lay northwest. It
seemed likely to him that Shif'less Sol, if he could travel at all,
would go in the direction or supposed direction of Tom Ross, and Henry
went northwestward for about a mile before stopping, following a narrow
little valley, leading back from the river and not well wooded. The
traveling was easy here, and easy traveling was what a wounded man would
certainly seek. His stop was made because he had come to a brook, a
clear little stream that flowed somewhere into the Ohio.

Henry again used his reasoning faculties first, and his powers of
observation afterward. Wounds made men hot and thirsty, and hot and
thirsty men would drink cool water at the first chance. He got down on
his knees and examined the grass minutely up and down the brook on both
banks. He was not looking for footprints. He knew that time would have
effaced them here as it had done back by the river. He was searching
instead for a dim spot, yellowish red, somber and ugly.

He came presently to the place, larger and more somber than he had
anticipated. "Here is where Sol knelt down to drink," he murmured, "and
his blood flowed upon the grass while he drank. Poor old Sol!" He was
afraid that Sol had been steadily growing weaker and weaker, and he
dreaded lest he should soon find a dark, still object among the bushes.

A hundred yards further he found something else that his eyes easily
read. The ground had been soft when a man passed and, hardening later,
had preserved the footsteps. The trail lay before him, clear and
distinct for a distance of about a rod, but it was that of a staggering
man. A novice even could have seen it. The line zigzagged, and the
footprints themselves were at irregular distances. "Poor old Sol," Henry
murmured again. Just beyond the soft ground he found another of the
somber splotches, and his heart sank. No one could stand a perpetual
loss of blood, and for a dark moment or two Henry was sure that
Shif'less Sol had succumbed. Then his natural hopefulness reasserted
itself. Shif'less Sol was tough, enduring, the bravest of the brave. It
seemed to Henry's youthful mind that his lion-hearted comrade could not
be killed.

He continued his advance, examining the ground carefully everywhere, and
following that which offered the least obstacle to a wounded and weak
man. He saw before him a mass of grass, high and inviting, and when he
looked in the center of it he found what he hoped, but not what he
dreaded. Some o