“Yes, Dagaeoga,” replied his comrade, “and it will be fought with the odds heavily against us.  I think the Mountain Wolf should not have awaited Sharp Sword here, but who am I to give advice to a leader, so able and with so much experience?”

“But we beat St. Luc once in a battle by a lake!”

“Then we had a fleet, and, for the time, at least, we won command of the lake.  Now the enemy is supreme on Oneadatote.  If we have any canoes on its hundred and twenty-five miles of length they are lone and scattered, and they stay in hiding near its shores.”

“Why are you watching its waters now so intently, Tayoga?”

“To see the sentinels of the foe, when they come down from the north.  Sharp Sword is too great a general not to use all of his advantages in battle.  He will advance by water as well as by land, but, first he will use his eyes, before he permits his hand to strike.  Do you see anything far up the lake, Dagaeoga?”

“Only the sunlight on the waters.”

“Yes, that is all.  I believed, for a moment or two, that I saw a black dot there, but it was only my fancy creating what I expected my sight to behold.  Let us look again all around the horizon, where it touches the water, following it as we would a line.  Ah, I think I see a dark speck, just a black mote at this distance, and I am still unable to separate fancy from fact, but it may be fact.  What do you think, Dagaeoga?”

“My thought has not taken shape yet, Tayoga, but if ’tis fancy then ’tis singularly persistent.  I see the black mote too, to the left, toward the western shore of the lake, is it not?”

“Aye, Dagaeoga, that is where it is.  If we are both the victims of fancy then our illusions are wonderfully alike.  Think you that we would imagine exactly the same thing at exactly the same place?”

“No, I don’t!  And as I live, Tayoga, the mote is growing larger!  It takes on the semblance of reality, and, although very far from us, it’s my belief that it’s moving this way!”

“Again my fancy is the same as yours and it is not possible that they should continue exactly alike through all changes.  That which may have been fancy in the beginning has most certainly turned into fact, and the black mote that we see upon the waters is in all probability a hostile canoe coming to spy upon us.”

They watched the dark dot detach itself from the horizon and grow continuously until their eyes told them, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that it was a canoe containing two warriors.  It was moving swiftly and presently Rogers and Willet came to look at it.  The two warriors brought their light craft on steadily, but stopped well out of rifle shot, where they let their paddles rest and gazed long at the shore.

“It is like being without a right arm to have no force upon the lake,” said Rogers.

“It cripples us sorely,” said Willet.  “Perhaps we’d better swallow our pride, bitter though the medicine may be, and retreat at speed.”