When Gummery Glyndon jumped into the river to escape from his pursuers, he still clutched his trusty rifle by its barrel, and he held fast to it, as the swift current swept him rapidly down-stream.
The Indians did not follow him into the river, but paused upon its bank, and began to hastily reload their guns. The loss they had sustained in their attack upon the hunter and the boys had rendered them furious for vengeance. But the current swept Glyndon out of sight, for the bank was thickly wooded, before they could bring their guns to bear upon him.
They discharged them, notwithstanding, in the direction in which he had gone.
Glyndon laughed as he heard the harmless discharge.
“Trying to shoot me round a corner,” he muttered. “Well, they won’t get my ha’r this time; but the boys are done for—poor lads! poor lads!”
He shook his gray head sorrowfully over this reflection. Then he saw the trunk of a tree floating in the stream ahead of him. He struck out for it, gained it, and ensconced under its further side, floated with it down the stream. As he went with the current, he made good headway, and soon reached the camp of the surveyors.
A shout from the bank announced that he was observed and recognized as he approached, and the members of the party clustered upon the bank to receive him, as he guided his log toward the shore. At this point the river was fordable, and the banks were sandy and sloping. His feet touched bottom as he came to the sand-bar that stretched across the entire width of the stream, and he allowed the log to float away, and walked ashore.
“What luck?” demanded Lieutenant Gardiner, as the gaunt figure of the old hunter drew near.
“Bad!” answered Glyndon, laconically; and he briefly related to Gardiner, Blaikie and Robbins the particulars of his scout.
All were of his opinion that little mercy would be shown to the boys by their captors, and they deeply lamented their untimely fate.