The Hidden Children by Robert W. Chambers (books to improve english .TXT) 📗

a great scurrying and scattering in the thickets, and I heard the Andastes running off, leaving their dead master to me and to my people, who were now arriving.

I do not know who took his scalp; but it was taken by some Indian or Ranger who came crowding around to look down upon this painted dead man in his scarlet cloak.

"Amochol is dead," I said to Boyd.

He looked at me with lack-lustre eyes, nodding. We marched on along the trail by which we had arrived.

For five miles we proceeded in silence, my Indians flanking the file of riflemen. Then Boyd gave the signal to halt, and sent forward the Sagamore, the Grey-Feather, and Tahoontowhee to inform the General that we would await the army in this place.

The Indians, so coolly taken from my command, had gone ere I came up from the rear to find what Boyd had done.

"Are you mad?" I exclaimed, losing my temper, "Do you propose to halt here at the very mouth of the hornet's nest?"

He did not rebuke me for such gross lack of discipline and respect—in fact, he seemed scarcely to heed at all what I said, but seated himself at the foot of a pine tree and lit his pipe. As I stood biting my lip and looking around at the woods encircling us, he beckoned two of his men, gave them some orders in a low voice, crossed one leg over the other, and continued to smoke the carved and painted Oneida pipe he carried in his shot-pouch.

I saw the two riflemen shoulder their long weapons and go forward in obedience to his orders; and when again I approached him he said:

"They will make plain to Sullivan what your Indians may garble in repeating—that I mean to await the army in this place and save my party these useless miles of travelling. Do you object?"

"Our men are not tired," I said, astonished, "and our advanced guard can not be very far away. Do you not think it more prudent for us to continue the movement toward our own people?"

"Very well—if you like," he said indifferently.

After a few minutes' inaction, he rose, sounded his whistle; the men got to their feet, fell in, and started, rifles a-trail. But we had proceeded scarcely a dozen rods into the big timber when we discovered our two riflemen, who had so recently left us, running back toward us and looking over their shoulders as they ran. When they saw us, they halted and shouted for us to hasten, as there were several Seneca Indians standing beside the trail ahead.

In a flash of intuition it came to me that here was a cleared runway to some trap.

"Don't leave the trail!" I said to Boyd. "Don't be drawn out of it now. For God's sake hold your men and don't give chase to those Indians."

"Press on!" said Boyd curtly; and our little column trotted forward.

Something crashed in a near thicket and went off like a deer. The men, greatly excited, strove to catch a glimpse of the running creature, but the bush was too dense.

Suddenly a rifleman, who was leading our rapid advance, caught sight of the same Senecas who had alarmed him and his companion; and he started toward them with a savage shout, followed by a dozen others.

Hanierri turned to Boyd and begged him earnestly not to permit any pursuit. But Boyd pushed him aside impatiently, and blew the view-halloo on his ranger's whistle; and in a moment we all were scattering in full pursuit of five lithe and agile Senecas, all in full war-paint, who appeared to be in a panic, for they ran through the thickets like terrified sheep, huddling and crowding on one another's heels.

"Boyd!" I panted, catching up with him. "This whole business looks like a trap to me. Whistle your men back to the trail, for I am certain that these Senecas are drawing us toward their main body."

"We'll catch one of them first," he said; and shouted to Murphy to fire and cripple the nearest. But the flying Senecas had now vanished into a heavily-wooded gully, and there was nothing for Murphy to fire at.

I swung in my tracks, confronting Boyd.

"Will you halt your people before it is too late?" I demanded. "Where are your proper senses? You behave like a man who has lost his mental balance!"

He gave me a dazed look, where he had been within his rights had he cut me down with his hatchet.

"What did you say?" he stammered, passing his hand over his eyes as though something had obscured his sight.

"I asked you to sound the recall. Those Indians we chase are leading us whither they will. What in God's name ails you, Boyd? Have you never before seen an ambush?"

He stood motionless, as though stupefied, staring straight ahead of him. Then he said, hesitatingly, that he desired Tim Murphy to cripple one of the Senecas and fetch him in so that we might interrogate him.

Such infant's babble astounded and sickened me, and I was about to retort when a shout from one of our men drew our attention to the gully below. And there were our terrified Indians peering out cunningly at us like so many foxes playing tag with an unbroken puppy pack.

"Come, sir," said I in deepest anxiety, "the game is too plain for anybody but a fool to follow. Sound your recall!"

He set his whistle to his lips, and as I stood there, thunderstruck and helpless, the shrill call rang out: "Forward! Hark-away!"

Instantly our entire party leaped forward; the Indians vanished; and we ran on headlong, pell-mell, hellward into the trap prepared for our destruction.

The explosion of a heavy rifle on our right was what first halted us, I think. One of the soldiers from the 4th Pennsylvania was down in the dead leaves kicking and scuffling about all over blood. Before he had rolled over twice, a ragged but loud volley on our left went through our disordered files, knocking over two more soldiers. The screaming of one poor fellow seemed to bring Boyd to his senses. He blew the recall, and our men fell back, and, carrying the dead and wounded, began to ascend the wooded knoll down which we had been running when so abruptly checked.

There was no more firing for the moment; we reached the top of the knoll, laid our dead and wounded behind trees, loaded, freshened our priming, and stood awaiting orders.

Then, all around us, completely encircling the foot of our knoll, woods, thickets, scattered bushes, seemed to be literally moving in the vague forest light.

"My God!" exclaimed Elerson to Murphy. "The woods are crawling with savages!"

A dreadful and utter silence fell among us; Boyd, pale as a corpse, motioned his men to take posts, forming a small circle with our dead and wounded in the centre.

I saw Hanierri, the Oneida guide, fling aside his blanket, strip his painted body to the beaded clout, draw himself up to his full and superb height, muttering, his eyes fixed on the hundreds of dark shapes stealing quietly among the thickets below our little hill.

The two Stockbridge Indians, the Yellow Moth and Yoiakim, pressed lightly against me on either side, like two great, noble dogs, afraid, yet trusting their master, and still dauntless in the threatening face of duty.

Through the terrible stillness which had fallen upon us all, I could hear the Oneida guide muttering his death-song; and presently my two Christian Indians commenced in low voices to recite the prayers for the dying.

The next moment, Murphy and Elerson began to fire, slowly and deliberately; and for a little while these two deadly and unerring rifles were the only pieces that spoke from our knoll. Then my distant target showed for a moment; I fired, reloaded, waited; fired again; and our little circle of doomed men began to cheer as a brilliantly painted warrior sprang from the thicket below, shouted defiance, and crumpled up as though smitten by lightning when Murphy's rifle roared out its fatal retort.

Then, for almost every soul that stood there, the end of the world began; for a thousand men swarmed out of the thickets below, completely surrounding us; and like a hurricane shrilling through naked woods swept the death-halloo of five hundred Iroquois in their naked paint.

On every side the knoll was black with them as they came leaping forward, hatchets glittering; while over their heads the leaden hail of Tory musketry pelted us from north and south and east and west.

Down crashed Yoiakim at my side, his rifle exploding in mid-air as he fell dead and rolled over and over down the slope toward the masses of his enemies below.

As a Seneca seized the rolling body, set his foot on the dead shoulders and jerked back the head to scalp him, the Yellow Moth leaped forward, launching his hatchet. It flew, sparkling, and struck the scalper full in the face. The next instant the Yellow Moth was among them, snarling, stabbing, raging, almost covered by Senecas who were wounding one another in their eagerness to slay him.

For a moment it seemed to me that there was a chance in this melee for us to cut our way through, and I caught Boyd by the arm and pointed. A volley into our very backs staggered and almost stupefied us; through the swirling powder gloom, our men began to fall dead all around me. I saw Sergeant Hungerman drop; privates Harvey, Conrey, Jim McElroy, Jack Miller, Benny Curtin and poor Jack Putnam.

Murphy, clubbing his rifle, was bawling to his comrade, Elerson:

"To hell wid this, Davey! Av we don't pull foot we're a pair o' dead ducks!"

"For God's sake, Boyd!" I shouted. "Break through there beside the Yellow Moth!"

Boyd, wielding his clubbed rifle, cleared a circle amid the crowding savages; Sergeant Parker ran out into the yelling crush; the two gigantic riflemen, Murphy and Elerson, swinging their terrible weapons like flails, smashed their way forward; behind them, using knife, hatchet, and stock, I led out the last men living on that knoll—Ned McDonald, Garrett Putnam, Jack Youse, and a French coureur-de-bois whose name I have never learned.

All around us raged and yelled the maddened Seneca pack, slashing each other again and again in their crazed attempts to reach us. The Yellow Moth was stabbed through and through a hundred times, yet the ghastly corpse still kept its feet, so terrible was the crushing pressure on every side.

Suddenly, tearing a path through the frenzied mob, I saw a mob of cursing, sweating, green-coated soldiers and rangers, struggling toward us—saw one of Butler's rangers seize Sergeant Parker by the collar of his hunting shirt, bawling out:

"Hurrah! Hurrah! Prisoner taken from Morgan's corps!"

Another, an officer of British regulars, I think, threw himself on Boyd, shouting:

"By heaven! It's Boyd of Derry! Are you not Tom Boyd, of Derry, Pennsylvania?"

"Yes, you bloody-backed Tory!" retorted Boyd, struggling to knife him under his gorget. "And I'm Boyd of Morgan's, too!"

I aimed a blow at the red-coated officer, but my rifle stock broke off across the skull of an Indian; and I began to beat a path toward Boyd with the steel barrel of my weapon, Murphy and Elerson raging forward beside me in such a very whirlwind of half-crazed fury that the Indians gave way and leaped aside, trying to shoot at us.

Headlong through this momentary opening rushed Garrett Putnam, his rifle-dress torn from his naked body, his heavy knife dripping in the huge fist that clutched it. After him leaped Ned McDonald, the coureur-de-bois, and Jack Youse, letting drive right and left with their hatchets. And, as the painted crowd ahead recoiled and shrank aside, Murphy, Elerson, and I went through, smashing out the way with our heavy weapons.

How we got through God only knows. I heard Murphy bellowing to Elerson:

"We're out! We're out! Pull foot, Davey, or the dirty Scutts will take your hair!"

A Pennsylvania soldier, running heavily down hill ahead of me, was shot, sprang high into the air in one agonized bound, like a stricken hare, and fell forward under my very feet, so that I leaped over him as I ran. The Canadian coureur-de-bois was hit, but the bullet stung him to a speed incredible, and he flew on, screaming with pain, his broken arm flapping.

Behind me I dared not look, but I knew the Seneca warriors were after us at full speed. Bullets whined and whizzed beside us, striking the trees on every side. A long slope of open woods now slanted away below us.

As I ran, far ahead of me, among the trees, I saw men moving, yet dared not change my course. Then, as I drew nearer, I recognized Mr. Lodge, our surveyor, and Thomas Grant with the Jacob-staff, the four chain-bearers with the chain, and Corporal Calhawn, all standing stock still and gazing up the slope toward us.

The next moment