ain did our feet seek
the deeper water. It would go no higher than our knees, and the sound
which the regiment made in marching was like that of a great flatboat
going against the current. It had been a sad, lavender-colored day, and
now that the gloom of the night was setting in, and not so much as a
hummock showed itself above the surface, the Creoles began to murmur.
And small wonder! Where was this man leading them, this Clark who had
come amongst them from the skies, as it were? Did he know, himself?
Night fell as though a blanket had been spread over the tree-tops, and
above the dreary splashing men could be heard calling to one another in
the darkness. Nor was there any supper ahead. For our food was gone,
and no game was to be shot over this watery waste. A cold like that of
eternal space settled in our bones. Even Terence McCann grumbled.

"Begob," said he, "'tis fine weather for fishes, and the birrds are that
comfortable in the threes. 'Tis no place for a baste at all, at all."

Sometime in the night there was a cry. Ray had found the water falling
from an oozy bank, and there we dozed fitfully until we were startled by
a distant boom.

It was Governor Hamilton's morning gun at Fort Sackville, Vincennes.

There was no breakfast. How we made our way, benumbed with hunger and
cold, to the banks of the Wabash, I know not. Captain McCarty's company
was set to making canoes, and the rest of us looked on apathetically
as the huge trees staggered and fell amidst a fountain of spray in the
shallow water. We were but three leagues from Vincennes. A raft was
bound together, and Tom McChesney and three other scouts sent on a
desperate journey across the river in search of boats and provisions,
lest we starve and fall and die on the wet flats. Before he left Tom
came to me, and the remembrance of his gaunt face haunted me for many
years after. He drew something from his bosom and held it out to me, and
I saw that it was a bit of buffalo steak which he had saved. I shook my
head, and the tears came into my eyes.

"Come, Davy," he said, "ye're so little, and I beant hungry."

Again I shook my head, and for the life of me I could say nothing.

"I reckon Polly Ann'd never forgive me if anything was to happen to
you," said he.

At that I grew strangely angry.

"It's you who need it," I cried, "it's you that has to do the work. And
she told me to take care of you."

The big fellow grinned sheepishly, as was his wont