"Wait!" whispered the other. "Somehow that feather seems familiar to me."
"Do you mean it might be Blue Jacket?" asked Bob, eagerly; for, to tell the truth, he himself had had a similar idea flash through his mind.
"Nothing more. See, he seems to be looking around calmly, as though in no hurry to make a hostile move. There, he has put his hand up to his mouth. I believe he means to signal. Yes, listen, there goes the bark of the red fox, which you remember he always uses to tell us he is near. It must be Blue Jacket!"
Bob, however, laid a hand on his reckless brother.
"Let me try him first, Sandy," he said; and immediately there broke out the singular grunting sound which a hedgehog makes when turning over the dead leaves looking for his food.
Immediately a low voice called out:
"Bob! Sandy!"
After that there could no longer be any doubt as to the identity of the Indian whose head had been so strangely outlined against the circle of the moon. Gaining their feet, the two young pioneers directed the other to where they were standing. And it was with considerable satisfaction they thus made the discovery that it was a friend instead of a foe whose coming had alarmed them.
"Ugh!" said Blue Jacket, as he gripped a hand of each, having learned this method of greeting among the whites while an inmate of the Armstrong cabin, recovering from his wound. "Glad meet Bob, Sandy. Much wonder who carry torch in woods. Think paleface boy, no can be sure. What hunt so far away settlement?"
"Kate has been stolen by four Seneca Indians, and they are speeding as fast as they can go toward their village away to the far north!" Bob explained.