“Ah!  That is what I thought the captain was up to.”

Rogers had turned sharp to the left, the direction in which Ticonderoga stood.  He slacked down his speed somewhat, for the perspiration was streaming down the faces even of his trained and hardy followers.  From time to time, he looked round to see that all were keeping well together.  Although, in such an emergency as this, none thought of questioning the judgment of their leader, many of them were wondering at the unusual speed at which he was leading them along.  They had some two miles start of their pursuers, and, had evening been at hand, they would have understood the importance of keeping ahead until darkness came on to cover their trail; but, with the whole day before them, they felt that they must be overtaken sooner or later, and they could not see the object of exhausting their strength before the struggle began.

As they ran on, at a somewhat slower pace now, an idea as to their leader’s intention dawned upon most of the scouts, who saw, by the direction they were taking, that they would again strike the lake shore near the French fort.  Nat, who, light and wiry, was running easily, while many of his comrades were panting with their exertions, was now by the side of James Walsham.

“Give me your rifle, lad, for a bit.  You are new to this work, and the weight of the gun takes it out of you.  We have got another nine or ten miles before us, yet.”

“I can hold on for a bit,” James replied.  “I am getting my wind better, now; but why only ten miles?  We must be seventy away from the fort.”

“We should never get there,” Nat said.  “A few of us might do it, but the redskins would be on us in an hour or two.  I thought, when we started, as the captain would have told us to scatter, so as to give each of us some chance of getting off; but I see his plan now, and it’s the only one as there is which gives us a real chance.  He is making straight for the French fort.  He reckons, no doubt, as the best part of the French troops will have marched out after the redskins.”

“But there would surely be enough left,” James said, “to hold the fort against us; and, even if we could take it, we could not hold it an hour when they all came up.”

“He ain’t thinking of the fort, boy, he’s thinking of the boats.  We know as they have lots of ’em there, and, if we can get there a few minutes before the redskins overtake us, we may get off safe.  It’s a chance, but I think it’s a good one.”

Others had caught their leader’s idea and repeated it to their comrades, and the animating effect soon showed itself in the increased speed with which the party hurried through the forest.  Before, almost every man had thought their case hopeless, had deemed that they had only to continue their flight until overtaken by the redskins, and that they must, sooner or later, succumb to the rifles of the Iroquois and their French allies.  But the prospect that, after an hour’s run, a means of escape might be found, animated each man to renewed efforts.