“You can guide us thither?”
“I am sure that I can, sir.”
“Very good, lead the way, and we will get to the village as quickly as circumstances will permit. If Dick Dare was recaptured and taken back to the village, he may be in danger, and we will endeavor to rescue him.”
“True, sir.”
They set out at once, with Ben in the lead, as guide. Captain Morgan was right behind Ben, and then after them came the soldiers, Tim Murphy and Fritz Schmockenburg being close to the captain and Ben. These two liked Dick immensely, and were worried for fear something serious had happened to him.
After a walk of about three and a half or four hours, Ben called a halt and said that the Indian village was within half a mile of the spot where they were standing.
“We had better advance slowly and cautiously,” he advised, and the captain so ordered.
Presently they came in sight of the village, and at the same moment they were discovered and a wild yell went up from the lips of an Indian brave that had been standing guard. This was the alarm signal to his fellow braves in the village, and instantly there was a great skurrying around among the redskins, as they hastened this way and that, trying to get together for the purpose of offering battle to the soldiers.
When they saw how large a number they had to contend with, however, they quickly decided that prudence was the better part of valor, and took to their heels, and after them went the patriot soldiers, firing as they ran, and dropping quite a number of the savages, dead or wounded.
The soldiers pursued the Indians as long as they could see any of them, and then they returned to the village, and began looking in the various wigwams, to see if Dick Dare was there, a prisoner.