“But,” continued his bride, with increasing anxiety, “the shote an’ the cry was long before you comes home. Pr’aps it bees Leetil Tim.”
“Impossible,” said Big Tim quickly; “father must have bin miles away at that time, for Lopsuck Hill is good three hours’ walk from here as the crow flies, an’ the Blackfeet came from the opposite airt o’ the compass.”
The young hunter’s prolonged silence after this, as well as the expression of his face, showed that he was not quite as easy in his mind as his words implied.
“Did the cry seem to be far off?” he asked at last quickly.
“Not far,” returned his wife.
Without speaking, Big Tim began to buckle on the cavalry sabre, not in the loosely-swinging cavalry fashion, but closely and firmly to his side, with his broad waistbelt, so that it might not impede his movements. He then selected from the arms a short double-barrelled gun, and, slinging a powder-horn and shot-pouch over his shoulders, prepared to depart.
“Now listen, my soft one,” he said, on completing his arrangements. “I feel a’most sartin sure that the cry ye heard was not daddy’s; nevertheless, the bare possibility o’ such a thing makes it my dooty to go an’ see if it was the old man. I think the Blackfeet have drawed off to have a palaver, an’ won’t be back for a bit, so I’ll jist slip down the precipice by our secret path; an’ if they do come back when I’m away, pepper them well wi’ slugs. I’ll hear the shots, an’ be back to you afore they can git up the hill. But if they should make a determined rush, don’t you make too bold a stand agin ’em. Just let fly with the big-bore when they’re half-way up the track, an’ then slip into the cave. I’ll soon meet ye there, an we’ll give the reptiles a surprise. Now, you’ll be careful, soft one?”
Soft one promised to be careful, and Big Tim, entering the hut, passed out at a back door, and descended the cliff to the torrent below by a concealed path which even a climbing monkey might have shuddered to attempt.
Meanwhile Softswan, re-arranging and re-examining her firearm, sat down behind the breastwork to guard the fort.
The sun was still high in the heavens, illuming a magnificent prospect of hill and dale and virgin forest, and glittering in the lakelets, pools, and rivers, which brightened the scene as far as the distant horizon, where the snow-clad peaks of the Rocky Mountains rose grandly into the azure sky.