“Did you tell him that we are running away from them?”
“Yes. Wait a minute.”
The Indian was speaking. He pointed up the river and his manner was earnest and emphatic. When Scar Face paused, Raoul turned to the others again.
“He says he has heard that there is a good ford a little way up the river. That is probably where our people crossed. He thinks that Murray and the Sioux will follow the horse tracks to the ford. If Scar Face and his braves lie in wait there, they can get a shot at Murray when he tries to cross. They will take us to the ford in their canoes.”
Before Raoul had finished this explanation, the Indian was showing signs of impatience. He turned now and led the way in among the willows. There, where the river current had taken a crescent-shaped bite out of the mud bank, two birch canoes were pulled up. Five young braves, arrayed in feathers and war paint, came out from hiding places among the bushes, where they had been waiting for their leader, who had been for a look across the prairie west of the river.
They were a wild and fearsome looking little band. Had the boys not known that they were, for the time being at least, on the Saulteur side of the quarrel, they might have hesitated to trust themselves with the war party. But they had given Scar Face and his comrades information of value, and had nothing to fear from them.
XXXVIII
THE FIGHT AT THE BOIS DES SIOUX
The Indians wasted few words and little time. Walter and Raoul were assigned to one canoe, Neil to the other. Riding as passengers, they took the opportunity to munch the chunks of pemmican they had brought with them, but had not paused to eat.
The Bois des Sioux, above the Ottertail, proved to be an insignificant stream. It had no valley, but meandered crookedly through a mere trench in the flat prairie. Willows and other bushes fringed its muddy waters. Its banks were sometimes open, sometimes wooded with groves or thin lines of cottonwood, poplar, wild cherry, and other trees. It would be possible to ford the stream almost anywhere, Walter thought, if one did not stick fast in the mud. He watched the shores anxiously for signs that horses had recently been across.
The Indians had been paddling for not more than a half hour, when Scar Face, who was in the bow of the canoe that carried Walter and Raoul, gave a little grunt, and pointed with his paddle blade to the low west bank. Undoubtedly animals had gone up or down there. The willows were broken, the mud trampled. The Indians swerved the canoe close in. The broken bushes were still fresh.