[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
and gave a long, mournful howl. Then, he too disappeared.
A mile west of the settlement Wetzel abandoned the forest and picked his way
down the steep bluff to the river. Here he prepared to swim to the western
shore. He took off his buckskin garments, spread them out on the ground,
placed his knapsack in the middle, and rolling all into a small bundle tied it
round his rifle. Grasping the rifle just above the hammer he waded into the
Page 133
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
water up to his waist and then, turning easily on his back he held the rifle
straight up, allowing the butt to rest on his breast. This left his right arm
unhampered. With a powerful back-arm stroke he rapidly swam the river, which
was deep and narrow at this point. In a quarter of an hour he was once more in
his dry suit.
He was now two miles below the island, where yesterday the Indians had been
concealed, and where this morning Miller had crossed. Wetzel knew Miller
expected to be trailed, and that he would use every art and cunning of
woodcraft to elude his pursuers, or to lead them into a death-trap. Wetzel
believed Miller had joined the Indians, who had undoubtedly been waiting for
him, or for a signal from him, and that he would use them to ambush the trail.
Therefore Wetzel decided he would try to strike Miller's tracks far west of
the river. He risked a great deal in attempting this because it was possible
he might fail to find any trace of the spy. But Wetzel wasted not one second.
His course was chosen. With all possible speed, which meant with him walking
only when he could not run, he traveled northwest. If Miller had taken the
direction Wetzel suspected, the trails of the two men would cross about ten
miles from the Ohio. But the hunter had not traversed more than a mile of the
forest when the dog put his nose high in the air and growled. Wetzel slowed
down into a walk and moved cautiously onward, peering through the green aisles
of the woods. A few rods farther on Tige uttered another growl and put his
nose to the ground. He found a trail. On examination Wetzel discovered in the
moss two moccasin tracks. Two Indians had passed that point that morning. They
were going northwest directly toward the camp of Wingenund. Wetzel stuck close
to the trail all that day and an hour before dusk he heard the sharp crack of
a rifle. A moment afterward a doe came crashing through the thicket to
Wetzel's right and bounding across a little brook she disappeared.
A tree with a bushy, leafy top had been uprooted by a storm and had fallen
across the stream at this point. Wetzel crawled among the branches. The dog
followed and lay down beside him. Before darkness set in Wetzel saw that the
clear water of the brook had been roiled; therefore, he concluded that
somewhere upstream Indians had waded into the brook. Probably they had killed
a deer and were getting their evening meal.
Hours passed. Twilight deepened into darkness. One by one the stars appeared;
then the crescent moon rose over the wooded hill in the west, and the hunter
never moved. With his head leaning against the log he sat quiet and patient.
At midnight he whispered to the dog, and crawling from his hiding place glided
stealthily up the stream. Far ahead from the dark depths of the forest peeped
the flickering light of a camp-fire. Wetzel consumed a half hour in
approaching within one hundred feet of this light. Then he got down on his
hands and knees and crawled behind a tree on top of the little ridge which had
obstructed a view of the camp scene.
From this vantage point Wetzel saw a clear space surrounded by pines and
hemlocks. In the center of this glade a fire burned briskly. Two Indians lay
wrapped in their blankets, sound asleep. Wetzel pressed the dog close to the
ground, laid aside his rifle, drew his tomahawk, and lying flat on his breast
commenced to work his way, inch by inch, toward the sleeping savages. The tall
ferns trembled as the hunter wormed his way among them, but there was no
sound, not a snapping of a twig nor a rustling of a leaf. The nightwind sighed
softly through the pines; it blew the bright sparks from the burning logs, and
fanned the embers into a red glow; it swept caressingly over the sleeping
savages, but it could not warn them that another wind, the Wind-of-Death, as
near at hand.
A quarter of an hour elapsed. Nearer and nearer; slowly but surely drew the
Page 134
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
hunter. With what wonderful patience and self-control did this cold-blooded
Nemesis approach his victims! Probably any other Indian slayer would have
fired his rifle and then rushed to combat with a knife or a tomahawk. Not so
Wetzel. He scorned to use powder. He crept forward like a snake gliding upon
its prey. He slid one hand in front of him and pressed it down on the moss, at
first gently, then firmly, and when he had secured a good hold he slowly
dragged his body forward the length of his arm. At last his dark form rose and
stood over the unconscious Indians, like a minister of Doom. The tomahawk
flashed once, twice in the firelight, and the Indians, without a moan, and
with a convulsive quivering and straightening of their bodies, passed from the
tired sleep of nature to the eternal sleep of death.
Foregoing his usual custom of taking the scalps, Wetzel hurriedly left the
glade. He had found that the Indians were Shawnees and he had expected they
were Delawares. He knew Miller's red comrades belonged to the latter tribe.
The presence of Shawnees so near the settlement confirmed his belief that a
concerted movement was to be made on the whites in the near future. He would
not have been surprised to find the woods full of redskins. He spent the
remainder of that night close under the side of a log with the dog curled up
beside him.
Next morning Wetzel ran across the trail of a white man and six Indians. He
tracked them all that day and half of the night before he again rested. By
noon of the following day he came in sight of the cliff from which Jonathan
Zane had watched the sufferings of Col. Crawford. Wetzel now made his favorite
move, a wide detour, and came up on the other side of the encampment.
From the top of the bluff he saw down into the village of the Delawares. The
valley was alive with Indians; they were working like beavers; some with
weapons, some painting themselves, and others dancing war-dances. Packs were
being strapped on the backs of ponies. Everywhere was the hurry and bustle of
the preparation for war. The dancing and the singing were kept up half the
night.
At daybreak Wetzel was at his post. A little after sunrise he heard a long
yell which he believed announced the arrival of an important party. And so it
turned out. Amid thrill yelling and whooping, the like of which Wetzel had
never before heard, Simon Girty rode into Wingenund's camp at the head of one
hundred Shawnee warriors and two hundred British Rangers from Detroit. Wetzel
recoiled when he saw the red uniforms of the Britishers and their bayonets.
Including Fipe's and Wingenund's braves the total force which was going to
march against the Fort exceeded six hundred. An impotent frenzy possessed
Wetzel as he watched the orderly marching of the Rangers and the proud bearing
of the Indian warriors. Miller had spoken the truth. Ft. Henry vas doomed.
"Tige, there's one of them struttin' turkey cocks as won't see the Ohio,"
said Wetzel to the dog.
Hurriedly slipping from round his neck the bullet-pouch that Betty had given
him, he shook out a bullet and with the point of his knife he scratched deep
in the soft lead the letter W. Then he cut the bullet half through. This done
he detached the pouch from the cord and running the cord through the cut in
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]