ittle as possible.
Their caution was well taken. They saw Indian signs, once a feather that
had fallen from a scalp lock, once footprints, and once the bone of a
deer recently thrown away by him who had eaten the meat from it. The
country seemed to be as wild as that of Kentucky. Small settlements, so
they had heard, were scattered at great distances through the forest,
but they saw none. There was no cabin smoke, no trail of the plow, just
the woods and the hills and the clear streams. Buffalo had never reached
this region, but deer were abundant, and they risked a shot to replenish
their supplies.

They camped the second night of their march on a little peninsula at the
confluence of two creeks, with the deep woods everywhere. Henry judged
that they were well within the western range of the Six Nations, and
they cooked their deer meat over a smothered fire, nothing more than
a few coals among the leaves. When supper was over they arranged soft
places for themselves and their blankets, all except Long Jim, whose
turn it was to scout among the woods for a possible foe.

"Don't be gone long, Jim," said Henry as he composed himself in a
comfortable position. "A circle of a half mile about us will do."

"I'll not be gone more'n an hour," said Long Jim, picking up his rifle
confidently, and flitting away among the woods.

"Not likely he'll see anything," said Shif'less Sol, "but I'd shorely
like to know what White Lightning is about. He must be terrible stirred
up by them beatin's he got down on the Ohio, an' they say that Mohawk,
Thayendanegea is a whoppin' big chief, too. They'll shorely make a heap
of trouble."

"But both of them are far from here just now," said Henry, "and we won't
bother about either."

He was lying on some leaves at the foot of a tree with his arm under
his head and his blanket over his body. He had a remarkable capacity for
dismissing trouble or apprehension, and just then he was enjoying great
physical and mental peace. He looked through half closed eyes at his
comrades, who also were enjoying repose, and his fancy could reproduce
Long Jim in the forest, slipping from tree to tree and bush to bush, and
finding no menace.

"Feels good, doesn't it, Henry?" said the shiftless one. "I like a
clean, bold country like this. No more plowin' around in swamps for me."

"Yes," said Henry sleepily, "it's a good country."

The hour slipped smoothly by, and Paul said:

"Time for Long Jim to be back.