He led the way to the log cabin, and at once set about packing the most valuable of his and Tom's possessions. Sammy led out the old pony which was usually employed in dragging timber, and roped the articles to his back, big tears welling up in his eyes as he did so. When all was ready Steve took a brand from the fire, looked once more upon his old home, the cabin in which he had lived sixteen happy years, and then fired the shingles. There was an air of resolution on his face as he did so, and he stood to windward watching the flames as they caught hold and licked round the logs with the same expression. Then, as the roof fell in and huge tongues of flame flared up into the air, he turned away with a smile.
"I will help to build a mansion where that happy home was," he said. "Come Jim and Mac, and you too, Silver Fox, old friends, we will go where we can be of use to our country, and one of these days we will settle again in these parts, when the French have been driven into Canada."
"When they have been sent neck and crop out of North America," growled Jim. "Pick up yer traps, Steve. The other folks air waitin' for us way up there back of the rise."
Sammy took the rope bridle of the laden animal, and the trappers and their Indian friend fell in behind. And thus did Steve leave his home, not to return again till many an adventure had befallen him, and not till many and many a man had fallen in the contest which was about to break out with a ferocity which was almost unexampled.
Sad and heavy of heart were the settlers whom Steve and his friends met at the top of the divide which ran between the valley in which they had lived and the forest region beyond, stretching right away to the Alleghany mountains; for each one of the forty or more persons of whom the party consisted had just lost home and belongings. Men, women, and children had been forced to turn out of their log cabins and take to the woods.
"It air a shame and no mistake," said Jim as the men of the party gathered about Steve's pony and discussed the matter. "But there's jest one thing that makes it easy so to speak."
"Easy! Yer don't call it an easy thing to have to fire the hut that took so long to build, do yer, Huntin' Jim?" cried one of the trappers, Pete Jarvis by name, his brows contracting as his bitterness increased. "Yer don't say as it's an easy thing fer a man what's fifty and more to turn his back on what he's given years of his life to make, to steal like a skunk out'er these woods, where he's trapped and shot, and with his wife and children take the trail back to the west. Yer don't think that, Huntin' Jim. It's hard enough to break a man's heart."