“I couldn’t fire on you a few minutes ago, but I never felt more pleasure than in doing so just now!”
It was a proof of the excellent training of the sentinels by Shagbark that, startling as was the episode, not one of them abandoned his station. Each knew that to do so would be to invite an attack from the undefended quarter. All held their ground, alert and ready to fire the instant the chance offered.
The crack of the rifle and the shriek of the red man roused more than one sleeper. Three of the men caught up their guns and scrambled out of the wagons. They were bewildered and at sea for the moment. The youth saw the terrified face of a mother peering out of the open space in the canvas at the rear of the Conestoga.
“What does it mean, Alden?” she asked, failing to see the feet of the redskin who lay under the axletree.
“I fired at an Indian,” replied the youth; “keep out of sight for the bullets may be flying any minute.”
The face vanished, for the woman was sensible even in her fright. Her two small children had not awakened, and she lay down between them, an arm over each, while a prayer went up to the only sure refuge in time of peril.
Alden was sure that the report of his gun and the outcry of the victim would bring Shagbark to the spot and he was not mistaken. The lad was watching the plain for him when he came silently forward from the rear and spoke:
“Good for ye, younker! I won’t need ye many years under my care to make a fust-class hunter and trapper of ye. How was it?”
His youthful friend told what had occurred.