"Leave the imp to me," muttered Tobe; "keep a good look-out on your side fer more o' the same sort. Don't let 'em fool ye!"
CHAPTER VIII.
A STROKE FOR VENGEANCE.
With painfully throbbing heart, Fred Wilson left his companions and hastened along the narrow Trace toward the blazing cabin, to learn the fate of his family. He dreaded the worst, for a strange sensation of coming evil weighed heavily upon his mind.
He was not given to superstition or a belief in omens, but now it seemed as though the spirit of some loved one was hovering around him. A firm belief assailed him that he was doomed to suffer some deep and bitter loss.
And in vain he strove to cast this thought aside; it would return despite himself. And from a fancy, it became a settled conviction.
Still it did not prevent him from displaying his usual caution and skill, and he glided along the path, dark and gloomy though the woods were, with almost the certainty and ease he would have displayed in broad daylight. Only at times could he distinguish the reddish glow of the blazing cabin; at others the densely clustering boughs concealed it from his vision.
In this manner he had proceeded over half a mile, when he fancied he heard the faint sound of cautious footfalls before him. Instantly pausing, he bent his ear to the ground. He was not deceived; some person or persons were coming toward him.
With a wild hope in his heart, the young scout softly drew to one side of the Trace, and crouched down beside the trunk of a large tree, in such a position that the passers-by, whoever they might chance to be, would be momently outlined against a rift in the tree-tops beyond.