THE RESCUE AND WHAT FOLLOWED.
The night was not far advanced when Kenowatha and the Girl Avenger
reached the vicinity of the Indian village, and concealed themselves in
the tall weeds that flourished there on the banks of the Maumee. Beside
the flambeaus, they had borne disguises down from the cave, which they
now proceeded to don. Kenowatha had laid aside the gray fox-tails that
had formed a portion of his fantastic head-dress, divested himself of
all the characteristic ornaments that were wont to distinguish him
as the renegade’s young _protege_, and disguised himself as a common
Indian boy--one of the many little red vagabonds that run about the
Indian villages deep in mischief, long after their staider parents had
yielded to the wooings of the somnolent god. He realized the peril
attached to the expedition he had undertaken, he knew that a decree of
outlawry had been passed against him, that the common warrior who took
his scalp should forthwith be promoted to a full chief, and lead three
hundred braves against the Black Snake, who at that hour was marching
from Defiance to Victory.
Never before had he inaugurated action so perilous as the present one,
and it seemed the pinnacle of rashness for two children--for in stature
and years the avengers might be styled thus--to attempt to rescue a
white spy from the midst of a tribe that could muster five thousand
warriors.
The young twain felt no fear, and prepared for work as calmly as though
getting ready for a great festival. They resolved before entering the
woods to submit to no captivity.
“Better,” said Nanette, “to fall striking dead those who spared not our
own parents, than to undergo the terrible tortures inflicted by the
Indians and their scarlet queen.”
“Ay, ay,” returned Kenowatha, “we will not fall into their hands alive.
If they get us at all, it will be bereft of life. But they will not
capture us, girl. As yet I have not struck a single blow of vengeance.
I am not to die thus, no! no! It is decreed by high Heaven that my
chosen mark--the red cross--shall become as terrible as your bloody
crescent.”
When the twain rejoined each other in the woods--for they had separated
to don their disguises--a silent pressure of hands, followed,
accompanied by a look that told how inseparably their fates were linked
together, by the strangest circumstances that ever existed in the
untraveled forest wilds.
Their guns were concealed in the grass, and armed but with their
knives, concealed but ready for use, about their persons, they stood
erect, listened a moment, then marched boldly forward. The most
careful observer would have proclaimed the couple what they seemed to
be--what they counterfeited--an Indian boy and girl--for though they
kept together they roamed about the village with a nonchalance that
would deceive the most suspicious. Still, as a precautionary measure,
they kept in the shadows as much as possible, yet did not shrink from
walking into the glare of the ground fires whenever necessary. No
suspicion seemed to attach itself to the young would-be-rescuers, and
the lazy savages little dreamed that their deadliest foes were in their
very midst.
By-and-by in their seemingly aimless saunterings they approached the
prison cabin wherein a noble man waited for them--waited behind strong
logs and a guard of stalwart braves, whose eyes noted every thing that
came near in the fitful starlight.
The avengers were prepared to find the prison strongly guarded, and
knew that to rescue the young spy they must have recourse to a strategy
seldom if ever used in red villages. The strategy, as perilous and
startling in its character as it was unique, found birth in the Girl
Avenger’s brain, and Kenowatha joined in the scheme. Crouching in the
gloomy shadow of a lodge, the twain remained silent until the opaque
clouds that crept over the western horizon had completely clothed the
sky in blackness, and vailed the shining faces of the stars.
The prison-hut was built of strong beech logs, dove-tailed, after
the usual mode of constructing cabins in the West, and the roof was
composed of three layers of bark, each two inches thick, and secured
by strong wooden pins. The hut had been built for the express purpose
of securing prisoners, under the eye of the Girty brothers, and other
renegades, and many a noble red and white captive had marched, in the
noon of life, from its gloomy recesses to the fatal stake, beneath a
pellucid sky. The inmates of the prison-hut were secured to a stake in
the center of the structure, thus preventing them from self-escape.
Kenowatha and the Girl Avenger crept to the rear of the hut without
attracting the attention of the guards who stood at the door, and with
the noiseless and ghostly movements of the lizard, as it ascends the
slimy wall, Nanette began to ascend the cabin to its roof. Breathless,
and with drawn knife Kenowatha waited below, ready to give the signal
of danger or drive the keen blade into the heart of the first red-man
who approached.
The rough exterior of the logs aided the young She-wolf in her perilous
undertaking, and presently she found herself grasping the bark
coverings of the hut.
For a moment she paused, but no signal or sound coming up from below,
she went to work. Bracing herself against the jutting logs at the
corner of the structure, her hands, by dint of toil, withdrew several
of the wooden pins, which she thrust into her bosom, and a strip of
bark was laid aside. Another and another noiselessly followed it, and
then, like a cat, the girl dropped from the roof into the interior of
the hut. The blackness of palpable darkness surrounded her, and in the
lowest of whispers she whispered a name:
“Mark Morgan!”
A noise--no voice--guided her to the captive, and a moment later her
knife noiselessly severed his bonds.
“I thought you never were coming,” whispered the young spy; “but better
late than never, you know, girl. The guards are dead? You found the
door too well secured for your little hands, eh?”
“The guards are as watchful as ever,” was the response. “We’ve stolen a
march on them--Kenowatha and I.”
Mark Morgan could scarcely repress an exclamation of astonishment at
the daring feat.
“Come!” whispered the Girl Avenger, “our work is but half-done. You are
not free yet. Go up first; I’ll follow.”
In silence Morgan groped his way to the corner, and clambered toward
the opening in the rock. While he was performing this action, Nanette
crept back to the post, upon whose worn surface she hastily cut her
dreaded crescent which she reddened with her own blood, drawn with the
point of her knife.
“They will know who’s been here when they open the door,” she
murmured, as she completed her work. “In my native country--La Belle
France--visiting people leave their card, and this is mine. They’ve
seen it before,” she added, with an inaudible chuckle, “for I am a
frequent, though not very welcome, visitor in these parts.”
The rescued spy reached the ground in safety; but as Nanette was about
to descend, a signal of danger came up from Kenowatha. She paused on
the roof, and awaited developments. Vainly she tried to pierce the
gloom, as she listened attentively. Suddenly, just the slightest noise
floated up to her, and then followed Kenowatha’s signal for her to
recommence her descent. The danger was passed.
A moment later, she stood on _terra firma_, and Kenowatha grasped her
hand.
“Stoop!” he whispered in her ear, while he drew the little stained hand
nearer the earth.
She obeyed.
Lower and lower the boy thrust her hand, until it touched a man’s face,
still warm, and covered with what she well knew to be blood. Kenowatha
allowed the girl’s hand to rest on the dead face for a moment: then
he took her finger and ran it through two deep gashes on the bloody
forehead, which formed his red mark--the cross.
“He came from the lodges, no doubt, to assassinate our spy,” whispered
Kenowatha, proud of his work. “But his work is ended. They who wear my
cross never admire it. Let us go; the guards may scent their brother’s
gore.”
The Girl Avenger rose to her feet, and a moment later the trio were
speeding toward the hidden guns, which reached, they resumed their
journey until they paused on the banks of the Maumee several miles
below the Ottawa town.
“You may tell her all now,” said Mark Morgan, as he took his rescuer’s
hands to say farewell. “I owe you a life, and if you guard the girl--my
white flower--well, I shall owe you another. I will not be gone long.
I will meet my General marching this way, and you shall receive his
thanks for what you have done to-night. Now mind you, watch the girl
well; keep sleepless eyes on these persons--Wacomet the trader and
Rudolph Runnion. When his wound permits, unless watched, that red-coat
will attempt something desperate, for I tell you he has sworn that
Effie shall not become my bride--before that happens he will take her
life, or worse.”
“We will watch those whom you mention as we watch over our own lives
against the Death League,” said Kenowatha. “Have no fears on that
score; the first hand that is raised against the girl drops in death.”
Again Mark Morgan wrung the hands of the hunted twain, promised to
return in a few days with Wayne, with whom they yearned to fight, and
was gone.
“Now for the She-wolf’s den,” said Kenowatha, looking into Nanette’s
face. “We have not broken our word. We told Effie that we were going
deer-hunting, and if we haven’t hunted and saved one dear, to her,
then I’ve no judgment. Won’t the girl open her eyes when we tell her
all about her lover, and won’t that red-coat wish that the red-skins
had scalped him before we found him? Yes, yes, girl, that man must be
watched. Mark was right; he’s a dog. I’ve a mind to give him over to
them who want him. I’ll warrant you that he shot young Campbell in cool
blood, for I’ve seen the very devil in his black eyes. I tell you,
girl--Nanette--I’m in for giving him up. I can get to the fort before
dawn; the English will not give me over to those who seek my heart’s
blood. I will appoint a place for a small portion of the garrison to
meet me, say, to-morrow night, and then we will deliver the murderer
over to justice.”
The White Fox’s proposition found favor in Nanette’s eyes. She felt
that Rudolph Runnion was a murderer, deserving a murderer’s reward,
and then he was the enemy of those who were her friends. Under these
circumstances she believed that they would be justified in delivering
him over to the avengers of youthful blood, and thus spoke to Kenowatha.
They were nearer the fort now than they would be when at the hidden
home, and intent upon accomplishing the work they had resolved upon,
Kenowatha glided from his companion’s side, and a moment later was lost
in the gloom. He promised to meet her in the cave some time during the
coming day.
Freed from the renegade’s _protege_, the young She-wolf resumed her
journey to her home, and at length crept into the gloomy opening from
whence they had executed their exit a few hours before. She never
dreamed of the thrilling events that had transpired during her absence,
and glided along the underground corridor entirely unsuspicious of
danger. When near the cave proper, she noted a smoldering fire ahead,
and very naturally concluded that Effie and the British criminal had
fallen asleep.
On, on, she glided, and at length entered the large apartment wrapped
in demi-gloom, despite the efforts of the dying blaze to the contrary.
The walls, in which a score of natural niches or holes remained, were
shrouded in almost impenetrable gloom, while the deathlike silence
boded ill for the hunted beauty. When she crossed the threshold, she
turned to the couches; but before her eyes could greet them, a terrific
yell broke the stillness, and the niches poured forth the members of
the Death League!
For hours Joe Girty and his band had waited for the coming of the
hunted ones, nor had they darted from their concealment until they
were satisfied that Kenowatha was not with the Girl Avenger. The
bloodthirsty band hemmed her in on all sides save one, for with the
yell of triumph, perhaps untimely given, she had sprung against the
wall, and faced her enemies with a stern defiance that proclaimed to
them that she asked no quarter, expected none, and none would give.
Startled at her demeanor, the seven--for Wacomet, with his fertile
budget of lies, had joined the band--paused before the hunted one, with
drawn knives and uplifted tomahawks, eager to drink her blood. They
scarce expected resistance on the girl’s part; they thought that their
numbers would awe her into submission; but in such thought they found
themselves sorely mistaken.
While thus the Death League stood, inwardly admiring the bravery and
seeming rashness of the hunted girl, the ornamented rifle shot to her
shoulder, a loud report filled the cavern, and the Speckled Snake
shrieked and fell dead upon the stones!
Then the Death League were roused to action; then the rifle of the Girl
Avenger described rapid circles around her head, for, with a cry of
defiance, she had sprung from the wall; and the battle for the mastery,
against the greatest odds that pale-face ever fought, raged in that
gloomy place.
When Nanette darted forward, she kicked the dying brands into the faces
of her foes, through whose numbers her clubbed rifle cut a swath, that
closed a moment later, and had to be opened again. At length, with
half of her enemies placed _hors du combat_, she reached the opposite
wall, and the remainder darted forward to end the conflict.
No clubbed rifle met them; they brought up suddenly against the
limestone rock, and realized that the young She-Wolf was gone!
Turkey-foot, whose cheek the lock of the Girl Avenger’s weapon had
dreadfully mangled, was the first to regain his composure. He snatched
an ember from the floor and fanned it into a flame by whirling it over
his head.
“The She-wolf shall not escape the Death League!” he cried, darting
forward, followed by Wacomet and several others.
The torch revealed a passage leading into the rock, and with a shout of
triumph the chief sprung into it.
The corridor was almost devoid of angles, and suddenly Turkey-foot
reached its termination against rocks that gave forth no hollow sound.
With a cry of dismay the chief turned to his brethren, and all threw an
inquiring stare into each other’s faces.
Had the She-wolf dissolved into the damp air that filled the passage?
While this mental interrogative puzzled the brains of the revengers, a
shout from behind drove an ejaculation of horror from their lips.
_The Girl Avenger was in their rear_.