their leafy covert, the moon appeared over the
tree-tops far above them, flooding the glen with light, and making a
restless shimmer of diamonds of the rushing brook. The two men moved
warily up the stream, setting their feet with care upon the slippery
stones. Once Landless stumbled, but caught at a huge boulder, and saved
himself from falling, sending, however, a stone splashing down into the
water. They drew themselves up within the shadow of the rock, and
listened with straining ears, but there came no answering sound save the
cry of a whip-poor-will, and they went on their way. When they were
within a hundred feet of the encampment, the Indian left the stream,
crossed the strip of earth between it and the cliff, and pointed to a
broken and uneven line that ran at a height of some five feet from the
ground along the face of the cliff. Landless looked and saw a very
narrow ledge, a mere projection here and there of jagged and broken
rock, a pathway perilous and difficult as might well be imagined. So
narrow and insignificant it looked, such a mere seam along the vast
wall, that a white man passing through the ravine might never have
noticed it.

"It is our path," said the Susquehannock. "It leads above the heads of
these dogs and their crackling twigs, straight to where lies the
maiden."

Without a word Landless caught at the stem of a cedar projecting from a
fissure in the rock, and swung himself up to the cleft. The Indian
followed, and with silence and caution they commenced their dangerous
journey. Landless was no novice at such work. When a boy, he had often
rounded the face of frowning white cliffs with the sea breaking in
thunder a hundred feet below. Then a bird's nest had been the prize of
high daring, death the penalty of dizziness or a misstep. Now, although
not two yards below him was the solid earth, a misstep would send him
crashing down to a more fearful doom--but the prize! A light was in his
eyes as he crept nearer and nearer to the shed built against the rock.

They passed the smouldering embers of a large fire, and came full upon
the circle of sleeping Indians. They lay in the moonlight like fallen
statues, their bronze limbs motionless, their high, stern features
impassive as death. From their belts came the glint of tomahawk and
scalping knife, and beside each warrior lay his bow and quiver of
arrows. Only one man had a gun. It lay in the hollow of his arm, its
barrel making a gleaming line a