'A canoe,' I commented, 'then we could take off up toward the forks of the creek.'
'That man back yonder?' Archie wondered. 'Who could have shot him? One of his own crowd, maybe?'
'He didn't seem to be dead,' Dorian commented. 'I saw him trying to roll over when we went down the ladder.'
Me, I hadn't any comment to make. My only worry was getting loaded again, and I was hopeful of recharging my pistol alone, where they could not see. No use them getting ideas, but it was my shot that broke the attack, coming unexpected like that, and alarming folks in the cabins.
'There's a farmhouse,' Dorian suggested, 'smoke coming from the chimney. We might buy some breakfast.'
'I'm for that,' Archie agreed.
'All right,' I said, 'but we'd best not linger over coffee. We will have followers comin' up the trail after us, and they won't be bare-handed. They'll come to fetch trouble this time.'
We walked down to the lane and spoke to the shepherd dog who came charging at us. I put a hand out to him and after a moment he sniffed it, then seemed to accept us, although he barked again from time to time as we come nigh the door.
That door opened and there was a man standing there who had to put his head outside to stand up, he was that tall. He had thin reddish hair and a large Adam's apple.
'We're travelin' folks,' I said to him, 'headin' back for my own mountains, and these gentlemen are keepin' the bears off my back whilst we walk. Right now we're shy of breakfast.'
'Come in an' set. Ma's puttin' on some sidemeat an' corn fritters. Coffee's a-bilin'. This here is fresh ground from our own parch. Never did take to lettin' anybody else parch m' coffee.'
He glanced at Archie, who had seated himself on the steps where he could watch the road. 'He belong to you?'
'He's a free man. Has never been any other way.'
'Then I'd warn him to get back across the Ohio. Some who come huntin' escaped slaves aren't pa'tic'lar who they lay hold of.'
'I'll tell him. He's a good man.'
'If he's keepin' watch for you all, tell him to set in the barn window. That way he can see a mile or two down the road.' He paused, glancing from me to Dorian. 'You two runnin' off?'
Dorian was embarrassed. 'No, sir. Miss Sackett had business with my uncle and he wanted Archie and me to see she got home all right, to Tennessee. She's been followed by some bad people.'
We ate, taking our time. I described Felix Horst, Tim Oats, and Elmer. 'There's others, but those three are the ones we know.'
'Your name is Sackett?'
'It is.'
'You got kinfolk in the Clinch Mountains? Seems to me I've heard tell of Sacketts down thataway.'
'Some. They're cousins, sort of.'
I carried food to Archie. 'We'd best be movin', ma'am.' He glanced at me. 'You know how we're goin'?'
'Up the Sandy. If we could find a canoe, we'd move a lot easier.'
Dorian was up and ready. The sandy-haired man was watching him. 'You need you a rifle-gun,' he said. 'If those follerin' you have a rifle-gun, they'll pick you off.'
'Do you have one to sell?'
The man shook his head. 'I've my own, but we can't live without meat, and I shoot my meat. You might find one of the McCoys with an extry rifle-gun, although folks hereabouts only has what they need, mostly.'
'We'd better go.' Dorian held out his hand to the man, who accepted it. We thanked his wife and waved at the children and went out by the gate.
'They're comin',' Archie said, 'a mile or two back. At least one of them has a rifle.'
That scared me. If that one could shoot, there would be places he could lay his rifle-gun on a rest and take out any one of us at a distance.
The trail followed the Big Sandy. We crossed a meadow wet with morning dew and went into the trees. It was shadowed there, and still. Dorian led the way, and he had a considerable stride.
There was a place where the trail curved out from the woods to the bluffs above the river. We looked back and glimpsed them, five of them.
'They're gainin' on us,' Archie said. 'We've got to make our fight.'
Chapter 15
'Not yet,' I said, and they looked at me, surprised, I guess, that a girl would speak up at such a time. 'We'll make ourselves hard to catch,' I said. 'Come on!'
My eyes had been busy and I'd seen a dim trail taking off through the trees. As I started, Dorian hung back. 'Where's that go?' he demanded.
'We'll find out, won't we?'
Muttering, he followed. The trail led down through the trees into a wooded hollow. There were deer tracks, but I saw no human tracks. Swiftly I led the way through the trees, past some craggy rocks, and across a small stream. Waiting there, I waved them past and then tried to make the signs of their passing less obvious. Oats was a city man, I was sure, and I suspected Elmer was. I knew nothing of Horst, but if I could confuse them a mite, it would save time.
They had walked on, as I meant them to do, and I stood listening. There was no sound but a faint stirring of wind, and then I heard a voice, somebody calling. They had already reached the place where we'd turned off, but had they noticed? I was hoping they would continue on along the Big Sandy.
Regal had hunted down this way a long time back, following an old trail left by Pa in his younger days, and I was hopeful of finding the trail that ran parallel to Blaine Creek, or sort of.
A moment more lent to obscuring tracks, and then I followed along after Dorian and Archie. It was quiet in the woods, but sound carried when a body was in the open. I must caution them about talking. From time to time the trail emerged on the banks of the creek or in a meadow, but we moved on, heading south. Every step was drawing us closer to Sackett country, but we still had a ways to go. If I only had my rifle-gun!
It was back yonder, waiting for me in a tavern where I'd left it, and far from here. Yet, I dearly wanted that rifle and I studied in my mind to find a way to get there and pick it up. The tavern was miles away to the west and south, but mostly south.
When I fetched up with Dorian and Archie, they were resting, waitin' for me. 'Where's this taking us?' Dorian complained. 'We're getting nowhere very fast!'
'Talk soft,' I said. 'Voices carry. They've passed by where we turned off, but they'll realize something's wrong and they'll come a-lookin'.'
We had a chance to gain time, so I led off along the trail. This was wild country, and strange to them, and Dorian didn't like it much, me leading off thataway. He wanted to go places that he knew, and that meant to towns or settlements.
This was lonesome country; until a few years back, Injun hunting country. We were on the Kentucky side now, but most of those West Virginia mountains had belonged to nobody. Here and there Indians lived in the low country but stayed out of the mountains except when in pursuit of game.
It was wild country, rough, cut by many small streams, heavily timbered, country but it was my kind of country, the kind where I'd grown up. Settlements were all right for most folks, but a body was too easily seen and followed where other folks abide.
There were folks along the river, however, and once in a while a place hidden back in the hollow. It came to me suddenly that somewhere ahead was the little town of Louisa and that while I'd been thinking poor, I needn't do so longer. We could go into that town and I could buy me a new rifle-gun, biding the time I could recover my own. At least I wouldn't feel so plumb undressed as I did now.
That meant takin' a chance on being caught up with, but having a rifle-gun meant all the difference.
'Mr. Chantry,' I advised, 'there's a town yonder on the river. I think we'll amble thataway. You better keep your shootin' hand ready, because we'll almost surely run into Felix Horst and some of his outfit.'
'At least we can buy a decent meal!' he said. 'I am not worried about Horst.'
