"Yes, I'm all right. You keep paddling."
"There they are!"
The Miamis had burst out upon the shore behind. They yelled furiously, and shook their fists—but they yelled and threatened in vain. Now they dared not follow farther. The boats from the Kentucky shore took the paddlers off the raft; dragged Little Fat Bear from the cold water. His teeth chattered. He could not manage himself. He had not been taken out any too soon.
"Who are you, anyhow! White boys? Where from?"
"We're the boys that the Miamis stole from the Pope settlement last February—all except Billy Wells. He's with 'em still."
"What! How'd you get away? Your folks had give you up. I declare! Made off alone, did you!"
"Clear from the Little Calumet River. Been three weeks."
"Whoopee! Think o' that! Guess we'd better take you down to Louisville, soon as we can. Colonel Pope's moved into town, 'count o' Injuns. He'll be powerful glad to see you, and so will your other folks."
And that proved true. Colonel Pope met them at the landing. Little Fat Bear was carried ashore, to be rubbed and dosed. And from this time on for many a week there certainly were four boy heroes in the Louisville district, with "tall" stories to be told over and over again.
Sometimes they wondered how William Wells, "Black Snake," was getting along; but they knew that he was all right.