The Eyes of the Woods Part 9

"Didn't you hear the villyun say that two o' the warriors wuz to go back with the boat?"

"Well, what of it?"

"Then two warriors is goin' to be me an' you, Henry."

"Of course. I ought to have thought of it, too."

"Thar must be sent'nels on the bank, but waitin' 'bout ten minutes we'll git into the canoe an' paddle off. The sent'nels will know that two warriors are to go back in it, an' they'll think we're them. This darkness which has come up, heavy an' black, on purpose to help us, will keep 'em from seein' that we ain't warriors. When we git into the middle o' the river, whar thar eyes can't even make out the canoe, we'll go down stream like a flash o' lightnin', pick up the boys and then be off ag'in like another flash o' lightnin'."

"A good plan, Sol, and we'll try it. As you say, luck is always on the side of the bold, and I don't see why we can't succeed."

But to wait the necessary fifteen minutes was one of the hardest tasks they ever undertook. It would not do to take the canoe at once, as suspicion would certainly be aroused. They must conform to Blackstaffe's own plan. It seemed to them that they must actually hold themselves with their own hands to keep from creeping forward to the canoe, yet they did it, though the minutes doubled and redoubled in length, and then tripled; but, after a time that both judged sufficient, they slid forward, and Henry's knife cut the willow withe. Then they lifted themselves gently into the canoe, took up two of the paddles and were away.

Henry's back was to the southern bank, and despite all his experience and courage shivers ran through his body at the thought that a bullet from the forest might strike him any moment. Yet he did not wish to seem in a hurry, and restrained his eagerness to paddle with all his might.

"Softly, Sol, softly," he said. "We must not be in too much haste."

"Don't I know it, Henry? Don't I know that we must 'pear to be the two warriors whose business it is to take back the canoe? Ain't I jest strainin' an' achin' to make the biggest sweep with my paddle I ever swep', an' ain't my mind pullin' ag'inst my hands all the time, tryin'

to keep 'em at the proper gait? Are you sh.o.r.e you ain't felt no bullet in your back yet, Henry?"

"No, Sol. What makes you ask such a question?"

"'Cause I reckon I wuz so much afeared o' one that I imagined the place whar it's track would be in me, ef it had been really fired. My fancy is pow'ful lively at sech a time."

"There has been no alarm, at least not yet, and we're near the middle of the river. The canoe must be invisible, although I can see the fires on either sh.o.r.e. Now, Sol, we'll turn down stream and paddle with all our might, showing what canoemen we really are!"

It was with actual physical as well as mental joy that they turned the prow of the canoe toward the southeast, that is, with the current, and began to do their best with the paddles. They no longer had that horrible fear of a bullet in the back, and muscles seemed to leap together with the spirit into greater strength and elasticity.

"Come on you, Henry," said Shif'less Sol exultantly. "Keep up your side!

Prove that you're jest ez good a man with the paddle ez me! We ain't makin' more'n a mile a minute, an' fur sech ez we are that's nothin' but standin' still!"

The two bent their powerful backs a little and their great arms swept the paddles through the water at an amazing rate. The soul of Shif'less Sol surged up to the heights. He became dithyrambic and he spoke in a tone not loud, but full of concentrated fire and feeling.

"Fine, you Henry, you!" he said. "But we kin do better! The canoe is goin' fast, but one or two canoes in the hist'ry o' the world hez gone ez fast! We must go faster by ten or fifteen miles an hour an' set the record that will stan'! It's so dark in here I can't see either bank, but I wish sometimes I could, warriors or no warriors! Then I could see 'em whizzin' by, jest streaks, with all the trees and bushes meltin'

into one another like a green ribbon! Now, that's the way to do it, Henry! Our speed is jumpin'! I ain't sh.o.r.e whether the canoe is touchin'

the water or not! I think mebbe it's jest our paddles that dip in, an'

that the canoe is flyin' through the air! An' not a soun' from 'em yet!

They haven't discovered that the wrong warriors hev took thar boat, but they will soon! Now we'll turn her in toward the southern bank, Henry, 'cause in the battin' o' an eye or two we'll be whar the rest o' the boys are a-lyin' hid in the bushes! Now, slow an' slower! I kin see the trees an' bushes separatin' tha.r.s.elves, an' thar's the bank, an' now I see the face o' Long Jim, 'bout seven feet above the groun'! He's an onery, ugly cuss, never givin' me all the respeck that's due me, but somehow I like him, an' he never looked better nor more welcome than he does now, G.o.d bless the long-armed, long-legged, fightin', gen'rous, kind-hearted cuss! An' thar's Paul, too, lookin' fur all the world like a scholar, crammed full o' book l'arnin', 'stead o' the ring-tailed forest runner, half hoss, half alligator, that he is, though he's got the book l'arnin' an' is one o' the greatest scholars the world ever seed! An' that's Tom Ross, with his mouth openin' ez ef he wuz 'bout to speak a word, though he'll conclude, likely, that he oughtn't, an' all three o' 'em are pow'ful glad to see us comin' in our triumphal Roman gallus that we hev captured from the enemy."

"Galley, Sol, galley! Not gallus!"

"It's all the same, galley or gallus. We hev got it, an' we are in it, an' it's a fine big canoe with six paddles, one for ev'ry one o' us an'

one to spare! Now here we are ag'in the bank, an' thar they are ready to jump in!"

There was no time for hesitation, as a long and tremendous war whoop from a point up the stream seemed to surcharge the whole night with rage and ferocity. It was evident that the warriors had discovered that the wrong men had taken the canoe, as they were bound to do soon, and the chase would be on at once, conducted with all the power and tenacity of those who devoted their lives to such deeds.

"They'll know, of course, that we've come down the stream, not daring to go against the current," said Henry, "and they'll follow with every canoe they have."

"An' more will run along either bank hopin' fur a shot," said the shiftless one, "an' so while we turn our canoe into a shootin' star ag'in we'll hev to remember to keep in the middle o' the stream. A lot o' the dark that helped us to git the canoe is fadin' away, leavin' us to make our race fur our lives mostly in the open."

The great war whoop came again, filling the forest with its fierce echoes, and then followed silence, a silence which every one of the five knew would be broken later by the plash of paddles. The valley Indians had great canoes, sometimes carrying as many as twenty paddles, and when twenty strong backs were bent into one of them it could come at greater speed than any five in the world could command.

But this five, calm and ready to face any danger, put their rifles where they could reach them in an instant, and then their canoe shot down the stream.

CHAPTER V

THE PROTECTING RIVER

The Ohio was the great stream of the borderers. It was the artery that led into the vast, rich new lands of the west, upon its waters many of them came, and upon its current and along its banks were fought thrilling battles between white men and red. Many a race for life was made upon its bosom, but none was ever carried on with more courage and energy than the one now occurring.

They kept well to the middle of the stream, which was still of great width, a full mile across, where they would be safe from shots from either sh.o.r.e, until the river narrowed, and although they sent the canoe along very fast, they did not use their full strength, keeping a reserve for the greater emergency which was sure to come.

Meanwhile they worked like a machine. The arms of five rose together and five paddles made a single plash. In the returning moonlight the water took on a silver color, and it fell away in ma.s.ses of shimmering bubbles from the paddle blades. Before them the river spread its vast width, at once a channel of escape and of danger. The forest yet rose on either bank, a solid ma.s.s of green, in which nothing stirred, and from which no sound came.

The silence, save for the swish of the paddles, was brooding and full of menace. Paul, so sensitive to circ.u.mstance, felt as if it were a sullen sky, out of which would suddenly come a blazing flash of lightning. But to Henry the greatest anxiety was the narrowing of the river which must come before long. The Ohio was not a mile wide everywhere, and when that straightening of the stream occurred they would be within rifle shot of the warriors on one bank or the other. And while the Indians were not good marksmen, it was true that where there were many bullets not all missed.

A quarter of an hour pa.s.sed, and they heard the war-whoop behind them, and then a few moments later the faint, rhythmic swish of paddles. The moonlight had been deepening fast, and Henry saw two of the great canoes appear, although they were yet a full half mile away. But they came on at a mighty pace, and it was evident that unless bullets stopped them they would overtake the fugitives. Henry put aside his paddle, leaving the work for the present to the others, and studied the long canoes. He and his comrades might strain as they would, but in an hour the big boats filled with muscular warriors would be alongside. They must devise some other method to elude the pursuit. A shout from Paul caused him to turn.

A peninsula from the south projected into the river, making its width at this point much less than half a mile, and upon the spit, which was bare, stood several Indian warriors, rifle in hand and waiting.

"Turn the canoe in toward the northern sh.o.r.e," said Henry. "We must chance a shot from that quarter, dealing with the seen danger, and letting the unseen go. Sol, you and Tom take your rifles, and I'll take mine too. Paul, you and Jim do the paddling and we'll see whether those warriors on the sand stop us, or are just taking a heavy risk themselves."

The canoe sheered off violently toward the northern bank, but did not cease to move swiftly, as Paul and Jim alone were able to send it along at a great rate. Henry, with his rifle lying in the hollow of his arm, watched a large warrior standing on the edge of the water.

"I'll take the big fellow with the waving scalp lock," he said.

"The short, broad one by the side o' him is mine," said Shif'less Sol.

"Which is yours, Tom?"

"One with red blanket looped over his shoulder," replied the taciturn rover.

"Be sure of your aim," said Henry. "We're running a gauntlet, but it's likely to be as much of a gauntlet for those warriors as it is for us."

Perhaps the Indians on the spit did not know that the canoe contained the best marksmen in the West, as they crowded closer to the water's edge, uttered a yell or two of triumph and raised their own weapons. The three rifles in the canoe flashed together and the big warrior, the short, broad one, and the one with the red blanket looped over his shoulder, fell on the sand. One of them got up again and fled with his unhurt comrades into the forest, but the others lay quite still, with their feet in the water. As the marksmen reloaded rapidly, Henry cried to the paddlers:

"Now, boys, back toward the middle of the river and put all your might in it!"

Paul and Long Jim swung the canoe into the main current, which had increased greatly in strength here, owing to the narrowing of the stream, and their paddles flashed fast. Two of the Indians who had fled into the woods reappeared and fired at them, but their bullets fell wide, and Henry, who had now rammed in the second charge, wounded one of them, whereupon they fled to cover as quickly as they did the first time.

Shif'less Sol and Tom Ross had also reloaded, but put their rifles in the bottom of the boat and resumed their paddles. The danger on the land spit had been pa.s.sed, but the great canoes behind them were hanging on tenaciously and were gaining, not rapidly, but with certainty. Henry swept them again with a measuring eye, and he saw no reason to change his calculations.

"They'll come within rifle shot in just about an hour," he repeated.

"We'd pick off some of them with our bullets, but they'd keep on coming anyhow, and that would be the end of us."