Part 24 (1/2)

She peered into the gloom as sharply as she could and was not kept in suspense.

She offered no resistance, and quickly joined those who were overtaken by disaster.

It was much the same with Eva, although she struggled with great energy and narrowly escaped violence, as did Aunt Peggy, when she chastised the audacious Seneca.

Habakkuk McEwen, as we have stated, was in a quandary, but he ascended, his feet going over the ledge first. Such an approach to a foe is not disquieting, and he was caught at greater disadvantage than any of the others.

He tried hard to throw himself over the rocks, but was prevented; and thus it was that the capture of the entire party was completed.

”Great Caesar!” exclaimed Habakkuk, as he joined his friends. ”The height, and length, and breadth, and depth of this failure is the most stupend'us I ever heerd tell of.”

And no one said him nay.

CHAPTER x.x.x.

It is necessary at this point that some attention should be given to the predecessor of our friends in captivity--Gravity Gimp.

The particulars of his capture will be recalled, it being somewhat similar to that of his followers, inasmuch as he was pounced upon and overwhelmed before he could make any effectual resistance, though, for a time, he kept things ”moving.”

But he was forced to succ.u.mb at last, and was led away by those whom he had fought so bravely, and into whose hands he dreaded falling aware as he was what fate awaited him.

”Be keerful,” he called out, limping heavily, ”I've got a game leg, and I want yer to play light on it.”

Whether they understood his words or not is a small matter; but the American Indian is accustomed to the language of gesture, and when the African limped forward, as though unable to bear half the weight on one limb, they could not mistake what it meant.

The gun of the captive was taken from him, and, as he was such a miserable pedestrian just then, his hands were not bound behind him, as was the case with the prisoners afterwards taken.

Ordinarily, the rough usage given his captors during the struggle would have resulted in serious injury to some of them; but the Iroquois were too sinewy, lithe, and graceful on their feet to fare ill, and they gathered about him, with something akin to admiration, when he was conducted farther into the mountain, where they had a large camp-fire burning.

”I s'pose eberybody makes mistakes,” muttered Gravity, moving slowly along; ”leastways I'm purty sartin I made a wery big one, when I got too cur'us to know what dese willains was up to.”

No indignity was offered him on the walk to the fire, which was burning a couple of hundred yards away, but he felt that nothing like mercy was to be expected from his captors.

The negro had proven his coolness and courage in more than one instance that day, and Maggie Brainerd asked herself whether the loyal fellow really knew what fear is.

But when Gimp reached the camp-fire, and saw Jake Golcher with other Indians grouped around him, his heart gave a throb of terror.

He knew that wretch too well to make any mistake concerning him. It was Gimp who, but a few hours before, had visited the worst kind of physical indignity on the Tory, who now possessed the chance to repay him.

Jake was sitting on a fallen tree, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, and his chin in his hands, looking into the glowing embers, and apparently only half listening to the guttural conversation going on among the Indians about him.

He had spent so much time with the Seneca branch of the Iroquois, that he understood their tongue quite well. But, as he slowly puffed at his short clay pipe, his thoughts were far away.

Most likely he was recalling the incidents of the day, that were a source of mixed pleasure and pain to him.

”The overthrow of the rebels was complete,” he muttered, his face lighting up with pa.s.sion. ”It'll be a good many years before Wyoming will get over this, and I've got even with a lot of them that hain't used me well. There's Parker, who called me a lazy loafer two years ago, because I wouldn't pay him a little money I had borrowed. Well, I settled up with him to-day, and he'll never call anybody else such a disrespectful name agin.