While Edith remained plunged in these gloomy reveries, an active, but not less sad, consultation was going on at the other side of the room, which ended in the adoption of the plan proposed by Lord H----, very slightly modified by the suggestions of Mr. Prevost. An orderly whom Captain Hammond had brought with him was left at the house as a sort of guard for Edith, it being believed that the sight of his red coat would act as a sort of intimation to any Indians who might be in the woods that the family was under the protection of the British government. Lord H---- and the young officer set out together for the boatmen's village--whence Walter had departed for Albany, and where a small party of English soldiers were now posted--intending to obtain all the aid they could, and sweep along the forest till they came to the verge of the recent fire, leaving sentinels on the different trails, which, the reader must understand, were so numerous throughout the whole of what the Iroquois called their Long House, as often to be within hail of each other.
Advancing stealthily along these narrow pathways, Lord H---- calculated that he could reconnoitre the whole distance between the great river and the fire with sufficient closeness to prevent any numerous party of Indians passing unseen, at least till he met with the advancing party of Mr. Prevost, who were to search the country thoroughly for some distance round the house, and then to proceed steadily forward in a reverse course to that of the young nobleman and his men.
No time was lost by Lord H---- and Captain Hammond on the road, the path they took being for a considerable distance the same by which Lord H---- had first arrived at Mr. Prevost's home, and throughout its whole length the same which the young officer had followed in the morning. It was somewhat longer, it is true, than the Indian trail by which Woodchuck had led them on his expedition; but its width and better construction more than made up for the difference in distance; and the rain had not been falling long enough to affect its solidity to any great extent. Thus little more than an hour and a half sufficed to bring the two officers to the spot where a company of Lord H----'s regiment was posted; and the first task, that of seeking some intelligence of Walter's movements after landing, was more successful than might have been expected.
A settler, who supplied the boatmen with meal and flour, was even then in the village, and he averred truly that he had seen young Mr. Prevost, and spoken with him, just as he was quitting the cultivated ground on the bank of the river, and entering the forest ground beyond. Thus his course was traced up to a quarter before three o'clock on the Thursday preceding, and to the entrance of a government road which all the boatmen knew well. The distance between that spot and Mr. Prevost's house was about fourteen miles, and from the boatmen's village to the mouth of the road, through the forest, some six or seven. Besides the company of soldiers, numbering some seventy-three or seventy-four men, there were at least forty or fifty stout, able-bodied fellows amongst the boatmen well acquainted with all the intricacies of the roads round about, and fearless and daring from the constant perils and exertions of their mode of life.
These were soon gathered round Lord H----, whose rank and military station they now learned for the first time; and he found that the tidings of the disappearance of Walter Prevost, whom most of them knew and loved, excited a spirit in them which he had little expected. He addressed a few words to them at once, offering a considerable reward to each man who would join in searching thoroughly the whole of that part of the forest which lay between the spot where the young man was last seen and his father's house. But one tall, stout man, of about forty, stepped forward and spoke for the rest, saying: "We want no reward for such work as that, my lord. I guess there's not a man of us who will not turn out to search for young Walter Prevost, if you'll but leave redcoats enough with the old men to protect our wives and children in case of need."
"More than sufficient will remain," replied Lord H----; "I cannot venture for anything not exactly connected with the service, to weaken the post by more than one-quarter of its number; but still we shall make up a sufficient party to search the woods sufficiently, if you will all go with me."
"That we will! that we will!" exclaimed a dozen voices; and everything was soon arranged. Signals and modes of communication and co-operation were speedily agreed upon; and the practical knowledge of the boatmen proved fully as serviceable as the military science of Lord H----. He was far too wise not to avail himself of it to the fullest extent; and soon, with some twenty regular soldiers, and thirty-seven or thirty-eight men from the village, each armed with his invariable rifle and hatchet, and a number of good, big, active boys, who volunteered to act as a sort of runners and keep up the communication between the different parts of the line, he set out upon his way along the edge of the forest, and reached the end of the government road, near which Walter had been last seen, about one o'clock in the day.
Here the men dispersed, the soldiers guided by the boatmen; and the forest was entered at some fourteen different places, wherever an old or a new trail could be discovered. Whenever an opportunity presented itself by the absence of brushwood, or the old trees being wide or far apart, the boys ran across from one party to another, carrying information or directions; and though each little group was often hidden from the other as they advanced steadily onward, still it rarely happened that many minutes elapsed without their catching a sight of some friendly party on the right or left; while whoop and halloo marked their progress to each other. Once or twice the trails crossing, brought two parties to the same spot; but then, separating again, immediately, they sought each a new path, and proceeded as before.
Few traces of any kind could be discovered on the ground, for the rain, though it had now ceased, had so completely washed the face of the earth that every print of shoe or moccasin was obliterated. The tracks of cart wheels, indeed, seemingly recent, and the foot marks of a horse and some oxen, were discovered along the government road, but nothing more, till, at a spot where a large and deeply indented trail left the highway, the ground appeared a good deal trampled by hoof marks, as if a horse had been standing there some little time; and, under a thick hemlock tree at the corner of the trail, sheltering the ground beneath from the rain, the print of a well-made shoe was visible. The step had evidently been turned in the direction of Mr. Prevost's house, and up that trail Lord H---- himself proceeded, with a soldier and two boatmen.
No further step could be traced, however; but the boatman who had been the spokesman a little while before, insisted upon it that they must be on young Master Walter's track. "That's a New York shoe," he said, "made that print, I am sure; and depend upon it, we are right where he went. Keep a sharp look under all the thick trees at the side, my lord. You may catch another track. Keep behind, boys--you'll brush 'em out."