But he said good-bye to those who were near, untied Phoebe and rode slowly away. The day was very near its close.
CHAPTER X—“MORE BULLETS, MORE LEAD.”
Ree did not doubt that Lone-Elk, expecting that he and John would meet to talk over the events of the day and the outcome of the “talk,” would either spy upon him as he made his way home, or keep watch of the clearing during the night.
The lad easily saw in the Seneca the influence which set Captain Pipe and many of the other Delawares against him and against John. He concluded, too, that so far as Lone-Elk was concerned, the accusation of witchcraft was but a means to an end.
He was certain that the Seneca had some evil purpose in view in causing the Delawares to believe the absurd things he told them. Or was it only to shield himself from suspicion in connection with Big Buffalo’s death that he had invented the witchcraft story? Was the Seneca, then, really the murderer of the Delaware warrior? If he were not, he must have some reason for turning the people of Captain Pipe’s village against their white neighbors other than merely to avert suspicion from himself.
Often the worn and anxious boy recalled the warning Captain Pipe had given him to carry to the settlements no news of what the Indians were doing. Could it be that some attack upon Gen. Wayne’s men was being planned and the Delawares, inspired by Lone-Elk, were afraid the white boys would hear of it and give the alarm? Or did Lone-Elk merely fear the Paleface pioneers would discover the secret lead mine which gave him his hold upon Captain Pipe? Maybe that keen old redskin himself feared the same thing and dreaded lest the white soldiers should invade the country to win possession of so rich a prize.
Ree wondered if he was right in any of these surmises, then it would seem that the wish of the Indians was to cause him and John to forsake their cabin and their clearing and be gone to return no more. On the other hand, after the warning he had received, it would be positively unsafe for him to travel far in the direction of Fort Pitt or the settlements, lest the redskins suspect him of going to betray some secret, and so make an end of him. What then could he do?
So, completely tired out after the past two anxious days and nights, Kingdom floundered more and more hopelessly in a sea of “ifs” and “but thens,” and confused question marks, as he tried in vain to arrive at what would seem to him a correct summing up of the situation.
“It’s just no use thinking any more about it,” he declared to himself when half way home. But he added, “Not now, at least,” as a second thought, for he well knew in what direction his mind would turn when he had rested and could reflect with more composure.
A half mile from the Delaware town Ree had let Phoebe gallop wherever the trail was open enough to make such speed possible, and he had a grim satisfaction in the belief that Lone-Elk was following him.