Hardscrabble | Page 4

of spilin' a good dinner?" returned the soldier. "It was all smokin' hot when I came in from choppin', and I thought it best for every man to tuck it in before I said a word about it. Besides, I reckon I don't know as they meant any harm, seein' as how they never carried off my top-knot;--only it was a little queer they were hid in that way in the woods, and looked so fierce when they first jumped up in their nasty paint."
"Who knows," remarked Mr. Heywood, taking down his rifle from the side of the hut opposite to the chimney, and examining the priming, "but these fellows may have tracked you back, and are even now, lurking near us. Ephraim Giles, you should have told me of this before."
"And so," replied the soldier, "I was goin' to, when Loup Garou began with his capers. Then it was I gave a parable like, about his scentin' the varmint better nor we human critters could."
"Ephraim Giles," said Mr. Heywood, sharply, while he fixed his dark eye upon him, as if he would have read his inmost soul, "you say that you have been a soldier, and fought with our army on the Wabash. Why did you leave the service?"
"Because," drawled the ex-militaire, with a leering expression of his eye, "my captin was a bad judge of good men when he had 'em, and reckoned I was shammin' when I fell down rale sick, and was left behind in a charge made on the Injins at Tippecanoe. I couldn't stand the abuse he gave me for this, and so I left him."
"Cool, indeed," sneered Mr. Heywood; "now then, Ephraim Giles, hear my opinion. Your captain thought you were a coward, for he judged you from your conduct. I, too, judge you from your conduct, and have no hesitation in pronouncing you to be a rogue or a fool."
"Well, I want to know!" was the only rejoinder of the man, as he went on unconcernedly with his whittling.
"Le Noir," said his master to the Canadian, who, imitating his example, had taken down a long duck gun from the same side of the hut, "take your dog with you. and reconnoitre in the neighborhood. You speak Indian, and if any of these people are to be seen, ascertain who they are and why--"
Here he was interrupted by the gradually approaching sounds of rattling deer hoofs, so well known as composing one of the lower ornaments of the Indian war-dress, while, at the same moment, the wild moaning of Loup Garou, then standing at the front door-way, was renewed even more plaintively than before.
Mr. Heywood's cheek blanched. It was not with fear, for he was a man incapable of fear in the common acceptation of the word, but independently of certain vague apprehensions for others, his mind had been in a great degree unhinged by an unaccountable presentiment of evil, which instinctively had come over it that day. It was this, that, inducing a certain irresoluteness of thought and action, had led him into a manifestation of peevish contradiction in his address to Ephraim Giles. There are moments, when, without knowing why, the nerves of the strongest--the purposes of the wisest, are unstrung--and when it requires all our tact and self-possession to conceal from others, the momentary weakness we almost blush to admit to ourselves.
But there was no time for reflection. The approach to the door was suddenly shaded, and in the next instant the dark forms of three or four savages, speedily followed by others, amounting in all to twelve, besides their chief, who was in the advance, crossed the threshold, and, without uttering a word, either of anger or salutation, squatted themselves upon the floor. They were stout, athletic warriors, the perfect symmetry of whose persons could not be concealed even by the hideous war-paint with which they were thickly streaked--inspiring anything but confidence in the honesty or friendliness of their intentions. The head of each was shaved and painted as well as his person, and only on the extreme crown had been left a tuft of hair, to which were attached feathers, and small bones, and other fantastic ornaments peculiar to their race--a few of them carried American rifles--the majority, the common gun periodically dealt out to the several tribes, as presents from the British Government, while all had in addition to their pipe-tomahawks the formidable and polished war-club.
Such visitors, and so armed, were not of a description to remove the apprehensions of the little party in the farm-house. Their very silence, added to their dark and threatening looks, created more than mere suspicion--a certainty of evil design--and deeply did Mr. Heywood deplore the folly of Ephraim Giles in failing to apprise him of his meeting with these people, at