, with his blandest circumlocutions, that,
partly as a check upon his dear brother's good faith, bound as he was by
his oath of fidelity to the English government,--and he almost choked
with the relish of his derision every time he mentioned it,--and to make
sure that he should handle the guns properly, and fire them with due
effect,--not aiming them wildly, so that the balls might fly over the
fort, or fall short, not spiking the guns, or otherwise demolishing
them, all of which his great knowledge of the arm rendered possible, and
the ignorance of the poor red man unpreventable, they had determined to
take with them the remnant of the garrison, their lives to be pledges of
his good conduct and effective marksmanship; and if at last his earnest
and sincere efforts should prove unavailing, and the commandant should
continue to hold out and refuse to surrender when finally summoned,
these, the countrymen and fellow-soldiers of that officer, should be
singly tortured and burned before his eyes, within full sight and
hearing of Fort Prince George.

As the fiendish ingenuity of this scheme was gradually unfolded, Stuart
sat stunned. All the anguish he had suffered seemed naught to this
prospect. He staggered under the weight of responsibility. The lives of
the poor remnant of his garrison,--more, their death by fire and
torture,--hung upon such discretion as he could summon to aid his
exhausted powers in these repeated and tormented ordeals. He said
nothing; he could not see and he did not care for the succession of
chuckles in which Oconostota was resolved at the delightful spectacle of
his dismay. The Cherokee had beaten this man of resource at his little
game of war, and now had outmaneuvered him at his mastercraft of
scheming!

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote J: Tooth!]

[Footnote K: Very excellent.]

[Footnote L: Three.]

[Footnote M: Four--six.]

[Footnote N: The great hawk is at home!]

CHAPTER XIII

Stuart seemed utterly vanquished--his spirit gone. In silence he was
conducted back to his quarters in Demere's house at Fort Loudon. And as
there he sat in the spare, clean room, in the single chair it contained,
with one elbow on the queer, rough little table, constructed according
to a primitive scheme by the post carpenter, he stared forward blankly
at the inevitable prospect so close before him. He had not now the
solace of solitude in which he might have rallied his faculties. On the
buffalo rug on the f