After uttering the words in a tone which he tried in vain to render careless, the young savage threw his rifle on his back, hung a piece of meat to his girdle, and went off hurriedly, not turning round once. Five minutes later, he disappeared in the chaparral.
"Poor brother!" Ellen murmured, "he is going to a certain death."
"Well," Red Cedar said, with a shrug of his shoulders, "we are all going to death, and each step unconsciously brings us nearer to it: what use is it feeling sorry about the fate that threatens him; do we know what awaits ourselves? We are not lying on a bed of roses. My child, I warn you, that we shall require all, our skill and sagacity to get out of it, for I cannot calculate on a miracle occurring."
"That is far more prudent," Fray, Ambrosio said, cunningly; "besides, it is written somewhere, I forget where, 'Help yourself, and heaven will help you.'"
"Yes," the squatter replied, with a grin, "and there never was a finer opportunity for putting the precept in practice."
"I think so, and am waiting for you to explain to us what we have to do."
Without answering the monk, Red Cedar turned to his daughter.
"Ellen, my child," he asked her, in an affectionate voice, "do you feel strong enough to follow us?"
"Do not trouble yourself about me, father," she replied; "wherever you pass, I will pass: you know that I have been accustomed to the desert from my childhood."
"That is true," Red Cedar remarked doubtfully: "but this is the first time you have tried the mode of travelling we shall be obliged to adopt."