Boone reached the hollow oak without seeing aught to make him apprehend danger. The forest was as quiet as if no deed of blood had ever occurred within its bounds. As silent as though the terrible form—the demon of the Indian and the phantom of the white—had never stricken unto death and sent to his long home the stout-limbed Shawnee warrior.
“Hullo! thar’s no one about,” Boone muttered, as he peered within the hollow of the oak.
“Boone!” cried a voice, low and cautiously from the thicket that fringed the little glade wherein stood the oak.
Then from the darkness, into the circle of light cast by the moonbeams, stepped Kenton.
“Top-knot all right, eh?” questioned Boone, clasping the hand of the other warmly within his own broad palm.
“Yes, but how long it will be all right is a riddle. The Injuns are ’round us thick as bees ’round a honeycomb.”
“Then you’ve seen the red heathen?”
“Yes, I scouted in right to the Injun village. But, as I lay in ambush, there was an awful row kicked up and I was afeard of being caught in a trap by the Injuns, so I jist retreated to safer quarters.”
“A row, eh?” said Boone, smiling.
“Yes, a ’tarnal row; they just kicked up Old Scratch for a little while. I reckon it must have been a fight among the Shawnees,” Kenton replied.