The point where I had broken cover to step into the circle of fire light was nearly equidistant from the Englishmen's camp on the right and the horse meadow on the left, so I had not to pass within recognition range of the great fire; indeed, I might have skulked1 in the laurel cover all the way, thus coming to the horses unseen by any, but that I was afraid Falconnet might miss his trooper. So I thought it best to show myself discreetly2.
Copying our captive's lounging stride, I first held a sauntering course down to the stream's edge, keeping the great camp-fire and the droning Indian hive well to the right and far enough aloof3 to baffle any over-curious eye at either. Coming to the stream without mishap4, I stopped and made a feint of drinking; after which I crossed and climbed slowly toward the makeshift powder magazine.
As I have said, the camp was pitched in a small savanna5 or natural clearing on the right bank of the little river. This clearing was hedged about by the forest on three sides, and backed by the densely6 wooded steeps and crags of the western cliff. I guessed the compass of it to be something more than an acre; not greatly more, since the fire at the troop camp lighted all its boundaries.
On the left or opposite bank of the stream there was no intervale at all. The ground rose sharply from the water's edge in a rough hillside thickly studded and bestrewn with boulders7 great and small; fallen cleavings and hewings from the crags of the eastern cliff. 'Twas at the foot of one of the boulders, a huge overhanging mass of weather-riven rock facing the camp, that the powder cargo9 was sheltered; so isolated10 to be out of danger from the camp-fires.
From the hillside just below this powder rock I could look back upon the camp en enfilade, as an artilleryman would say. Nearest at hand was the half-moon of Indian lodges11 with the hollow of the crescent facing the stream, and a caldron fire burning in the midst. Around the fire a ring of warriors13 naked to the breech-clout kept time in a slow shuffling15 dance to a monotonous16 chanting; and for onlookers17 there was an outer ring of squatting18 figures—the visiting Tuckaseges, as I supposed.
Beyond the Indian lodges, and a little higher up the gentle slope of the savanna, were the troop shelters; and beyond these, half concealed19 in the fringing of the boundary forest, was the tepee-lodge12 of the women.
On the bare hillside beneath the powder magazine I made no doubt I was in plainest view from the great fire, and the proof of this conclusion came shortly in a bellowing20 hail from Falconnet.
"Ho, Jack22 Warden23!" he called, making a speaking-trumpet of his hands to lift the hail above the chanting of the Indian dancers. "Have a look at that shelter whilst you are over there and make sure 'twill shed rain if the weather shifts."
Now some such long-range marking down as this was what I had been angling for. So I came to attention and saluted24 in soldierly fashion, thereby25 raising a great laugh among my pseudo-comrades around the trooper fire—a laugh that pointed26 shrewdly to the baronet-captain's lack of proper discipline. But that is neither here nor there. Having my master's order for it, I climbed to the foot of the powder rock.
Here the bare sight of all the stored-up devastation27 set me athirst with a fierce longing28 for leave to snap a pistol in the well-laid mine. For if these enemies of ours had planned their own undoing29 they could never have given a desperate foeman a better chance. To hold the pine boughs30 of the rude shelter in place they had piled a great loose wall of stones around and over the cargo; and the firing of the powder, heaped as it was against the backing cliff of the boulder8, would hurl31 these weighting stones in a murderous broadside upon the camp across the stream.
But since my dear lady would also share the hazard of such a broadside, I had no leave to blow myself and the powder convoy32 to kingdom come, as I thirsted to—could not, you will say, having neither pistol to snap nor flint and steel to fire a train. Nay33, nay, my dears, I would not have you think so lightly of my invention. Had this been the only obstacle, you may be sure I should have found a way to grind a firing spark out of two bits of stone.
But being otherwise enjoined34, as I say, I turned my back upon the temptation and held to the business in hand, which was to reach and recross the stream higher up and so to come among the horses.
As I had hoped to find them, the saddles were hung upon the branches of the nearest trees, Margery's horse-furnishings among them. At first the black mare35 was shy of me, but a gentling word or two won her over, and she let me take her by the forelock and lead her deeper into the herd36 where I could saddle and bridle37 her in greater safety.
My plan to cut her out was simple enough. Trusting to the darkness—the horse meadow was far enough from the fires to make a murky38 twilight39 of the ruddy glow—I thought to lead the mare quietly away up the stream and thus on to the foot of that ravine by which we hoped to climb to the old borderer's rendezvous40 on the plateau. But when all was ready and I sought to set this plan in action, an unforeseen obstacle barred the way. To keep the horses from straying up the valley an Indian sentry41 line was strung above the grazing meadow, and into this I blundered like any unlicked knave42 of a raw recruit.
Had I been armed, the warrior14 who rose before me phantom-like in the laurel edging of the meadow would have had a most sharp-pointed answer to his challenge. As it was,—I had left my sword with Jennifer because the captured trooper whose understudy I was had left his sword in camp,—I tried to parley43 with the sentry. He knew no word of English, nor I of Cherokee; but that deadlock44 was speedily broken. A guttural call summoned others of the horse-keepers, and among them one who spoke45 a little English.
"Ugh! What for take white squaw horse?" he demanded.
"'Tis the captain's order," I replied, lying boldly to fit the crisis.
At that they gave me room; and had I hastened, I had doubtless gone at large without more ado. But at this very apex46 point of hazard I must needs play out the part of unalarm to the fool's envoi, taking time to part the mare's forelock under the head-stall, and looking leisurely47 to the lacings of the saddle-girth.
This foolhardy delay cost me all, and more than all. I was still fiddle-faddling with the girth strap48, the better to impose upon my Indian horse-guards, when suddenly there arose a yelling hubbub49 of laughter in the camp behind. I turned to look and beheld50 a thing laughable enough, no doubt, and yet it broke no bubble of mirth in me. Half-way from the nearest forest fringe to the great fire a man, white of skin, and clothed only in a pair of trooper boots, was running swiftly for cover to the nearest pine-bough shelter, shouting like an escaped Bedlamite as he fled. It asked for no second glance, this apparition51 of the yelling madman; 'twas our captive soldier, foot-loose and racing52 in to raise the hue53 and cry.
Now you may always count upon this failing in a cautious man, that at a crisis he is like to do the unwisest thing that offers. This cutting out of Margery's mare was none so vital a matter that I should have risked the marring of Ephraim Yeates's plan upon it. Yet having done this very thing, I must needs make a bad matter infinitely54 worse.
Instead of mounting to ride a charge through the camp, and so to draw the pursuit after me toward the cavern55 entrance, as I should, I slapped the mare to send her bounding through the guard line, snatched a saddle from its oak-branch peg56 to hurl it in the faces of the sentry group, and darting57 aside, plunged58 into the laurel thicket59 to come by running where I could and creeping where I must to that place where I had left Richard Jennifer.
All hot and exasperated60 as I was, 'twas something less than cooling to find Dick a-double on the ground, holding his sides and laughing like a yokel61 at his first pantomime.
"Oh, ho, ho! did you—did you twig
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