CHAPTER XII.

ROWING AND RUNNING FOR LIFE.

Spagano bore Huldah Armstrong to the knoll where his strength suddenly deserted him, and he sunk to the earth.

“White girl go,” he said, looking at Huldah, who stood over him undecided how to act. “Indian got to die here. English bullet cut life-string. The red-coat soldier want girl; he come here soon. Look, there burns his soldiers’ fires. Quick, girl! keep from him. Wolf-Cap in the wood; he find you soon.”

“Wolf-Cap,” cried Huldah. “Was you working for him?”

The Indian nodded, unable to speak.

“Where is he?”

A feeble red hand pointed to the south-east, and the Indian fell back with a groan.

The settler’s daughter bent over him, but the red-man’s soul was pursuing the trail to his happy hunting grounds, far, far away from the death-freighted wood.

“Dead—my only friend gone!” exclaimed the girl. “What shall I do? Give myself to the Briton? No, no! a thousand deaths in these forests are preferable to a life with him.”

The torches of the red-coated hunters flashed in her face, and snatching up Spagano’s rifle, she turned, and fled in the direction lately indicated by the Indian’s finger.

The moon had reached the meridian now, and the faint light which she showered through the trees, enabled the flying girl to pick her way without great difficulty. She was confident that she was hurrying toward the Huron, and she knew that by following the river-trail, she would eventually reach Fort Strong. This hope nerved her to great endurance, and at last, as the day was breaking, she saw the murky water rushing lakeward.

A thrill of joy shot through her heart, and lifting her eyes to heaven, she thanked God for guiding her to the water, which was to her, at that hour, a synonym of safety.

She felt fatigued and threw herself upon the ground to recruit her strength. She felt herself alone by the river, and the birds performed their matutinal antics about her, perfectly happy and unconcerned.

Lighter and lighter grew the forest, but Huldah Armstrong saw it not. A desire to rest was to her but the precursor of a doze, and she reclined on the river-bank with closed eyes and half-shut hands.

Suddenly a boat rounded a bend a few yards above her place of repose, and came rapidly toward her.

It was a small boat, and contained a man, who handled the oars like one accustomed to their use. He was a white, and wore the oft described garb of the settler; but a sword lay at his side, and rifles and pistols. He glanced uneasily at the banks, as he kept his canoe in the middle of the stream, and seemed eager to reach a certain objective point still far away.

But all at once his gaze fell upon Huldah Armstrong, plainly seen from the river, and a moment after the discovery, he ran his canoe cautiously to the bank.

At first, after striking the shore, he was inclined to believe the maiden a decoy; but after a close scrutiny of the vicinity, he became bolder and crept up the bank.

His large black eyes burned with a hateful triumph, not unmixed with the baser passions, and his first care was to remove the rifle from Huldah’s feeble grasp.

Then, precisely as Spagano had done a few hours before, he lifted her from the ground; but held her at arms’ length that he might enjoy her horror and surprise at finding herself captive again.

Huldah opened her eyes with a spasmodic start, and the bright color of life deserted her cheeks.

“Captain Strong, what does this mean? and how came you here?” she cried, staring into his face, covered with a fiendish smile.

“I boated it, girl,” he answered; “but I can’t tell all now. We’ll continue my voyage, and when I get the craft under way again, I’ll tell a little story.”

“But whither are you going?”

“’Tis very natural that you should put that question, seeing that I’m Captain Strong, and you Huldah Armstrong,” he said, with a light chuckle. “I’m going to Detroit, I guess, and you’re going along.”

“No, no! Is it possible, Captain Strong, that you possess the inhumanity of the savage?”

“It is, if you would think so. But we’re losing time here. I want to overtake the barges; they’re traveling slowly, being heavily loaded, and I guess we can come up with them at the mouth of the Huron.”

With the last word he started toward the river with his prize, and presently, with her hands fastened upon her back, the settler’s child faced the captain in the craft.

“Now, my girl, we’re fairly under way,” he said, when they had proceeded some distance, “and I’ll tell you the promised story.”

“I should like to hear it, Captain Strong. I can not conceive how you escaped from the fort.”

He smiled.

“Men relent, sometimes,” he answered. “After the abandonment of the siege, they placed me on trial, and I found that a current had set in in my favor. But many cried like wolves for my death—among them, one Levi Armstrong. But a vote was taken, and a meager majority pronounced in favor of my exile. I swore never to return to the “fire-lands,” and they marched me down to the river and shoved me off with every thing I called my own. I was glad to get off, for, girl, I expected to die. If it hadn’t been for you and your father, I’d have been with the king’s soldiers now.”

“How did I prevent you?” asked Huldah.

“You told your father that you heard me whispering to Sawyer at the gate, and the old man resolved to nab me then.”

“Then, Captain Strong, you really are a traitor?” said the girl, bitterly.

He bit his lip and looked daggers at her before he spoke again.

“Well—yes; but it is a hard name to bear.”

“You poisoned the well.”

“Yes—but Matt Hunter stood by me on that.”

“You thought the men would surrender before being burned alive?”

“They would. Oh, we had our plans perfected, Huldah Armstrong. Your father arrested me in the nick of time. Twenty minutes more of freedom and I would have flung wide the gates to the Indians.”

“And what reward was you to receive for your Arnold trick?”

“My life and yours!”

“I was to have been the price of a massacre?”

“Yes. I’m talking plainly now,” he said. “The three pistol-shots on the hill told me that O’Neill accepted the propositions which I sent him by the deserter Sawyer; but our plans failed.”

The girl did not reply; her eyes wandered from his expression of triumph, and she thought of her perilous situation.

Captain Armstrong hated her, and to humor his hate he would make her a hopeless captive. Mercy at his hands was not to be thought of; he would shoot her down before he would surrender her into other hands, and she upbraided herself for not allowing O’Neill to capture her in the forest. The colonel, a monster though he was, possessed several good traits; Zebulon Strong, the traitor, could boast of none.

“You’re tryin’ to catch the British troops?” she said, after a long silence.

“Yes.”

“Then what?”

“Why, we’ll go to Detroit, thence east. I shall enter the army, probably; but build no hopes on my words; they’re poor foundations, girl. You shall never leave me until the hand of death falls heavily on one or both of us. I swear it by all that is good and bad! It is the oath of Zebulon Strong, and he is a desperate man. There—girl, what do you see?”

A strange light had suddenly flashed in Huldah’s eyes, and quickly the traitor turned his head and looked up the river.

A boat containing three men was bearing down upon him!

An oath shot from his throat as he turned again.

“By the eternal world! I’ve seen them in time!” he said, “and they might as well turn back, for they can’t catch Zeb Strong.”

Relinquishing the oars for a moment, he doffed his coat and the next minute the canoe was flying down the stream like an arrow.

The figures in the pursuing boat were seen to spring to the oars with new life, and the race soon became one of the most exciting character. Captain Strong possessed the strength of a giant in his iron frame, and his oars lashed the waves into foam, as he drove the boat toward his goal, lake Erie, distant many miles.

“You needn’t pray for their success,” he cried, looking up into Huldah’s wishful, hopeful face, “for they can’t catch us! It’s impossible. Your father gave me a splendid boat with oars that can not break. By heavens! with this canoe I could shoot the fury rapids of perdition. With these sticks—”

Snap went an oar!

A cry of horror rung from the captain’s throat, and he tried to use the broken paddle, but without effect.

The boat began to become unmanageable, and he tried to guide it ashore with the sound oar, swearing like a trooper all the time.

“Didn’t I say that nothing but death could separate us?” he asked, darting Huldah a look of despair. “I’m Zebulon Strong—don’t forget that. I’m a traitor, too, and a devil!”

The canoe struck the bank at last, and the captain looked at his followers, now within rifle-shot. He saw three weapons leveled at his breast; but he was shielding it with the girl, and they dared not shoot.

“Drop the girl!” came a voice from the boat.

Strong greeted it with a laugh.

“I’m no fool!” he cried. “I’m Zebulon Strong, I am. So good-by, boys! we’ll meet again, mebbe,” and he waved his hat at the occupants of the boat, then sprung into the forest.

A minute after his disappearance, the trio reached the spot and sprung upon his trail. They were Wolf-Cap, Mark Harmon and an Indian well known to the reader, as Silver Hand. Already the traitor and his prize had vanished among the trees, and his trail led toward the spot where Colonel O’Neill had lately surprised the Night-Hawks’ camp.

Undoubtedly the captain knew but little of the intricacies of the wood he was treading; perhaps he was bewildered, for he was running _from_ Detroit, having turned his back upon the walls surmounted by the British flag.

The trio were confident of catching him, for the trail was plain, and certain signs told them that he was giving out.

“He’ll never turn traitor again if we catch ’im,” said Wolf-Cap, with determination.

“Never, Wolf-Cap,” echoed young Harmon.

Three seconds later the crack of a distant rifle fell upon the pursuers’ ears.

They did not pause; but exchanged meaning looks, and quickened their gait.

The drama that followed the surprise of the Night-Hawks’ camp was enacted over again.

Wolf-Cap and his followers at last came up with Zebulon Strong.

But the captain lay full length on the ground, with a bullet in his brain!

Sooner than he had expected, death had separated him and his captive.