"He will be all the more anxious to catch the children," Mrs. Welch said despondently.
"It can't be denied, ma'am, as he will do his best that way," Pearson answered. "It all depends, though, on the boy. I wish I was with him in that canoe. Howsomever, I can't help thinking as he will sarcumvent 'em somehow."
The night passed without any further attack. By turns half the garrison watched while the other lay down, but there was little sleep taken by any. With the first gleam of daylight Mrs. Welch and her husband were on the lookout.
"There's two canoes out on the lake," Pearson said. "They're paddling quietly; which is which I can't say."
As the light became brighter Pearson pronounced, positively, that there were three men in one canoe and four in the other.
"I think they're all Injuns," he said. "They must have got another canoe somewhere along the lake. Waal, they've not caught the young uns yet."
"The boats are closing up to each other," Mrs. Welch said. "They're going to have a talk, I reckon. Yes, one of 'em's turning and going down the lake, while the other's going up. I'd give a heap to know where the young uns have got to."
The day passed quietly. An occasional shot toward the house showed that the Indians remained in the vicinity and, indeed, dark forms could be seen moving about in the distant parts of the clearing.
"Will it be possible," the farmer asked Pearson, when night again fell, "to go out and see if we can discover any traces of them?"
"Worse than no use," Pearson said positively. "We should just lose our har without doing no good whatever. If the Injuns in these woods—and I reckon altogether there's a good many hundred of 'em—can't find 'em, ye may swear that we can't. That's just what they're hoping, that we'll be fools enough to put ourselves outside the stockade. They'll lie close round all night, and a weasel wouldn't creep through 'em. Ef I thought there was jest a shadow of chance of finding them young uns I'd risk it; but there's no chance—not a bit of it."