At last darkness came. The trapper heard his pursuers returning, so he crept stealthily from his hiding-place and made for the river. He reached it in an hour, and by the light of the half moon, saw a frontiersman fishing from a canoe. He was afraid to call to him, for the woods were full of Indians, so he attracted his attention by beating upon the water with a stick. The fellow saw him; picked him up, and paddled him to the other shore, where his handcuffs were cut from his wrists. Next day he stood among his own friends.
Not long after this remarkable escape the trapper was at a fort on Wheeling Creek from which a number of pioneers had mysteriously disappeared.
“They have been killed by the redskins,” said one of the backwoodsmen, who resided there. “How, where, and when, no one seems to know; but, my friend, there have been mysterious calls of turkeys in the woods. Turkeys, mark you, my friend,—wild turkeys!”
Wetzel pricked up his ears. He remembered that each of the men who had been killed had heard turkey calls near the fort: had gone out to shoot one for supper: and had never returned. The turkey calls had all come from one direction and here was a high hill covered with boulders. A small cave-like depression could be seen from the camp. Putting two and two together, he decided that Mr. Redskin had produced the call of Mr. Turkey and that it was Mr. Redskin’s unerring aim that had put an end to the lives of so many good frontiersmen. “I shall soon stop the twaddle of the fascinating tongue of Mr. Gobbler,” said the scout to himself.
Setting out one morning, before day had broken, he soon drew near a hill, on the top of which was a small cave. It was an excellent spot in which to hide one’s self, and, placing himself in ambush, he watched it narrowly. At sunrise he saw the tufted head of a Shawnee appear in the narrow opening, and the “gobble, gobble, gobble” of a turkey, sounded from the throat of the savage. The trapper bent low and watched the performance, for it was an exact imitation of the male bird. “Gobble, gobble, gobble,” echoed again from the gloom of the cave, and, “crack” sounded the rifle of the bold pioneer. A wail of anguish arose from the cavern’s mouth. Then all was still. The Shawnee gobbler had gone to the Happy Hunting Grounds.
Well pleased with himself, Wetzel started back to the fort with the scalp-lock of the enterprising brave, and, as he neared the stockade, met a soldier hastening towards him.
“Did you hear that turkey call?” said the enthusiastic sportsman. “I’m going out to get him, sure.”
The scout pointed to his girdle.
“There is Mr. Gobbler,” said he. “He was the kind of a bird that shoots a rifle. My boy, you should thank your lucky stars that I saw him first.”
Not long after this event the frontiersman made a journey to the Kanawha River with John Madison, brother of James Madison, at one time President of the United States. They were busy surveying some land, and one day came to a hunter’s cabin, which appeared to be deserted.