CHAPTER XII.
CONCLUSION
They come! – be firm – in silence rally!
The Long Knives our retreat have found!
Hark! their tramp is in the valley,
And they hem the forest round!
The burthened boughs with pale scouts quiver,
The echoing hills tumultuous ring,
While, across the eddying river,
Their barks, like foaming war-steeds, spring,
The bloodhounds darken land and water,
They come – like buffaloes for slaughter.
– G. P. Morris.
At that point from which the Huron had advanced to the fort, the Shawnees and Miamis had now collected, preparatory to their final attack upon it. The wood being thick at this spot, they had little difficulty in keeping their bodies out of sight, the besieged being enabled to judge of their position by the points of their rifles and portions of their dress, which they took no pains to conceal.
"That means business," said Dernor, loosening his knife, and examining the priming of his rifle. "What's their idea, Oonamoo?"
"Run all togedder – make big rush – all come from one side."
Being satisfied of this, the Huron crossed over to the side of the hunter, so as to be ready for the assault. He was as cool as if sitting in his own wigwam, although none was more aware than himself of the peril that hung over his head. Could the Shawnees or Miamis once obtain his person, no species of torment that their fiendish minds could invent would be left untried upon him. But he had played hide-and-seek too long with death, to be disconcerted in a moment like this.
"What are they waiting for?" asked Dernor, who began to grow impatient at the delay.
"Ain't waitin' – here dey come!"
As he spoke, ten Indians suddenly appeared to view, from behind as many trees, and, pausing a moment, set up a yell that must have been heard miles distant, and rushed with the speed of the whirlwind toward the fort. Half-way across the clearing they had come, when the sharp crack of two rifles was heard, and the two foremost savages, making a tremendous bound in the air, came down to the ground in their death-struggles. But the others were not checked in the least. On they came, right over the prostrate bodies, and the next minute were tearing at the pile of logs, with the fury of madmen.
The Rifleman and the Huron had discharged their rifles together at the savages, as they came pouring forward; then drawing their knives, they awaited the onset. The logs, loosely thrown together, could not long resist the efforts to dislodge them, and, in a few minutes, came tumbling to the ground. The first bronzed skull that appeared above them was shattered like an egg-shell, by the stock of the Huron's rifle; while, as the savages swarmed in, Dernor stooped, and catching Edith round the waist, bounded clear of the logs, and dashed at headlong speed across the clearing. Right behind, like a pack of hounds, poured his relentless enemies, held in check solely by the Huron, who, covering the retreat of his white friends, raged like a tiger with his clubbed rifle; but, powerful and agile as he was, he was finally brought to the earth, and, heedless of him, the savages poured onward, intent only on capturing Dernor and Edith.
At this moment the edge of the clearing was reached; the fugitive had dashed into the wood, and his enemies were just following, when several flashes illuminated the edge of the forest, and simultaneous with the report, the remaining Riflemen of the Miami, with one exception, burst into the clearing and shot forward like a tornado toward the savages. The number of the whites was increased by Harry and Jim Smith, but half of the Indians had already gone to the earth, and the remaining ones broke and scattered as if a mine had exploded beneath their feet.
"Hello! anybody hurt?" demanded Harry Smith. "Come back here, Lew, and let us see you."
The fugitive had run quite a distance; but, recognizing the voice of a friend, he halted, looked back, and then returned. In the clearing, he saw standing the panting, excited forms of the brothers Smith, Allmat, George Dernor and Ferdinand Sego! The latter was leaning on his rifle, and looked up as Lewis and Edith came to view. He instantly started, as if struck by a bullet, and gazed at her as though he doubted the evidence of his own eyes. Edith, on her part, was hardly less agitated. She trembled and leaned heavily a moment on the hunter's arm, and then, relinquishing her hold, bounded forward and was clasped in the arms of Sego. Neither spoke until they had partly recovered from their emotions; then they conversed in tones so low, that the bystanders, had they wished, could not have overheard the words that were said.
All this time, as may well be supposed, Lewis Dernor was tortured by the most agonizing emotions. The beautiful dreams and air-castles which he had been continually forming and building during the past few days, now dissolved like mist in the air, and left nothing but the cold, cheerless reality, far colder and more cheerless than had ever before impressed him. Sego and Edith were reunited, and although there appeared to have been some mystery and misunderstanding between them, it was now cleared up, and their happiness seemed complete. The Rifleman drew a deep sigh and looked up.
"I say, Lew," said his brother, "I've asked yer half a dozen times, whether there's any thing that need keep us here any longer?"
"The Huron – Oonamoo?" asked the hunter, looking around him.
"Was Oonamoo with you? – I recollect, now, Tom said he was. Well, that must be him, then, stretched out yonder."
The two moved toward the prostrate form of the Indian, which lay upon its face. They rolled him over on his back, but he was limp and nerveless as a rag. His body was still warm, but to all appearance he was entirely lifeless – a gash on the side of his face, from which a great quantity of blood had streamed over his person, adding to the ghastly appearance of the body.
"Poor fellow! he's dead," said Lewis, with a saddened feeling, as he looked down upon him. "He was a faithful fellow, and had few equals. I'm sorry he's dead."
"Oonamoo ain't dead," said the prostrate individual, opening his eyes, and getting upon his feet with some difficulty. "Play 'possum – dat all."
"You're a good one," said George Dernor, admiringly, as he supported him. "You've had considerable of a hurt though, along side of your noddle."
"Hit purty hard – hurt a leetle," said the Huron.
"We'll dress your wounds as soon as we reach the brook out in the woods. What did you play 'possum for?"
"Fool Shawnee – fool Miami – t'ink dey cotch Lew and gal, den come and git Oonamoo scalp. If t'ink he ain't dead, kill him; wait till get out of sight, den run."
The meaning of which was, that the Huron, upon being felled to the earth, concluded it best to feign death until his enemies were out of sight, when he would have risen to his feet and fled. The wound he had received was so severe, that he knew his flight would be difficult and tardy, and he, therefore, avoided giving any signs of life as long as he had reason to believe the savages were in the vicinity. Of course he was perfectly conscious when the two Riflemen stood over him, and heard their words. Understanding at once from these the changed condition of affairs, he arose to his feet, as we have mentioned.
A few minutes later, the party was moving slowly through the wood. The brothers Smith led the way; behind them came Sego and Edith far more affectionate and loving than she and Dernor had ever been. The latter, with his brother, and Allmat and Oonamoo, brought up the rear. In a few minutes they reached the brook, where the party halted.
The stoical Huron had borne up like a martyr thus far; but the precipitation with which he sought a seat the moment a pause was made, showed that he had taxed nature to the utmost. The cool fluid was taken from the brook in the canteens of the hunters, all the blood thoroughly washed from the Indian, and then the wound was carefully bandaged by Edith, from pieces of her own dress. This done, the savage rose to his feet – his head being so swathed and bundled up that it was nearly thrice its ordinary size – and looked about him with an air that was truly amusing.
"You'll be all right agin in a few days," said Harry Smith. "Let's move on, as the day is getting well along."
"Oonamoo don't go furder – leave you here," said the savage.
"How is this? Come, go with us to the settlement and stay till your wound gets better," said Lewis.
All joined their entreaties, but it availed nothing. The savage had made up his mind, and it could not be changed.
"Can't stay – Shawnees, Delawares, all round – git much scalp in woods," and waving them an adieu, he plunged into the forest.
"Injin is Injin!" said Jim Smith; "you can't change his nature. The missionaries have had a hold of him, and made him an honorable red-skin, but they can't get that hankering after scalps out of him. Shall I tell you where he's going? He's going back: to the clearin' where them dead Injins are stretched, and intends to get their top-knots. I seen him look at 'em very wishful-like when we started away. He was too weak, and he didn't want to do it afore Edith, or he'd 've had 'em afore we left that place."
[The next time the Riflemen encountered the Huron, it was upon the war-trail, and full a dozen more scalp-locks hung at his girdle!]
Again the party moved forward, now with considerable briskness, there being no cause for tardiness or delay. Sego and Edith conversed in low tones, every look and action showing their perfect happiness, while the hardy leader of the Riflemen was as wretched an object as it is possible to imagine. They had progressed several miles, when, as they descended a sort of hollow, they encountered O'Hara, hurrying along as fast as the shortness of his legs would permit.
"Hello!" he exclaimed, suddenly halting. "Is the row done with?"
"Of course it is," replied Harry Smith.
"Who finished it?"
"We all had a hand in it, I reckon."
"It's an all-fired shame. As soon as – where's Oonamoo?" he abruptly demanded, looking around him.
"Gone off in the woods for scalps."
"Didn't lose his?"
"No; although he come mighty nigh losing his head."
"It's an all-fired shame," resumed O'Hara. "As soon as he got inside the fort there with Lew, I streaked it for the settlement to get the boys. I told you to hurry, but after you got to the clearin', I wanted you to wait so that I could jine in the fun, and pitch in promiscuously. Why didn't you do it?"
"Matters were mixed up a little too much to allow us to wait," replied Lewis Dernor.
"S'pose they was, but I'm mad and want to lick somebody. Won't you fight, Lew?"
The latter merely smiled, and the party moved on, O'Hara being forced to bottle his wrath, as he could find no one upon whom to expend it. Occasionally, however, he and the brothers Smith had a war of words, but it amounted to nothing, being attended by no real ill-feeling upon either side.
It was just growing dark when the party reached the settlement. The delight with which the fugitives were welcomed by the settlers need not be described. Many had had the most painful apprehensions regarding Edith, and nearly every family felt as if one of its members had been restored, upon her return. And the confidence which they reposed in the gallant-hearted Rifleman, the reliance which they placed upon his prowess and bravery, were such that all felt his death would have been a public calamity.
The Riflemen remained several days in the settlement, there being no special cause for hurrying their departure. While the members of this small party enjoyed themselves to the utmost, the sadness and dejection of their leader was remarked by all. He was often seen wandering in the woods, silent and moody, resolutely refusing communication with any one. He carefully avoided Sego and Edith, until the latter, wondering more than the others at the cause of his changed behavior, sent word to him that she wished him to spend an evening with her. Dernor's first impulse was to refuse the invitation; but, on second thought, he concluded to accept it, and he returned a reply promising to call upon her on the following evening.
Edith was living with Smith, where Sego was also spending his time, and, from the wording of her invitation, he confidently expected to meet her alone. He was considerably disappointed and chagrined, therefore, on entering the room, to find Sego seated within a few feet of her, the expression of both faces showing that each was full of happiness and utterly delighted with each other. Both welcomed him, and when he had been seated, Edith asked, rather abruptly:
"Now, Lewis, what is the matter with you?"
"Nothing," he replied, looking at the toe of his moccasin, and feeling a little stubborn and ugly simply because his fair questioner was just the opposite.
"Now you needn't tell me that," she persisted. "What makes you act so strangely – and keep away from me as though you hated me?"
"You ought to know," replied the hunter, more sullenly than before.
"I? I am sure I do not. Pray, what is it?"
The hunter, who was acting much like a pouting child, refused to make answer. Edith laughingly repeated her question several times, but it was not replied to. Still laughing and blushing, she arose, and moved her chair close beside him; then, sitting down, placed one of her warm hands in his. Gently patting his embrowned cheek with the other hand, she asked, in that voice which none but the maiden can assume who is conscious of her power:
"Won't you tell Edith what troubles you?"
Matters were getting decidedly dangerous. There sat the sullen hunter, his head bent, his lips closed, and his eyes fixed resolutely upon the toe of his moccasin. Right before these eyes, so directly before them that the view of his foot was almost hid, was the beaming, laughing, radiant face of Edith, looking right up in his own, her eyes sparkling, and her countenance a thousand times more lovely than ever. Several times Dernor felt like catching her to his bosom, and kissing her lips again and again; but, as he was on the very point of doing so, he remembered that Sego was in the room, and felt more angered than ever, and gazed harder than ever at his moccasin.
"Won't you even look at me?" asked Edith, putting her open hand over his eyes, as if to pull his gaze down. He instantly looked her steadily in the face, without changing a muscle of his countenance, while she, folding her hands, returned the gaze with equal steadiness. Her lips, too, were resolutely closed, but her eyes fairly scintillated with mischief, and she seemed just able to prevent herself from laughing outright. How long this oculistic contest would have continued we can not pretend to say, but it was ended by Edith asking:
"What makes you look so troubled, Lewis?"
"Because I am," he replied, curtly.
"Tell me the cause, and I will do all I can to help it."
"It's you that have done it!" He spoke with deep feeling.
"I that have done it!" repeated the girl, in consternation. "Why, how did I do it?"
"Edith!" His words were ringingly clear. They were winged with reproof. "Do you want me to tell you?"
"Of course I do."
"When we were alone, you led me to believe that you loved me. As soon as you saw Sego you went right into his arms, and I was forgotten."
The lurking mirth and mischief in her face grew more perceptible each moment, while he was certain, although he did not look in that direction, that Sego was doing his best to smother a laugh.
"Well, what of that?" she asked, looking down from his face and toying with a button at his waist.
"What of that?" he exclaimed, indignantly. "It is the meanest thing a person could do."
The reader must be indulgent, and consider the circumstances in which the hunter was placed. The mischievous Edith was tormenting him. How could she, being a woman, help it?
"Don't you believe I love you?" she asked, after a moment's pause.
"Believe it? To my sorrow and mortification, I know you don't."
"Lewis!"
"You love Sego, and I can be nothing to you but one of many friends," he added.
"Yes, dearly do I love Sego!" the maiden replied, with the old roguishness in her eyes.
"Fudge!" he exclaimed, impatiently, and making a movement as if to move away. "Edith" – he spoke earnestly – "I can not bear this trifling. I am sorry you have treated me thus. I must leave you – "
"No, you must not leave me!" she as earnestly answered.
"Do you wish to keep me here longer, to mortify me?"
"I have something more to say to you."
"Say it quickly, then."
"In the first place, look straight into my eyes, as you did a few minutes ago."
The hunter did as requested, although it was a harder task than he suspected.
"Now," said Edith, "in the first place, I love you; and, in the second place, I love him (pointing to Sego); but (here a pause) I do not feel the same toward each of you."
"I shouldn't think you did, the way things looked in the clearing!"
Edith laughed outright, and then said:
"Lewis, let me tell you something. The man sitting there, whom you know as Ferdinand Sego, is my own father!"
"Is that so?" demanded Dernor, almost springing off his seat, "Then, by thunder, if you ain't the most noble gal in the wide creation, and I the biggest fool."
And he embraced her, unmindful of the presence of Sego, who seemed in danger of an epileptic fit from his excessive laughter.
"How is this? Let's understand matters," said the Rifleman, a few minutes later.
"I can soon explain," said Sego. "To commence at the beginning, my name is Ferdinand Sego Sudbury. I emigrated out in this western country some years since, with my wife, and only daughter, Edith, here. Shortly after, my wife died; and, feeling lonely and dejected, I took to wandering in the woods, making long hunts, to while away the time. You remember when I encountered you, and received an invitation to make one of your number. I accepted it, with the understanding that I could not spend my entire time with you. When not with you, I was at my own cabin, with my daughter. I joined under the simple name which you have known me by, for no reason at all save that it was a mere notion, I having used that name in the East on more than one occasion. I kept my relations with your band secret from Edith, as I did not wish to alarm her by letting her know that I took part in your desperate expeditions.
"It happened on one occasion, when wandering along the Ohio, on my return to my cabin, that I encountered a flat-boat, in which were several of my acquaintances. At their urgent request, I waded out, was taken on board, and accompanied them to their destination, down the river. Here I left them, and several days after reached my cabin. I found Edith gone. The undisturbed condition of the furniture forbade the supposition that she had been carried off by the savages. I endeavored to find her trail, but a storm obliterated all traces, and I was compelled to give her up as lost.
"It was quite a while before I rejoined you. When I did, I said nothing of my loss, not believing that you knew any thing about it. It seems singular that I should have omitted to mention it; but, I will not deny I had a lingering suspicion that Edith had eloped with some young hunter, whose acquaintance she had formed during my absence. After I had been with you some time, I mentioned her name, but, you not having heard it, I gained no satisfaction by doing so.
"What happened after this is known, perhaps, better to you than to me. If you love Edith, as I rather suspect you do, from all I have heard and seen, you are welcome to her. I know she has a strong affection for you."
It is wonderful how a matter like the one in question will become known in a small community. The next day there was not a person in the whole settlement who was not aware of what has been related in the last few pages, and there was not one who did not rejoice in the happiness of the noble-hearted leader of the Riflemen of the Miami.
As we have hinted in the commencement of this work, the organization known by the name last mentioned, kept up its existence several years longer. Lewis Dernor remained its nominal leader, but, after his marriage, the exploits of its members became less frequent and noted. All, however, joined in the great border war which raged for several years previous to 1794. In Anthony Wayne's great battle of this year, Tom O'Hara and Allmat fell, and, as has been said in another place, the organization was broken up, never again to be revived. Lewis Dernor and Edith lived to a ripe old age, and their descendants at this day are among the most respectable and widely-known of the inhabitants of Southern Ohio.