“Why not?  It is an easier and safer way to take a prisoner to Tioga Point than to drag him thither tied.”

“But he may escape——­”

The Sagamore gave me an ironic glance.

“Is it likely,” he said softly, “when we are watching?”

“But he may manage to do us a harm.  You saw how cunningly he has kept up communication with our enemies, to leave a trail for them to follow.”

“He has done us what harm he is able,” said the Sagamore coolly.

I hesitated, then asked him what he meant.

“Why,” he said, “their scouts have followed us.  There are two of them now across the Susquehanna.”

Thunderstruck, I stared at the river, where its sunlit surface glittered level through the trees.

“Do the others know this?” I asked.

“Surely, Loskiel.”

I looked at my Indians where they lay flat behind their trees, rifles poised, eyes intent on the territory in front of them.

“If my brother does not desire to bring the Wyandotte to General Sullivan, I will go to him now and kill him,” said the Mohican carelessly.

“He ought to hang,” I said between my teeth.

“Yes.  It is the most dreadful death a Seneca can die.  He would prefer the stake and two days’ torture.  Loskiel is right.  The Erie has been a priest of Amochol.  Let him die by the rope he dreads more than the stake.  For all Indians fear the rope, Loskiel, which chokes them so that they can not sing their death-song.  There is not one of us who has not courage to sing his death-song at the stake; but who can sing when he is being choked to death by a rope?”

I nodded, looking uneasily toward the river where the two Seneca spies lurked unseen as yet by me.

“Let the men sling their packs,” I said.

“They have done so, Loskiel.”

“Very well.  Our order of march will be the same as yesterday.  We keep the Wyandotte between us.”

“That is wisdom.”

“Is it to be a running fight, Mayaro?”

“Perhaps, if their main body comes up.”

“Then we had best start across the Ouleout, unless you mean to ford the Susquehanna.”

The Sagamore shook his head with a grimace, saying that it would be easier to swim the Susquehanna at Tioga than to ford it here.

Very quietly we drew in or picked up our pickets, including the ruffianly Wyandotte, or Erie, as he was now judged to be, and, filing as we had filed the night before we crossed the Ouleout and entered the forest.

Two hours later the Oneida in the rear, Tahoontowhee, reported that the Seneca scouts were on our heels, and asked permission to try for a scalp.

By noon he had taken his second scalp, and had received his first wound, a mere scratch from a half-ounce ball, below the knee.  But he wore it and the scalp with a dignity unequalled by any monarch loaded with jewelled orders.

“Some day,” said the Sagamore in my ear, “Tahoontowhee will accept the antlers and the quiver.”