“Why not?” coolly asked the hunter. “Wa’n’t that the agreement ’twixt you an’ Girty? Didn’t yer say as ye’d be hyur when they come to embark, ready to take part in the fightin’?”
“Not exactly. I told him I should be here if I was nowhere else, but, to be frank, it was my intention to be somewhere else.”
“What! ye ain’t afeard, be yer?”
“Oh, no! not in the least,” was the quick rejoinder. “It isn’t fear that urges me to keep out of the fight, but stronger and better reasons. You see, I’m deeply, madly in love, and can not run the risk of losing the bewitching beauty I have taken so much pains to secure. Suppose I should go into the fight and get killed; where would be the reward for my labor? and what would become of the girl? Besides all this, if the Indians should, by any chance, be defeated, and I captured, I should be strung up to the nearest tree for the part I had taken in the conflict. Don’t you see?”
Nick Robbins seemed to meditate. After a while he asked:
“Wal, what d’ye perpose to do?”
“Before answering that question,” said McCabe, “I should like to know whether you are going to take part in the massacre or not?”
“It have been my intention to do so all along, but ef you don’t I don’t, that’s sartin.”
“Very good. I will suggest, then, that we move down the bank of the river about half a mile, or whatever the distance may be, and take our stand just opposite the island.”
“What then?”