it was a giant
stream, nevertheless, and a swimming head upon its surface would be
exposed for a long way to rifle shots. Shif'less Sol wheeled and fired
at the group that was now emerging from the woods, causing it to
hesitate and then stop for a few minutes, although several shots were
fired in return. The shiftless one felt a sharp, stinging pain in his
side as a bullet glanced off his ribs, but he did not wince.

"Jump, Henry," he cried, "jump ez fur out into the river ez you kin!"

The bank at the very edge of the water was about a dozen feet high, and
Henry leaped as far as he could. He heard a splash behind him as Sol,
too, sprang into the water of the Ohio, but the shiftless one remained
in the shadow of the bank.

"What is it, Sol?" cried Henry in alarm.

"I've been touched a leetle by a mite o' lead. It don't amount to much,
but to-night I don't believe I kin swim the Ohio. I'll drift down river
under the bank an' they'll never see me."

Sol was already floating away with the stream in the deepest shadow, and
Henry, swimming as before with only one arm, struck out strongly for the
Kentucky shore.

CHAPTER XII

THE ONE WHO ARRIVED

Henry Ware, when his last comrade, hurt and spent, drifted away in the
darkness, felt that he was alone in every sense of the word. But the
feeling of failure was only momentary. He was unhurt, and the good God
had not given him great strength for nothing. He still held the rifle in
his left hand above his head and swam with the wide circular sweep of
his right arm. The yellow waves of the Ohio surged about him and soon he
heard the nasty little spit, spit of bullets upon the water near his
head and shoulders. The warriors were firing at him as he swam, but the
kindly dusk was still his friend, protecting him from their aim.

He would have dived, swimming under water as long as his lungs would
hold air. But he did not dare to wet his precious rifle and ammunition,
which he might need the very moment he reached the other shore--if he
reached it.

He heard the warriors shooting, and then came the faint sound of
splashes as a half dozen leaped into the water to pursue him. Henry
changed the rifle alternately from hand to hand in order to rest
himself, and continued in a slanting course across the river, drifting a
little with the current. He did not greatly fear the swimmers behind
him. One could not attack well in the water, and they were likely,
moreover, to lose