“Thar,” he thought, with a sly chuckle, “I guess the Crows will have some difficulty to foller me. If they find the dead Injun, then they’ll track me to the river an’ then they’ll be bothered. They won’t think for a single moment that I’ve gone up-stream right into their camp, ’cos that’s foolhardy, but, bless their stupid souls, the bold game is the one that wins in the long run. No, of course they’ll imagine that I’ve gone down the river an’ they won’t dare to track me very far in that direction for fear of gettin’ within range of our rifles. I think I’ve fooled ’em ’bout as cute as it can be done. They’ll get sick of tackling the ‘Crow-Killer’ ’fore long, I reckon; if they don’t, they’re bigger fools than I take ’em to be.”
So up the river, hid by the overhanging bank, cautiously went the “Crow-Killer.” It was necessary to again ascend the bank in order to get within ear-shot of the Indians; but how to do it without leaving the marks of his feet upon the soft clay bank was a puzzle. Circumstances favored him. Right before him a stunted oak grew out of the bank and overhung the stream; grasping the trunk with his hands, light and quick as a cat, Abe lifted and swung himself up over the bank, his feet finding a resting-place on the bottom of the tree-trunk and thus leaving no mark.
The bank thus again gained, he plunged once more into the thicket.
After advancing a few steps, he heard the sound of horses pawing the ground, a sure proof that he was near the camp.
Cautiously he stole forward a few steps more, when the thicket ended suddenly, and before him extended another little glade, not tenanted by a single savage as was the other, but by a score or more of the red braves. Extending himself flat on the ground, the guide, snake-like, wormed himself forward among the tangled underbrush, until he arrived at the very edge of the thicket, where he could not only command a full view of what was going on, but could hear nearly every word that was said. As he conjectured, he looked upon the main camp of the war-party.
On the prairie, close to the timber, the horses of the party, the wild Indian ponies, hardy and savage as their masters, the red chiefs, were tethered.
Some thirty warriors were in the little glade; the rest of the party, as the scout had surmised, were watching the camp of the emigrants.
All of the thirty warriors, excepting some eight, who appeared to the practiced eyes of the “Crow-Killer” to be the principal chiefs, were scattered over the prairie edge of the little glade near the horses, nearly all reclining on the ground.
The eight chiefs, among whom was the “White Vulture,” were seated near the middle of the glade in a circle, apparently holding a council. So the scout judged, and also that the council had just commenced, as the calumet, from which the smoke lazily curled, was being passed from mouth to mouth.
“Now then,” thought the guide, “we’ll see what the red devils are arter.” Then his eyes wandered anxiously over the Indians near the horses.