“We have come to see,” continued Scarouady. “For the French Indians are told he is a man of such terrible temper that he must be guarded on the march or he will run wild and spread death among all the Indians who would fight him.”
“That is true,” answered Robert.
“Well,” said Scarouady, “I think Washington is going to take the fort, unless more foolishness is done. We will wait on the hill and see, for we have risked our lives before and gained nothing.”
The General was so weak from his pain that the officers urged him to wait a day or two before making the attack.
“No,” he replied. “I will sleep in Fort Duquesne tomorrow night or I will sleep nowhere.”
There had been smoke, this evening, in the direction of the fort; and in the middle of the night a great “Boom!” shook the woods. What this meant nobody knew and nobody cared. They all would see on the morrow.
In the morning they started on from these headwaters of Turkey Creek, near whose mouth, not many miles west, General Braddock’s army had been cut to pieces.
The day was dark and chill—this day when Fort Duquesne should fall, after four years of defiance.
The Buckskins led, to clear the road of the enemy. After them followed Head of Iron, in his litter, at the fore of the Highlanders. The Royal Americans held the right, under Colonel Bouquet. The other Virginians, and the Pennsylvanians and the Maryland and North Carolina companies held the left, under Washington. The drums beat—tap, tap—and the steady tramp of feet rustled the dead leaves of the forest aisles.