Again confusion prevailed in the pursuing fleet, and there was a decline of enthusiasm.Braxton Wyatt and Walter Butler raged and swore, but, as they showed no great zeal for the lead themselves, the Iroquois did not gain on the fugitive boat.They, too, were fast learning that the two who crouched there with their rifles ready were among the deadliest marksmen in existence.They fired a dozen shots, perhaps, but their rifles did not have the long range of the Kentucky weapons, and again the bullets fell short, causing little jets of water to spring up.
"They won't come any nearer, at least not for the present," said Henry, "but will hang back just out of rifle range, waiting for some chance to help them."Shif'less Sol looked the other way, down the Susquehanna, and announced that he could see no danger.There was probably no Indian fleet farther down the river than the one now pursuing them, and the danger was behind them, not before.
Throughout the firing, Silent Tom Ross and Long Jim Hart had not said a word, but they rowed with a steadiness and power that would have carried oarsmen of our day to many a victory.
Moreover, they had the inducement not merely of a prize, but of life itself, to row and to row hard.They had rolled up their sleeves, and the mighty muscles on those arms of woven steel rose and fell as they sent the boat swiftly with the silver current of the Susquehanna.
Mary Newton still lay on the bottom of the boat.The children had cried out in fright once or twice at the sound of the firing, but she and Paul bad soothed them and kept them down.Somehow Mary Newton had become possessed of a great faith.She noticed the skill, speed, and success with which the five always worked, and, so long given up to despair, she now went to the other extreme.With such friends as these coming suddenly out of the void, everything must succeed.She had no doubt of it, but lay peacefully on the bottom of the boat, not at all disturbed by the sound of the shots.
Paul and Sol after a while relieved Long Jim and Tom at the oars.
The Iroquois thought it a chance to creep up again, but they were driven back by a third bullet, and once more kept their distance.
Shif'less Sol, while he pulled as powerfully as Tom Ross, whose place he had taken, nevertheless was not silent.
"I'd like to know the feelin's o' Braxton Wyatt an' that feller Butler," he said." Must be powerful tantalizin' to them to see us here, almost where they could stretch out their hands an' put 'em on us.Like reachn' fur ripe, rich fruit, an' failin' to git it by half a finger's length.""They are certainly not pleased," said Henry," but this must end some way or other, you know.""I say so, too, now that I'm a-rowin'," rejoined the shiftless one, "but when my turn at the oars is finished I wouldn't care.
Ez I've said more'n once before, floatin' down a river with somebody else pullin' at the oars is the life jest suited to me."Henry looked up."A summer thunderstorm is coming," he said, "and from the look of things it's going to be pretty black.
Then's when we must dodge 'em."
He was a good weather prophet.In a half hour the sky began to darken rapidly.There was a great deal of thunder and lightning, but when the rain came the air was almost as dark as night.Mary Newton and her children were covered as much as possible with the blankets, and then they swung the boat rapidly toward the eastern shore.They had already lost sight of their pursuers in the darkness, and as they coasted along the shore they found a large creek flowing into the river from the east.
They ran up the creek, and were a full mile from its mouth when the rain ceased.Then the sun came out bright and warm, quickly drying everything.
They pulled about ten miles farther, until the creek grew too shallow for them, when they hid the boat among bushes and took to the land.Two days later they arrived at a strong fort and settlement, where Mary Newton and her four children, safe and well, were welcomed by relatives who had mourned them as dead.
