Like a flash Ree’s rifle flew to his shoulder and he seemed to take no aim whatever; yet the bullet flew true. But just an instant after he fired the crack of another rifle sounded behind him. A leaden ball shrieked close to his head and a lock of his hair fell fluttering to the ground.
CHAPTER VII.
On Into the Wilderness.
Great as the shock of the sudden attack and his narrow escape was, Ree gave only a little yell of surprise and anger, and ran in the direction from which the shot had come, drawing his pistol as he went. He found no one. Though utterly regardless of the danger he might be in by thus exposing himself, he made a careful search.
“Land o’ livin’, boy, ye’ll be meat for the redskins before ye’ve crossed the frontier, if ye don’t be keerful!” cried the woodsman, quickly coming up, springing from tree to tree, and thus always keeping their protecting trunks between himself and the point from which the mysterious shot had been fired. “What is the varmint pepperin’ away at ye so, for?”
“I haven’t the least idea, for I don’t know who it is,” Ree answered.
But he was glad the woodsman’s frank manner left no room to suspect him of treachery, although there had been grounds for this suspicion in the circumstance of the shot having been fired just as his own rifle and that of his friend had been discharged.
John had remained on guard beside Jerry and the cart, watchful for any sign of their strange enemy, completely mystified by the attack. Presently he joined Ree and the hunter who were searching for the trail of the would-be assassin. Tracks were found at last (high up on the rocky hillside)—those of a white man, for he wore boots; but they were very faint and Ree declared he would waste no time in attempting to follow them.