t you dead--you
and likely the rest of the boys. You'd escaped once from those same
Injuns; 't ain't their nater to let a man escape twice. So Rebecca got
heart-sick. After waitin' a bit, and hearin' naught, she packed what
she could and took the children, and set out hossback for her father's
home in North Caroliny."

Daniel Boone grew pale.

"Alone?"

"Yes."

"Did she get there?"

"Yes; all right. Never harmed."

"Thank God. I do not blame her."

"But Jemimy's here. Here's Jemimy! She didn't go."

That was the pleasant surprise. Jemima, aged seventeen, rushed into
his arms.

"Father! Father!"

"Gal, gal! Bless you, gal! But why didn't you go with ma?"

"I wanted to be here if you came back, father. I knew you'd come."

Daniel Boone wiped the tears of joy from his tired eyes. He thrust
Jemima aside, for sterner duty.

"Gather everybody into the fort. We must repair it and be ready for a
siege. When I left Chillicothe four days ago the Injuns had armed and
painted for the war-path and they'll be on us any moment."

That changed the scene. There was calling and running. Boone ate a
few mouthfuls, while directing. As they all worked he told his story;
he answered a hundred questions about the other prisoners; wives and
brothers and sisters were eager to know how they were getting along.

Within twenty-four hours Fort Boonesborough had been repaired. It was
a roomy fort; the walls of palisades a foot thick and twelve feet high
fenced almost an acre. They were helped by the rows of cabins, blank
to the outside, the hewn-shingle or "shakes" roofs sloping sharply. In
the corners there were block-houses, projecting out like bastions, so
as to sweep the walls with their port-holes. Boonesborough had been
well planned, and ranked as the strongest settlers' fort in Kentucky.

But the clearing around was small. The brush and forest were within
gun-shot, and the river, flowing between high banks, was only sixty
yards in front. The old salt lick extended from the very walls.
Inside the fort a well had been excavated, at sign of a spring.

The Indians did not appear. Soon second-stories had been added to the
block-houses, making double bastions. Then, on July 17, William
Hancock came in. He also had escaped from Chillicothe; but he had been
twelve days on the way, and was almost famished.

"There was rare racin' and chasin' up yonder when they found you'd
cleared out, Daniel," he rep