"And you, too! So be it—I will work alone. Though all the rest abandon you, Edith, I will save you, or die! For you don't think those devils murdered her, do you?" he wildly added, imploringly gazing into the face of the old hunter.
"No, I don't. Never mind my reasons just now. But see—I b'lieve she's alive; that I kin find her—an' I've swore that I'll git her away from the varmints if mortal man kin do it," quietly replied Boone.
"Then you ain't goin' back with us?"
"No, Jim; the chief an' I have other work on hand."
"And I—I go too."
"You'd better go back with the boys, Abel. We two kin do all that's needed, 'specially as sarcumvention must come into play."
"I will go—if not with you, then alone," doggedly added Dare, his black eyes gleaming.
"All right—you shall go."
A few more words were spoken and then the party separated, the settlers carrying with them the bodies of their friends, to bury them in some spot where the savages would not be likely to unearth them for the sake of their scalps. The three scouts continued up the river-bank, shortly after, crossing at the ford previously mentioned.
At mid-afternoon they paused, and composed themselves to rest, snugly ensconced in a dense thicket that covered the summit of a hill overlooking the Osage village. They needed rest, and could do nothing until the shades of night fell upon the earth.