Alagwa stared at the spot where he had vanished, listening to the thudding of the soft earth into the ditch beneath him. Toward what refuge he was striving she did not know, but she was sure that he could not reach it on his own feet. If all of his party were slain, and she did not doubt that they were, he could escape only by water. Both the Auglaize and the Maumee below the fort were navigable for small boats, and if Brito and his comrades had come in one, he might regain it and float down the Maumee, possibly to safety.
Should she let him go? No pity was in her heart. The frontier was grim; it translated itself into primitive emotions, taking no account of the shadings of civilization or of the blending of good and evil that inheres in every man. Those brought up amid its environment hated their enemies and loved their friends; they took no middle course. Brito was an enemy and Alagwa hated him. All her life she had been taught to let no wounded enemy escape. Brief had been her acquaintance with the Englishman, but it had been long enough to show her what manner of man he was. Should she let him go to come back again, perhaps to destroy the thread of life that still remained in the helpless man by her side. Or should she finish the work she had begun and make Jack safe against at least this deadly foe. Feverishly she fingered the hilt of her knife.
As she hesitated Jack’s plaintive voice came again. “Who’s talking” he mumbled. “I—I can’t see. I can’t think. I—I—Bob! Bob!”
“I’m here, Jack!” Alagwa’s fingers tightened upon his.
Over the lad’s face came a look of peace. “Something’s happened to me,” he breathed. “But you’ll stay with me, won’t you, Bob?”
“Yes! Yes! I’ll stay with you. Don’t fear. I’ll never leave you.”
“Good.... I—I seem weak somehow. Did somebody hit me?... I want to get up. I must get up. Help me.” The lad caught at her arm and tried to pull himself up.
Alagwa did not hesitate. She was sure that, for a time at least, he would far better lie flat upon the ground. “Don’t get up!” she commanded. “Lie still. You have been wounded. Very nearly have you taken the dark trail to the Land of the Hereafter. You must lie still.” Her voice was imperative.
Jack yielded to it. “All right!” he sighed. “But—But I want Cato.”
Once more Alagwa remembered the negro. She stood up and looked about her.