained a better footing. It hurt his pride to be dragged, and now he walked on in the path that the warrior indicated.

They stopped after a while in an open space in the forest. The moon was clearing a little, and Paul saw other warriors standing about. Nearly all were wounded. Hideous and painted they were, with savage eyes filled with rage and disappointment, and the looks they gave Paul made him consider himself as one dead.

As the moon cleared, more warriors drifted back into the glade. Some of these, too, bore wounds, and Paul's heart leaped up with fierce joy as he saw that they had been defeated. The firing had ceased and the wilderness was returning to silence, broken only by the low words of the savages and the soft sound of their moccasins on the earth.

Paul was still in a sort of daze. The warriors were grouped about him, their sole visible trophy of the battle, and they regarded him with vengeful eyes. But he had passed through so much that he was not afraid. His only feeling was that of dull stupefaction, and mingled with it a sort of lingering pride that his comrades had been the victors, although he himself was a prisoner. He did not know whether they would kill him or take him with them, and at that moment his mind was so dulled that he felt little curiosity about the question.

A thin, sharp-faced warrior of middle years seemed to be the leader of the band, and he talked briefly to the others. They nodded toward Paul, and then, with a warrior on each side of the prisoner, they started northward. Paul, his brain clearing, judged that they were taking him as a trophy, as a prize to show in their village before putting him to death.

They marched silently through the forest, curving far to the left of the battlefield. The warriors were about a score in number, and Paul thought they must have lost at least half as many in battle. Their hideous paint and their savage faces filled him with repulsion. Their wild life and the mystery of wild nature did not appeal to him as they had once appealed to Henry in a similar position. To Paul, the chief thing about the wilderness was the magnificent home it would make in the future for a great white race. Spared for the present, he expected to live. Henry had saved him once, and he and his comrades would come again to the rescue.

He stumbled at first in their rapid flight from weakness, and the warrior next to him struck him a blow as a reminder. Paul would have struck back, but his hands were tied, and he could only guard himself against another stumble. Pride sustained him.

They did not stop until nearly dawn, when they camped by the bank of a creek and ate. Paul's arms were unbound, and the hatchet-faced chief tossed him a piece of venison, which he ate greedily because he was very hungry. Then, as the warriors seemed in no hurry to move, he sagged slowly over on his side and went to sleep. Despite his terrible situation, he was so thoroughly worn out that he could not hold up his head any longer.

When Paul awoke the sun was high, and he was lying where he had sunk down. The warriors were about him, some sitting on the grass or lying full length, but the party seemed more numerous than it was the night before. He looked again. It was certainly more numerous, and there, too, sitting near him, was a white youth of nearly his own age. Paul rose up, inspired with a feeling of sympathy, and perhaps of comradeship, and then, to his utter amazement, he saw that the youth was Braxton Wyatt, one of the boys who had come over the mountains with the group that had settled Wareville.

Braxton Wyatt, a year or two older than Paul, had always been disliked at Wareville. Of a sarcastic, sneering, unpleasant temperament, he habitually made enemies, and did not seem to care. Paul disliked him heartily, but in this moment of sudden meeting he felt only sympathy and fellowship. They were captives together, and all feeling of hostility was swept from his mind.

"Braxton!" he exclaimed. "Have they got you, too?"

Wyatt rose up, came to Paul, and took his hand in the friendliest manner.

"Yes, Paul," he said. "I was out hunting, thinking that there were no savages south of the Ohio, and I was taken last night by a band which joined yours this morning while you slept."

"Why haven't they killed us?" asked Paul.

"I suppose they'd rather show us to the tribe first, or maybe they think they can adopt us, as Henry Ware was once. They haven't treated me badly."

"That may be because you were taken without any loss to them," said Paul. "We've had a big fight, and I'm the only one they got. Henry Ware, Tom Ross, Shif'less Sol, and the others beat them off."

"That was grand fighting!" said Braxton. "Tell me about it."

Wyatt's fellowship and sympathy greatly cheered Paul, and he told in detail about the battle with the band, and all that preceded it. Braxton Wyatt listened with attention, but more than once expressed surprise.

"How many did you say were left back there on the hill?" he asked at last.

"We were ten when we began the fighting," replied Paul. "One that I know of was killed, and it is likely that one or two more were. Then I'm gone. Not more than six or seven can be left, but they are the best men in all these woods. Twice their number of Indians cannot whip them."

Paul said the last words proudly, and then he added:

"Henry and Ross and Shif'less Sol will come for me. They'll be sure to do it. And they'll rescue you, too."

Braxton Wyatt looked thoughtful.

"I think you're right," he said; "but it'll be a very risky thing for them, especially if the Shawnees expect it. Be sure you don't let the Indians think you are dreaming of such a thing."

"Of course not," said Paul.

The sharp-faced chief now came up, and said something to Wyatt. Braxton replied in the Indian tongue.

"I didn't know that you understood any Shawnee," said Paul in surprise, as the chief turned away.

"I've picked it up, a word here and a word there," replied Wyatt, "and I find it very useful now. The Chief—Red Eagle is his name—says that if you'll give 'em no trouble, he won't bind your hands again, for the present, anyway. I've followed that plan, and I've found it a heap easier for myself."

Paul pondered a little. Braxton Wyatt's advice certainly seemed good, and he did not wish to be bound again. It would be better to go along in docile fashion.

"All right, Braxton," he said, "I'll do as you suggest. We won't make them any trouble now, but after a while we'll escape."

"That's the best way," said Wyatt.

Red Eagle and another warrior, who seemed to be his lieutenant, were talking earnestly. The chief presently beckoned to Wyatt, who went over to him and replied to several questions. But Wyatt came back in a few moments, and took his seat again beside Paul.

A half hour later they resumed the march, and Paul knew by the sun that they were going northward. Hence he inferred that they would make no further attack upon the white hunters, and were bound for what they called home. Refreshed by his rest and sleep, and relieved by the removal of the bandages from his wrists, he walked beside Wyatt with a springy step, and his outlook upon life was fairly cheerful. It was wonderful what the comradeship of one of his own kind did for him! After all, he had probably been deceived about Braxton Wyatt. Merely because his ways were not the ways of Henry and Paul was not proof that he was not the right kind of fellow. Now he was sympathetic and helpful enough, when sympathy and help were needed.

The march northward was leisurely. The Shawnees seemed to have no further expectation of meeting a foe, and they were not so vigilant. Paul and Braxton Wyatt were kept in the center of the group, but they were permitted to talk as much as they pleased, and Paul was not annoyed by any blow or kick.

"Have you any idea how far it is to their village, Braxton?" Paul asked.

"A long distance," replied Wyatt. "We shall not be there under two weeks, and as the party may turn aside for hunting or something else, it may be much longer."

"It will give Henry and Ross and the others more time to rescue us," said Paul.

Braxton Wyatt shrugged his shoulders.

"I wouldn't put much hope in that if I were you, Paul," he said. "This band is very strong. Since the two parties joined it numbers forty warriors, and our friends could do nothing. We must pretend to like them, to fall in with their ways, and to behave as if we liked the wild life as well as that back in the settlements, and in time would like it better."

"I could never do that," said Paul. "All kinds of savages repel me."

Braxton Wyatt shrugged his shoulders again.

"One must do the best he can," he said briefly.

The leisurely march proceeded, and they camped the next afternoon in the midst of a magnificent forest of beech, oak, and hickory, building a great fire, and lounging about it in apparently careless fashion. But Paul was enough of a woodsman to know that some of the warriors were on watch, and he and Braxton, as usual, were compelled to sit in the center of the group, where there was no shadow of a chance to escape.

Hunters whom they had sent out presently brought in the bodies of two deer, and then they had a great feast. The venison was half cooked in strips and chunks over the coals, and the warriors ate it voraciously, chattering to each other, meanwhile, as Paul did not know that Indians ever talked.

"What are they saying, Braxton?" he asked.

"I can't catch it very well," replied Wyatt, "but I think they are talking about a stay near the Ohio—for hunting, I suppose. That ought to be a good thing for us, because they certainly will not decide about our fate until we get back to their village, and the more they are used to us the less likely they are to put us to death."

Paul watched the warriors eating, and they were more repellent to him than ever. Savages they were, and nothing could make them anything else. His ways could never become their ways. But the fresh deer meat looked very good, and the pleasant aroma filled his nostrils. Braxton Wyatt noticed his face.

"Are you hungry, Paul?" he asked.

"No, not hungry; merely starving to death."

Wyatt laughed.

"I'm in the same condition," he said, "but I can soon change it."

He spoke to Red Eagle, and the thin-faced chief nodded. Then Braxton picked up two sharpened sticks that the savages had used, and also two large pieces of venison. One stick and one piece he handed to Paul.

"Now we also will cook and dine," he said.

Paul's heart warmed toward Braxton Wyatt. Certainly he had done him wrong in his thoughts when they lived at Wareville. But he was thinking the next moment about the pleasant odor of the deer meat as he fried it over the coals. Then he ate hungrily, and with a full stomach came peace for the present, and confidence in the future. He slept heavily that night, stretched on the ground before the fire, near Braxton Wyatt, and he did not awaken until late the next morning.

The Indians were very slow and leisurely about departing, and Paul realized now that, vigilant and wonderful as they were in action, they were slothful and careless when not on the war path, or busy with the chase. He saw, also, that the band was entirely too strong to be attacked by Henry and his friends.

They marched northward several days more, at the same dawdling pace, and then they stopped a week at one place for the hunting. Half the warriors would go into the forest, and the next day the other half would go, the first remaining. They brought in an abundance of game, and Paul never before saw men eat as they ate. It seemed to him that they must be trying to atone for a fast of at least six months, and those who were not hunting that day would lie around the fire for hours like animals digesting their food. He and Braxton Wyatt were still treated well, and their hands remained unbound, although they were never allowed to leave the group of warriors.

Paul was glad enough of the rest and delay, but the life of the Shawnees did not please him. He was too fastidious by nature to like their alternate fits of laziness and energy, their gluttony and lethargy afterwards, but he took care not to show his repulsion. He acted upon Wyatt's advice, and behaved in the friendliest manner that he could assume toward his captors. Wyatt once spoke his approval. "The Chief, Red Eagle, thinks of adopting you, if you should fall into their ways," said Wyatt.

"He may adopt me, but I'll never adopt him," replied Paul sturdily.

But Wyatt only laughed and shrugged his shoulders, after his fashion.

A few days later they reached the Ohio. It was running bankful, and where Paul saw it the stream was a mile wide, a magnificent river, cutting off the unknown south from the unknown north, and bearing on its yellow bosom silt from lands hundreds of miles away. The warriors took hidden canoes from the forest at the shore, and Paul thought they would cross at once and continue their journey northward, but they did not do so. Instead, they dawdled about in the thick forest that clothed the southern bank, and ate more venison and buffalo meat, although they did not kindle any fire. A day or two passed thus amid glorious sunshine, and Paul still could not understand why they waited.

Meanwhile he still clung tenaciously to his great hope. He might escape, he might be rescued, and then Henry and he would resume their task which would help so much to save Kentucky. No matter what happened, Paul would never lose sight of this end.

AT THE RIVER BANK

The days dragged into a week, and the Shawnees still clung to the banks of the great river, occasionally hunting, but more often idling away their time in the deep woods near the shore. Paul's wonder at their actions increased. He could not see any purpose in it, and he spoke several times to Braxton Wyatt about it. But Wyatt always shrugged his shoulders.

"I do not know," he said. "It is true they build no camp fires, at least no big ones, and they do not seem to be much interested in hunting; but I cannot guess what they are about, and I should not dare to ask Red Eagle."

Paul noticed that Red Eagle himself often went down to the bank of the river, and would watch its surface with the keenest attention. But Paul observed also that he always looked eastward—that is, up the stream—and never down it.

Paul and Wyatt were allowed an increasing amount of liberty, but they were held nevertheless within a ring through which they could not break; Paul was shrewd enough to perceive it, and for the present he made no effort, thinking it a wise thing to appear contented with his situation, or at least to be making the best of it. Braxton Wyatt commended his policy more than once.

On the morning of the seventh day the chief went down to the bank of the river once more, and began to watch its surface attentively and long, always looking up the stream. Paul and Braxton Wyatt and some of the warriors stood among the trees, not fifty feet away. They also could see the surface of the river for a long distance, and Paul's eyes followed those of the chief, Red Eagle.

The Ohio was a great yellow river, flowing slowly on in its wide channel, the surface breaking into little waves, that crumpled and broke and rose again. Paul could see the stream for miles, apparently becoming narrower and narrower, until it ended in a yellow thread under the horizon. Either shore was overhung with heavy forest red with autumn's touch. Wild fowl occasionally flew over the current. It was inexpressibly weird and lonely to Paul, seemingly a silent river flowing on forever through silent shades.

He saw nothing on the stream, and his eyes came back to the thin, hatchet-faced chief, who stood upon the bank looking so intently. Red Eagle had begun to interest him greatly. He impressed Paul as being a thorough savage of savages, fairly breathing cruelty and cunning, and Paul saw now a note of expectation, of cruel expectation, in the fierce black eyes of the Shawnee. And as he looked, a sudden change came over the face of the chief. A gleam appeared in the black eyes, and the tall, thin figure seemed to raise itself a little higher. Paul again looked up the stream, and lo! a tiny dark spot appeared upon its surface. He watched it as the chief watched it, and it grew, coming steadily down the river. But he did not yet know what it was.

Now the spirit of action descended quickly upon the whole band. The chief left the shore and gave quick, low orders to the men, who sank back into the forest, taking Paul and Braxton Wyatt with them. Two warriors, having Paul between them, crouched in a dense thicket, and one of them tapped the unarmed boy meaningly with his tomahawk. Paul did not see Braxton Wyatt, but he supposed that he was held similarly by other warriors, somewhere near. In truth, he did not see any of the savages except the two who were with him. All the rest had melted away with the extraordinary facility that they had for hiding themselves, but Paul knew that they were about him, pressed close to the earth, blurred with the foliage or sheltered by tree trunks.

The boy's eyes turned back to the river, and the black blot floating on its surface. That blot, he knew, had caused this sudden disappearance of a whole band of Shawnees, and he wanted to know more. The black blot came down the stream and grew into shape and outline, and the shape and outline were those of a boat. An Indian canoe? No; it rapidly grew beyond the size of any canoe used by the savages, and began to stand up from the water in broad and stiff fashion. Then Paul's heart thumped, because all at once he knew. It was a flatboat, and it was certainly loaded with emigrants coming down the Ohio, women and children as well as men, and the Shawnees had laid an ambush. This was what the crafty Red Eagle had been waiting for so long.

It was the final touch of savagery, and the boy's generous and noble heart rebelled within him. He started up, propelled by the impulse to warn; but the two warriors pulled him violently back, one of them again touching him significantly with his tomahawk. Paul knew that it was useless. Any movement or cry of his would cause his own death, and would not be sufficient to warn those on the boat. He sank back again, trembling in every nerve, not for himself but for the unsuspecting travelers on the river.

The boat came steadily on, Paul saw a number of men, some walking about and others at the huge sweeps with which it was controlled. And—yes, there was a woman and a child, too; a little girl with long, yellow curls, who played on the rude deck. Paul put his hand to his face, and it came back wet.

Then he remembered, and his heart leaped up. The river was a mile wide, and the boat was keeping near the middle of the stream. No bullet from the savages could reach it. Then what was the use of this ambush? It had merely been a chance hope of the savages that the boat would come near enough for them to fire into it, but instead it would go steadily on! Paul looked exultantly at the two warriors beside him, but they were intently watching the boat, which would soon be opposite them.

Then a ghastly and horrible thing occurred. A white face suddenly appeared upon the shore in front of Paul—the face of a white youth whom he knew. The figure was in rags, the clothing torn and tattered by thorns and bushes, and the hair hung in wild locks about the white face. Face and figure alike were the picture of desolation and despair.

The white youth staggered to the very edge of the water, and, lifting up a tremulous, weeping voice, cried out to those on the boat:

"Save me! Save me! In God's name, save me! Don't leave me here to starve in these dark woods!"

It was a sight to move all on the boat who saw and heard—this spectacle of the worn wanderer, alone in that vast wilderness, appealing to unexpected rescue. Fear, agony, and despair alike were expressed in the tones of Braxton Wyatt's voice, which carried far over the yellow stream and was heard distinctly by the emigrants. To hear was also to heed, and the great flatboat, coming about awkwardly and sluggishly, turned her square prow toward the southern shore, where the refugee stood.

Braxton Wyatt never ceased to cry out for help. His voice now ran the gamut of entreaty, hope, despair, and then hope again. He called upon them by all sacred names to help him, and he also called down blessings upon them as the big boat bore steadily toward the land where two score fierce savages lay among the bushes, ready to slay the moment they came within reach.

Paul was dazed at first by what he saw and heard. He could not believe that it was Braxton Wyatt who was doing this terrible and treacherous thing. He rubbed away what he thought might be a deceptive film before his eyes, but it was still Braxton Wyatt. It was the face of the youth whom he had known so long, and it was his voice that begged and blessed. And there, too, came the boat, not thirty yards from the land now! In two more minutes it would be at the bank, and its decks were crowded now with men, women, and children, regarding with curiosity and pity alike this lone wanderer in the wilderness whom they had found in such a terrible case. Paul heard around him a rustling like that of coiled snakes, the slight movement of the savages preparing to spring. The boat was only ten yards from the shore! Now the film passed away from his eyes, and his dazed brain cleared. He sprang up to his full height, reckless of his own life, and shouted in a voice that was heard far over the yellow waters:

"Keep off! Keep off, for your lives! It is a renegade who is calling you into an ambush! Keep off! Keep off!"

Paul saw a sudden confusion on the boat, a running to and fro of people, and a bucking of the sweeps. Then he heard a spatter of rifle shots, all this passing in an instant, and the next moment he felt a heavy concussion. Fire flashed before his eyes, and he sank away into a darkness that quickly engulfed him.

When Paul came back to himself he was lying among the trees where he had fallen, and his head ached violently. He started to put up his hand to soothe it, but the hand would not move, and then he realized that both hands were bound to his side. His whole memory came back in a flash, and he looked toward the river. Far down the stream, and near the middle of it, was a black dot that, even as he looked, became smaller, and disappeared. It was the flatboat with its living freight, and Paul's heart, despite his own desperate position, leaped up with joy.

From the river he glanced back at the Indian faces near him, and so far as he could tell they bore no signs of triumph. Nor could he see any of those hideous trophies they would have been sure to carry in case the ambush had been a success. No! the triumph had been his, not theirs. He rolled into an easier position, shut his eyes again to relieve his head, and when he opened them once more, Braxton Wyatt stood beside him. At the sight, all the wrath and indignation in Paul's indomitable nature flared up.

"You scoundrel! you awful scoundrel! You renegade!" he cried. "Don't you ever speak to me again! Don't you come near me!"

Braxton Wyatt did not turn back when those words, surcharged with passion, met him full in the face, but wore a sad and downcast look.

"I don't blame you, Paul," he said gently, "for speaking that way when you don't understand. I'm not a renegade, Paul. I did what I did to save our lives—yours as well as mine, Paul. The chief, Red Eagle, threatened to put us both to the most awful tortures at once if I didn't do it."

"Liar, as well as scoundrel and renegade!" exclaimed Paul fiercely.

But Braxton Wyatt went on in his gentle, persuading, unabashed manner:

"It is as true as I stand here. I could not take you, too, Paul, to torture and death, and all the while I was hoping that the people on the boat would see, or suspect, and that they would turn back in time. If you had not cried out—and it was a wonderfully brave thing to do!—I think that at the last moment I myself should have done so."

"Liar!" said Paul again, and he turned his back to Braxton Wyatt.

Wyatt looked fixedly at the bound boy, shrugged his shoulders a little, and said:

"I never took you for a fool before, Paul."

But Paul was silent, and Braxton Wyatt went away. An hour or two later Red Eagle came to Paul, unbound his arms, and gave him something to eat. As Paul ate the venison, Braxton Wyatt returned to him and said:

"It is my influence with the chief, Paul, that has secured you this good treatment in spite of their rage against you. It is better to pretend to fall in with their ways, if we are to retain life, and ever to secure freedom."

But Paul only turned his back again and remained silent. Yet with the food and rest the ache died out of his head, and he was permitted to wash off the blood caused by the heavy blow from the flat of a tomahawk. Then he crossed the Ohio with the band.

Paul was in a canoe with Red Eagle and two other warriors, and Braxton Wyatt was in another canoe not far away. But Paul resolutely ignored him, and looked only at the great river, and the thick forest on either shore. He was now more lonely than ever, and the Ohio that he was crossing seemed to him to be the boundary between the known and the unknown. Below it was Wareville and Marlowe, tiny settlements in the vast surrounding wilderness, it was true, but the abodes of white people, nevertheless. North of it, and he was going northward, stretched the forest that savages alone haunted. The crossing of the river was to Paul like passing over a great wall that would divide him forever from his own. All his vivid imagination was alive, and it painted the picture in its darkest and most somber colors.

They reached the northern shore without difficulty, hid the canoes for future use, and resumed their leisurely journey northward. Braxton Wyatt, who seemed to Paul to have much freedom, resumed his advances toward a renewal of the old friendship, but Paul was resolute. He could not overcome his repulsion, Braxton Wyatt might plead, and make excuses, and talk about the terror of torture and death, but Paul remained unconvinced. He himself had not flinched at the crucial moment to undo what Wyatt was doing, and in his heart he could find no forgiveness for the one whom he called a renegade.

Wyatt refused to take offense. He said, and Paul could not but hear, that Paul some day would be grateful for what he was doing, and that it was necessary in the forest to meet craft with craft, guile with guile.

The days passed in hunting, eating, resting, and marching, and Paul lost count of time, distance, and direction. He had not Henry's wonderful instinct in the wilderness, and he could not now tell at what point of the compass Wareville lay. But he kept a brave heart and a brave face, and if at times he felt despair, he did not let anyone see it.

They came at last to a place where the forest thinned out, and then broke away, leaving a little prairie. The warriors, who had previously been painting themselves in more hideous colors than ever, broke into a long, loud, wailing chant. It was answered in similar fashion from a point beyond a swell in the prairie, and Paul knew that they had come to the Indian village. The wailing chant was a sign that they had returned after disaster, and now all the old squaws were taking it up in reply. Paul was filled with curiosity, and he watched everything.

The warriors emerged from the last fringe of the forest, their faces blackened, the hideous chant for their lost rising and falling, but never ceasing. Forward to meet them poured a mongrel throng—old men, old squaws, children, mangy curs, and a few warriors. Paul was with Red Eagle, and when the old squaws saw him, they stopped their plaintive howl and sent up a sudden shrill note of triumph. In a moment Paul was in a ring of ghastly old faces, in every one of which snapped a pair of cruel black eyes. Then the old women began to push him about, to pinch him, and to strike him, and they showed incredible activity.

Thoroughly angry and in much pain, Paul struck at the hideous hags; but they leaped away, jabbered and laughed, and returned to the attack. While he was occupied with those in front of him, others slipped up behind him, jabbed him in the back, or violently twitched the hair on his neck. Tears of pain and rage stood in Paul's eyes, and he wheeled about, only to have the jeering throng wheel with him and continue their torture. At last he caught one of them a half blow, and she reeled and fell. The others shouted uproariously, and the warriors standing by joined in their mirth.

One of the hags finally struck Paul a resounding smack in the face, and as he turned to pursue her another from behind seized a wisp of hair and tried to tear it out by the roots. Paul whirled in a frenzy, and so quickly that she could not escape him. He seized her withered old throat in both his hands, and then and there he would have choked her to death, but the warriors interfered, and pulled his hands loose. But they also drove the old women away, and Paul was let alone for the time. As he stood on one side, gasping as much with anger as with pain, Braxton Wyatt, who had not been persecuted at all, came to him again with ironic words and derisive gesture.

"It was just as I told you, Paul," he said. "I gave you good advice. If you had taken it, they would have spared you. What you have just got is only a taste to what you may suffer."

Paul felt a dreadful inclination to shudder, but he managed to control himself.

"I'd rather die under the torture than do what you have done, you renegade!" he said.

This was the first time since they crossed the Ohio that he had replied to Braxton, but even now he would say no more, and Wyatt, following his custom, shrugged his shoulders and walked away. Then all, mingled in one great throng, went forward to the village. Paul saw an irregular collection of buffalo-skin and deer-skin tepees, and a few pole wigwams, with some rudely cultivated fields of maize about them. A fine brook flowed through the village, and the site, on the whole, was well chosen, well watered, and sheltered by the little hills from cold winds. It was too far away from those hills to be reached by a marksman in ambush, and all about hung signs of plenty—drying venison and buffalo meat, and skins of many kinds.

When they came within the circle of huts and tents, Paul was again regarded by many curious eyes, and there might have been more attempts to persecute him, but the chief, Red Eagle, kept them off. Red Eagle was able to speak a little English, but Paul was too proud to ask him about his own fate. Not a stoic by nature, the boy nevertheless had a will that could control his impulses.

He was thrust into a small pole hut, and when the door was tightly fastened he was left alone there. The place was not more than six feet square, and only a little higher than Paul's head when he stood erect. In one corner was a couch of skins, but that was its whole equipment. Some of the poles did not fit closely together, leaving cracks of a quarter of an inch or so, through which came welcome fresh air, and also the subdued hum of the village noises. He heard indistinctly the barking of dogs, and the chatter of old squaws scolding, but he paid little heed to them because he felt now the sudden rush of a terrible despair.

The Ohio had been the great wall between Paul and his kind, and with the steady march northward, through the forests and over the little prairies, still another wall, equally great, had been reared. It seemed to Paul that Henry and Shif'less Sol and his other friends could never reach him here, and whatever fate the Shawnees had in store for him, it would be a hard one. Wild life he liked in its due proportion, but he had no wish to become a wild man all his days. He wanted to see the settlements grow and prosper, and become the basis of a mighty civilization. This was what appealed to him most. His great task of helping to save Kentucky continually appealed to him, and now his chance of sharing in it seemed slender and remote—too slender and remote to be considered.

The boy lay long on his couch of skins. The hum of the village life still came to his ears, but he paid little heed to it. Gradually his courage came back, or rather his will brought it back, and he became conscious that the day was waning, also that he was growing hungry. Then the door was opened, and Red Eagle entered. Behind him came a weazened old warrior and a weazened old squaw, hideous to behold. Red Eagle stepped to one side, and the old squaw fell on Paul's neck, murmuring words of endearment. Paul, startled and horrified, pushed her off, but she returned to the charge. Then Paul pushed her back again with more force. Red Eagle stepped forward, and lifted a restraining hand.

"They would adopt you in place of the son they have lost," he said in his scant and broken English.

Paul looked at Red Eagle. It seemed to him that he saw on the face of the chief the trace of a sardonic grin. Then he looked at the weazened and repulsive old pair.

"Put me to the torture," he said.

Now the sardonic grin was unmistakable on die face of the chief.

"Not yet," he said, "but maybe later."

Then he and the old pair left the hut, and presently food was brought to Paul, who, worn out by his trials, ceased to think about his future. When he had finished eating he threw himself on the couch again, and slept heavily until the next day.

A CHANGE OF PLACES

Now came a time which Paul did not wholly understand, but which seemed to him a period of test. The repulse of the old couple was not permanent. They came back again and again, inviting him to be their son, and patiently endured all his rebuffs until he began to feel a kind of pity for them. After that he was always gentle to them, but he remained firm in his resolve that he would not become a savage, either in reality or pretense.

After a week he was allowed to walk in the village and to look upon barbaric life, but he saw not the remotest chance of escape. The place contained perhaps five hundred souls—men, women, children, and papooses—and at least fifty mangy curs, every one of whom, including the papooses and curs, seemed to Paul to be watching him. Black eyes followed him everywhere. Nothing that he did escaped their attention. Every step was noted, and he knew that if he went a yard beyond the village he would bring a throng of warriors, squaws, and dogs upon him. But he was grateful for this bit of freedom, the escape from the confinement of close walls, and the forest about them, glowing with autumnal foliage, looked cool and inviting. He saw nothing of Braxton Wyatt, but Red Eagle told him one day that he had gone northward with a band, hunting. "He good boy," said Red Eagle. Paul shuddered with disgust.

More than two weeks passed thus, and it seemed to Paul that he was not only lost to his own world, but forgotten by it. Kentucky and all his friends had dipped down under the horizon, and would never reappear. Henry and Ross and Shif'less Sol would certainly have come for him if they could, but perhaps they had fallen, slain in the night battle. His heart stood still at the thought, but he resolutely put it away. It did not seem to him that one of such strength and skill as Henry Ware could be killed.

Paul sat on a rock about the twilight hour one day, and watched the sun sinking into the dark forest. He was inexpressibly lonely, as if forsaken of men. Savage life still left him untouched. It made no appeal to him anywhere, and he longed for Wareville, and his kind, which he was now sure he would never see again. Behind him rose the usual hum of the village—the barking of dogs, the chatter of squaws, and the occasional grunt of a warrior. In their way, these people were cheerful. Unlike Paul, they were living the only life they knew and liked, and had no thoughts of a better.

The lonely boy rose from the rock and walked back toward the pole hut, in which they fastened him every night. It had become a habit with him now, and he knew that it saved useless resistance and a lot of trouble. Had he taken a single step toward the forest instead of his own prison hut, a score of watchful eyes would have been upon him.

The twilight melted into the dark, and fires gleamed here and there in the village. Dusky figures passed before and behind the fires—those of squaws cooking the suppers. Paul's eyes wandered, idle and unobserving, over the savage scene, and then he uttered a little cry of impatience as a hulking warrior lurched against him. The man seemed to have tripped upon a root, an unusual thing for these sure-footed sons of the forest, and Paul drew back from him. But the savage recovered himself, and in a low voice said:

"Paul!"

Paul Cotter started violently. It was the first word in good English that he had heard in a time that seemed to be eternity—save those of Braxton Wyatt, whom he hated—and the effect upon him was overpowering. It was like a voice of hope coming suddenly from another world.

"Paul," continued the voice, now warningly, "don't speak. Go on to your hut. Friends are by."

Then the hulking and savage figure walked away, and Paul knew enough to take no apparent notice, but to continue on as if that welcome voice Had not come out of the darkness. Yet a thousand little pulses within him were throbbing, throbbing with joy and hope.

But whose was the voice? In his excitement he had not noticed the tone except to note that it was a white man's. He glanced back and saw the hulking form near the outskirts of the village, but the light was too dim to disclose anything. Henry? No, it was not Henry's figure. Then who was it? A friend, that was certain, and he had said that other friends were by.

Paul walked with a light step to his prison hut, sedulously seeking to hide the exultation in his face. He was not forgotten in his world! His friends were ready to risk their lives for him! His heart was leaping as he looked through the dusk at the smoking camp fires, the dim huts and tepees, and the shadowy figures that passed and repassed. He would soon be leaving all that savage life. He never doubted it.

He came to his prison hut, went calmly inside, and a few minutes later, the regular time being at hand, the door was fastened on the outside by Red Eagle or some of his people. He might perhaps have forced the door in the night, but he had not considered himself a skillful enough woodsman to slip from the village unobserved, and accordingly he had waited. Now he was very glad of his restraint.

Paul lay down on the couch of skins, but he was not seeking sleep. Instead he was waiting patiently, with something of Indian stoicism. He saw through the cracks in his hut the Indian fires, yet burning and smoking, and the dim figures still passing and repassing. There was also the faint hum to tell him that savage life did not yet sleep, and now and then a mongrel cur barked. But all things end in time, and after a while these noises ceased; even the cure barked no more, and the smoking fires sank low.

The Indian village lay at peace, but Paul's heart throbbed with expectation. Nor did it throb in vain. A muffled sound appeared in time at his door. It was some one at work on the fastenings, and Paul listened with every nerve a-quiver. Presently the noise ceased, a shaft of pale night light showed, and then was gone. But the door had been opened, and then closed, and some one was inside.

Paul waited without fear. He could barely see a dark, shapeless outline within the dimness of his hut, but he was sure it was the figure of the slouching warrior who had bumped against him. The man stood a moment or two, seeking to pierce the dusk with his own eyes, and then he said in a low voice:

"Paul! Paul! Is it you?"

"Yes," replied Paul, in the same guarded tone, "but I don't know who you are."

The figure swayed a little and laughed low, but with much amusement.

"It 'pears to me that we are forgot purty soon," it said. "An' I've worked hard fur a tired man."

Then Paul knew the familiar, whimsical tone. The light had burst upon him all at once.

"Shif'less Sol!" he exclaimed.

"Jest me," said Sol; "an' ain't I about the purtiest Shawnee warrior you ever saw? Why, Paul, I'm so good at playin' a loafin' savage from some other village that nary a Shawnee o' them all has dreamed that I am what I ain't. If ever I go back thar in the East, I'm goin' to be a play-actor, Paul."

"You can be anything on earth you want to be, Sol!" said Paul jubilantly. "It was mighty good of you to come."

"You'd a-thought Henry would a-come," whispered Sol; "but we decided that he was too tall an' somehow too strikin'-lookin' to come in here ez a common, everyday Injun, so it fell to me to loaf in, me bein' a tired-lookin' sort o' feller, anyway. But they're out thar in the woods a-waitin', Henry an' Tom Ross an' that ornery cuss, Jim Hart."

"I knew that you fellows would never desert me!" exclaimed Paul.

"Why, o' course not!" said Sol. "We never dreamed o' leavin' you. Now, Paul, we've got to git through this village somehow or other. Lucky it's purty dark, an' you'll have to do your best to walk an' look like a Red. Maybe we kin git fur enough to make a good run fur it, and then, with the woods an' the night helpin' us, we may give them the slip. Here, take this."

He pressed something cold and hard into Paul's hand, and Paul slipped the pistol into his belt, standing erect and feeling himself much of a man.

"It's time to be goin'," said Shif'less Sol.

"I'm ready," said Paul.

But neither took more than a single step forward, stopping together as they heard a light noise at the door.

"Thunder an' lightnin'!" said Shif'less Sol, under his breath. "Somebody's suspectin'."

"It looks like it," breathed Paul.

"Lay down on the skins and pretend to be asleep," said Shif'less Sol.

Paul lay down on the couch at once, in the attitude of one who slumbers, and closed his eyes—all but a little. Shif'less Sol shoved himself into the corner, and blotted out his figure against the wall.

The door opened and Braxton Wyatt stepped in. What decree of fate had caused him to be spying about that night, and what had caused him to find the door of Paul's prison hut unfastened? He stood a few moments, trying to accustom his eyes to the dark, and he plainly heard the regular breathing of Paul on the bed of skins. Presently he saw the dim, recumbent figure also. But he was still suspicious, and he took a step nearer. Then a big form, projected somewhere from the dark, hurled itself upon him, and he was thrown headlong to the earthen floor. Strong fingers compressed his throat, and he gasped for breath.

"Here, Paul," said Sol, "tear off a piece o' that skin an' stuff it into his mouth."

Paul, who had leaped to his feet, obeyed at once.

"An' cut off some stout strips o' the same with this knife o' mine," said Shif'less Sol.

Paul again obeyed at once, and in three minutes Braxton Wyatt lay bound and gagged on the earthen floor. Shif'less Sol Hyde and Paul Cotter stood over him, and looked down at him, and even in the dark they saw the terror of all things in his eyes.

"The Lord has been good to us to-night, Paul," said Shif'less Sol, with a certain solemnity, "an' He wuz best o' all when He sent this hound here a-spyin'."

"You know what he is?" said Paul.

"Ef I don't know, I've guessed."

Then the two stood silent for a little space, still gazing down at Braxton Wyatt, bound and gagged. Paul had never before seen such stark dread in the eyes of any one, and he shuddered. Despite himself, he felt a certain amount of pity.

"He would have lured a boat-load of our people into the hands of the savages," he said.

"I'll put this knife in his foul heart, Paul," said Shif'less Sol.

The bound figure quivered in its bonds, and the eyes became wild and appealing.

"No, not that," replied Paul; "I couldn't bear to see anyone helpless put to death."

"It was just the thought uv a moment," said Shif'less Sol. "We've got a better use fur him. It's the one that the Lord sent him here fur. Now, Paul, help me strip off his huntin' shirt."

They took off Braxton Wyatt's hunting shirt, leggins, and cap, and Paul put them on, his own taking their place on the form of the gagged youth.

"Now, Paul," said Shif'less Sol, "you're Braxton Wyatt—for a little while, at least, you've got to stand it—an' he's you. Help me roll him up thar on your bed o' skins, an' he kin sleep in calm an' peace until they bring him his breakfast in the mornin'."

They put Wyatt on the couch, and his eyes glared fiercely at them. He struggled to speak, but they did not care to hear him. Sol took the weapons from his belt and gave them to Paul.

"Good-night, Braxton," said Shif'less Sol pleasantly. "Fine dreams to you. We're glad you came. You happened in jest in time."

Wyatt quivered convulsively on his bed of skins. Paul was filled with repugnance, but he would not exult. His nature would not permit him. Shif'less Sol opened the door, and the two stepped out into the open air and a dark night. No one was about, and the shiftless one deliberately fastened the doors on the outside in the usual manner. Then he and Paul strolled away through the village.

"Remember that you are Braxton Wyatt," whispered Shif'less Sol. "Walk ez near like him ez you kin. You've seen him often enough to know."

The two sauntered lazily forward. An old squaw, crouched by a low and smoking fire, gave one glance at them, but no more. She went on dreaming of the days when she was young, and when the braves fought for her. A mangy cur barked once, and then lay down again at the foot of a deer-skin lodge. A warrior, smoking a pipe in his own doorway, looked up, but saw nothing unusual, and then looked down again.

The coolness of Shif'less Sol was something wonderful to see. He merely loafed along, as if he had no object in the world but to pass away the time, and there was nothing in the course he chose to indicate that he meant to reach the forest. Now and then he spoke apparently casual words to Paul, and the boy, in the faint light, wearing Braxton Wyatt's clothes, might easily pass for Braxton Wyatt himself, even to the keen eyes of the Shawnees.

Presently they reached the northern end of the village, the one nearest to the forest, and it was here that Shif'less Sol intended to make the escape. Paul kept close to him, and he noticed with joy that all the time the light, already faint, was growing fainter. The friendly forest seemed to curve very near. Paul's heart throbbed with painful violence.

Shif'less Sol passed the last wigwam, and he took a step into the open space that divided them from the forest. Paul stepped with him, but a gaunt and weazened figure rose up in their path. It was that of the old squaw who wished a new son, and she stared for a few moments at the clothes of Braxton Wyatt, and the figure within them. Then she knew, and she uttered a shrill cry that was at once a lament and a warning. At the same time she flung her arms around Paul in a gesture that was intended alike for affection and detention.

"Run, Paul, run!" exclaimed Shif'less Sol.

Paul attempted to throw off the old woman, but she clung to him like a wild cat, showing marvelous strength and tenacity for one so little and weazened and old. Shif'less Sol saw the difficulty and, seizing her in his powerful grasp, tore her loose.

"Don't hurt her, Sol!" cried Paul.

Shif'less Sol understood, and he cast her from them, but not with violence. Then the two ran with utmost speed and desperate need toward the forest, because the village behind them was up and alive. Lights flared, dogs barked, men shouted, and before the friendly trees were reached rifles began to crack.

"Jumpin' Jehoshaphat!" cried Shif'less Sol, as a bullet whistled past his ear. "Ef that don't put life into a tired man, I don't know what will."

He ran with amazing swiftness, and Paul, light-footed, kept beside him. But the alert Shawnee warriors, ever quick to answer an alarm, were already in fleet pursuit, and only the darkness kept their bullets from striking true. Paul looked back once—even in the moment of haste and danger he could not help it—and he saw three warriors in advance of the others, coming so fast that they must overtake them. He and Sol might beat them off, but one cannot fight well and at the same time escape from a multitude. His heart sank. He would be recaptured, and with him the gallant Shif'less Sol.

Flashes of fire suddenly appeared in the forest toward which they ran, and death cries came from the two warriors who pursued. Shif'less Sol uttered an exultant gasp.

"The boys!" he said. "They're thar in the woods, a-helpin'."

Daunted by the sudden covering fire, the pursuing mob fell back for a few moments, and the two fugitives plunged into the deep and friendly shadows of the woods. Three figures, all carrying smoking rifles, rose up to meet them. The figures were those of Henry Ware, Tom Ross, and Jim Hart. Henry reached out his hand and gave Paul's a strong and joyous grasp.

"Well, Sol has brought you!" he said.

"But Sol's not goin' to stop runnin' yet for a long time, tired ez he is," gasped the shiftless one.

"Good advice," said Henry, laughing low, and without another word the five ran swiftly and steadily northward through the deep woods. Henry had on his shoulder an extra rifle, which he had brought for Paul, so confident was he that Sol would save him; but he said nothing about it for the present, preferring to carry the added weight himself. They heard behind them two or three times the long-drawn, terrible cry with which Paul was so familiar, but it did not now send any quiver through him. He was with the ever-gallant comrades who had come for him, and he was ready to defy any danger.

Henry Ware, after a while, stopped very suddenly, and the others stopped with him.

"I think we'd better turn here," he said, unconsciously assuming his natural position of leader. "It's not worth while to run ourselves to death. What we've got to do is to hide."

"Them's blessed words!" gasped Shif'less Sol. "I wuz never so tired in all my born days. Seems to me I've been chased by Shawnees all over this here continent of North Ameriky!"

Paul laughed low, from pure pleasure—pleasure at his escape and pleasure in the courage, loyalty, and skill of his comrades.

"You may be tired, Sol," he said, "but there was never a braver man than you."

"It ain't bravery," protested the shiftless one. "I get into these things afore I know it, an' then I've got to kick like a mule to get out o' 'em."

But Paul merely laughed low again.

Henry turned from the north to the west, and led now at a pace that was little more than a walk. Paul and Sol drew deep breaths, as they felt the heavenly air flowing back into their lungs and the spring returning to their muscles. They went in Indian file, five dusky figures in the shadow, a faint moonlight touching them but wanly, and all silent. Thus they marched until past midnight, and they heard nothing behind them. Then their leader stopped, and the others, without a word, stopped with him.

"I think we've shaken 'em off," said Henry, "and we'd better rest and sleep. Then we can make up our plans."

"Good enough," said Shif'less Sol. "An' ef any man wakes me up afore next week, I'll hev his scalp."

He sank down at once in his buckskins on a particularly soft piece of turf, and in an incredibly brief space of time he was sound asleep. Jim Hart, doubling up his long, thin figure like a jackknife, imitated him, and Paul was not long in following them to slumberland. Only Henry and Ross remained awake and watchful, and by and by the moonlight came out and silvered their keen and anxious faces.

THE ISLAND IN THE LAKE

When Paul awoke the others were munching the usual breakfast of dried venison, and Henry handed him a piece, which he ate voraciously. Henry was sitting on the ground, with his back against a fallen log, and he regarded Paul contemplatively.

"Paul," he said, in the dryest possible tones, "I don't see how you could have been so hard-hearted."

Paul looked at him, startled. "Why, what do you mean?"

"To tear yourself away, as you did, from a loving father and mother. Why, Sol, here, tells me that you actually threw your mother from you."

"Truth, Gospel truth," put in Shif'less Sol. "I never seen sech a cruel, keerless person. He gives her jest one fling into the south, an' then he bolts off into the north, like an arrow out o' the bow. I follows him lickety-split to bring him back, but he runs so fast I can't ketch him."

Paul smiled.

"I've one father and mother already," he said, "and so I have no use for two. Rather than cause embarrassment, I came away as quickly as I could."

"You did come fast," said Henry dryly.

"It was mighty fine of all of you to come after me," said Paul earnestly, "and to risk your lives to save me from the Shawnees. But I knew you'd do it."

"Uv course," said Tom Ross simply. "The rest uv our party would hev come, too, but they were needed back thar in Kentucky. Besides, we could spare 'em, ez it took cunnin' an' not numbers to do what we had to do."

"What's our next step?" asked Paul, who was in the highest of spirits—his imagination, with its usual vivid rebound, now painted everything in glowing colors.

"We are going northward," said Henry.

"Northward?"

"Yes, it's necessary. There's some great movement on foot among the tribes. It's not the Shawnees alone, but the Miamis and Wyandots and others as well, though the Shawnees are leaders. War belts are passing between all the tribes, and we think they are joining together to destroy all the white settlements in Kentucky."

"An' some renegades are helpin' 'em," said Tom Ross. "They may hev better luck than they did when they attacked Wareville."

"Yes, an' there's Braxton Wyatt," said Shif'less Sol sorrowfully, "He's cunnin' an' revengeful, an' he'll do us a power o' harm. Paul, you ought to a-let me put a knife in atween his ribs when I had the chance. I might a-saved some good lives an' a power o' sufferin'."

Paul did not reply, but he was not sorry that he had interfered. He could not see a bound youth killed.

"I think we'd better be goin' now," said Tom Ross. "We've got to keep to the north, to throw the Shawnees off the track, an' then we'll come back an' spy on 'em."

"An' me with only ten hours o' rest got to git up an' start to runnin' ag'in," said Shif'less Sol plaintively.

"Wa'al, no, you needn't run," said Tom Ross, grinning. "You can jest walk for about forty hours without stoppin'!"

Shif'less Sol heaved a deep sigh, but made ready. Jim Hart undoubled himself, cracked his joints, and said deliberately:

"Ef I wuz ez lazy ez Shif'less Sol Hyde, I'd a-stayed back thar in the East, whar a feller might jest sleep hisself to death, an' no Injuns to torment him."

"Ef I wuz es mean an' onchristian ez Jim Hart, I'd go an' join Braxton Wyatt an' become a renegade myself," rejoined Shif'less Sol.

Paul smiled. He enjoyed the little spats of Sol and Jim, but he knew that the two were as true as steel, and the best of friends to each other. Moreover, he was about to take up again the mission which Fate seemed so constantly to interrupt. The scene of action had been shifted to the great northern woods, and it now seemed to Paul that perhaps Fortune had been kind in bringing him there. If a league of the tribes were being attempted for a new attack upon the settlements, the powder for Marlowe might well rest, for the present, in its hiding-place in the woods, while his comrades and he undertook more important action elsewhere.

Before they started, Henry and Ross took stock of their ammunition, of which they had a plentiful supply, replenished more than once from their enemies, and also gave an abundance to Paul. The extra rifle given to him, one of those taken from the two warriors that Henry had slain, was a fine weapon, carrying far and true, and he was perfectly satisfied with it.

Then they started, and they traveled all day northward, through a fine rolling country, with little prairies and great quantities of game. It was fully equal to Kentucky, but Paul knew they were in the heart of the chosen home of the northern Indians, and it behooved them to be cautious. But there were no signs of pursuit, and they went on all day undisturbed.

Late in the afternoon they entered a dense forest, and walked through it about two hours, when Paul saw an opening among the trees. It was a great flash of silver that all at once greeted his eyes. But as he looked it turned to gold under the late sun.

"Another of those little prairies," he said.

Henry laughed.

"No, Paul," he said, "that's not a prairie. The sun and the sky together have fooled you. It's a lake, and we're going to live in it for a little while."

"A lake," echoed Paul, "and we're going to live in it? Come on, I want to see it!"

Kentucky was not a country of lakes, and Paul did not know much about them. Hence, as he hastened forward, he was thinking more of the lake itself than of Henry's somewhat enigmatic words, "We're going to live in it."

They soon reached its margin, and Paul uttered a little cry of delight. It was a splendid sheet of water, shaped like a half moon, seven miles long, perhaps, and two miles across at the center. But at the widest part stood a gem of a wooded island, covered with giant trees. High hills, clothed with magnificent forest, rose all around the lake.

The beauty of the scene penetrated the souls of all. Uneducated men like Shif'less Sol and Jim Hart felt it as well as Paul. The five stood in silence, gazing at the lake and the gem of a wooded island. The light from the sinking sun gleamed in red and gold flame across the silver waters, and on the wooded island the boughs of the trees seemed to be touched with fire.

"That's where we are to stay," said Henry, pointing to the little island. "No Indian will ever trouble us there."

"Why?" asked Paul, looking at him questioningly.

"Wait and you'll see," replied Henry.

Henry led the way along the shore, and from a dense thicket at the water's edge he took a light canoe.

"I captured this once," he said; "brought it across the woods and hid it here, thinking it might be useful some day, and now you see I am right. Get in! Light as it is, it will hold us all."

Henry and Ross took the paddles, and they pushed out into the lake. Shif'less Sol uttered a long and deep sigh of satisfaction.

"Now, this jest suits a tired man," he said. "Henry, you an' Tom can paddle jest ez long ez you please. I'd like to do all my travelin' this way."

"An' you'd get so lazy you'd want somebody to come an' feed you with a spoon," said Jim Hart.

"An' it would jest suit me to have you do it. That's jest the kind uv a job you're fit fur, Jim Hart."

"Shet up, you two," said Ross. "You hurt my ears, a-buzzin' an' a-buzzin'."

Shif'less Sol sank back a little and closed his eyes. An expression of heavenly luxury and ease came over his face, but it could not last long because in a few minutes the boat reached the wooded island. Shif'less Sol opened his eyes, to find that the sun was almost gone, and that the shadows had come among the great trees.

"Cur'us kind o' place," he said. "Gives me a sort o' shiver."

Paul had felt the same sensation, but he said nothing. Before them lay the little island, a solid, black blot, its trees blended together, and behind them the lake shone somberly in the growing darkness.

"All out!" said Henry cheerfully. "This is home for a while, and we need rest."

They sprang upon the narrow beach, and Henry and Ross dragged the canoe into some thick bushes, where they hid it artfully. Paul meanwhile was looking about him, and trying to keep down the ghostly feeling that would assail him at times. The island, so far as he could judge, was perhaps two hundred yards long, half as broad, and thickly covered with forest. But he could see nothing of the interior.

"Come," said Henry Ware, in the same tone of cheerful confidence, as he led the way.

The others followed, stepping lightly among the great tree trunks, and Henry did not stop until he came to a small, open space in the very center of the island, where a spring bubbled up among some rocks, and flowed away in a tiny brook in a narrow channel to the lake. The open space was almost circular, and the great trees grew so thickly around that they looked like a wall.

"Here is the place to rest," said Henry. "There is no need for anybody to watch."

They lay down upon the ground, disposing themselves on the softest spots that they could find. Paul stared up for a few moments at the great circular wall of trees, and the weird, chilly sensation came again, but he was too tired and sleepy to think about it long. In fifteen minutes he slumbered soundly, and so did all the others. They lay with their faces showing but faintly in the dusk, and as they lay in the sheltered cove a soft wind breathed gently over them.

All were up early in the morning, and Paul was surprised to see Henry lighting a fire with flint and steel.

"Why do you do that, Henry?" he said. "Will not the smoke give warning to our enemies that we are here?"

"We shall send up but little smoke," replied Henry; "but if they should see it, they will not come."

He went on with the fire, and Paul, although mystified, would not ask anything more, too proud to show ignorance, and confident that anyhow he would soon learn the cause of these strange proceedings. The fire was lighted, and burned brightly, but cast off little smoke. Then Henry turned to Paul.

"Let's go up to the north end of the island," he said.

It was a walk of but a few minutes, and Henry, stopping before they reached the margin of the lake, said:

"Look up, Paul!"

Paul did so, and saw many dark objects in the forks of trees about him, or tied to the boughs. They looked like shapeless bundles, and he did not know what they were.

"A burying ground," said Henry, in answer to his inquiring look.

Paul felt the same weird little shiver that had assailed him the night before.

"A burying ground!"

"Yes, but by some old, old tribe before the Shawnees or Miamis. What you see are only bundles of sticks and skeletons. No bodies have been left here in a long time, and the Indians think the island is haunted by the ghosts of those who died and were left here long, long ago. That is why we needed to keep no watch last night. I discovered this place on a hunting trip, and I've always kept it in mind.