A NIGHT RAID BY THE INDIANS
Several weeks later Mrs. Parsons was at the spring getting a bucket of
water when, without warning, an arrow came whizzing in her direction,
and buried itself in the ground close by.
With a shriek the good woman let fall her bucket and rushed for the
cabin, shrieking that the Indians were at hand.
“The Indians!” cried Harmony, who had her hands deep in a batch of
dough she was kneading.
“Yes, the Indians!” panted the Quakeress. “They just shot an arrow at
me. Get thee gone, Cora, and tell Harry and thy brother.”
Cora needed no second notice, but leaping up from her spinning frame
rushed to the opposite side of the cabin, where Joe and Harry were
working in the garden.
“The Indians! the Indians!” she called loudly. “Come into the house!”
At the announcement both young pioneers dropped their garden tools and
caught up their muskets, leaning against a stone wall.
“Where are they?” demanded Harry, who was the first to reach the cabin.
“I don’t know. But one shot an arrow at your mother.”
“Mother, are you hurt?” asked Harry.
“No,” was the answer. “But the arrow came close to me. See, there it
is,” and she pointed it out with her hand.
“I see the Indian!” cried Harry, and pointed to the distant forest. A
red man had crossed an open place on a run.
Eagerly those in the cabin watched for the reappearance of the Indian,
and in the meantime all armed themselves, the boys with their rifles,
Mrs. Parsons with a shotgun, and the girls with pistols. The outer
doors of the cabin were closed and barred, and also the windows,
leaving only the loopholes open.
“It must mean an uprising,” said Joe, who had his eye glued to a
loophole on one side of the cabin, while Harry kept guard at a loophole
opposite.
“This is some of Red Feather’s work,” came from Harry bitterly. “I knew
it was a mistake to let him go.”
“More than likely Yellow Blanket has got Long Knife to make the
attack,” answered Joe.
Ten minutes went by, and they saw nothing of the Indians. Then a yell
from a distance rent the air, followed by a number of scattering shots.
“That is over to the Ford cabin,” said Joe. “I hope they haven’t caught
Mr. Ford and Darry in the open. If they have it’s good-by to them.”
“I’m going up to the roof to take a look around,” said Harry, and lost
no time in climbing the ladder to the loft.
The roof was a sloping one, and near the ridge was a trapdoor or
scuttle. Standing on a block of wood that was handy, Harry raised the
trapdoor and looked out.
Hardly had he done so than there followed the flight of two arrows
directed at him. One struck the roof just below the lad, and the other
grazed his hair. He tumbled back and let the trapdoor fall into place
with a bang.
“See anything?” queried Joe from below.
“All I want to,” answered Harry, when he could recover sufficiently to
speak.
“What do you mean?”
“Two of the wretches fired arrows at me, and they came altogether too
close for comfort.”
“Phew! Then this cabin is being watched surely, Harry!”
“Be careful, my son,” pleaded Mrs. Parsons. “Thee must not expose
thyself again.”
“I’m not going to,” answered Harry.
Once more the young pioneer took his station at a loophole. He and Joe
were at opposite sides of the living room, while Mrs. Parsons and the
girls were on the watch from the bedchambers.
“How much water have we on hand?” asked Joe, presently.
“The cask is full,” answered Harmony. “I looked only this morning.”
She referred to a cask that had been sunk under the living room floor
sometime before. This cask had been fitted with a cover, and the water
in it was changed once a week by either Joe or Harry. It was not used
ordinarily, but had been placed there for possible use in just such an
emergency as now seemed at hand.
“Do you--do you think they’ll keep on the watch until to-night?”
faltered Cora.
“Possibly--unless they are defeated in other directions,” answered Joe.
Slowly an hour went by, and still none of the red men appeared. Twice
they heard rifle-shots at a great distance, but that was all.
“They seem to have moved in another direction,” said Harry.
“Don’t give up watching,” was his chum’s caution.
A little later they heard a dozen or more shots in the direction of
the fort. Then came a yell, and more shots lasting the best part of a
quarter of an hour.
“I see an Indian!” cried Harmony, later still. “He is crossing the
clearing where you cut down the last tree.”
Both Joe and Harry rushed to look, but before they could get an eye at
the loophole the enemy had disappeared.
“We’ve got to continue on guard,” said Joe. “Those wretches wouldn’t
like anything better than to catch us unawares.”
The first alarm had come shortly after midday, and the balance of the
afternoon wore away slowly. To relieve the monotony of the lookout,
those on guard shifted from one loophole to another. When it grew dark
Mrs. Parsons prepared a hasty supper.
“We had best eat now,” she said. “Later on there may not be a chance.”
Although outwardly calm, each person in the cabin was tremendously
excited. The girls were particularly nervous, for they well knew what
capture by the Indians might mean.
“I’d rather die first,” whispered Harmony to her sister.
“So would I,” Cora answered. And then they both thought of their mother
and of Clara Parsons. Where were these loved ones now?
“If they are going to attack at all it will be to-night,” said Joe.
“We’ll have to remain on guard until morning.”
Slowly the mantle of night fell. The Indians had timed their raid on
the settlement well. There was no moon, and the drifting clouds cut off
many of the stars.
Mrs. Parsons’ eyesight was not of the best, and it was decided that Joe
and Cora were to take up the first watch, lasting three hours, and were
then to give place to Harry and Harmony for the next three hours. This
would give each a much needed rest, for to watch at a loophole proved
very tiring both to eyes and nerves.
With the coming of night all became silent around the cabin. No candles
were lit and all the lower cracks in the cabin logs were covered by
having articles of furniture placed against them. Thus it would be
impossible for the Indians to look inside, even if they came up close
to the building.
An ordinary eye would have distinguished little outside during that
watch. But Joe’s eye was trained by constant usage, and he made a note
of many things--the flight of birds and the slinking of a fox across
one of the clearings.
The sight of the fox was a little cheering. “If he can sneak around
the Indians must be pretty far away,” was the way the young pioneer
reasoned.
At last Joe’s watch came to an end, and he and Cora laid down to rest,
leaving Harry and Harmony on guard. Then another hour dragged by,
seeming little short of an age.
Harmony had just uttered a long sigh of weariness when something caught
her eye and caused her to become once again on the alert. Something was
moving among the trees nearest to the cabin.
“I see something!” she whispered. “Whether it is an Indian, or a white
man, or an animal, I cannot tell.”
“We’ll take no chances,” said Harry, and ran to the loophole, at the
same time rousing Joe and the others.
It was an Indian Harmony had seen. He was now behind a tree, but soon
they saw him come forth once more, drop into the grass, and worm his
way along toward the cabin.
“He is coming this way,” cried Harry softly.
“Alone?” queried Joe.
“Yes.”
“Then give him a shot, as soon as he is in range.”
“Be sure he is an Indian,” came from Mrs. Parsons. “You do not want to
shoot a friend.”
“A friend would come forward boldly,” answered Joe.
Trembling with excitement, Harry pushed the muzzle of his rifle through
the loophole. Then he took careful aim at the uncertain figure in the
grass and fired.
There was a shriek of pain and the red enemy leaped up and swung around
one arm as if in intense pain. Then he dropped down again and loped
back to the protection of the forest.
“I hit him--but I didn’t kill him,” said Harry, as he pulled in his
smoking firearm; and then he set to work to reload the rifle with all
speed.
Once more they went on watch, and slowly the minutes went by. Then Joe
suddenly thrust out his gun-barrel and discharged the weapon.
Another yell followed, and an Indian who had been in hiding behind the
stone wall of the garden fell forward, shot through the shoulder. But
he, too, managed to crawl away and disappeared into the forest.
This was the last of the alarms. Evidently the Indians imagined the
cabin well protected, and they did not dare to make a rush. Slowly the
morning dawned, and hardly had the sun peeped over the trees than they
saw Daniel Boone riding toward the cabin at full speed, followed by
half a dozen frontiersmen.
“Hurrah, here is Colonel Boone!” cried Joe, and he threw open the door
to receive the great hunter.
“Are you all safe here?” demanded Boone, with a quick glance around.
“Yes, we are all safe,” answered Harry; “but we have had a pretty hard
night of it,” and he told their story.
“The Indians attacked seven of the cabins in this settlement and some
cabins further off,” said Daniel Boone. “A small party of ’em also came
to the fort. But we have sent them about their business with the loss
of but one man--old Wimbley--who was brutally murdered in the woods.
Three of the redskins were killed in the various fights and there are
probably a dozen wounded.”
“Who led the raid, do you know that?” asked Joe.
“Long Knife. He is now at the head of all the tribes in this
neighborhood. Red Feather is dead.”
Daniel Boone was out rounding up the settlers to go after the Indians.
Joe readily agreed to go along, leaving Harry to watch over those at
the log cabin.
“Take care of yourself, Joe,” said Harry, as the pair parted.
“And you take care of yourself and the others, Harry,” was the answer.
It was nearly noon before the settlers started out, sixty-five strong,
and led by Colonel Boone. Each man carried a rifle and plenty of
ammunition, and in addition rations for two days. If more food was
needed the settlers felt that they could easily supply themselves from
the game in the forest and the plenteous fish in the numerous streams.