The Riflemen of the Ohio Part 33

They grasped his hand, one by one, and shook his good arm heartily.

"Was that where you caught the bullet?" asked Henry, looking at the bad arm.

Long Jim nodded.

"Broke?"

Long Jim shook his head.

"Thought so at first," he replied, "but it ain't. Bruised more'n anything else, but it's been terrible sore. Gittin' better now, though.

I'll hev the use uv it back all right in a week."

"It seems that you haven't been faring so badly," said Henry.

Long Jim looked around the little valley and grinned in appreciation.

"I knowed I couldn't do anything about the fort with this bad arm," he said. "Weakened ez I wuz, I wuzn't sh.o.r.e I could swim the river with one arm, an' even ef I ever reached the fort I'd be more likely to be a hindrance than a help. So I found this place, an' here I've stayed, restin' an' recuperatin' an' waitin' fur you fellers to come back. I didn't want to shoot, 'cause them that I didn't want to hear might hear it, an' 'cause, too, I knowed how to set traps an' snares."

"We saw one of them as we came along," said Henry.

"They've worked bee-yu-tiful," said Long Jim, an ecstatic look coming over his face. "I've caught rabbits an' a 'possum. Then I set to work and built this oven, an' I've learned a new way to broil rabbit steaks on the hot stones. It's sh.o.r.ely somethin' wonderful. It keeps all the juice in 'em, an' they're so tender they jest melt in your mouth, an'

they're so light you could eat a hundred without ever knowin' that you had 'em."

"That's what I'm thinkin'," said Shif'less Sol, reaching for his rifle.

"Gimme about twenty o' them steaks quicker'n you kin wink an eye, Jim Hart, or I'll let you hev it."

Long Jim, the soul of an artist still aflame within him, willingly produced the steaks, and all ate, finding that they were what he had claimed them to be. But he waited eagerly for the verdict, his head bent forward and his eyes expectant.

"Best I ever tasted," said Henry.

Long Jim's eyes flashed.

"Finer than silk," said Shif'less Sol.

Sparks leaped from Long Jim's eyes.

"Could eat 'em forever without stoppin'," said Tom Ross.

Long Jim's eyes blazed.

"I couldn't 'a' stood it ef you fellers hadn't liked my finest 'chievement," he said. "Shows you've got more sense than I thought you had."

"Jim feels like Columbus did that time he discovered Ameriky," said Shif'less Sol. "Knowed it wuz thar all the time, but wanted other people to know that he knowed it wuz thar."

"It's a snug place, Jim, this little valley, or rather pit, of yours,"

said Henry, "but we must leave it at once and find Paul."

"That's sh.o.r.ely so," said Long Jim, casting a regretful look at his oven, "but I wish we could come back here an' stay a while after we found him. That thar oven don't look much, but it works pow'ful. I b'lieve I could make some more uv them Columbus dis-kiv-er-ies with it."

"I don't think we will be back this way for a long time," said Henry, "but your oven will keep. Sol is compelled to bear a similar sorrow. He has the snuggest nest in the side of a cliff that ever you did see, but he has left it just as it is, and he hopes to see it again some day."

"That bein' the case," said Long Jim, "I think I kin stand it, since Sol here is my brother in sorrow."

They left the deep little valley, although Jim Hart cast more than one longing glance behind, and began the search for Paul, who had been the first to fall by the way. The four were a unit in believing that this would be the most difficult task of all. Paul, although he had learned much, was not a natural woodsman in the sense that the others were.

Henry had reckoned all the time upon certain laws of the forest which Sol, Tom, and Jim would obey. He was with them like the skilled boxer meeting the skilled opponent, but Paul might at any time strike a blow contrary to science, and therefore unexpected. Although Paul had not been wounded, Henry felt more apprehension about him than he had ever felt about any one of the others, because of this very uncertainty.

They returned upon the back trail, and with four minds and four pairs of eyes working, they had no great difficulty in locating the point at which Paul had left them. Like most of the country it was heavily wooded, and one could easily find a hiding place so long as the dark lasted.

They located their own line of flight, not because any visible signs of it were left, but because they remembered the region through which they had run.

"Here is whar Paul turned away an' jumped into the bushes," said Shif'less Sol, "an' he sh.o.r.ely didn't go fur, 'cause he wuz pow'ful tired. I reckon Paul wuz tired enough to last him fur a month."

They turned to the eastward, and about a half mile further on, after long search, they found a place in the densest bushes that showed signs of crushing. Some twigs were broken, and several of the smaller bushes, bent to one side by a heavy body, had not returned to their normal position.

"Here is where Paul laid down to rest," said Henry.

"An' he wuz so tired he fell asleep an' slep' all night," said Shif'less Sol.

"He sh.o.r.ely did," said Tom Ross, "'cause these bushes wuz bent so long they ain't had time to straighten out ag'in."

"An' him with nothin' to eat the next mornin', poor feller," said Long Jim sympathetically.

They were able to follow Paul's trail a rod or so by the bent bushes, but then they lost it, and they stood conferring. Henry's eye fell upon a ma.s.s of wild flowers on a distant hill slope, red, blue, and delicate pink. He admired them at first, and then his eyes brightened with sudden comprehension.

"Paul has always loved beautiful things," he said to his comrades. "He does not forget to see them even in moments of danger, and he would naturally go toward that slope over there covered with wild flowers."

Shif'less Sol slapped his knee in approval.

"You do reason fine, Henry," he said. "Paul would sh.o.r.ely make fur them flowers, jest 'cause he couldn't help it."

They invaded the flower field, and, as all of them confidently expected, they saw signs that Paul had been there. Some of the flowers were broken down, but not many--Paul would take care not to injure them in such a way. But Henry's shrewd eye noticed where several had been cut from the stem. Paul had done this with his hunting knife, and probably he had thrust one or more of the flowers into his buckskin hunting coat.

When they crossed the flower field the trail was lost again.

"Now," said Long Jim, "how are you goin' to tell what Paul wuz thinkin'

when he wuz comin' 'long here?"

Henry and Shif'less Sol wrinkled their brows in thought.

"Paul was not wounded," he replied. "After his night's sleep--and probably he did not wake up until long after daylight had come--he was thoroughly rested and as strong as ever. After making sure of his direction from the hill top here, he would go toward the river, thinking it his duty yet to reach the fort if he could."

"An' naterally," said Shif'less Sol, "he'd go whar the walkin' wuz easiest, but whar thar wuz kiver so he couldn't be seen by warriors. So he'd choose the easy slope under them big trees thar, an' go south toward that valley."

"Reckon you're right," said Long Jim in a convinced tone. "That's just about what Paul would do."

They descended the slope, an easy one, for a quarter of a mile, and came to a valley thickset with bushes and blackberry vines containing sharp briars.

"Paul wouldn't go crashin' into a briar patch," said Long Jim.