“I—I can’t walk much further,” came presently from Ezra Winship.
“By gum! I forgot about that wound in your leg,” exclaimed Pep Frost; “but we air a-comin’ to some rocks now an’ more’n likely they’ll afford us some kind o’ a hidin’-place.”
The old pioneer was right, and leaving the brook they crawled up a series of rough rocks and then into a hollow thick with brushwood. Here they felt comparatively safe, and Ezra Winship sank down exhausted, unable to take another step.
While Pep Frost remained on guard to give the alarm should any of the Indians appear in the vicinity, Mr. Winship gave Joe some of the particulars of the attack on the camp of the pioneers.
“We were caught at something of a disadvantage,” said he. “The horses were giving us a good deal of trouble because one of them stepped into a nest of hornets. While the men were trying to calm the beasts the Indians rushed at us without warning.”
“Was anybody killed?”
“Yes; at the first volley Jim Vedder was laid low and Jerry Dillsworth received a wound from which he cannot possibly recover. The Freemans’ baby was also struck in the shoulder while her mother was holding her in her arms. Those who weren’t struck ran for their guns, and we fought the redskins for fully quarter of an hour. But at last the tide of battle went against us, and I was laid low with an arrow wound in the thigh. I went down and a horse came down on top of me, and that was all I knew for about half an hour, when I found myself a prisoner and tied to a tree in the dark.”
“And mother and the girls——”
“I didn’t see anything more of them,” answered Ezra Winship sadly. “I know your mother was hit in the arm by a tomahawk, but I don’t believe the wound was very bad. The last I saw of Pep Frost he was fighting to save Clara Parsons from being carried away. But a blow from a club one of the redskins carried stretched him flat, and when I saw him again he was a prisoner like myself.”
“And what of all of the others, father?”