water, and the Indian himself,
collapsing, slipped gently over the side and into the Ohio. The second
Indian had fallen upon his back in the canoe, and only the paddlers
remained.

Henry was conscious afterward that he had heard two shots, but at the
time he did not notice them. The deliverance was so sudden, so
opportune, that it was miraculous, and while the frightened paddlers
sent their canoe flying away from the bank, Henry and his comrades
darted into the thick bush that lined the cliff and were hidden from the
sight of all who were on the river.

"Our clothes and our rifles," whispered Henry. "We must get them at
once."

"They fired from the fort just in time," said Tom Wilmore.

Henry glanced upward. The palisade was at least three hundred yards
away.

"Those bullets did not come from Fort Prescott," he said. "It's too far
from us, and they were fired by better marksmen than any who are up
there now."

"I think so, too," said Seth Cole, "an' I'm wonderin' who pulled them
triggers."

Shif'less Sol and Tom Ross were first in Henry's mind, but he knew that
both had suffered wounds sufficient to keep them quiet for several days,
and he believed that the timely shots were the work of other hands.
Whoever the strangers might be they had certainly proved themselves the
best and most timely of friends.

They reached the thicket in which they had hidden their clothes and
rifles, and found them untouched.

"Queer how much confidence clothes give to a feller!" exclaimed Seth
Cole, as he slipped on his buckskins.

"It's so," said Henry, "and it's so, too, that you're not a whole man
until you get back your rifle."

When he grasped the beautiful weapon which had been his prize he felt
strength flowing in a full tide in every vein. Before he was halt, a
cripple, but now he was a match for anybody. He heard a quick, gasping
breath, and the sound of a soft fall.

Tom Wilmore had sunk forward, prone in the bushes. His wound in the
shoulder was deeper than he had admitted. Through the thicket came the
sounds of pursuit. The warriors had left the canoes and were seeking
them on land.

But the borderers had no thought of deserting their senseless comrade.
Two of the men raised him up between them, and Henry, Seth Cole, and the
sixth, armed with weapons of range and precision, protected the rear. Up
the slope they went toward the fort. Henry presently heard light
footsteps among the bushes and he fired toward the