“The sun was nigh an hour high when they got off.”
“Shouldn’t wonder if the cap’n has gone crazy,” muttered Byers, as George Benning hastened away, in search of the chief who commanded the war-party of the Crows.
He had met him returning from the thicket in which the remaining Blackfeet had taken refuge. In their efforts to dislodge their enemies from that position, the Crows had sustained serious loss, and had concluded that the game was not worth the candle. They had abandoned the siege, therefore, and were about to collect the horses of the Blackfeet, preparatory to returning home.
It was Benning’s belief that the Blackfeet warriors who had gone in pursuit of Silverspur and his companions would be likely to overtake the fugitives, in which event they would at once return to their village. He hoped to be able to induce the Crows to follow their trail, and meet them as they came back. They would thus easily gain another victory, which ought to be, as he supposed, a sufficient inducement for them to do as he wished them to.
But the Crow, when Benning presented this view of the case to him, steadily refused to do any thing of the kind. His party had come but for a special purpose, he said. That purpose had been accomplished, and it was their duty to return. Besides, several warriors had been lost in the attack upon the Blackfeet in the thicket, and it was their custom, when such a misfortune had befallen a war-party, to return immediately to their village, and to mourn for the fallen before attempting any other achievement.
All the arguments that Benning could use were ineffectual to change the determination of the chief, and he declared his intention of following the trail alone, in the hope that chance might in some way give him an opportunity of aiding Flora Robinette.
From this he was dissuaded by Pap Byers and the chief. The former represented to him that he would be unable to do any thing alone, and the latter advised him to accompany the warriors to the Crow village. He might there represent the case, the chief said, to Bad Eye, the chief of the village, who would be sure to sympathize with him, and would probably place a body of warriors under his control, for an expedition against the Blackfeet.
These arguments were so strongly advanced, and appeared so reasonable, that Benning reluctantly consented to accompany the Crow warriors, and set out with a heavy heart.
It must be said, although George Benning would not have liked to make the admission, that he felt very ill at ease concerning the company in which Flora Robinette had left the Blackfeet. He had hoped to rescue her himself; but another had been before him, and that other was a handsome, brave, and impulsive fellow, who might be as energetic and victorious in love as Benning knew him to be in war. What could be more likely than that he should fall in love with fair Flora Robinette, and what better opportunity could a man have for pressing his suit, than just when he had rescued the lady of his love from captivity among savages?
The more Benning thought of this, the more it troubled him. From what he had seen and heard of Fred Wilder, he had formed a high opinion of him; but he now began to torture himself with doubts and suspicions, which were not flattering to the character of Silverspur. If that person should succeed in getting Flora safely out of the clutches of the Blackfeet, there was no knowing what mean advantage he might take of her position and his achievement. Benning had never declared his love to Flora. He had thought that she had perceived it, and he had seen indications that led him to hope that his love was returned; but that was all. It would be only natural, if Wilder should address her, that she should feel herself bound in honor to listen favorably to the man who had saved her from a fate that might have been worse than death. It was highly probable, indeed, that she would consent to marry him, if she found that no objection could be urged against him.