He groaned, as well he might, when he saw that his exertion for salvation had accomplished nothing, for the Indians turned toward the river and he soon lost sight of them.
At last Tecumseh reached his lost brethren. With wild neighs they welcomed him back, and he returned the salute with sundry plunges which almost unhorsed his despairing rider. The horse’s strength did not seem weakened in the least degree, and this told Charley Shafer that, in bygone days, he had been the monarch of some great equine family.
For he skirted the edge of the wandering herd like a meteor, and boldly threw himself in the van.
Now the boy clung closer than ever to the iron-gray, for eight hundred hoofs were thundering behind him, and the sound fell doomfully upon his ears.
He was riding, helpless, at the head of death.
The sun descended toward the grayish clouds that crowned the horizon, and still over the rolling land the lost herd, and its new leader, thundered on.
The boy at length became so weak and discouraged that it seemed as if he must tumble off the horse’s back, and Tecumseh himself seemed to know that his rider would soon drop from his perch.
Suddenly he thought of the Pawnee village, which Frontier Shack said was north of the Platte; and he knew that the horses were running in a northerly direction. Might they not encounter the Pawnee Loups, and then might a lasso not fall near Tecumseh’s head, and he be saved?
He scarcely dared hope for such a finale to his wild ride, and yet he prayed devoutly for it.
The prayers for such a deliverance still rose from his lips, when Tecumseh snorted with rage and sprung to the right.