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Page 64
"Fool!" cried Girty, fiercely, to the Indian. "Did I not tell you his
life must be spared for the stake?"
The savage drew himself up with dignity, and walked away without reply;
while the renegade, examining the bruises of the fallen man for a moment
or two, ordered him to be taken to the council-house, and, if possible,
restored to consciousness. He then returned to Algernon, who had been
left standing a sad spectator of the whole proceedings, and said, in a
gruff voice:
"Now, by ----! young man, it's your turn; and let me tell you, it will
stand you in hand to do your best. Come, let us see what sort of a
figure you will cut."
As he concluded, he severed the thongs around the hands of our hero, and
unceremoniously began to strip him, in which he was aided by a couple of
old squaws.
The features of Algernon were pale, but composed; and he allowed himself
to be handled as one who felt an escape from his doom to be impossible,
and who had nerved himself to undergo it with as much stoicism as he
could command. As his vestments were rent from his body, the wound
in his side was discovered to be nearly healed; and would have been
entirely so, probably, but for the irritation occasioned it of late by
his long marches, exposure and fatigue, which had served to render it at
present not a little painful. As his eye for a moment rested upon it,
his mind instantly reverted to its cause--recalled, with the rapidity
of thought, which is the swiftest comparison we can make, the many and
important events that had since transpired up to the present time,
wherein the gentle Ella Barnwell held no second place--and he sighed,
half aloud:
"I would to Heaven it had been mortal!--how much misery had then been
spared me?"
As he said this, one of the squaws, who had been observing it intently,
struck him thereon a violent blow with her fist, which started it to
bleeding afresh, and, in spite of himself, caused Algernon to utter a
sharp cry of pain, at which all laughed heartily. Thinking doubtless
this species of amusement as interesting as any, the old hag was on the
point of repeating the blow, when Girty arrested it, by saying something
to her in the Indian tongue, and all three turned aside, as if to
consult together, leaving our hero standing alone, unbound.
A wild thought now suddenly thrilled him. He was free, perchance he
might escape; at least he could but die in the attempt; and that, at
all events, was preferable to a lingering death of torture! He looked
hurriedly around. Only the renegade and the squaws were close at hand,
and they engaged in conversation. The main body of the Indians were at a
distance, awaiting him to run the gauntlet. He needed no second thought
to prompt him to the trial; and wheeling about, he placed his hand upon
the wound, and bounded away with the fleetness of the deer. In a moment
the yells of an hundred savages in pursuit, sounded in his ear, and
urged him onward to the utmost of his strength. He was no mean runner at
any time; now he was flying to save his life, and every nerve did its
duty. Before him was a slope, that stretched away to the river Miami;
and down this he fled with a velocity that astonished himself; while
yell after yell of the demons behind, now in full chase, were to him
only so many death cries, to stimulate him to renewed exertions. At last
he gained the river and rushed into the water. It was not deep, and he
struggled forward with all his might. On the opposite side was a steep
hill and thicket. Could he but gain that, hope whispered he might elude
his pursuers and escape. Again he redoubled his exertions; and, joy--joy
to his heart--he reached it, just as the foremost of his adversaries,
a powerful and fleet young warrior, dashed into the stream from the
opposite bank. He now for the first time began to feel weak and
fatigued; but his life was yet in danger, and he still pressed onward.
Alas! alas! just on the point of escape, his strength was failing him
fast, the blood was trickling too from his wound, and a sharp, severe
pain afflicted him in his side. Oh God! he thought--what would he not
give for the strength and soundness of body he once possessed! The
thicket he had entered was dense and dark, so that it was impossible to
move through it with much velocity, or see ahead any distance; and as
the thought just recorded rushed through his brain, he came suddenly
upon a high, steep rock. By this time his nearest pursuer was also
entering the thicket; and in a minute or two more he felt capture would
be certain, unless he could instantly secrete himself till his strength
should be again renewed. Fortune for once now seemed to stand his
friend; for stooping down at the base of the rock, he discovered it
to be shelving and projecting somewhat over the declivity; so that by
dropping upon the ground and crawling up under it, he would, owing to
the density and darkness of the thicket, as before mentioned, be wholly
concealed from any one standing upright. To do this was the work of a
moment; and the next he heard his pursuing foe rush panting by, with
much the same sense of relief that one experiences on awakening from a
horrible dream, where death seemed inevitable, and finding oneself lying
safely and easily in a comfortable bed.
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