The darkness favored his flight. As yet no attack had been made upon the fort from the stream. The major portion of the besiegers were on the hill, the summit of which was on a level with the embrasures, into which the foe could shoot with effect.
Thus far the enemy had trusted to the blazing arrows; but, as the trapper gained the stream, a volley was poured into the block-house.
The next moment it was returned by the besieged, and numerous cries told Wolf-Cap that some of the foe had fallen.
“I don’t like to leave the boys,” said the trapper, sadly, pausing in his flight, and listening to the battle which had now opened furiously. “And Huldah is yonder in the midst of it all. But the Indians wait for me at the cave. Three can do more than one. I wish the two war here now; then—”
There was the quick, sharp snapping of a twig, and Silver Hand and his assistant stood before the trapper.
“We no go to cave,” said Silver Hand. “Hide here ’while to watch fight. But look, Wolf-Cap! roof all on fire. Why don’t pale-faces put it out? They got water in fort.”
“Yes, but the traitor has disabled them somehow. I’m afraid it’s all day with the brave fellows. But they shan’t die alone!” and the trapper started forward.
“Silver Hand and Golden Cheek go with Wolf-Cap,” said the Wyandot, and a moment later the trio were hurrying toward the seemingly doomed structure.
That side of the roof which looked to the hill was in a furious blaze, which threw a lurid glare upon the battle-ground, and the discharges of musketry by both parties resembled a pitched battle.
Suddenly the artillery of heaven added its thunder to the fight, and great drops of rain began to fall thick and fast from the inky clouds.
But let us return to the fort, and see what followed Levi Armstrong’s discovery of the poisoning of the well.
The settler’s eyes fell upon Zebulon Strong, as the startling words written at the conclusion of chapter five rung from his lips.
But the captain stood the scrutiny unflinchingly, and started forward with drawn sword.
“The traitor shall die!” he cried. “Let every one look to his neighbor, and watch him closely. As for myself, I believe that Morg Sawyer is the villain; but he is beyond our power. Men, to the lower floor with picks; we’ll dig another well immediately. By the help of God, we’ll hold out against the red and white fiends until fresh water can be struck!”
He turned away as he finished, and was ordering a number of men below to inaugurate the digging of a new well, when Huldah Armstrong bounded toward the settler and touched his arm.
“Father,” she said, in a cautious tone, “Captain Strong is the traitor! I was standing near the logs, a moment since, and heard Wolf-Cap at the gate. He told the guards that our captain had betrayed us into the hands of the savages.”
The next instant Levi jerked his arm from Huldah’s grip, and started toward Strong, who was handing buckets of water to the men on the roof.
“Men,” he cried, in thunderous tones, “treason must not thrive here. Captain Strong, you must consider yourself the prisoner of the garrison.”
Before turning to the old settler the traitor passed the bucket he was in the act of lifting to the nearest man.
He retained a wonderful self composure.
“I submit, if it be the will of the men,” he said, calmly. “Heaven forefend that I should seek to betray these women and children into merciless hands,” and he glanced around on the swarthy faces revealed by the tallow dips.
“Let the captain help us,” cried several voices; but old Levi silenced the speakers with a look.
“I’d like to, but it won’t do,” he said. “The evidence is strong against him. I saw him whispering to Morg Sawyer at the gate, a minute before that dog’s desertion, and Wolf-Cap has just shouted over the palisades that he is a traitor.”
For the first time the captain’s face grew pale, and Levi proceeded to disarm him.
“I’m sorry for all this, Cap,” he said, sympathetically; “but you see, we’ve got to do it, and—”
“Arrest Captain Strong!” interrupted a sturdy young settler, whose head shot above the hatchway at this juncture. “Wolf-Cap has just halloed over the gate that he is a traitor. Ah! so you’ve already caught the dog! Zeb Strong, for a shilling I’d strike you stiff and cold on these boards. I’ve two sisters here, and to think that you would give them over to the tomahawk!”
The youth towered before the suspected man with flashing eyes and leveled gun, and other weapons were drawn to shed the captain’s blood.
“No, no, boys; he’s not condemned yet,” said Levi Armstrong, pushing the weapons aside. “We’ll tend to him after the fight.”
“But we may not win.”
“Then, of course, he dies.”
A guard of several men was placed over the captain, who was taken below where strong arms threw up the earth in great heaps. Mad eyes fell upon the captive, and he was told that his life would be forfeited if he attempted to escape.
Above, the settlers fought the flames at the risk of their lives, for the foe were raining bullets from the hill and the battle had opened in terrible earnest.
Suddenly a startling cry came from the vicinity of the well.
“No more water!”
And the words were echoed on every side. Mothers pressed their babes to their breasts, and told the little ones that the last drop of water had been drawn from the well!
“What of the fire?” shouted Armstrong to the men on the roof.
“If we had more water we could master it,” was the reply. “Without water we are doomed.”
Then he leaped to the gangway and cried to the well-diggers below.
“No water yet?”
“No!” was the despairing answer.
The fire-fighters threw the buckets from the roof and clambered down after them. But all who went up did not come down. Several had been shot by the enemy, and lay dead on the ground between the fort and the palisades.
Now every one believed that the fort was doomed to destruction. The clapboards on the western roof were blazing furiously, and cinders were falling among the besieged. The light added to the ghastly scene; but the settlers stood nobly at the port-holes and more than one shot proved the death-knell of a foe.
All at once a peal of thunder, rattling over their heads, shook the fort to its very foundation, and ejaculations of joy burst from every throat.
“God be praised!” cried a woman bursting from the shuddering throng with her babe in her arms. “He is sending the rain to save us. Praised be His holy name!”
A moment later and the storm clouds broke and great gray drops fell splattering in the fire.
The rain was greeted with a hearty cheer that reached the ears of the besiegers, and every faint heart took hope. For a moment the rain descended in scattered quantities, and then it came down in gigantic and irresistible sheets.
“We are saved—hurrah! hurrah!” cried the younger settlers, stepping back from the ports and slipping in the blood and water that covered the puncheons. “Open the well and let the water in.”
Sure enough, the crimson demon was yielding to the deluge, and every one saw in their deliverance the hand of Deity.
“We’re not out of the fire yet,” said Levi Armstrong, calmly, for to him command of the fort had been given by unanimous consent. “After the rain we must fight again, then no roof can protect us—the fire-arrows will drop among us. But we must to work. Remove the ammunition below to a dry place, and let our dead be laid aside and the wounded cared for.”
Brave men sprung with eagerness to the task. Several kegs of powder were carried below, and the loss of the garrison looked after.
It was discovered that it had suffered quite severely during the battle. From behind stumps, the Indians had fired into the ports, distinctly revealed by the widely-leaping flames of the roof, and with fatal effect. The majority of the stricken settlers were killed outright—shot through the head—while every wound was dangerous. Twenty-one men had fallen, including the loss at the gate and another, Morgan Sawyer, had deserted.
The well-diggers struck water as the storm broke over the fort; but they did not cease their labors, for they knew that it would not last long—a summer shower, but a furious, a saving one.
“Miss Armstrong, can I trust you?”
“You can.”
“Then come with me.”
The first speaker was Matt Hunter, the man whom Captain Strong had placed over the well after Sawyer’s defection.
He was a small, wiry man, rather prepossessing in appearance, and had fought like a tiger with the water buckets.
Huldah Armstrong drew from his look that he had something in view for the good of the garrison, and followed him to the gangway.
But, as the settler had put his foot on the first round of the ladder, the face of a strange man was revealed below, and he started back.
“Wolf-Cap!” he shouted to the busy men and women about him. “Wolf-Cap is here!”
Immediately the cry of “Wolf-Cap” resounded throughout the fort, and the next minute the Night-Hawks’ foe appeared above the hatch!
“Welcome, welcome, neighbor Belt!” cried old Levi, springing to the trapper. “Bloody times, these.”
“Ay, ay,” said Wolf-Cap, quickly. “But to the ports; This is the darkest hour of the night. The foe is crawling through the storm both from the river and hill. Thank heaven! the rain has saved your fort.”
The settlers sprung to their places.
“The demons carry ladders,” continued Wolf-Cap, “and they’ll make a desperate effort to carry the palisades by storm.”
Matt Hunter and Huldah did not wait to hear the trapper’s words, but hurried below and paused before the guard at the lower door.
“You can’t get out here,” said the sentry.
“Can’t,” echoed Hunter. “We’re on a mission from our new captain.”
“True, Miss?” asked the soldier, looking at Huldah.
“Mr. Hunter should know,” she answered, and the heavy door was unbolted, and they stepped into the yard.
“Miss Armstrong, I am on a secret mission for your father,” he said, when they heard the door shut violently. “I can not disclose it yet, so please bear with me. We must now relieve the gate guards.”
He walked rapidly toward the gate, where three sturdy settlers stood.
“Jones, Vanderberg and Poston, I believe,” he said, pausing before the trio, whose forms were just visible in the gloom.
“Yes,” answered a rough voice, “them’s we. What’s wanting?”
“Our new captain wants Vanderberg and Poston to the council up-stairs. Wolf-Cap advocates a change of tactics. We—Miss Armstrong and I—will guard the gate with Jones, until relieved. We were sent hither for that duty.”
Matt Hunter paused; but the two men hesitated. Since the arrest of Zebulon Strong, they did not know whom to trust, and theirs was the most important post connected with the safety of the fort.
“No doubt other strength will be sent hither on your appearance above,” said Hunter, uneasily. “Your voices are needed in the council. You can leave your muskets here; but I think we will not need ’em. Wolf-Cap reports the foe under cover.”
His last words decided the guards; they leaned their muskets against the stockade and left the gate.
Without difficulty they gained the interior of the fort, and paused a moment to inquire into the progress of the well-diggers.
Then they ascended the ladder and appeared in the battle-room. The storm had spent its fury by this time, but the wind was flaring the dips and imparting a demi-gloom to the entire interior of the place. Still, the light enabled the sentries to see men at the port-holes, and the women were scrubbing the floor with bedding. There was nothing that looked like a council of war.
“Where’s the cap’n?” asked Vanderberg, touching a woman’s arm—and the dame could not repress a cry when she looked up into his white face.
“Here,” called a lusty voice from a darkened corner, and a tall form advanced toward the guard. “I’m here—what’s wanting?” and then the commander caught sight of Vanderberg’s face. “Roger Vanderberg, what are you doing here?” he cried, and his hand closed on the settler’s arm. “Your post is at the outer gate. What can have brought you hither? Speak! These are nights when traitors are abroad.”
The guard, now thoroughly alarmed and frightened, could not find his tongue for a moment.
“And Poston, you here too? Who is at the gate?”
“Sir, your daughter and Matt Hunter,” cried Vanderberg, with considerable fire in his tone. “He sent me up to the council.”
“Council? there’s no council here,” and the old settler’s cheeks suddenly grew pale. “I never sent for you—never! Matt Hunter must mean something terrible. We’ll go down and see.”
He sprung to the hatch, and quickly disappeared, followed by the sentries.
The lower guard opened the door without a challenge, and the trio passed into the yard.
There Levi Armstrong’s worst fears were realized. The gate was deserted and stood ajar!
Deserted? No! At the foot of one of the posts lay the body of a man.
“Heavens! Huldah is gone!” cried the settler, staggering from the scene, for a moment completely unmanned.
For a moment only.
“The gate! the gate!” he cried, springing forward, but Vanderberg and Poston had foreseen the danger.
Their strong arms closed the ponderous structure, as a hundred arrows buried their flinty heads in the boards!
The gate was then barricaded in a jiffy.
“Listen! They’re about to storm us,” said Vanderberg.
“Quick, then! Summon thirty men hither!” shouted Levi. “We must meet them here first. ’Twill be daylight soon, thank heaven!”
Vanderberg sprung to execute the task assigned him, and the old settler bent over the form lying at the gate.
It was poor Jones. His skull had been crushed by the butt of a musket, and he was quite dead.
“The old fort swarms with traitors,” said Armstrong, looking up at Poston. “Hunter was Strong’s confederate. Now we’ll meet the storming dogs.”
He muttered the last sentence as a body of men emerged from the fort.
“Huldah isn’t gone, Armstrong?” said the foremost man, whose wolf-skin cap proclaimed his personality.
“Gone—gone, Belt!”
“Curse the luck! Why didn’t I shoot Matt Hunter, when I caught him tampering with my traps, two years ago?”
“Would to heaven you had.”
Wolf-Cap looked at the settler and then gritted his great teeth till they fairly cracked.
“Matt Hunter took the girl along to buy his own liberty,” he murmured. “Royal Funk will get her now. But he sha’n’t wear her—no! not while my name is Card Belt.”
“Nor while mine is Mark Harmon!”
The trapper started and saw the young borderman standing by his side.
“Your hand on that, boy!” cried the trapper, with a smile, and two hands were clasped and sealed in determination.
“I guess the dogs have gone back to growl,” said Belt, glancing up. “They’ve let the golden moment slip. It’s gettin’ too light to attack now.”
Fort Strong could not have successfully resisted an assault of the allies on the stockade. The settlers knew this; but were determined that the foe should be met with courage as fierce as his own, and that he should find none but dead bodies when he entered the fort.
Already the women were arming themselves and their words of encouragement threw more strength into their husbands’ arms.
We left Wolf-Cap and the two Indian chiefs hurrying toward the fort, and have also witnessed the former’s appearance among the besieged. Before entering, he had tarried a while without for the purpose of watching the enemy. His great heart leaped for joy when the rain began to descend, and beside the gate, he dismissed the chiefs with low words, intended for their ears alone.
He heard the foe approach, and learned that they bore ladders which, no doubt, they had constructed beyond the hill during the day, and then he hastened to prepare the settlers for the new danger.
But the sky grew lighter, and the assault came not. From some cause which the besieged could not fathom, the proposed attack had been suddenly abandoned, and when the light rendered objects distinguishable from the fort, not an enemy could be seen.
The dun storm clouds rolled heavily toward the south, and by-and-by the sun’s rays fell upon the charred roof of Fort Strong.
But let us follow the fortunes of Huldah Armstrong, and learn why the assault was abandoned—abandoned when the most unlearned warrior could foresee the result of a grand attack with the ladders.
To all appearances, the Indians had been withdrawn from the river; but such was not the case. The light of the burning roof revealed the ground between fort and stream, but not a brave lay behind the stumps. Colonel O’Neill attacked the fort from the hill only, thinking that the garrison might be driven to an attempt to fly to the river and escape by boats. Therefore, he had drawn the Indians to the tall grass on the bank, and during the entire fight not a shot was fired from the ambush.
But the colonel’s plans did not succeed.
“Why this delay?” exclaimed the officer, angrily, looking and listening from the summit of the hill where he stood, surrounded by half a dozen Indians and as many English officers. “The assault should have been made ere this.”
“We have not heard Funk’s signal yet, colonel,” answered one of the officers, suggestively.
“Fire and fury! he should have given it five minutes since,” and O’Neill looked at a beautiful chronometer which he drew from his bosom. “The truth of the matter is, Funk is crazy after a girl in the fort, and if he can get her, he will let the foe beat us off. Curse the laggard!”
A minute’s silence followed the Briton’s last words. The signal, whatever it was to have been, did not cleave the cool night air—not a sound came from the fort.
“The jig is up,” hoarsely hissed O’Neill, stamping his foot with rage. “Funk’s infernal passion for that girl has ruined our plans. Splitlog, is he a specimen of the men you associate with? Go and recall the forces! The day is breaking now, and if our men are not instantly withdrawn, they will be slaughtered like sheep.”
The Wyandot sachem left the hill, and presently every besieger relinquished the designed attack.
Colonel O’Neill was livid with rage, and threatened to withdraw his troops.
“Frank is the cause of all this,” he thundered to Splitlog. “You should take the villain out and shoot him when he shows his face in camp. But he’ll never have the audacity to show his face here. Perhaps he succeeded in getting the girl, and has fled to parts unknown. The fort would have been ours after a brief struggle. The deserter declares that Strong has six men on whom he can depend. So, chief, you see what we have missed by one man’s absorbing passion.”
“Night-Hawk do bad work, sure,” said Splitlog, like the colonel, in no good humor. “He better not come back to braves.”
“Killing him won’t mend matters; but—”
The interruption that broke the sentence was caused by the sudden appearance of a young Wyandot warrior, who informed the twain that Royal Funk and his Night-Hawks were boldly approaching.
O’Neill and the chief exchanged looks of surprise.
“That man possesses the audacity of the devil,” said the colonel. “Now stick to your word, Splitlog; pay him up. Do not listen to his excuses. If you do, he’ll conquer.”
White and red occupied the tent of the former, and when they stepped out, they beheld a large body of soldiers and savages approaching.
At the head of the array walked Roy Funk and his remaining Night-Hawks, six in number, for Sam Cole had slain his white adversary at the tree to which Wolf-Cap was bound at the opening of the fort fight, and the second Night-Hawk whom Silver Hand threw into the river on the same occasion, would march no more to deeds of brigandage.
There was a cloud on the outlaw’s face as he neared the little group; but he walked boldly erect, unmindful of the fierce looks and muttered epithets that the Indians hurled upon him.
At length he halted before the couple at the tent, and looked them calmly in the eye without a word.
“You have come to report,” said O’Neill, suddenly and sarcastically.
“With your permission, sir,” retorted the Night-Hawk captain.
“If you wish, you may tell the story of your treachery. Though I would rather not hear it, I will listen. You know the disaster you have hurled upon this army.”
“I am, to some extent, perhaps, to blame for the non-attack on the stockade. I am willing to take all the blame on my shoulders at any rate. They are strong,” and he shrugged them, “and can carry heavy loads.”
“But let the Night-Hawk talk of his dog acts,” cried Splitlog, stepping nearer Funk, furious almost beyond control.
“I was about ready to give my signal when we beheld a suspicious figure creeping from the fort to the river. We followed, and captured a man—Matt Hunter by name. He was a deserter and told us much. Captain Strong is a prisoner in the fort. His designs have been discovered. Wolf-Cap is in the fort.”
“I thought you held him captive?” said O’Neill, at this juncture.
“I did, but Cole wanted to trust his honesty, and Duke White here interfered. They fought and Cole got the best of Duke; but, after all, Wolf-Cap escaped.”
“But what about the man you caught?”
“The boys gave him to the Wyandots by the river. He’s yonder now with Sawyer, the other deserter. He was carrying a woman from the fort.”
“Stealing a woman, eh? Go on, Roy Funk, this is a romantic story you’re telling. Took some hard thinking no doubt.”
An illy-concealed sneer pervaded the officer’s words; but the outlaw chief did not appear to notice it.
“We got the girl of course, and,” looking at O’Neill, “she’s my girl, colonel—Huldah Armstrong.”
“This will all do to tell, Roy Funk,” said the soldier; “but it won’t slip down. You don’t understand greasing lies. That is an art which you should have mastered.”
“You’ll believe me if I produce the deserter and girl?” flashed Funk.
“I will, and not until then will I credit a single word you have uttered.”
The outlaw turned quickly upon one of his men.
“Jackson, go and bring Hunter and the girl here,” he said, in maddened tones, and the look which he then darted at his other Night-Hawks drew them nearer his imperiled form.
“You shall see that I haven’t lied!” he said, turning to O’Neill again. “Splitlog has enjoyed a long acquaintance with me, and he can not put his finger on a single lie of mine.”
“But what say you in extenuation of your crime of disobeying orders?”
“Circumstances, sir, interposed to check my career, and when I had disposed of my captives, you were withdrawing your troops. But, Colonel O’Neill, I want you to understand that I am a free man here. Roy Funk and his fellows do as they please; but for this time I have condescended to be a subordinate. You, sir, are the minority here. Splitlog by superiority of numbers commands.”
O’Neill bit his lip and referred the outlaw to the Wyandot for punishment. He felt that Splitlog would rid himself of Funk’s presence, and now he devoutly wished the forest freebooter out of his way.
A brief time elapsed between Jackson’s disappearance and his return.
A line of knolls or hills encircled the southern side of the fort, and terminated at the river. They enabled the outlaw to perform his errand without being seen by the besieged settlers, and he approached the assemblage with Huldah Armstrong and the treacherous borderman.
“There!” said Funk, in triumph, looking at his prisoners. “Colonel O’Neill, have I lied?”
The British soldier did not reply, for he was looking at the settler’s daughter, whose wonderful backwoods beauty was entrancing his Highland-tainted heart.
“What does Night-Hawk want to do with white girl?” asked Splitlog, breaking the silence that followed Funk’s speech.
“I intend making her Mrs. Funk, as I have told the colonel,” said the outlaw, quickly, glancing at the officer as he spoke. “She is mine!”
“But Night-Hawk didn’t give signal. He let a squaw run off with his head.”
Splitlog’s anger was rising again, and O’Neill was secretly rejoicing.
“I know it, chief; but to-night we’ll work together.”
“Like we did when it was dark before,” hissed the Wyandot, and his right arm started back threateningly. “The Night-Hawk is a traitor, and traitors are dogs. He no man at all who’ll let blue eyes draw him from duty.”
“Well, what is Splitlog going to do about it?”
The question was put calmly, but there was the lurking of a defiant, devil-may-care spirit in the words.
“He going to make example, as the pale-faces say,” was the reply. “Little Hickory, take the girl—”
“No you won’t!” interrupted the outlaw, and before the chief addressed could advance a step, Jackson threw Huldah Armstrong forward and Funk caught her in his arms.
“I appeal to the braves of the Wyandot nation, and to true English soldiers,” he cried, springing upon a fallen tree and looking around over the crowd. “I have fought for the flag of St. George and for the wampum of the Wyandots. I failed in a duty last night, but to-night we can take the fort. Put yourselves in my place last night. For such a pretty woman as this, who would not have forgotten every thing save love?”
Numerous cheers greeted the outlaw’s speech, but Splitlog, with a cloud on his face, advanced toward the log.
“Stop, chief,” cried Funk, cocking one of his pistols, and looking down upon the Wyandot. “I don’t want to shed blood on this occasion. My men will stand by me—if we go down, ’twill be as the fall of one man.”
Stern determination was written on the Night-Hawk’s face, and he glanced at Huldah, hanging half-senseless across his left arm.
“Don’t give in to him!” whispered O’Neill to Splitlog, who had stopped. “Make an example of the dog!”
The chief was inclined to do so.
“A vote! a vote!” cried the soldiers.
“We’ll have no votes on this question!” thundered Colonel O’Neill.
“We will!” answered a stalwart corporal, stepping forward, pistol in hand. “Colonel O’Neill, your men say that Funk’s fate shall not be settled by one man.”
“Fire and furies, this is mutiny!” and the English sword leaped from its scabbard. “Corporal, who commands the Ninety-first—you or I?”
Corporal Quitman did not reply, but saluted his superior and stepped aside.
“We will vote on Funk’s life!” came a cry from the rebellious quarter, and the Indians began to demand a ballot, in their own language.
Colonel O’Neill was shaking with rage.
“Colonel, you had best listen to the men!” ventured Quitman, again.
“Who gave you authority to suggest to me?” roared the epauleted Briton, starting toward the corporal. “Sergeant Wilkinson, arrest the mutineer.”
But the sergeant did not stir.
“What! dare you disobey, too?”
“I dare!” was the quiet response. “Colonel, if a majority of the Wyandots and the old Ninety-first say that Funk’s deed deserves death, we will submit. But one man, and he an Indian, shall not dictate in such a case as this.”
The mutineers applauded the sergeant’s words, and Colonel O’Neill stepped back, and gazed with horror into Splitlog’s face.
“I know what you want, colonel,” said Roy Funk, at this juncture, “and I don’t blame you, either, for you don’t pick up such a girl as this in the woods every day. Let the red-coats vote, and the Indians, too. If they say I deserve death, you may kill me.”
O’Neill looked up at the outlaw, and then turned to the sachem.
“I leave it to you, Splitlog,” he said. “Count me out; but Funk should live if he can cower such a man as you!”
Splitlog shrugged his shoulders and turned to his braves.
The lives of many brave men hung upon his savage caprices, and the silence that followed O’Neill’s last and bitter words seemed palpable.
The Wyandot hated, detested the British, Colonel O’Neill particularly; but he had sold his nation to the English cause, and he must not, in a single act, manifest an abatement of zeal. The colonel, under whose command Splitlog had already fought, had said that Royal Funk’s disobedience should be punished with death, and the Indian believed that he spoke to the king.
But the British soldiers were demanding something of a trial for the outlaw, and his Indians were joining in the clamor. So far as he was personally concerned, he would not punish Funk, and here was an opportunity to favor the forest freebooter. Funk, no doubt, had done Splitlog a service in days gone by, and an Indian never forgets such an action.
He stood before the outlaw a moment in silence, and then spoke.
“Splitlog hears the voices of his people,” he said. “He will not strike the Night-Hawk until they have pronounced on his fate. He,” pointing to Funk, “has lived long among the Wyandots; they know him—he is brave.”
As the Indian paused, O’Neill stepped forward, and laid his hand on the naked shoulder. The Briton’s face was still aflame with rage.
“Say nothing for nor against him, chief,” he said, in the Wyandot tongue. “Tell your braves to say life or death, and that quickly.”
He snapped the words out fiercely, and darted a malignant look at Splitlog as he turned away:
“I’ll pay you for this, you scarlet dog,” he murmured, under his breath. “I’ll pay you for lying, see if I don’t.”
Splitlog smiled contemptuously, and bit his nether lip.
“Down with you, Wyandots,” he cried, angrily, flashing his eyes over his armed nation. “Down like wolves, and let the warriors who vote for life hold up their guns.”
Like one man the red assembly dropped to the ground, and near two hundred guns were held on high!
A majority voted for life.
“I knew they’d do it,” hissed O’Neill. “And Splitlog sanctions the decision. My men shall not vote.”
A stern determination clothed the last words, and they were yet quivering on his lips when the chief, with a triumph which his best dissimulative arts could not conceal, turned upon him:
“Now let the red-coats vote,” cried Splitlog. “If many of them say ‘death,’ the waters of the Huron shall roll over the Night-Hawk.”
An eager gleam of hope lit up the colonel’s eyes at this.
Sword in hand he leaped upon the log near the Night-Hawk captain.
“You who vote for life will advance ten paces westward. Right about—face. Forward—march!”
Many a Briton obeyed the military command, and the colonel ordered a sergeant to count the ayes.
Two hundred and one men voted for life, and strange to say, a like number had kept their places!
“I vote for death!” said the colonel, when he had informed Splitlog of the even counts; “therefore I make a majority, and the outlaw dies.”
“Did Splitlog vote?” cried the chief. “No! he left it to his men. But he will look to the vote of the red-coats. He says that the Night-Hawk shall fly from the land of the Wyandots before the sun sweeps over the bosom of the Huron again, and he shall never return. Does this suit the king’s soldier?”
“He should die. We, his own people, say as much,” said O’Neill.
“But Indians say, ‘Live, Night-Hawk.’ Splitlog must listen to his people; when they say ‘No,’ he must not say ‘Yes.’”
“So be it, then. But he shall not take his captive along.”
“Whatever is his he may keep,” answered the Indian, and then he looked up at Royal Funk.
“Night-Hawk, you are free to go,” he said. “After this night, let these forests hear your tread no more. Splitlog and his braves say so.”
“Agreed,” answered Funk. “I accept your mercy. I go, never to return. Soldiers who voted for my life, I thank you; and, Colonel O’Neill, my fervent prayer is that we may meet again.”
“Amen!” grated the Briton. “I echo your prayer from the bottom of my heart!”
“Come, boys,” said the outlaw, descending from his perch, and addressing his band in a low tone, “we’ll leave this accursed place at once, or so soon as we can get off. We’ll go down the river in barges, and after a while strike over land toward Detroit. There’s no use in talking. Our days are up in the ‘fire-lands,’ though I’d like to linger here to settle scores with Wolf-Cap.”
The Night-Hawks expressed their willingness to follow their leader, but they abominated the thought of a forced exile. They had lorded it over the fire-lands until they believed themselves invincible, but they had discovered one at whose command they must depart.
“Well, Miss Huldah, we are going to leave the old fire-lands, and we’re never coming back any more. What do you think about that?”
For a moment the settler’s child said nothing. She stood before the outlaw in the little tent which Colonel O’Neill had given him, when they were on better terms than now, and looked up into his darkly handsome face.
“Of course, sir, I do not wish to go,” were the words that fell from her lips, at last. “But I know ’tis useless for me to appeal to you.”
“Utterly useless, Huldah,” he answered, calmly. “I will offer you no violence, and none shall come to you from any one. But let me tell you now that I am very passionate, and that no hand shall snatch you from me. I will make no avowal of love; this is not the place for such; but if I did not love you I would return you to the old man who, in your presence calls you child. Huldah, tell me how many lovers you possess?”
“None, unless I must regard you as such,” she answered, with a faint smile.
“You should have thought a moment before you spoke. There’s Wolf-Cap—”
“His hair is gray in many places,” said Huldah, interrupting him. “He is not my lover.”
“Granted; but hasn’t some young hunter in Fort Strong looked softly into your eyes? Speak truly, Huldah Armstrong—I want to know.”
For a moment the settler’s daughter recalled the daring young men who had bravely defended their loved ones in the besieged fort, and a flush of crimson mantled her fair cheeks.
“I think I have no lover,” she said, looking up again.
“But you blushed while you thought,” said the outlaw, quickly; “and blushes, like figures, Huldah, do not lie. Some young buck-skin-clad fellow has made your heart beat fast behind the walls of the doomed fort. Tell me his name.”
“Why would you know?”
“I would kill him, if he escaped the massacre. Huldah, I will endure no rivals for your hand. Remember this. But you have skipped a lover.”
The fair girl, whose cheeks had grown pale beneath the vengeful words, looked surprised.
“Yes, you possess a third lover, Huldah. Can you not name him?”
“I can not. Your words are fraught with mystery,” she replied.
“Colonel O’Neill is your lover. He tried to have me shot, that he might possess you. What do you think of your red-coated Adonis? He’s the handsomest of all your lovers—isn’t he, Huldah?”
The outlaw laughed at his sarcastic question, and turned to talk to one of his men, whose face appeared at the opening.
A short conversation in a low whisper passed between the Night-Hawks, when the face disappeared, and Funk turned to his captive again.
“We won’t get off till near sundown,” he said. “That liveried dog has refused to loan us his boats, and Splitlog has been compelled to send to the mouth of the Catauga for several of his own. By heavens! Huldah, I want to meet that man away from his men. I’d promote Major Gosnoke to the colonelcy with a bullet. There’s something devilish afoot. I feel it. This night will witness treacherous deeds. O’Neill will not give you up tamely—neither will I!”
A moment later the outlaw walked from the tent, and Huldah Armstrong heard him say a few words to the Night-Hawks who guarded her, before he walked away.
The long hours of that summer day waned, and not a shot was fired at the fort. It was a painful silence to the girl, and told of bloody scenes during the coming darkness. She could see the charred roof from her prison, but not a besieged form greeted her eye.
By and by the trees on the river-bank cast long shadows, and Splitlog, followed by numerous warriors and a few soldiers, was seen approaching the outlaw’s tent.
Five Night-Hawks received the company with lowering gaze, and a word from the chief drew out Roy Funk and his prisoner.
“We’re ready, chief,” said the Night-Hawk leader.
“Then to the river,” replied Splitlog, pointing to the water. “The boats wait for the Night-Hawks of the fire-lands.”
The entire party marched down to the river, where an outlaw and several Indians guarded two large and strong boats.
“This is the beginning of our journey, Huldah,” said Roy Funk, as he gently lifted the settler’s daughter into one of the barks. “The beginning, I say; God knows what the ending will be.”
His words implied grave doubts of a safe termination of the voyage; but the next moment he was talking cheerfully to his men and the chief.
“We’ll see you again, Splitlog,” called the outlaw, as the boats were cast from their moorings. “We’ll drink fire-water some day over our doings in the fire-lands. But remember what I whispered in your ear: watch him, as you would a snake!”
Then the outlaws seized the pliant paddles, and the two big boats moved rapidly down the current.
For the dusk that stretched before the voyagers seemed to breathe of a lurking foe.
Splitlog and his companions watched the boats until a bend in the river hid them from sight.
“Now,” said the chief, turning away, “the white man’s fort falls. The night is coming on, and the flames of the big timbers must light the sky.”
But other scenes than the taking of the block-house, were to demand the Wyandot’s attention before dawn.