Adventure Magazine Cover — page 132: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

126 without noise and lie down in the stern. The wind was blowing strong, and the Night Walker’s calumet was rushing the clouds rapidly under the western stars. As I took my place and gently pushed off into the cur- renta drop of rain fell on my face. Whether it was red medicine, white prayers or just luck, I was duly grateful. Durgin in the bottom of the canoe gave a convulsive jerk as there sounded the wild yell of some Shawnee watcher who had ap- proached close enough to the grave to find the spot deserted. From up the river and from the direction of the swaying corn the cry was repeated. The chase was on. I mumbled prayers for a downpour. The dancing flames of the fire below us at the landing-place were reflected weirdly in the black water. Farther down and on the opposite shore burned three fires at the Delaware village. These were two danger points we must pass. The savages kept call- ing out to each other as we hugged the bank and worked down-stream. Then a white man began shouting in Shawnee: “Up the bank! They have gone up the river!”’ I recognized him as Simon Girty. A deep, bass voice thundered above the wind: ‘Another white man must die to drive the bad medicine away from my village. The Spotted Snake is ready to burn one of the men.” This would be none less than Blue Jacket. But all this urging would not have drawn all the Shawnee from the neighborhood of the fire had not a Shawnee warrior some distance up-stream fiercely yelled: “Here they are! Big Bear has found them! Spread out! Spread out! They run toward the corn!” This announcement sent every able- bodied man rushing either toward Big Bear or at right angles from the river to stop our entering the corn. Those who ran along the bank passed within a rod of us. Big Bear repeated his triumphant cries, and the village was fast emptying itself in the logi- cal direction we would have taken if it had not been for Henry Ball, sent to us by Girty. I dipped my paddle more rapidly and swung out toward the opposite bank, where excited voices on the Point were demanding to know what was the matter. Men would soon be making the crossing. W/{th a final sweep of the paddle I shot the light craft Adventure down-stream, bowed low and waited to see what would happen. We shot through the fitfully illuminated zone; there came no fresh alarms. I rose to my knees and sent the craft inshore to avoid the streamers of light being blown from the Delaware fires across the stream. The Night Walker had played the fugitive and was leading the enemy a merry chase. His occasional betrayal of his position com- pletely deceived the Shawnees and Girty into believing the white men were all but within their grasp. The clamor of the chase was receding as we drew opposite the Delaware village. A new danger threatened us as some of the Delawares began crossing to learn the cause of the disturbance. I heard a man say the prisoners must have escaped, and an- other declare one of us was to have been roasted in the morning to drive the bad medicine away from the village. Durgin shifted his position, and something scraped across the side of the canoe. I whispered for him to remain motionless if he valued his life. , “Getting the bow-gun ready,” he replied. I commanded him to desist and gently sent the canoe against the bank and held it there. At this point luck made a double turn in our favor. The Delawares changed their course to a long diagonal and made for the light at the landing-place; the rain be- gan falling smartly. Three canoes passed our position before I allowed our craft to float down the darkness. Even*when clear of the two villages we could not make haste, for the water was low. I could not let Durgin help me for fear he might upset us. But there was no noise of pursuit, and if the savages had turned their attention down-stream they were hunting in deadly silence. Nor did the cries of discovery continue up the river. This led us to believe that the Night Walker had been too hard-pressed to keep up the deceit and that the Shawnees were suddenly learning Big Bear’s hopes of an easy capture were misleading. A few miles below the villages we grounded on a rock and were compelled to carry the canoe nearly half a mile through shallow water and over half-submerged rocks. It rained steadily; the whole business was a dismal one. If there was a channel through the obstruction—and there must have been as Ball came up by canoe—we could not COMGHOO S CO