"Beaujeu, St. Luc and Dumas are not the men to make a carpet
of roses for us to march on. There is something here that does not
meet the eye. What say you, Tayoga?"

"I like it not," replied the Onondaga. "In war I fear the forest when
it is silent."

Near them a small circle of land had been cleared and in it stood a
house, lone and deserted. It had been built by a trader named Fraser
and in it Washington, who had visited it once before on a former
mission, and one or two others sat, during the period of rest and
refreshment. The young Virginian, despite his great frame and gigantic
strength, was so much wasted by fever that, when he came forth to
remount, he was barely able to keep his place in his saddle.

Now the merry trumpets sang again and the red and blue column, lifting
itself up, resumed its march along the trail through the forest toward
Duquesne. The river was on one side and a line of high hills on the
other, but the forest everywhere was dense and in its heaviest
foliage. Braddock, despite the safe passage of the ford, was not
reckless. A troop of guides and Virginia light horsemen led the way. A
hundred yards behind them came the vanguard, then Gage with a picked
body of British troops, after them the axmen, who had done such great
work, behind them the main body of the artillery, the wagons and the
packhorses, while a strong force of regulars and Virginians closed up
the rear. Scouts and skirmishers ranged the flanks, though they were
ordered to go not more than a few hundred yards away.

Robert, Tayoga and Willet were with the guides at the very apex of the
column, and they continually searched the forests and the thickets
with keen eyes for a possible enemy. But all was quiet there. The
game, frightened by the advancing army, had gone away. Not a leaf, not
a bough stirred. The blazing sun, now near the zenith, poured down
fiery rays and it was hot in the shade of the great trees that grew so
closely together.

Robert and the other scouts and guides in the apex marched on
soundless feet, but he heard close behind him the tread of the
Virginia light horsemen, behind them the steady march of the regulars
under Gage, and behind them the deep hum and murmur of the army, the
creaking of wheels and the clank of the great guns. Despite the
following sounds he was conscious all the time of the deep, intense
silence in the forest on either side of him. The birds, like the game,
had gone away, and there wa