“No,” he replied, halting.
“But this is not the road leading to the settlement. We should follow the trail running parallel with the river—the trail we just left.”
“Yes, I know that that is the direct road,” he answered; “but we are obliged to make a wide detour here to escape the Shawnees. There is a large body of them ambushed by the trail a short distance below here. We are to make a circle to avoid them, and will come upon the trail again in due time. Do not fear; I will guide you safely. I know these wilds well. There is not a foot of ground between here and the Ohio that is not as familiar to me as my own hand. It is many years, though, since I have traversed these woods, but I’ve a good memory and am not likely to go astray.”
“I feared that you might have made a mistake in the path, therefore I spoke,” said Virginia, perfectly satisfied with the stranger’s reasons.
On went the stranger again, and although he had imposed caution on the girl, he did not seem to use much himself, for he went straight onward as before, without seeming to fear danger.
For a short time only did the guide continue in a straight path, for soon he commenced a zigzag course; first to the right, then to the left, then apparently he retraced the very path that they had come; then turned abruptly to the right again, went on a little way, then bent his course to the left.
Virginia was puzzled; she had been able before to tell the way in which they had been proceeding; but now, after all this turning and twisting, her brain was bewildered, and she could not guess whether she was going straight to Point Pleasant or in the opposite direction.
If the design of Benton had been to bother the girl by the abrupt turns he had made, and to confuse her as to the direction in which they were bending their steps, he had succeeded admirably.
Virginia followed without a word. She was fully trusting the man who was guiding her.
“We will soon be at the meeting-place appointed,” said Benton, after an hour’s weary tramp through the almost trackless wilderness.