Four days and nights we rowed down the great river, our oars
double-manned, for fear that our coming might be heralded to the French
towns. We made our first camp on a green little island at the mouth of
the Cherokee, as we then called the Tennessee, and there I set about
cooking a turkey for Colonel Clark, which Ray had shot. Chancing to look
up, I saw the Colonel himself watching me.
"How is this, Davy?" said he. "I hear that you have saved my army for me
before we have met the enemy."
"I did not know it, sir," I answered.
"Well," said he, "if you have learned to turn an evil omen into a good
sign, you know more than some generals. What ails you now?"
"There's a pirogue, sir," I cried, staring and pointing.
"Where?" said he, alert all at once. "Here, McChesney, take a crew and
put out after them."
He had scarcely spoken ere Tom and his men were rowing into the sunset,
the whole of our little army watching from the bank. Presently the other
boat was seen coming back with ours, and five strange woodsmen stepped
ashore, our men pressing around them. But Clark flew to the spot, the
men giving back.
"Who's the leader here?" he demanded.
A tall man stepped forward.
"I am," said he, bewildered but defiant.
"Your name?"
"John Duff," he answered, as though against his will.
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