“I came to give you intelligence that the Osages would probably be upon you in a few days,” said Boone; “but I did not think they were really in the neighbourhood until I heard your unerring hounds. Col. Cooper, of my settlement, made an excursion southward some ten days ago to explore a region he had never visited; but observing a large war-party at a distance, coming hitherward, he retreated precipitately, and reached home this morning. Excessive fatigue and illness prevented him from accompanying me over the river; and what is worse, nearly every man in our settlement is at present more than a hundred miles up the river, trapping beaver. If we are attacked to-night, or even within a day or two, we have nothing to depend upon but our own force to defend ourselves.”
“Should it be so, I doubt not we will be able to withstand them as successfully as we did before,” said Glenn.
“Let us go with Roughgrove to his house, and take his daughter and his effects to your little fortress,” said Boone, joining the old ferryman, whom a single word sufficed to apprize of the state of affairs.
“I must prepare for the worst, now,” said Roughgrove; “they will never forget or forgive the part I acted on the night of their defeat.”
Boone, Glenn, and Roughgrove proceeded down the valley, while Joe seemed disposed to loiter, undetermined what to engage in, having cast an occasional curious glance at Boone and his master when engaged in their low conversation, and rightly conjecturing that “something wrong was in the wind,” as he expressed it.
“Why don’t you go home?” asked Sneak, rolling the dead body into the grave, and dashing the mingled earth and snow remorselessly upon it.
“I’ll go when I’m ready,” replied Joe; “but I should like to know what all that whispering and nodding was about.”
“I can tell you,” said Dan; but his speech was suddenly arrested by a sign from Sneak.
“I wish you would tell me,” continued Joe, manifesting no little uneasiness.
“Have you got a plenty to eat at your house?” asked Sneak.