"I see!" she exclaimed eagerly. "When they have passed in to look for us, we will slip out, and push on." It was haste she thought of rather than escape. No moment passed, I think, when her whole will, her whole being, were not focussed upon the finding of the child. And the more I realized the intensity of her love and her pain, the more I marvelled at the heroic self-control which forbade her to waste her strength in tears and wailings. The conclusion at which she had now arrived, as to my plan, was one I had not thought of, and I considered it before replying.
"No," said I, presently; "that is not quite my purpose, though I confess it is a good one. But, comrade, this is a safe ambush! They must pass within close gunshot of us!"
"Oh," she cried, paling, and clasping her hands, "must there be more blood? But yes, they bring it on themselves," she went on with a sudden fierceness, flushing again, and her mouth growing cruel. "They would keep us from finding him. Their blood be on their own heads!"
"I am glad you think of that," said I. "They would have no mercy for us if they should take us now. But indeed, if it will please you to have it so, we need not shoot them down. We can treat them to such a medicine as they had before of me, sink their canoe, and leave them like drowned rats on the other shore."
"Yes," said Mizpah, quietly; "if that will do as well, it will please me much better."
And so it was agreed. A very few minutes later the canoe appeared, rounding into the estuary. The savages scanned both shores minutely, but rather from the habit of caution than from any thought that we might have gone to land. If, however, I had not taken care to make my landing behind a boulder, those keen eyes would have marked some splashed spots on the shingle, and we would have been discovered.
But no such evil fortune came about. The four paddles flashed onward swiftly. The four fierce, painted and feathered heads thrust forward angrily, expecting to overtake us in one of the inner reaches. I took up Mizpah's musket (which was loaded with slugs, while my own carried a bullet, in case I should be called upon for a long and delicate shot), and waited until the canoe was just a little more than abreast of us. Then, aiming at the waterline, just in front of the bow paddle, I fired.
The effect was instant and complete. The savage in the bow threw up his paddle with a scream and sprang overboard. He was doubtless wounded, and feared a second shot. We saw him swimming lustily toward the opposite shore. The others paddled desperately in the same direction, but before they had gone half-way the canoe was so deep in the water that she moved like a log. Then they, too, seized with the fear of a second shot, sprang overboard. By this time I had the musket reloaded.
"If they get the canoe ashore, with their weapons aboard her," said I, "they will soon get her patched up, and we will have it all to do over again. Here goes for another try, whatever heads may be in the way!"
Mizpah averted her face, but made no protest, and I fired at the stern of the canoe, which was directly toward me. A swimmer's head, close by, went down; and in a minute more the canoe did likewise. Three feathered heads remained in sight; and presently three dark figures dragged themselves ashore—one of them limping badly—and plunged into the woods.