The fears of Yankee Seth had been but too well founded, for Madge had indeed fallen into the hands of the traitorous Willimack. Early in the morning, not long after the escape of Will Floyd from the stake, the stockade had been surprised by a sudden onset from a savage party under the brutal chief. Matthew Floyd, defending her with desperate valor, was felled by the stroke of a hatchet and had dropped into the cellar just as the roof of the burning building began to fall. Willimack seized the half-fainting girl and dragged her out of the burning cabin by main force, keeping a tight grip upon her wrist, for he knew that she possessed enough moral courage to kill herself if he gave her the opportunity. A malicious grin writhed his dark face as the flames curled about the rafters of that doomed house.
"Wah!" he cried. "Burn, home of the white man, burn! The shelter which you refused to the chief, Willimack, you will give to no one. Burn, burn, burn!"
"You are a wretch," cried Madge. "Are you brave enough to kill me now and let me go to the noble man who had given the orphan girl a shelter through these long years?"
"Why should I kill you?" said Willimack. "No; live to cook the venison in the great wigwam of the Wyandot when the white man has ceased from off the land."
"Release me, then, and let me go back to my people. You have done wickedness enough."
He only laughed scornfully, and pointed to the bleeding bodies of the two soldiers and the negro servants. "You see all these," he said. "They stood by and laughed me to scorn when the Yellow Hair struck me down at his feet like a dog. Was this well? A chief is not a dog, and Willimack only lived for vengeance. See; you will from this time be an Indian, live as we live, die as we die, and be buried as we bury our dead. I have spoken. Willimack can not lie."
He turned about and uttered a signal-whoop, at which the men gathered about him, and he addressed them rapidly in the Indian language, which Madge did not understand. He had no sooner done so than they scattered and crossed the river in every conceivable conveyance, upon logs, planks and charred beams, leaving Willimack with only five men beside the ruins. He still held her hand, and turning away from the river, began his march to the West, closely followed by his men. She saw with ill-concealed fear the numberless artifices the man used to hide the trail, and feared that she was lost. Only once during the day he had stopped, and gave her food, and then marched on again. Her shoes were soon torn by the rough path over which she trod, and her feet bleeding. Once she stopped and said she would go no further, and Willimack turned fiercely upon her with a hatchet, but she did not blench.
"White girl," he said, "do you not fear death?"
"No," she said, boldly. "Death is preferable to the fate you design for me."