I thought it most unlikely; but his guess was right and mine was wrong.  Though any of these savages could lift a trail in daylight, following it at top speed like a trained blood-hound, yet now the darkness baffled them.

So there was some running to and fro in the road above our heads, and then the troopers galloped down.  Followed hastily a labored confab through the linguister, broken in the midst by a fury of hot oaths from Falconnet; and then the chase swept on toward the plantations, and we were left to make their losing of us sure by whatsoever means we chose.

We paddled slowly up stream in silence, keeping well within the blacker shadow of the tree fringe.  When we came opposite the glowing ruins of the hunting lodge, Jennifer backed upon his paddle.

“You’ll go ashore?” said he.

I said I would, adding:  “They have slaughtered poor old Darius, and I am loath to leave his bones for the buzzards to pick.”

He made no comment other than to swear in sympathy.  When the pirogue grounded, the Indian was out like a cat, to vanish phantom-wise among the trees.  I followed in some clumsier fashion, leaving Jennifer to keep the canoe; but half way up the hill he joined me, and would not turn back for all my urging.  “No; hang me if I’ll let you out of eye-grip again,” was all he would say; and so we went together, and were together at the seeing of what the glowing ember-heap would show us.

Poor Tomas had his sepulture already.  His cord had burned in two and let him down so close beside the cabin wall that all the blazing debris from the overhanging eaves had made his funeral pile.  Darius lay as I had last seen him; and him we buried in the maize clearing at the back, with the ember glow for funeral lights.

It was a chanceful thing to do.  Since the Cherokees had left their dead and wounded, and Falconnet the body of his trooper who had yielded me the musket, there was small doubt they would return.  Yet we had time to dig a shallow grave for my old henchman; to dig and fill it up again; and afterward to make a circuit round the burning pile to reach the river side once more.

When we had launched the canoe, and were afloat and ready for the start, the Catawba was still missing.

“Where is the chief, think you?” I asked; but Dick’s answer, if, indeed, he gave me any, was lost in a chorus of ear splitting yells rending the silence of the night like demon cries.  Then a single ululation, long drawn and fair blood chilling, answered back, and Jennifer swept the pirogue stern to strand with a quick paddle stroke.

“That last was Uncanoola’s war cry; they’ve doubled back in time to catch him at it!” he cried.  “Stand by to drive her when I give the word!  Here he comes!”

Down the sloping hillside, looking, in the red glow of the ember heap, more like a flying demon than a man, came the Catawba, one hand gripping the scalping-knife, the other flung aloft to flaunt his terrible trophies in sight of his pursuers.  They were so close upon him that waiting promised death for all of us; so Jennifer dipped again to send the canoe a broad jump from the bank.