get in front of them, began to fire.

Henry, remembering an old trick in such cases, curved a little from side
to side as he ran. He lost distance by it, but it was necessary in order
to confuse the marksmen. More shots were fired, and the Wyandots,
shouting their war cries, began to spread out like a fan in order that
they might profit by any divergence of the fugitive from a straight
line. Henry felt a pain in his shoulder much like the sting of a bee,
but he knew that the bullet had merely nipped him as it passed. Another
grazed his arm, but the God of the white man and the Manitou of the red
to whom he had prayed held him in His keeping. The Wyandots crowded one
another, and as they ran at full speed they were compelled to fire
hastily at a zig-zagging fugitive.

He made one more leap, longer and stronger than all the rest, and gained
the edge of the forest. At that moment he felt a tap on his side as if
he had been struck by a pebble, but he knew it to be a bullet that had
gone deeper than the others. It might weaken him later, but not now; it
merely gave a new impulse to his speed, and he darted among the trees,
spurning the ground like a racing deer.

The bullets continued to fly, but luck made the forest dense, the great
trees growing close to one another, and now the advantage was his. Only
at times was his body exposed to their aim, and then he ran so fast that
mere chance directed the shots. None touched him now, and with a deep
exulting thrill, so mighty that it made him quiver from head to foot, he
felt that he would make good his flight. Only ten minutes of safety from
the bullets, and he could leave them all behind.

Henry's joy was intense, penetrating all his being, and it remained.
Yes, life here in this green wilderness was beautiful! He had felt the
truth of it with all its force when they brought him forth to die,
passing from one torture to another worse, and he felt it with equal
poignancy now that he had turned the impossible into the possible, now
that the coming gift to him was life, not death. His spirit swelled and
communicated itself to his body. Fire ran through his veins.

He took a single fleeting look backward, and saw many brown figures
speeding through the forest. He knew their tactics. The fan would
develop into a half curve, and pursue with all the fleetness and
tenacity with which the Indian--above all the Wyandot--was capable. If
he varied but a single yard from the direct line