The Border Watch: A Story of the Great Chief's Last Stand

by Joseph A. Altsheler

Paul glanced quickly at him. His fine and sensitive mind understood at once the inflection in Henry's voice, and he sympathized.

"But they are our own people," he said, "and they are making homes which we must help to defend."

"A stronghold in the wilderness, where man, woman and child may be safe from wild beast and savage," said the schoolmaster oracularly. "Ah, boys—boys! how much do I owe you! Truly I thought I should never see this comfortable little village again, and here I am, sound and whole, returning in triumph upon a captured vessel."

They saw at the right a cleared field, in which the young corn was growing amid the stumps, and on the left was the sheen of wheat also amid the stumps. Mr. Pennypacker rubbed his hands delightedly, but Henry was silent. Yet the feeling was brief with the youth. Thoughts of his people quickly crowded it out, and he swung the paddle more swiftly. The other two, who were now helping him, did likewise, and the boat doubled its pace. Through the thinned forest appeared the brown walls of a palisade, and Henry, putting a hand in the shape of a trumpet to his lips, uttered a long, mellow cry that the forest gave back in many echoes. Faces appeared on the palisade and three or four men, rifle on shoulder, approached the bank of the river. They did not know either Henry or Paul, but one of them exclaimed:

"Ef that ain't Mr. Pennypacker riz right up from the dead then I'm a ghost myself!"

"It is Mr. Pennypacker," said the schoolmaster joyfully, "and I'm no more of a ghost than you are. I've come back from captivity, bringing with me two of those who saved me, young citizens of this village, Henry Ware and Paul Cotter."

They turned the head of the boat to the bank and the whole population poured forth to meet them. Henry and Paul were greeted half with laughter and half with tears by their parents—border stoicism was compelled to melt away at this moment—and then they blushed at the words that were said about them. Their stature and strength attracted the attention of everybody. The borderers could not fail to note the ease and grace of their movements, the lightness with which they walked, and the dexterity with which they pulled the big boat upon the bank. It was evident that these two youths were far above the average of their kind, that naturally of a high quality they had been trained in a school that brought forth every merit. Henry towered above his own father, who no longer looked upon him as one to whom he should give tasks and reproofs. And the admiration with which they were regarded increased when the schoolmaster told how he had been rescued by them and their comrades.

Henry sat that night in his father's house, and told long and true tales of their great wanderings and of danger and escape on land and water. He and Paul had eaten hugely, there was no escape, and he felt that he must sit quiet for a while. He was loth to talk of himself, but there was no escape from that either, and his story was so vivid, so full that it fairly told itself. As he spoke of the great journey and its myriad events between New Orleans and the Great Lakes, the crowd in the big room thickened. No one was willing to lose a word of the magic tale, and it was past midnight when he lay down on the blankets and sought sleep.

The next day and the next were passed in further welcome, but when Henry sought the blankets the third night he became conscious that the first flush of the return was over. The weather had turned very hot—it was now July—and the walls and ceiling of the room seemed to press upon him and suffocate him. He drew deep and long breaths, but there was not air enough to fill a chest that had long been used to the illimitable outside. It was very still in the room. He longed to hear the boughs of trees waving over him. He felt that only such a sound or the trickle of running water could soothe him to sleep. Yet he would make another effort. He closed his eyes and for a half hour lay motionless. Then, angry, he opened them again, as wide awake as ever. He listened, but he could hear no sound in either the house or the village.

Henry Ware rose to his feet, slipped on his clothing, and went to the window. He looked forth upon a sleeping village. The houses, built of solid logs, stood in ordered rows, gray and silent. Nothing stirred anywhere. He took his rifle from the hooks, and leaped lightly out of the window. Then he slipped cautiously among the houses, scaled the palisade and darted into the forest.