“When Alaska took the young white hunter to her lodge, Okolona’s hand thrust the knife into his son’s fingers. Ah! big hunter, the old Medicine loves his boy!”
“And I thank God for that love,” fervently responded Hewitt. “With this knife we can cut the thick bark above our heads, and the caged birds will be free again. Oonalooska, we must first get beyond the Shawnees’ lodge, before we can help the young hunter and the girl.”
The Indian acknowledged the giant’s argument.
“Then let us escape to-night, and before another moon we will return and rescue our friends. Alaska will not harm that chap till his wounds have healed, and they will not heal for two moons to come.”
“Oonalooska and the Lone Man must lie in the strong lodge until another darkness,” replied the Indian.
“Why?” disappointedly questioned Hewitt.
“Tecumseh’s braves will not sleep to-night. They stand around this lodge, and when another darkness comes they will not guard so well. Oonalooska knows this, for he has been a guard himself.”
Against his impatience, the hermit acquiesced in the Shawnee’s words, and, hiding the knife, they threw themselves upon the ground and went to sleep.
To say that Jim Girty was chagrined over the unexpected drift of affairs, would not express the state of his mind.
He was furious—almost beside himself with rage. He appreciated Tecumseh’s interference, which saved his life, and he knew that the chief had canceled the debt he owed him. Now Tecumseh owed him nothing, and vice versa. Though thrown again upon his own resources, he did not despair of ultimate success. In all his life his plots had never entirely failed, and whenever his feet touched the sands of the gulf of adversity, he always hoped for, plotted for, a brighter finale.