"Then act the part of a man, Monsieur, and cease your grumbling. The very life of Mademoiselle may hang upon our venture; and if you ever interfere or obstruct my purpose, I will kill you as I would a dog. You understand that, Monsieur de Croix; now, will you go or stay?"
He looked about him into the lonely, desolate shadows, and I could see him shrug his shoulders.
"I go with you, of course. Sacre! but I have small choice in the matter; 't would be certain death otherwise, for I know not east from west in this blind waste of sand."
I turned abruptly from him, and strode forward across the sand-ridge out into the short prairie grass beyond, shaping my course westward by the stars. However revengeful the Frenchman might feel at my plain speaking, I felt no hesitancy in trusting him to follow, as his life depended upon my guidance through the wilderness.
My mind by this time was fairly settled upon our first movement. The only spot that gave promise of a safe survey of the Indian camp, where doubtless such prisoners as there were would be held, I felt sure would be found amid the shadows of the west bank of that southerly stream along which the lodges were set up. From that vantage point, if from any, I should be able to judge how best to proceed on the perilous mission of rescue.
While we were feeling our way forward through the darkness, a great burst of flame soared high into the northern sky, the red light radiating far abroad over the prairie, until even our creeping figures cast faint shadows on the level plain.
"Saint Guise! They have set fire to the Fort!" exclaimed De Croix, halting and gazing anxiously northward.
"Ay, either to that or to the agency building," I answered. "It was not there I expected to find the prisoners, but rather hidden among those black lodges yonder whence all the shouting comes. 'T is torture, De Croix, which has so aroused those devils; and it will soon enough prove our turn to entertain them, if we linger long within this glare."
"You have a plan, then?"
"Only a partial one at present,—'t is to put the safeguard of the river between us and those yelling fiends. Beyond that it will all be the guidance of God."