Now it is not my purpose to set down all we did and said during this long chase. It would be of no interest to a stranger, since one hour was much like another until we were come near to the Indian town of Oghkwaga, where Brant usually made his headquarters while bent on such cruel work as that of harrying the settlers who favored the rebellion against the king, and it is not necessary I should write down here the well-known fact that Thayendanega was in the pay of the British.
It seemed much as if the Indians had no care as to whether they were being followed, for, instead of sending back scouts along the trail, as Brant almost always did, the party remained in a body, and even when we were so close on them as to lie down within view of their camp-fires at night, we never saw one of the painted villains who appeared curious to know if any person was in the rear.
We were within a day's march of the Indian town, and had lain down in a thicket of spruce bushes after having looked in vain for some signs of a prisoner, as we had done during each of the four days while we were directly behind the band and at no time more than two miles distant.
Jacob's face was wrinkled, or so it seemed to me, with lines drawn by sorrow because we had not succeeded in getting a glimpse of his father, and it was evident that the lad was beginning to fear, as did I, that the savages, finding a prisoner too troublesome, had tortured him to death; for if Master Sitz was yet alive and in the keeping of Brant's followers, why had we not got a glimpse of him?
"There is no reason why you should grieve so deeply, lad," Sergeant Corney said, as if he could read the boy's thoughts. "I'll answer for it that your father is as much alive as we are."
"How can you be certain of that?" Jacob asked, moodily.
"We have seen every one of their camps, eh?"
"An' have you noted any sign of a prisoner's havin' been tortured--meanin' a half-burned tree, a pile of rocks near the fire, or sich other like thing?"
Jacob shook his head; he could not bring himself to speak calmly of such a possibility.
"No, you haven't, an' we know without bein' told that when sich devils as follow Joe Brant get a prisoner in their clutches, they never kill him without torture. Now, 'cordin' to my way of thinkin', we can count to a certainty that he's alive."