The Forest Runners Part 33

Nothing more was said upon the subject for days, but Paul's mind was full of it. His comrades and he had impeded the making of the great war trail, and now they were to see that reenforcements safely reached their own. It was a continuing task, and it appealed powerfully to the statesman so strong in Paul.

A very cold winter moved slowly along, and they remained on the island, though Henry and Ross ranged far and wide. On one of these expeditions the two scouts met a wandering trapper, by whom they sent word again to their people in the south that they were safe.

Henry and Ross also learned that Yellow Panther would lead the Miamis, Red Eagle the Shawnees, and there would be detachments of Wyandots and others.

They would fall like a thunderbolt upon the wagon train, and destroy it utterly.

"And Braxton Wyatt will be with them?" said Paul indignantly.

"Of course," replied Henry.

"Henry, we've got to save that wagon train, if every one of us dies trying!" exclaimed Paul, with the greatest possible emphasis.

"Of course," said Henry again, quietly, but with the stern determination that meant with him do or die.

"It's a part o' our job," drawled Shif'less Sol, "but it must be nigh a thousand miles to the place whar the Wilderness Road comes out o' the mountains. I see a terrible long journey ahead fur a tired man."

Henry smiled. They all knew that none would be more zealous on the march, none more lion-hearted in battle, than this same Solomon Hyde, nicknamed the shiftless one.

"When do we start?" asked Jim Hart.

"Not before the cold weather pa.s.ses," replied Henry. "It wouldn't be worth while. The emigrant train won't come through the mountains until spring, and we can do better work here, watching the savages."

So they abode long in the hut on the haunted island, and had food and warmth in plenty. But in the Indian villages there was the stir of preparation for the great war trail in the spring, and also the sense of mystery and oppression. Yellow Panther, the Miami, and Red Eagle, the Shawnee, both felt in some strange, unaccountable way that they were watched. Half-lost tracks of unknown feet were seen in the snow; strange trails that ended nowhere were struck; three warriors, every one at a different time, claimed to have seen a gigantic figure speeding in a pale moonlight through the leafless forest; one of the bravest of the Shawnee warriors was found dead, his head cleft so deep that they knew a mighty hand, one of almost marvelous strength, had wielded the tomahawk. There were signs of a terrible struggle in the snow, but who had attacked and who defended they did not know, and the trail of the survivor was soon lost. A mysterious dread filled both Shawnees and Miamis.

Braxton Wyatt raged at heart in the Shawnee village, and had theories of his own, but he dared not tell them. It was known there that it was he who had led the Miamis into the sacrilegious invasion of the haunted island, and it would take his credit some time to recover from such a blow. To reestablish himself thoroughly he must do valuable work for his red friends on the coming great war trail. So he remained discreetly silent about the haunted island, and told all he knew of the white settlements, the Wilderness Road, and the way to trap the emigrant train. Here he could really be of great a.s.sistance to the alliance, and he told the chiefs all about the emigrants, how they marched, and how they would be enc.u.mbered with women and children.

Meanwhile, the five never ceased their vigilance. Henry and Ross bought a large quant.i.ty of ammunition from a Canadian trader whom they met on a trip far to the north, and however much they used in the winter, they were now a.s.sured of an abundance when they started southeast in the spring.

The winter was long and very cold. One snow fell upon another; one freeze after another thickened the ice upon the lake; and when the wind blew, it had the edge of a knife. But this could not last forever. One day the wind shifted around and blew from the south. Paul, who was outside the hut helping Jim Hart, felt a soft, warm breath on his face.

"Why, Jim!" he said, "the cold seems to be going away."

"So it is," said Jim Hart, "or at least it's gittin' ready. Spring ain't far off, an' I'm glad, Paul. I'm tired uv winter, an' I want to be strikin' out on the great war trail."

"So do I," said Paul.

"Wa'al, fur the matter o' that," said Shif'less Sol, "we've been on the great war trail fur three or four months now. There ain't to be no change except in the shiftin' o' the trail."

The warm wind continued to blow for days, the surface of the ice on the lake softened, and the snow began to melt. Still it blew, and the melted snow ran in rivers, the ice broke up into great sheets and chunks, and these, too, rapidly dissolved. Then a warm rain came, pouring for a day and a night, and the ice and snow were swept away entirely. But the whole earth ran water. Lakes stood in the forest, and every brook and creek, rushing in torrents, leaped its banks.

The five had remained in their hut when the rain came down, but two days later Henry and Ross were rowed over in the canoe, and went away to spy out the country. When they returned they said that the great war party of the allied tribes would soon be in motion, and it was time for the five to take their flight.

A warm sun had been shining for days, and the earth had dried again. The turbulent brooks and creeks had withdrawn to their accustomed beds, and faint touches of green were beginning to show in the wilderness.

"We'll leave our house just as we have built it," said Henry.

"Unless a white man should come wandering here, and that isn't likely, it won't be disturbed. It's been a good place for us."

"Yes," said Paul, "it has been a good home to us. I've spent a happy winter here, and I want to see it again."

But they had little time for sentiment. They were making the fast touches of preparation for the second stage of the great war trail--arranging clothing, light supplies of food, and, above all, ammunition. Then they left at night in their canoe. As they approached the mainland, all, as if by involuntary impulse, looked back at the haunted island, looming darkly in the night.

"It was no haunted island for us," said Paul.

"No," said Henry.

They landed, hid the canoe, and then, plunging into the forest, sped far to the south and east on tireless feet.

CHAPTER XIX

THE WARNING

Meanwhile war belts were pa.s.sing through all the forest, from tribe to tribe, to Shawnee, Miami, Ottawa, Wyandot--to every band, large or small.

Another great effort would be made to drive back the thin white vanguard that was now entering the finest hunting ground savages had ever known--the vast green wilderness of the Mississippi Valley, where the warriors had roamed and killed game for unknown generations. Northern and southern tribes had often met and fought in _Kain-tuck-ee_, but always each retreated after the conflict to north or to south, leaving _Kain-tuck-ee_ as it was before--a land of forest and canebrake, inhabited only by the wild beast.

Now, every warrior felt that the coming of the white stream over the mountains, however slender it might be at first, threatened a change, great and disastrous to them, unless checked at once. These white men cut down the forest, built houses that were meant to stay in one place--houses of logs--and plowed up the fields where the forest had been. They felt in some dim, but none the less certain, way that not only their favorite hunting grounds, but they and their own existence, were threatened.

They had failed the year before in a direct attack upon the new settlements, but these little oases in the wilderness must in time perish unless the white stream coming over the mountains still reached them, nourishing them with fresh bone and sinew, and making them grow. A great wagon train was coming, and this they would strike, surprising it in the vast, dark wilderness when it was not dreaming that even a single warrior was near.

A great defeat they had suffered at Wareville the year before still stung, and the spur of revenge was added to the spur of need. What they felt they ought to do was exactly what they wanted to do, and they were full of hope. They did not know that the stream flowing over the mountains, now so small, was propelled by a tremendous force behind it, the great white race always moving onward, and they expected nothing less than a complete triumph.

Active warriors pa.s.sed through the deep woods, bearing belts and messages.

Their faces were eager, and always they urged war. A long journey lay before them, but the blow would be a master stroke. They were received everywhere with joy and approval. The tomahawks were dug up, the war dances were danced, the war songs sung, and the men began to paint their faces and bodies for battle. A hum and a murmur ran through the northwestern forests, the hum and murmur of preparation and hope. Only the five, on their little island in the lake, yet heard this hum and murmur, so ominous to the border, but they were ready to carry the message through the wilderness to those to whom the warning meant the most.

The largest wagon train that had yet crossed the mountains into _Kain-tuck-ee_ toiled slowly along the Wilderness Road among the foothills, bearing steadily toward the Northwest. The line of canvas covers stretched away more than a hundred in number, and contained five hundred souls, of whom, perhaps, half were men and boys capable of bearing arms, the rest women and children.

They looked upon mountain, hill and forest, river and brook, with much the same eyes as those with which Henry and Paul had beheld them not so very long before, but they were not seeking at random in the wilderness as the Wareville people had done. No, they moved forward now to a certain mark.

They were to join their brethren at Wareville and Marlowe, and double the strength of the settlements. Word had come to them over the mountains that the little outposts in the vast wilderness lived and flourished, and the country was good. Moreover, they and their strength were needed.

Wareville and Marlowe looked for them as eagerly as they looked for Wareville and Marlowe.

Spring was deepening, and already had drawn its robe of green over all the earth, but Daniel Poe, the commander of the wagon train, paid little attention to its beauty. He was nearly sixty years of age, but in the very prime of his strength--a great, square-shouldered man, his head and face covered with thick, black beard. His eyes had their habitual look of watchful care. They had seen no Indian sign as they crossed the mountains, but he knew now that they were on the Dark and b.l.o.o.d.y Ground, and the lives of five hundred human beings were a heavy responsibility.

"You are sure the country is entirely safe?" he said to d.i.c.k Salter, one of his guides.

"I don't know no reason to doubt it," replied Salter. "The savages don't often get down here. The villages uv the northwestern tribes must be close on to a thousand miles from here, an' besides they were beat off last year, an' beat badly, when they tried to rush Wareville."

"That is so," said Daniel Poe thoughtfully; "we had word of it. But, d.i.c.k, we can't afford to take all these people into danger here in the woods. Look at the women and children."

They had just begun to stop for the night, and to draw the wagons into a circle in a convenient, slightly hollowed, open place. The women and children were trooping about upon the gra.s.s, and the air was filled with the sound of merry voices. All were browned by the sun, but they were healthy and joyous, and they looked forward with keen delight to meeting kin who had gone on before at Wareville. They had no fear of the mighty forests, when more than two hundred pairs of strong arms fenced them about.

"That is sh.o.r.ely a pleasant sight," said d.i.c.k Salter. "I've seed the same many evenin's, an' I hope to see it many more evenin's. We'll get 'em through, Mr. Poe, we'll get 'em through!"