“Look there! We must hurry. Signal the Indians to mend their pace and keep with us. Company is coming.”
Four canoes with French and Indian paddlers had appeared around the bend behind. They were loaded high. The loads, of course, were liquor, powder, lead and other presents for the Half-King party, and for Logstown, from the French “father.”
“Yah!” said Jacob Vanbraam. “It is better not to let dem rascals camp with us.”
“Or to get to Venango and below ahead of us,” Washington added. “They will make mischief.”
X
THE LONG DANGER MARCH
[Gist and John Davidson were the paddlers]; but the current of French Creek was so swift that they had to drop the paddles and use poles to fend off from the rocks and snags. The afternoon was cloudy and bitter cold. Upon either side of the black creek the snowy forest reeled in reverse.
