"Are you sartin that we ain't right after all?"
"Dish ish de path dat goes round, and come back of my house shust in front of it, and if we keeps on, te cabin will run ag'inst us."
"Then we may as well turn back."
Crockett guided his horse carefully around the other so as still to hold the lead, and after considerable trouble, Hans succeeded in imitating him, and the return was begun.
It is never a very pleasant thing to find you have taken the wrong road, and Colonel Crockett felt somewhat ruffled that his companion should have misled him; but, after all, he did not see as any thing was lost thereby.
He felt very grave doubts in his own mind of the wisdom of this attempt to reach the settlement, when it was as good as certain that the Comanches were ahead of him. At any rate, there was no wisdom in seeking to do so, supported only by Hans Bungslager.
Sebastian was as keen and skillful as he was brave. He was intimately acquainted with every crook and turn of the forest-paths, he had fought Comanches and Mexicans, and some reliance could be placed upon him in an emergency like this.
Pretty Katrina was far more valuable in the hour of danger than was her thick-headed uncle; and by turning back, there was the probability of joining them the sooner, provided they had not already come up and passed the point where the two paths joined.
This seemed so probable as to cause Crockett considerable misgiving, and he turned about to make a proposition to the Dutchman.
"You're so heavily-loaded, Hans, that it won't be safe for your hoss to undertake to git up a trot, if he was able, which I don't believe he is. So I'll gallop on ahead to meet the folks, while you take your time. Are you agreeable?"