And then, as if the musket flash and roar had been a lodestone and these
fierce Cherokees so many bits of steel to cluster thick upon it, I was
surrounded in the twinkling of an eye, and whizzing hatchets and rifle
bullets whining sibilant were but an earnest of the fate I had invited.




XV

IN WHICH A HATCHET SINGS A MAN TO SLEEP


In such a coil as this I'd looped about me there was nothing for it, as
it seemed, but to draw the steel and die as a soldier should. So I broke
cover on the forest side of the holly thicket with a yell as fierce as
theirs, and picked a tree to set my back against, and ran for it.

I never reached the tree. In mid career, when all the Cherokee wolf pack
was bursting through the holly tangle at my heels, two men, a white man
and an Indian, ran in ahead, as I supposed to cut me off. Just then the
dry roof of the hunting lodge roared aflame, reddening the forest far
and near. The light was at my back and on the faces of the two who ran
to meet me. A great sob swelled in my throat and choked me, but I ran
the faster. For these were my dear lad and the friendly Catawba,
charging gallantly to cover my retreat.

It was a ready help in time of need. They ran in bravely, the chief
ahead, twirling his tomahawk for the throw, with Dick a pace to right