“Just as you please,” answered corporal Nixon. “By and bye, sogers go to the Fort—take Injin with 'em.”
“Wah! Injin cross here,” and as he spoke, he sprang again to the bow of the boat, and at a single bound cleared the intervening space to the very stern.
Several heavy splashes in the water.—a muttered curse from the corporal—some confusion among his men, and the savage was seen nearly half-way across the river, swimming like an eel to the opposite shore.
“Damn the awkward brute!” exclaimed the former, angrily. “How many muskets are there overboard, Jackson?”
“Only three—and two cartouch boxes.”
“ONLY three indeed! I wish the fellow had been at old Nick, instead of coming here to create all this confusion. Is the water deep at the stern?”
“Nearly a fathom I reckon,” was the reply.
“Then, my lads, you must look out for other fish to-day. Jackson, can you see the muskets at the bottom?”
“Not a sign of them, corporal,” answered the man, as lying flat on the boat, he peered intently into the water. “The bottom is covered with weeds, and I can just see the tails of two large pikes wriggling among them. By Gemini, I think if I had my rod here, I could take them both!”
“Never mind them,” resumed the corporal, again delivering himself of a little wit; “muskets will be of far more use to us just now than pikes. We must fish them up—there will be the devil to pay if we go home without them.”