The Pathfinder | Page 4

a smoke."
As he concluded, the uncle drew a hand from his bosom, touched the
male Indian, who was standing near him, lightly on the shoulder, and
pointed out a thin line of vapor which was stealing slowly out of the
wilderness of leaves, at a distance of about a mile, and was diffusing
itself in almost imperceptible threads of humidity in the quivering
atmosphere. The Tuscarora was one of those noble-looking warriors
oftener met with among the aborigines of this continent a century since
than to-day; and, while he had mingled sufficiently with the colonists to
be familiar with their habits and even with their language, he had lost
little, if any, of the wild grandeur and simple dignity of a chief.
Between him and the old seaman the intercourse had been friendly, but
distant; for the Indian had been too much accustomed to mingle with
the officers of the different military posts he had frequented not to
understand that his present companion was only a subordinate. So
imposing, indeed, had been the quiet superiority of the Tuscarora's
reserve, that Charles Cap, for so was the seaman named, in his most
dogmatical or facetious moments, had not ventured on familiarity in an
intercourse which had now lasted more than a week. The sight of the
curling smoke, however, had struck the latter like the sudden
appearance of a sail at sea; and, for the first time since they met, he
ventured to touch the warrior, as has been related.
The quick eye of the Tuscarora instantly caught a sight of the smoke;
and for full a minute he stood, slightly raised on tiptoe, with distended
nostrils, like the buck that scents a taint in the air, and a gaze as riveted
as that of the trained pointer while he waits his master's aim. Then,
falling back on his feet, a low exclamation, in the soft tones that form
so singular a contrast to its harsher cries in the Indian warrior's voice,
was barely audible; otherwise, he was undisturbed. His countenance

was calm, and his quick, dark, eagle eye moved over the leafy
panorama, as if to take in at a glance every circumstance that might
enlighten his mind. That the long journey they had attempted to make
through a broad belt of wilderness was necessarily attended with
danger, both uncle and niece well knew; though neither could at once
determine whether the sign that others were in their vicinity was the
harbinger of good or evil.
"There must be Oneidas or Tuscaroras near us, Arrowhead," said Cap,
addressing his Indian companion by his conventional English name;
"will it not be well to join company with them, and get a comfortable
berth for the night in their wigwam?"
"No wigwam there," Arrowhead answered in his unmoved manner --
"too much tree."
"But Indians must be there; perhaps some old mess-mates of your own,
Master Arrowhead."
"No Tuscarora -- no Oneida -- no Mohawk -- pale-face fire."
"The devil it is? Well, Magnet, this surpasses a seaman's philosophy:
we old sea-dogs can tell a lubber's nest from a mate's hammock; but I
do not think the oldest admiral in his Majesty's fleet can tell a king's
smoke from a collier's."
The idea that human beings were in their vicinity, in that ocean of
wilderness, had deepened the flush on the blooming cheek and
brightened the eye of the fair creature at his side; but she soon turned
with a look of surprise to her relative, and said hesitatingly, for both
had often admired the Tuscarora's knowledge, or, we might almost say,
instinct, --
"A pale-face's fire! Surely, uncle, he cannot know _that_?"
"Ten days since, child, I would have sworn to it; but now I hardly know
what to believe. May I take the liberty of asking, Arrowhead, why you
fancy that smoke, now, a pale-face's smoke, and not a red-skin's?"

"Wet wood," returned the warrior, with the calmness with which the
pedagogue might point out an arithmetical demonstration to his puzzled
pupil. "Much wet -- much smoke; much water -- black smoke."
"But, begging your pardon, Master Arrowhead, the smoke is not black,
nor is there much of it. To my eye, now, it is as light and fanciful a
smoke as ever rose from a captain's tea-kettle, when nothing was left to
make the fire but a few chips from the dunnage."
"Too much water," returned Arrowhead, with a slight nod of the head;
"Tuscarora too cunning to make fire with water! Pale-face too much
book, and burn anything; much book, little know."
"Well, that's reasonable, I allow," said Cap, who was no devotee of
learning: "he means that as a hit at your reading, Magnet; for the chief
has sensible notions of things in his own way. How far, now,