“I believe any thing you say,” replied the old creature, betraying her anxiety to get rid of her visitor.
“You do, eh? Well, jist keep on thinking so, for I shall, mayhap, want to use you again some of these days. So good-by, and keep your eyes clean.”
With this injunction he started again for the river, following the stream for some distance, but finally, for some reason best known to himself, took to the mountains. Every few moments he would pause and listen, as if a faint sound met his ears, and then continue his journey.
After Nettleton had escaped from the mill, Fall-leaf began to look around for some other means of escape. He felt sure that Nettleton’s leap must be a fatal one—that, if he was not dashed to pieces by the wheel, he would surely be drowned in the rushing waters. All chance of escape for the poor Indian appeared quite as hopeless. The flames were already hissing around him, and curling up the sides of his prison-house. The fire had weakened the boards, and, just as the flames were coiling around his form, he made a desperate effort, and burst the siding from the mill. In an instant he sprung through the aperture, although the fiery element presented a formidable obstacle between himself and safety. He alighted, however, with only a few slight bruises, and, waiting for nothing, bounded forward. He knew if Walker had continued his journey down the river, he could soon overtake him. For an hour he did not slacken his pace, and finally, in turning a short bend in the river, he beheld the boat.
He was about to dash forward to the rescue of Miss Hayward, but he remembered that he had no gun, his only weapon being his sheath-knife, while Walker was well armed. He must resort to stratagem. His object was to watch for opportunity, and when Walker should land, or when the boat neared the shore, and the thicket favored the movement, to spring upon him suddenly, and drive the knife to his heart. But the river gradually grew wider, and Walker kept his boat in the center, too far distant from shore for any attempt for his seizure to prove successful. All that day and all the night following, the boat drifted on with the stream. It was evident Walker was anxious to reach a certain point as quickly as possible.