The Forest Runners Part 15

"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 pa.s.s 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 pa.s.s 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 pa.s.sed the last wigwam, and he took a step into the open s.p.a.ce 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 mult.i.tude. 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 a.s.suming 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 s.p.a.ce 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.

CHAPTER X

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 embarra.s.sment, 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."