The Hunters of the Ozark | Page 4

of a rise," remarked Fred, as he
carried the rope to a tree twenty feet distant and made it fast to a limb;
"there was a good deal of thunder and lightning last night off to the
east."
"But the creek doesn't come from that way," said the surprised Terry;
"so what is the odds, as me father said he used to ask when the Injins
was on all sides of him, and a panther in the tree he wanted to climb,
and he found himself standing on the head of a rattlesnake."
"The creek winds through every point of the compass, so it doesn't
make much difference, as you say, where it rains, since it is sure to
make a rise; the only question is whether the rain was enough to affect
the creek so that it will trouble us."
"If it was goin' to do that, wouldn't it have done so before this?" was the
natural question of his companion.
"That depends on how far away the rain was."
The boys were not idle while talking. The canoe was soon made fast,
and then they resumed their hunt for the estray. They were not skillful
enough in woodcraft to trace the animal through the forest by the
means that an Indian would have used, but they were hopeful that by
taking a general direction they would soon find her. If she still had the
bell tied around her neck, there was no reason why they should not be
successful.
But while walking forward, Fred Linden asked a question of himself
that he did not repeat aloud.
"Has she been stolen?"
This query was naturally followed by others. It certainly was
unreasonable to think that a cow would leave her companions and
deliberately wander off, at the time she was milked twice daily. She
would speedily suffer such distress that she would come bellowing
homeward for relief. If she really was an estray, she had missed two

milkings--that of the previous night and the morning that succeeded.
It was certain, therefore, that if she was stolen, the thief had attended to
her milking. But who could the thief be? That was the important
question that Fred confessed himself unable to answer.
There had been occasional instances of white men who had stolen
horses from the frontier settlements, but the lad could recall nothing of
the kind that had taken place in that neighborhood; all of which might
be the case without affecting the present loss, since it was evident that
there must be a first theft of that nature.
But, somehow or other, Fred could not help suspecting that the red men
had to do with the disappearance of the animal. I have intimated in
another place that Greville had never been harmed by the Indians, who
were scattered here and there through the country, for there was no
comparison between them and the fierce Shawanoes, Wyandottes,
Pottawatomies and other tribes, whose deeds gave to Kentucky its
impressive title of the Dark and Bloody Ground; but among the
different bands of red men who roamed through the great wilderness
west of the Mississippi, were those who were capable of as atrocious
cruelties as were ever committed by the fierce warriors further east.
What more likely, therefore, than that a party of these had stolen the
cow and driven her away?
There were many facts that were in favor of and against the theory; the
chief one against it was that if a party of Indians had driven off one cow,
they would have taken more. Then, too, the soft earth that had revealed
the hoof tracks ought to have shown the imprint of moccasins.
You will see, therefore, that Fred could speculate for hours on the
question without satisfying himself. He was sorry that he and Terry had
not brought their guns with them, and was half inclined to go back. It
was not yet noon, and they had plenty of time in which to do so.
"Terry," said Fred, turning suddenly about and addressing his friend,
who was walking behind him, "we made a mistake in not bringing our

guns."
The Irish lad was about to answer when he raised his hand in a warning
way and said:
"Hist!"
Both stood as motionless as the tree trunks about them, all their
faculties centered in the one of hearing.
There was the low, deep roar which is always heard in a vast wood,
made by the soft wind stealing among the multitudinous branches, and
which is like the voice of silence itself. They were so far from the creek
that its soft ripple failed to reach them.
"I don't hear any thing," said Fred at the end of a full minute.
"Nor do I," said Terry.
"Why then did you ask