e doorway, and was into the fresh open air. How good it felt!

Silence reigned in the village, but in the sky the stars had almost
vanished. He had not a half hour of leeway. He ran for the nearest
corn-field--well-nigh stumbled upon a squaw sleeping out of doors in
the midst of five children, but managed to leap them. It was a narrow
escape.

He gained the corn-field, and had glimpsed some loose horses. In the
corn-field he paused and untied his right arm, which had swollen black.
He must have a horse, or he never would get away with such a short
start. So he ran back for a horse. Fortune favored him, for he was
brave. He grabbed a piece of old blanket from a fence and caught a
horse by the mane; rapidly twisted the rope from his arm into a halter,
flung the blanketing across the horse's back, vaulted aboard, hammered
with his heels, and rode, a naked man on a scarcely less naked steed.

He charged recklessly on, through the forest. The branches lashed him
fiercely; he did not even feel them. His thoughts all were ahead,
ahead, leading to the Scioto River, fifty miles eastward toward the
Pennsylvania border.

What a good horse that was! He had chosen the first at hand, but he
had chosen the best in the herd. Mile after mile they forged, never
slackening. He fancied that he heard pursuit; before this the guards
had discovered his absence, the village was aroused and hot in chase.
The sun was up, and shining strongly. At this time he might have been
"eating fire"; that would not happen now--he would die by bullet, first.

He rode. He pitied the horse, but kept it at the gallop. The sun rose
high and higher, and they still were galloping free, up hill and down,
through forest, swamp and prairie. If he only might cross the Scioto!

He saw it, before. The time was verging upon noon. He reached the
Scioto at eleven o'clock. They had come fifty miles through the
trailless wilderness in seven hours! He dared not slacken. Together
they plunged into the stream and swam across. He mounted again; they
were away. The swim had freshened the good horse, it galloped again.

The sun was past the noon mark. Now the horse breathed heavily; it
stumbled, its eyes bulged redly, it had nearly run its course. He
forced it on, and it obeyed until it dropped dead under him. It had
borne him twenty-five more miles--seventy-five miles in eleven hours,
for the time was three o'clock.

A gallant horse, but he coul