"We will steal down and wait, lad. Do you come to the crest of the ridge, there to cover our retreat if need be."
Picking up the extra guns, I donned my snowshoes and we stepped forth from the shelter of the niche in the cliffs. Out to the north the sky was just beginning to blaze in the spirit-dance, and the faint glimmer of light among the trees betokened a campfire, while behind us rose the gaunt, bleak cliffs. To right and left in a long curve swept the bare-blown, bowlder-strewn ridge, and for a moment we stood watching.
On a sudden The Keeper whirled about, and as he did so I heard a sharp, clear note behind. Something struck me and bounded away from my furs, and even as the whistle of another arrow rang past, Radisson had flung me from my feet. A gunshot split the night, and another, and one lone, weird yell rose up.
"Cover, Davie, cover!" cried Radisson, slipping behind a bowlder. The Mohawk had clean vanished, but his voice quavered out in a single soul-rending war-cry such as I had never heard before. Then, gun in hand, I was crouching beside Radisson.
"That was poor aiming," he muttered. "They should have downed us at the first fire, or waited until—ah!"
Once more a musket spoke from the darkness, and the bullet crashed on the bowlder. Radisson fired instantly, then a choking cry came back to us. Now I realized that Gib had indeed seen our fire and with his cunning had surrounded us. Had he waited until daylight, we had never left that ridge alive, but doubtless the impatience of his warriors had overruled his craftiness.
"Wait here, lad," whispered Radisson as he reloaded, "while I seek The Keeper. We must not let daylight find us here."
If it did, it would find us frozen, I thought, while the arrows pattered around. No sign of any foe had I seen, but the blaze of the heavens began to light the dark face of the cliff as Radisson crawled away. Above, nestling against the face of the cliff, was a patch of drifted snow, and as my eyes grew accustomed to the light it seemed to me that across this a shadow moved.
I set my fusil in rest, and of a sudden my trembling hands grew firm again, as I drew a careful sight on that patch of snow. A shadow struck against it and wavered there, and in that instant I fired. While the long echoes of the shot died away on the farther cliffs, something crashed and was silent.
Before I could withdraw the gun, an arrow pierced my fur sleeve and quivered loosely in my arm. I jerked it away, for the hurt was but slight, and reloaded. Then came a shot from somewhere to my left, and again that long, heart-splitting yell of the Mohawk shrilled up. It was answered by two sudden shots, and catching up one of the spare guns beside me I fired at the flashes.