Rhythmic waves from the turbid, mighty current, sweeping past the creek mouth, beat into it at intervals, causing the heavy ark to rock slowly at its moorings. Fitfully then could be heard the impatient trampling of horses beneath the rough slab roof forward; a cow lowed for her calf, and turkeys and chickens “quuttered” drowsily on their roosts.
The fiddle was still going merrily; yet all the while a sharp-eyed old hunter stood a little apart from the dancers, watchful as a sentinel in war time; and within the ring of the firelight were stacked a dozen or more well-oiled flint-lock rifles, where they could be seized at a moment’s notice; for an attack by the Indians was still among the possibilities of an evening gathering.
There were other cares, however, and other hopes of a more personal nature; for ere long the tall young frontiersman whom the others called “captain,” and who seemed to be the leading spirit of the gathering, drew apart from the others, perhaps to look to the hawsers that held the ark, for he approached and tried their tension.
Very soon, however, he was joined by the handsome girl with whom he had led the Virginia Reel, and standing in the flickering shadows of the great trees down the bank, Marion Royce and Milly Ayer conversed long and earnestly.
The youthful arksman was a good type of that hardy generation of a century ago, that laid the foundation for the present greatness of the middle West. He was the offspring of pioneer stock from Virginia and New England, inured to labor, accustomed to danger, strong of arm, quick of eye, rough and ready in action, but manly and honest of heart.
Not yet twenty-two, he had already made three voyages to New Orleans. The long and turbid river-way, with its thousand perils, had grown familiar to him. Not his courage alone, but his coolness in danger and his wary carefulness, day and night, had led his fellows to choose him leader and captain for this fourth voyage on which these pioneer families had staked so much.
“YOU WILL SURELY COME BACK THEN?”
“It will be a long summer,” said Milly, soberly. “We shall not hear from you, perhaps, in all that time. But by September, Marion,—you will surely come back then?”
“Perhaps, if all goes well”, replied he, gravely. “But no one at home need fret if it is October or November. So many things may hold us back—head winds on the river, leaks, lending a hand with other boats; and then the delays of making our market at New Orleans.”