THE RIFLEMEN OF THE OHIO
A Story of Early Days along "The Beautiful River"
by
JOSEPH A. ALTSHELER
Author of "The Young Trailers," "The Forest Runners," "The FreeRangers," Etc.
New York and LondonD. Appleton and Company1922
Copyright, 1910, byD. Appleton and Company
Printed in the United States of America
"The Riflemen of the Ohio," while a complete story in itself, continuesthe fortunes of Henry Ware, Paul Cotter, and their friends, who were thecentral characters in "The Young Trailers," "The Forest Runners," "TheKeepers of the Trail," "The Eyes of the Woods," and "The Free Rangers."
"The head came up on the other side."]
CONTENTS
I.--THE EYE OF THE FLEET
II.--THE WYANDOT CHIEF
III.--THE SONG OF THE LEAVES
IV.--THE FOREST VILLAGE
V.--PLAY AND COUNCIL
VI.--THE GANTLET
VII.--ALONE IN THE WILDERNESS
VIII.--THE SHADOW IN THE WATER
IX.--THE GATHERING OF THE FIVE
X.--THE GREAT BORDERER
XI.--THE RACE OF THE FIVE
XII.--THE ONE WHO ARRIVED
XIII.--AT THE FORT
XIV.--SIX FIGURES IN THE DUSK
XV.--THE DEED IN THE DARK
XVI.--THE RETURN TRAIL
XVII.--PICKING UP THE STRANDS
XVIII.--THE HALTING OF THE FLEET
XIX.--THE WATERY PASS
XX.--THE TRUMPET'S PEAL
XXI.--FORCES MEET
XXII.--THE SPEECH OF TIMMENDIQUAS
XXIII.--ON THE OFFENSIVE
XXIV.--THE DECISIVE BATTLE
THE RIFLEMEN OF THE OHIO
CHAPTER I
THE EYE OF THE FLEET
The fleet of boats and canoes bearing supplies for the far east turnedfrom the Mississippi into the wide mouth of the Ohio, and it seemed, fora time, that they had come into a larger river instead of a tributary.The splendid stream, called by the Indians "The Beautiful River," flowedsilently, a huge flood between high banks, and there was not one amongthe voyagers who did not feel instinctively the depths beneath him.
A single impulse caused every paddle and oar to lie at rest a fewmoments, and, while they swung gently with the slow current just beyondthe point where one merged into the other, they looked at the two mightyrivers, the Mississippi, coming from the vast unknown depths of thenorthwest, rising no man knew where, and the Ohio, trailing its easylength a thousand miles through thick forests haunted by the mostwarlike tribes of North America. The smaller river--small only bycomparison--bore the greater dangers, and they knew it.
It was the fleet of Adam Colfax, and the five who had gone to NewOrleans and who had come back, triumphing over so many dangers in thecoming and the going, were still with him. Henry Ware, Paul Cotter, andShif'less Sol Hyde sat in the foremost boat, and the one just behindthem contained Silent Tom Ross and Long Jim Hart. After the great battleon the Lower Mississippi in which they defeated the Indians anddesperadoes under Alvarez, the voyage had remained peaceful as theypulled up to the Ohio.
"It's our own river again, Henry," said Paul. Both felt a sort ofproprietary interest in the Ohio.
"It's so, and I'm glad to look on it again," replied Henry, "but theShawnees, the Miamis, the Wyandots, and others will never let us bywithout a fight."
He spoke with gravity. But a boy in years, the many stern scenes throughwhich he had passed and his natural instinct for the wilderness made himsee far. He was thinking of the thousand miles, every one with itsdangers, that they must travel before they could unload their suppliesat Pittsburgh for the struggling colonists.
No concern of the future troubled the soul of Long Jim Hart. He was oncemore in the region that he loved. He looked at one river and then at theother, and his eyes glowed.
"Ain't it fine, Henry?" he said. "These two pow'ful big streams! Back uvthem the firm, solid country that you kin tread on without the fear uvbreakin' through, an' then the cool steadyin' airs that are blowin' onour faces!"
"Yes, it is fine, Jim!" said Henry with emphasis.
He, too, ceased to think, for the moment, of the future, and paid moreattention to the meeting of the rivers. The Ohio, at that point,although the tributary, was wider than the Mississippi, and for somedistance up its stream was deeper. Its banks, sloping and high, wereclothed in dense forest and underbrush to the water's edge. Nothingbroke this expanse of dark green. It was lone and desolate, save for thewild fowl that circled over it before they darted toward the water. Thenote of everything was size, silence, and majesty.
"We begin the second stage of our great journey," said Adam Colfax toHenry.
Then the leader raised his hand as a signal, hundreds of oars andpaddles struck the water, the fleet leaped into life again, and boatsand canoes, driven by strong arms, swung forward against the slowcurrent of the Ohio. Some rower in a leading boat struck up a wild songof love and war, mostly war, and others joined, the chorus swelling totwenty, fifty, then a hundred voices. It was a haunting air, and forestand water gave back the volume of sound in far, weird echoes.
But fleet and song merely heightened the effect of the wilderness.Nobody saw them. Nobody heard them. Desolation was always before them,and, as they passed, closed in again behind them. But the men themselvesfelt neither lonely nor afraid. Used to victory over hardship anddanger, their spirits rose high as they began the ascent of the secondriver, the last half of their journey.
Adam Colfax, stern New England man that he was, felt the glow, and Paul,the imaginative boy, felt it, too.
"I don't see how such an expedition as this can fail to get through toPittsburgh," he said.
"I'd like to go on jest ez we're goin' all the time," said Shif'less Solwith lazy content. "I could curl up under a rail and lay thar fur athousand miles. Jest think what a rest that would be, Paul!"
Henry Ware said nothing. The Mississippi had now dropped out of sight,and before them stretched only the river that hugged the Dark and BloodyGround in its curves. He knew too much to trust to solitude and silence.He never ceased to search the forests and thickets on either shore withhis trained eyes. He looked for little things, a bough or a bush thatmight bend slightly against the gentle wind that was blowing, or thefaintest glimpse of a feather on a far hill, but he saw nothing that wasnot in perfect accord with nature. The boughs and the bushes bent asthey should bend. If his eye found a feather it was on the back of thescarlet tanager or the blue jay. Before him flowed the river, a sheet ofmolten gold in the sun, current meeting boat. All was as it should be.
But Henry continued to watch. He, more than any other, was the eye ofthe fleet, will and use helping the gift of nature, and, as he knew,they had come to depend upon him. He was doing the work expected of himas well as the work that he loved, and he meant that he should not fail.
The song, mellow, haunting, and full of echoes, went on, now rising involume, then falling to a softer note, and then swelling again. Theyfinished the last verse and bar, and began a new one, tuned to thestroke of oar and paddle, and the fleet went forward swiftly, smoothly,apparently in a world that contained only peace.
Jim Hart turned his face to the cooling airs that began to blow a littlestronger. Paul was rapt far away among the rosy clouds of the future.Shif'less Sol, who held neither oar nor paddle, closed his eyes andleaned
luxuriously against a mast, but Henry sat immovable, watching,always watching.
The hours, one by one, dropped behind them. The sun swung toward thezenith and stood poised in the center of the skies, a vast globe ofreddish gold in a circling sea of blue. The light from the high heavenswas so brilliant that Henry could see small objects on either shore,although they were in the center of a stream, a mile wide. He sawnothing that did not belong there, but still he watched.
"Noon!" called Adam Colfax. "And we'll land and eat!"
Rowers and paddlers must have food and plenty of it, and there was ajoyous shout as the leader turned the prow of his boat toward a cove inthe northern shore.
"See anything that looks hostile in there, Henry?" asked Adam Colfax.
He spoke rather lightly. Despite his cautious nature and longexperience, he had begun to believe that the danger was small. His was apowerful party. The Northern Indians would hear of the great defeatsustained by their Southern brethren, and would avoid a foe whom theycould not conquer. He looked for an easy and quiet journey up the Ohio.
"I don't see anything but the ground and the trees," replied Henry,smiling, but continuing, nevertheless, to search the forest with thosewonderfully keen eyes of his.
"Perhaps we can find game, too," added Adam Colfax. "We need freshsupplies, and a country deserted like this should be swarming with deerand buffalo."
"Perhaps," said Henry.
When their boat touched the bank, Henry and Shif'less Sol sprang ashore,and slid silently into the forest. There they made a wide curve aboutthe cove that had served as a landing, but found no signs of life exceptthe tracks of game. After a while they sat down on a log and listened,but heard nothing save the usual sounds of the forest.
"What do you think of it, Sol?" asked Henry.
"O' course, Henry," replied the shiftless one judiciously, "we've got toexpect trouble sometime or other, but I ain't lookin' fur it yet awhile.We can't have no dealin's with it till it comes."
Henry shook his head. He believed that the instinct of Shif'less Sol,usually so alert, was now sleeping. They were sitting in the verythickest of the forest, and he looked up at the roof of green leaves,here so dense that only slim triangles of blue sky showed between. Theleaves stirred a little. There was a flash of flame against the green,but it was only a scarlet tanager that shot past, then a flash of blue,but it was only a blue jay. Around them, clustering close to the trees,was the dense undergrowth, and they could not see twenty yards away.
The faint, idle breeze died of languor. The bushes stood up straight.The leaves hung motionless. The forest, which was always to Henry a livething, seemed no longer to breathe. A leaf could have been heard had itfallen. Then out of that deadly stillness came a sudden note, a strange,wild song that Henry alone heard. He looked up, but he saw no bird, nosinger of the woods. Yet the leaves were rippling. The wind had risenagain, and it was playing upon the leaves in a mystic, solemn way,calling words that he knew or seemed to know. He glanced at Shif'lessSol, but his comrade heard only the wind, raising his head a littlehigher that its cool breath might fan his face.
To Henry, always attuned to the wilderness and its spirit, this suddenvoice out of the ominous silence was full of meaning. He started at thefirst trill. It was not a vain and idle song. A strange shiver ran downhis spine, and the hair on his head felt alive.
The great youth raised his head. The shiver was still in his spine. Allhis nerves and muscles were tense and drawn. The wind still sang on theleaves, but it was a warning note to Henry, and he understood. He satrigid and alert, in the attitude of one who is ready to spring, and hiseyes, as he looked up as if to seek the invisible hand among the greenleaves, were full of fire and meaning.
Chance made the shiftless one glance at his comrade, and he wasstartled.
"What is it, Henry?" he asked.
"I was hearing something."
"I hear nothin' but the wind."
"I hear that--and much more."
Shif'less Sol glanced again at his comrade, but Henry's face saidnothing, and the shiftless one was not a man to ask many questions. Hewas silent, and Henry listened attentively to the melodious breath ofthe wind, so gay, so light to one whose spirit was attuned only to theobvious, but so full of warning to him. He looked up, but he could seenothing. Nevertheless, the penetrating note came forth, never ceasing,drumming incessantly upon the boy's brain.
"I think we'd better go back to the camp, Sol," he said presently.
"So do I," said Shif'less Sol, "an' report that thar's nothin' to befound."
Henry made no reply as they plunged into the green thicket, treadingsoundlessly on soft moccasins and moving with such skill that leaves andboughs failed to rustle as they passed. But the note of the wind amongthe leaves pursued the boy. He heard it long after the glade in whichthey had sat was lost to sight, fainter and fainter, but full ofwarning, and then only an echo, but a warning still.
The feelings color what the eyes see. Shif'less Sol beheld only asplendid green forest that contained nothing but game for their hunting,deer, bear, buffalo, wild turkey, and other things good, but Henry sawover all the green an ominous, reddish tint. Game might be in thosewoods--no doubt it was swarming there--but he felt another presence, farmore deadly than bear or panther.
The boy saw a small object on the ground, almost hidden in the grass,and, without slackening his speed, he stooped and picked it up sosilently and deftly that Shif'less Sol, who was a little in advance,neither saw nor heard him.
It was the feather of an eagle, one that might have dropped from thewing of some soaring bird, but the quick eye of the boy saw that thequill had been cut with a knife, as the feather of a goose used to besharpened for a pen.
He suppressed the sharp exclamation that rose to his lips, and thrustthe feather into the bosom of his buckskin hunting shirt. The last echoof the warning note came to him and then died away in the forest.
They were at the camp fifteen minutes later, and the eyes of Shif'lessSol beamed at the joyous sight. In all their long journey they had foundno more pleasant anchorage, a sheltered cove of the Ohio, and firmground, clear of undergrowth, sloping gently to the water's edge. Theboats were tied in a great curve about the beach, and nearly all the menwere ashore, glad to feel once more the freedom of the land. Some stillsung the wild songs they had picked up in the West Indies or on theSpanish Main, others were feeding fires that crackled merrily and thatflung great bands of red flame against the glowing yellow curtain of thesunlight. Pleasant odors arose from pots and kettles. The air of frolicwas pervasive. The whole company was like so many boys with leave toplay.
Henry left Shif'less Sol and approached Adam Colfax, who was sittingalone on the exposed root of a big tree.
"You found nothing, of course?" said Adam Colfax, who shared the easyfeelings of his men.
"I found this," replied the boy, drawing the eagle feather from hisbreast.
"What is that? Merely the feather of some wild bird."
"The feather of an eagle."
"I fancy that many an eagle drops a feather now and then in thiswilderness."
"This feather was dropped last from the head of an Indian warrior."
"How do you know it?"
"See, the quill has been trimmed off a little with a knife. It was partof a decoration."
"It may have fallen many weeks ago."
"It could not be so. The plumage everywhere is smooth and even. It hasbeen lying on the ground only a little while. Otherwise it would bebedraggled by the rain or be roughened by the wind blowing it aboutamong the bushes."
"Then the feather indicates the presence of hostile Indians?" said AdamColfax thoughtfully. "I know by your manner that you think so."
"I am sure of it," said Henry with great emphasis.
"You're right, no doubt. You always are. But look how strong our forceis, men tried in toil and battle, and they are many! What have we tofear?"
He looked over his light-hearted host, and his blue eyes, usual
ly socold, kindled with warmth. One might search the world over, and not finda hardier band. Truly, what had he to fear?
Henry saw that the leader was not convinced, and he was not one to wastewords. After all, what did he have to offer but a stray feather, carriedby the wind?
"Dismiss your fears, my boy," said Adam Colfax cheerfully. "Think aboutsomething else. I want to send out a hunting party this afternoon. Willyou lead it?"
"Of course," said Henry loyally. "I'll be ready whenever the othersare."
"In a half hour or so," said Adam Colfax with satisfaction. "I knew youwouldn't fail."
Henry went to the fire, by the side of which his four comrades sateating their noonday meal, and took his place with them. He said not aword after his brief salute, and Paul presently noticed his silence andlook of preoccupation.
"What is the matter, Henry?" he asked.
"I'm going with a little party this afternoon," replied Henry, "to huntfor buffalo and deer. Mr. Colfax wishes me to do it. He thinks we needfresh supplies, and I've agreed to help. I want you boys to promise, ifI don't come back, that you'll go on with the fleet."
Paul sat up, rigid with astonishment. Shif'less Sol turned a lazy butcurious eye on the boy.
"Now, what under the sun do you mean, Henry?" he asked. "I've heard youtalk a good many times, but never like that before. Not comin' back? Isthis the Henry Ware that we've knowed so long?"
Henry laughed, despite himself.
"I'm just the same," he said, "and I do feel, Sol, that I'm not comingback from this hunt. I don't mean that I'll never come back, but it willbe a long time. So I want you fellows to go on with the fleet and helpit all you can."
"Henry, you're plum' foolish," said taciturn Tom Ross. "Are you out uvyour head?"
Henry laughed again.
"It does sound foolish," he admitted, "and I don't understand why Ithink I'm not coming back. I just feel it."
"I notice that them things mostly come contrariwise," said Shif'lessSol. "When I know that I'm goin' to hev hard luck it's gen'ally good.We'll look for you, Henry, at sundown."
But Paul, youthful and imaginative, was impressed, and he regarded Henrywith silent sympathy.