James Fenimore Cooper Oak Openings (PG) (v1.0) [txt]

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"Wolf don't touch him--wolf CAN'T touch him. Moccasin been under
tree. See him mark. Bess do as I tell you; go home, soon as ever
can. Short path to Detroit; an't two hundred pale-face mile."
"I see how it is, Pigeonswing; I see how it is, and thank you for
this hint, while I honor your good faith to your own people. But I
cannot go to Detroit, in the first place, for that town and fort
have fallen into the hands of the British. It might be possible for
a canoe to get past in the night, and to work its way through into
Lake Erie, but I cannot quit my friends. If you can put us ALL in
the way of getting away from this spot, I shall be ready to enter
into the scheme. Why can't we all get into the canoe, and go down
stream, as soon as another night sets in? Before morning we could be
twenty miles on our road."
"No do any good," returned Pigeonswing, coldly. "If can't go alone,
can't go at all. Squaw no keep up when so many be on trail. No good
to try canoe. Catch you in two days--p'raps one. Well, I go to
sleep--can't keep eye open all night."
Hereupon, Pigeonswing coolly repaired to his skins, lay down, and
was soon fast asleep. The bee-hunter was fain to do the same, the
night being now far advanced; but he lay awake a long time, thinking
of the hint he had received, and pondering on the nature of the
danger which menaced the security of the family. At length, sleep
asserted its power over even him, and the place lay in the deep
stillness of night.
CHAPTER XIX.
And stretching out, on either hand,
O'er all that wide and unshorn land,
Till weary of its gorgeousness,
The aching and the dazzled eye
Rests, gladdened, on the calm, blue sky.
--WHITTIER.
No other disturbance occurred in the course of the night. With the
dawn, le Bourdon was again stirring; and as he left the palisades to
repair to the run, in order to make his ablutions, he saw Peter
returning to Castle Meal. The two met; but no allusion was made to
the manner in which the night had passed. The chief paid his
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salutations courteously; and, instead of repairing to his skins, he
joined le Bourdon, seemingly as little inclined to seek for rest, as
if just arisen from his lair. When the bee-hunter left the spring,
this mysterious Indian, for the first time, spoke of business.
"My brother wanted to-day to show Injin how to find honey," said
Peter, as he and Bourdon walked toward the palisades, within which
the whole family was now moving. "I nebber see honey find, myself,
ole as I be."
"I shall be very willing to teach your chiefs my craft," answered
the bee-hunter, "and this so much the more readily, because I do not
expect to pracTYSE it much longer, myself; not in this part of the
country, at least."
"How dat happen?--expec' go away soon?" demanded Peter, whose keen,
restless eye would, at one instant, seem to read his companion's
soul, and then would glance off to some distant object, as if
conscious of its own startling and fiery expression. "Now Br'ish got
Detroit, where my broder go? Bess stay here, I t'ink."
"I shall not be in a hurry, Peter; but my season will soon be up,
and I must get ahead of the bad weather, you know, or a bark canoe
will have but a poor time of it on Lake Huron. When am I to meet the
chiefs, to give them a lesson in finding bees?"
"Tell by-'em-by. No hurry for dat. Want to sleep fuss. See so much
better, when I open eye. So you t'ink of makin' journey on long
path. If can't go to Detroit, where can go to?"
"My proper home is in Pennsylvania, on the other side of Lake Erie.
It is a long path, and I'm not certain of getting safely over it in
these troubled times. Perhaps it would be best for me, however, to
shape at once for Ohio; if in that state I might find my way round
the end of Erie, and so go the whole distance by land."
The bee-hunter said this, by way of throwing dust into the Indian's
eyes, for he had not the least intention of travelling in the
direction named. It is true, it was HIS most direct course, and the
one that prudence would point out to him, under all the
circumstances, had he been alone. But le Bourdon was no longer
alone--in heart and feelings, at least. Margery now mingled with all
his views for the future; and he could no more think of abandoning [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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