“The first that hears Shall be the first to bleed.”
The hunter, followed by his young comrade, now leaving the rest of the band to proceed to their contemplated stand by the main road, struck off into the woods to the right, and, with silent and rapid steps, led the way to the south-eastern shore of the pond. Here finding, as he seemed to have expected, a capacious canoe, dug out from the trunk of some huge pine, he drew it forth from its concealment, beneath a mass of fallen trees projecting over the bank, and, bidding Bart enter with the oars, and placing one knee on the stern, with a grasp on the sides, gave a push with his foot from the shore, which sent his rude craft surging out far into the open expanse of water before him. Before applying the oars, however, and while the canoe continued to move under the impulse it had thus received, its occupants employed themselves in bending their heads to the water, and listening for any sounds that might indicate the presence of others abroad on the pond. The night, as it was yet moonless, and as the sky was overclouded, was consequently a dark one; and the adventurers could distinguish little else but the dark outlines of the Green Mountains, that rose high in the western heavens, casting, by their huge shadows, an impenetrable pall of darkness over the intervening space beneath, from which not a sound rose to the ear, save an occasional short croak of some waterfowl, or the low, sullen dash of the waters along the shores.
“Nothing out on the pond, guess, but loons, ducks, and sich like,” quietly observed Bart, raising himself from his listening attitude; “nor can I make out any sounds from the nest of 'em you say there is over on the shore yonder. Ma'be they've pulled up stakes and are off with their traps, the wimin folks and all—shouldn't wonder, single bit.”
“Now I reason a little ditter different,” replied the sergeant. “They may be getting oneasy and suspicious, because their spies we took there at Coffin's don't return; and so keep still, and put out their fires, lest the absent ones be dogged back, and their rendezvous thus discovered; but I der don't believe the company would clear out till they knew what become of them. They are still there, I'm apt to think; so we will now put forward—first up north a piece, on this side, and then across and down to a little cove there is near their encampment.”
So saying, Dunning took up one of the oars, and, with long vigorous, but noiseless strokes, sent the boat rapidly ahead; while the other took a position most favorable for a lookout. In this manner, and taking turns at the oar, they soon, by the course they had marked out for themselves, reached the western side of the pond, and, heading round, moved cautiously along the shore towards the hostile encampment.
“Ah! there! one—two—yes, three camp fires, T can der catch glimmers of occasionally,” softly exclaimed Dunning, rising up in the boat, and peering ahead for observation. “I was right—the ditter rapscallions are there, snug in their quarters, but had wit enough to build their fires behind logs, or something, so as not to be seen from 'tother side. We are within the ditter matter of three hundred yards of 'em, now; so carefully, Bart, and don't let your oar graze the boat, or any thing, to give out the least sound; for they've ears, it's der probable, as well as we.”
A short time now sufficed to bring them to the small cove, at which the hunter had proposed to land. Here, under the screen of an impervious tangle of brushwood and fallen tree tops, which intervened between them and the foe, they drew up their boat on to the shore. They then, after taking off their shoes, which they left in the canoe, carefully crawled up the bank, passed round the thicket, and paused to listen. The sounds of voices conversing in low tones in one spot, the slow steps of a sentinel in another, and the snoring of some hard sleeper in a third, were soon detected by the quick ears of the anxious listeners.
“As I thought,” whispered Dunning, putting his mouth close to the ear of the other: “the head ones are ditter suspicious, and watchful; but we must try what can be done—at least to find the spot where they've put the gals. There's a ditter old shanty I used to camp in, about fifty yards ahead; and as that is probably the best they've got, I've been thinking they may have cooped 'em in there. Suppose you, who are lightest and smallest, creep forward to it, for ditter discoveries. I will follow half way, and wait.”
Without demurring to the suggestion, Bart immediately set forward, on his hands and knees, in the direction indicated by his companion. Carefully removing every dry twig and leaf from each place where he wished to bear his weight, and moving as noiselessly as the preying cat along the ground, he made his way onward till he had gone far enough, as he judged, to reach the expected shanty; when he paused to listen and reconnoitre. But now all seemed perfectly still. Not the slightest sound of any kind reached his ears; while it had, in some unaccountable manner, suddenly become so pitchy dark that he could not distinguish a single object before him. And he began to feel confused and doubtful about proceeding, when, by the action of those secret and undefinable sympathies, perhaps, by which, it is said, we sometimes become apprised of the presence of others before we are informed by the senses, he all at once became impressed with the idea that some person was near him. He therefore strained his senses to the utmost in trying to discover what objects might be before or around him; but all, for a while, to no purpose. In a short time, however, his ear caught the sound of a deep sigh, the softness of which told him it came from a female, within a few feet of him. With a palpitating heart, he now doubtfully attempted to move forward, when he suddenly perceived his head on the point of coming in contact with some broad, high obstacle, which seemed to rise like a wall before him, Surprised, and still more confused than before, he retreated a few paces, and looked upward, to try to make out the nature of the obstacle before him; when he discovered it to be the backside of the very shanty of which he was in search. The strange darkness, which had so suddenly overshadowed him, and which was caused by the obstruction of the skylight by this rude structure, being now explained, and every thing made clear to his mind, he cautiously moved round towards the front of the shanty, to find the entrance, no longer doubting that those he sought were within. On reaching the front corner, so as to enable him to peer round it on that side, he soon made out the entrance; but directly across it, to his disappointment, he discovered the half-recumbent form of a man, with a musket leaning on his shoulder. After a few hurried observations, in which he discovered, by the decaying fires before them several other shanties or tents among the trees, a few rods in front, Bart again slunk back to the spot he had just left, and was about to retrace his way to his companion, when a new thought occurred to him, and, moving up to the back of the shanty, which was formed by broad pieces of thick bark standing slantingly against a pole supported by crotches, and, placing his mouth to a crack, softly whispered the names of the captives, and turned his ear to the spot to catch the hoped-for response. For the first moment, all was still but the next, the catching of a long-suspended breath, and even, as he thought, the rapid beatings of a fluttering bosom, became audible. Presently a slight movement, as of a cautiously changed posture, was heard within; and the next instant a pair of soft lips came in contact with his ear at the crevice, articulating, in sounds scarcely above the slightest murmur of the air,—
“Who speaks my name?”
“Bart,” replied the other. “You know what I'm after. Can one of the barks between us be removed without alarming your keeper?”
“I fear—but he seems asleep—try it,” was the measured and hesitating reply.
After slightly essaying several of the pieces of the bark he wished to remove, he at length commenced operations at the bottom of one of them, and gently forcing it aside, inch by inch, in a short time effected an opening sufficient, as he judged, for the egress of the captives, and that too, he felt confident, without attracting the attention of the dozing guard.
“Now feel your way out; and, without stirring a twig or leaf creep on after me,” whispered Bart.
And receding a few paces from the opening, he paused to await the result. In a moment he had the satisfaction of perceiving a female form slowly emerging from the narrow passage into the open air without.
Supposing her companion to be immediately behind, he now, with a whispered word of encouragement, led the way from the spot. With frequent pauses, both to assure himself that he was followed by his charge, and to listen for any stir among the foe that should indicate a discovery of the escape, he continued to creep forward till he encountered Dunning, when, the latter taking the lead, they all moved on, one after another, in the same cautious manner as before, and soon reached the landing in safety; out as they emerged from the bushes, and the hunter turned to congratulate the ladies on their escape, it was now, for the first time, discovered that but one of them was present.
“Bart, how is this? ditter tell me—where is the other?” demanded Dunning, in a tone of disappointment and vexation.
But Bart, equally disappointed and perplexed, was mute; and the lady, who proved to be Miss Howard, replied,—
“Miss Haviland, if not retaken, is now wandering in the woods.”
“Der wandering in ditter woods, and you not with her?” again demanded the former with an air of mingled surprise and reproach.
“Yes sir, but I did not intend to desert her,” promptly replied the girl. “Perceiving we were not watched very closely by the man they put over us, she and I had thought of a plan of escaping into the woods and getting round into the road. And while he was talking with another, that he had stepped forward a little ways to meet, we slipped out undiscovered, and gained a thicket; when finding I had left my shawl, I, contrary to Miss Haviland's advice, I will own, ventured back to get it, and was detected, just as I was leaving the shanty a second time, and her absence discovered. This made a stir among them, and they ordered off scouts after her along the pond towards the road, which was the way I pointed when they were threatening me if I didn't tell. But she must have heard all and escaped.”
“Escaped! ditter deuse of an escape that; for a woman to get out into a forest full of Indians in search of her,” replied the still unreconciled hunter. “But what course has she der taken, think ye, gal?”
“The one we planned, likely; and that was, to take a wide sweep round their camp, gain the road, and make for the tavern, which she said was not far off,” replied the other.
“Well,” said Dunning, in a more mollified tone, “though der dogs is in the luck, to be sure, yet half a loaf is better than none. We must save what we have got; so into the canoe there with ye, gal; and you, Bart, take her across, der find Harry, whom I'd ditter rather you would meet first, and tell him you have left me this side to go in search of the other, who, if found, can most likely be got to the road as well the way she set out as this, in the shape things now stand.”
Although this conversation scarcely occupied a minute, and although, while the hunter was yet speaking, Bart and his fair friend were in their respective positions in the boat, which instantly shot out silently and swiftly into the pond, under the vigorous push given it by the former, yet the event showed that they had been none too speedy in their movements; for, at that instant, a sudden bustle in the tory encampment, which was quickly followed by the confused sounds of voices making rapid inquiries and giving orders, together with the stealthy tread of approaching footsteps, apprised the fugitives that not only was their escape discovered, but probably also the direction they had taken.
“Der narve it, narve it, Bart! The ditter divils are after ye!” shouted the hunter, hastily retreating from the shore and disappearing in the nearest thicket.
And scarcely had he gained a covert before his place was occupied by four or five of the enemy, who came rushing down to the water; when, discovering the receding boat, then not fifty yards distant, the acting leader of the band fiercely exclaimed “Put about there instantly, and come ashore, or we'll fire and kill every person in the boat!”
“O, but you'll kill us if we come back,” replied Bart, splashing round his oar as if turning the boat, which in fact was going swiftly ahead.
“No, we won't,” responded the leader, deceived by the apparent simplicity of the reply; “but be quick, or we fire!”
“Well, seeing you aint going to hurt us,” said the former, carelessly while at the same time directing, in a whisper, the girl to throw herself close on the bottom of the canoe, he silently, but with all his might, bent himself to the oar.
“Why,” said the leader, after a short and doubtful pause, as he peered out in the darkness at the dimly-seen boat—“why, aint the fellow still moving ahead? He is, confound him: fire!”
“Let drive, then!” sung out Bart, with the greatest sang froid, as he hastily cast himself down in the boat.
The next instant several bullets struck the boat, or whistled over it, as the fierce flashings and deafening reports of as many exploding muskets burst from the shore with startling effect on the darkness and silence of night.
“I vown! but that an't so bad shooting as might be, in the dark so,” exclaimed Bart, hastily springing up and seizing his oar. “They are more at the business than I thought 'em; and we may as well be a little further off afore they have time to load and fire agin, guess,” he added, suddenly changing the direction of the beat from the course it had been taking, and plying the oar with an energy which showed rather less indifference to his proximity to the hostile marksmen behind him than his words might seem to imply.
The tories, in the mean while, who had foolishly all discharged their pieces at once, fell to loading again as fast as was possible for them to do in the dark. But before any of them was ready to fire, the last traces of the fugitive boat had vanished from their view.
They were, however, after giving vent to their vexation in a volley of curses upon the fellow who had thus outwitted them, in getting beyond controlling distance, preparing to fire again, at random, in the direction in which the canoe was last seen moving, when their attention was suddenly arrested by firing in the woods a short distance to the south, which seemed to be an exchange of shots between their pickets and some enemy assailing them from that direction. They therefore hurried back to their companions, and with them rallied to make a stand against the force which all supposed was about to storm their encampment. But to their agreeable disappointment, though an occasional shot continued to be directed towards them by persons who seemed to be lurking in the distant thickets, no tangible force made its appearance for the firing which had so alarmed them, and caused them to call in all their scouts within hearing, and make every preparation for a desperate resistance, was, as the reader will have already imagined, but the feint made by Woodburn's party, who, hearing the reports of the guns discharged at the escaping canoe, and partly divining the cause, had advanced from their concealment, and begun to make the diversion agreed on at the outset. But not receiving the signal promised, in case help was needed, and feeling doubtful how to act, most of them fell back, and ceased operations, till Bart, who had, in the mean time, reached the shore, and, with the fearless girl he had released, hastened round to their post, arrived and informed them of all that had occurred. On receiving this aggravating intelligence, Woodburn, now almost frantic with disappointment and anxiety, instantly withdrew to the road with all his band, except two left to keep the enemy in a state of alarm; when they all, including even the heroic Vine Howard, immediately scattered in different directions through the dark forest in anxious search for the luckless Miss Haviland, to whom we will now return, for the purpose of encounter on that eventful night.
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