utt of his rifle, though
it was a shrewd blow. He's coming to."

Cawthorne looked down at the reviving savage, and then looked up to
thank the foresters, but they were gone. They had vanished so quickly
and silently that he had not heard them going. Had it not been for the
savage who was now sitting up he would not have believed that it was
real.

Henry and the shiftless one had dropped down in the bushes only a little
distance away, and, by the moonlight, they saw the look of bewilderment
on the face of the young Englishman.

"It don't hardly look fair to our people that we should let him go,"
said the shiftless one.

"But we had to," Henry whispered back. "It was either kill him or let
him go, and neither you nor I, Sol, could kill him. You know that."

"Yes, I know it."

"Now, the warrior has all his senses back, though his head is likely to
ache for a couple of days. We don't lose anything by letting them have
their lives, Sol. The talk of their encounter with us will grow mightily
as they go back to the Indian army. The warrior scarcely caught a
glimpse of us, and he's likely to say that he was struck down by an evil
spirit. Cawthorne's account of his talk with us will not weaken him in
his belief. Instead it will make him sure that we're demons who spared
them in order that they might carry a warning to their comrades."

"I see it, Henry. It's boun' to be the way you say it is, an' our luck
is still workin' fur us."

They saw the English lad and the warrior turn back toward the camp, and
then they rose, going away swiftly at a right angle from their original
course. After pursuing it a while, they curved in again toward the camp.

In a half-hour they saw the distant flare of lights, and knew that they
were close to the Indian army. They were able by stalking, carried on
with infinite pains and skill, to approach so near that they could see
into the open, where the fires were burning, but not near enough to
achieve anything of use.

Alloway, Cartwright, the renegades and the chiefs stood together, and
Cawthorne, and the warrior who had been with him, stood before them.
Evidently they had just got back, and were telling their tale. Both of
the foresters laughed inwardly. Their achievement gave them much
pleasure, and they felt that they were making progress toward forging
the new link in the chain.

"Can you see the cannon?" whispered Shif'less Sol.

"Over there at the far edge. The ammunition wagons