e first
shots the Senecas will try to tomahawk you and your children. Hold out
your hands."

She held out both hands obediently. The handle of a tomahawk was pressed
into one, and the muzzle of a double-barreled pistol into the other.
Strength flowed down each hand into her body.

"If the time comes, use them; you are strong, and you know how," said
the voice. Then she saw the dark figure creeping away.

CHAPTER XIV. THE PURSUIT ON THE RIVER

The story of the frontier is filled with heroines, from the far days
of Hannah Dustin down to the present, and Mary Newton, whom the unknown
figure in the dark had just aroused, is one of them. It had seemed to
her that God himself had deserted her, but at the last moment he had
sent some one. She did not doubt, she could not doubt, because the bonds
had been severed, and there she lay with a deadly weapon in either hand.
The friendly stranger who had come so silently was gone as he had come,
but she was not helpless now. Like many another frontier woman, she
was naturally lithe and powerful, and, stirred by a great hope, all her
strength had returned for the present.

Nobody who lives in the wilderness can wholly escape superstition,
and Mary Newton began to believe that some supernatural creature had
intervened in her behalf. She raised herself just a little on one elbow
and surveyed the surrounding thicket. She saw only the dead embers of
the fire, and the dark forms of the Indians lying upon the bare ground.
Had it not been for the knife and pistol in her hand, she could have
believed that the voice was only a dream.

There was a slight rustling in the thicket, and a Seneca rose quickly
to his knees, grasping his rifle in both hands. The woman's fingers
clutched the knife and pistol more tightly, and her whole gaunt figure
trembled. The Seneca listened only a moment. Then he gave a sharp cry,
and all the other warriors sprang up. But three of them rose only
to fall again, as the rifles cracked in the bushes, while two others
staggered from wounds.

The triumphant shout of the frontiersmen came from the thicket, and then
they rushed upon the camp. Quick as a flash two of the Senecas started
toward the woman and children with their tomahawks, but Mary Newton was
ready. Her heart had leaped at the shots when the Senecas fell, and
she kept her courage. Now she sprang to her full height, and, with the
children screaming at her feet, fired one barrel of the pistol direc