The Shadow of the North Part 40

"It is bad," said Tayoga. "An army can never have too many eyes."

Robert was deeply disappointed. He regretted not only the loss of Black Rifle and his men, but the further evidence of an unyielding temperament on the part of their commander. His own mind however so ready to comprehend the mind of others, could understand Braddock's point of view. To the general Black Rifle and his men were mere woods rovers, savages themselves in everything except race, and the army that he led was invincible.

"We'll have to make the best of it," he said.

"They've gone and they're a great loss, but the rest of us will try to do the work they would have done."

"That is so," said Tayoga, gravely.

At last the army moved proudly away into the wilderness. Hundreds of axmen, going ahead, cut a road twelve feet wide, along which cavalry, infantry, artillery and wagons and pack horses stretched for miles. The weather was beautiful, the forest was both beautiful and grand, and to most of the Englishmen and Virginians the march appealed as a great and romantic adventure. The trees were in the tender green leaf.a.ge of early May, and their solid expanse stretched away hundreds and thousands of miles into the unknown west. Early wild flowers, a shy pink or a modest blue, bloomed in the gra.s.s. Deer started from their coverts, crashed through the thickets, and the sky darkened with the swarms of wild fowl flying north. Birds of brilliant plumage flashed among the leaves and often chattered overhead, heedless of the pa.s.sing army. Now and then the soldiers sang, and the song pa.s.sed from the head of the column along its rippling red, yellow and brown length of four miles.

It was a cheerful army, more it was a gay army, enjoying the wilderness which it was seeing at one of the finest periods of the year, wondering at the magnificence of the forest, and the great number of streams that came rus.h.i.+ng down from the mountains.

"It's a n.o.ble country," said Grosvenor to Robert. "I'll admit all that you claim for it."

"And there's so much of it, Grosvenor, even allowing for the portion, the very big portion, the French claim."

"But from which we are going to drive them very soon, Robert, my lad."

"I think so, too, Grosvenor."

Often Robert, Willet and Tayoga went far ahead on swift foot, searching the forest for ambush, and finding none, they would come back and watch the axmen, three hundred in number, who were cutting the road for the army. They were stalwart fellows, skilled in their business, and their axes rang through the woods. Robert felt regret when he saw the splendid trees fall and be dragged to one side, there to rot, despite the fact that the unbroken forest covered millions of square miles.

The camps at night were scenes of good humor. Scouts and flankers were thrown out in the forest, and huge fires were built of the fallen wood which was abundant everywhere. The flames, roaring and leaping, threw a ruddy light over the soldiers, and gave them pleasant warmth, as often in the hills the dusk came on heavy with chill.

Despite the favorable nature of the season some of the soldiers unused to hards.h.i.+ps fell ill, and, more than a week later, when they reached a place known as the Little Meadows, Braddock left there the sick and the heavy baggage with a rear guard under Colonel Dunbar. A scout had brought word that a formidable force of French regulars was expected to reinforce the garrison at Fort Duquesne, and the general was anxious to forestall them. Young Was.h.i.+ngton, in whom he had great confidence, also advised him to push on, and now the army of chosen troops increased its speed.

Robert came into contact with Braddock only once or twice, and then he was noticed with a nod, but on the whole he was glad to escape so easily. The general brave and honest, but irritable, had a closed mind. He thought all things should be done in the way to which he was used, and he had little use for the Americans, save for young Was.h.i.+ngton, and young Morris, who were on his staff, and young s.h.i.+rley who was his secretary. To them he was invariably kind and considerate.

The regular officers made no attempt to interfere with Robert, Tayoga and Willet, who, having their commissions as scouts, roamed as they pleased, and, even on foot, their pace being so much greater than that of the army, they often went far ahead in the night seeking traces of the enemy. Now, although the march was not resisted, they saw unmistakable signs that it was watched. They found trails of small Indian bands and several soldiers who straggled into the forest were killed and scalped. Braddock was enraged but not alarmed. The army would brush away these flies and proceed to the achievement of its object, the capture of Fort Duquesne. The soldiers from England shuddered at the sight of their scalped comrades. It was a new form of war to them, and very ghastly.

Robert, Tayoga and Willet were the best scouts and the regular officers soon learned to rely on them. Grosvenor often begged to go with them, but they laughingly refused.

"We don't claim to be of special excellence ourselves, Grosvenor,"

said Robert, "but such work needs a very long training. One, so to speak, must be born to it, and to be born to it you have to be born in this country, and not in England."

It was about the close of June and they had been nearly three weeks on the way when the three, scouting on a moonlight night, struck a trail larger than usual. Tayoga reckoned that it had been made by at least a dozen warriors, and Willet agreed with him.

"And behold the trace of the big moccasin, Great Bear," said the Onondaga, pointing to a faint impression among the leaves. "It is very large, and it turns in much. We do not see it for the first time."

"Tandakora," said Willet.

"It can be none other."

"We shouldn't be surprised at seeing it. The Ojibway, like a wolf, will rush to the place of killing."

"I am not surprised, Great Bear. It is strange, perhaps, that we have not seen his footsteps before. No doubt he has looked many times upon the marching army."

"Since Tandakora is here, probably leading the Indian scouts, we'll have to take every precaution ourselves. I like my scalp, and I like for it to remain where it has grown, on the top of my head."

They moved now with the most extreme care, always keeping under cover of bushes, and never making any sound as they walked, but the army kept on steadily in the road cut for it by the axmen. Encounters between the flankers and small bands still occurred, but there was yet no sign of serious resistance, and the fort was drawing nearer and nearer.

"I've no doubt the French commander will abandon it," said Grosvenor to Robert. "He'll conclude that our army is too powerful for him."

"I scarce think so," replied Robert doubtfully. "'Tis not the French way, at least, not on this continent. Like as not they will depend on the savages, whom they have with them."

They had been on the march nearly a month when they came to Turtle Creek, which flows into the Monongahela only eight miles from Fort Duquesne a strong fortress of logs with bastions, ravelins, ditch, glacis and covered ways, standing at the junction of the twin streams, the Monongahela and the Alleghany, that form the great Ohio. Here they made a little halt and the scouts who had been sent into the woods reported silence and desolation.

The army rejoiced. It had been a long march, and the wilderness is hard for those not used to it, even in the best of times. Victory was now almost in sight. The next day, perhaps, they would march into Fort Duquesne and take possession, and doubtless a strong detachment would be sent in pursuit of the flying French and Indians.

Full warrant had they for their expectations, as nothing seemed more peaceful than the wilderness. The flames from the cooking fires threw their ruddy light over bough and bush, and disclosed no enemy, and, as the glow of the coals died down, the peaceful tails of the night birds showed that the forest was undisturbed.

Far in the night, Robert, Tayoga and Willet crept through the woods to Fort Duquesne. They found many small trails of both white men and red men, but none indicating a large force. At last they saw a light under the western horizon, which they believed to come from Duquesne itself.

"Perhaps they've burned the fort and are abandoning it," said Robert.

Willet shook his head.

"Not likely," he said. "It's more probable that the light comes from great fires, around which the savages are dancing the war dance."

"What do you think, Tayoga?"

"That the Great Bear is right."

"But surely," said Robert, "they can't hope to withstand an army like ours."

"Robert," said Willet, "you've lived long enough in it to know that anything is possible in the wilderness. Contrecoeur, the French commander at Duquesne, is a brave and capable man. Beaujeu, who stands next to him, has, they say, a soul of fire. You know what St. Luc is, the bravest of the brave, and as wise as a fox, and Dumas and Ligneris are great partisan leaders. Do you think these men will run away without a fight?"

"But they must depend chiefly on the Indians!"

"Even so. They won't let the Indians run away either. We're bound to have some kind of a battle somewhere, though we ought to win."

"Do you know the general's plans for tomorrow?"

"We're to start at dawn. We'll cross the Monongahela for the second time about noon, or a little later, and then, if the French and Indians have run away, as you seemed a little while ago to believe they would, we'll proceed, colors flying into the fort."

"If the enemy makes a stand I should think it would be at the ford."

"Seems likely."

"Come! Come, Dave! Be cheerful. If they meet us at the ford or anywhere else we'll brush 'em aside. That big body of French regulars from Canada hasn't come--we know that--and there isn't force enough in Duquesne to withstand us."

Willet did not say anything more, but his steps were not at all buoyant as they walked back toward the camp. Robert, lying on a blanket, slept soundly before one of the fires, but awoke at dawn, and took breakfast with Willet, Tayoga, Grosvenor and the two young Virginians, Stuart and Cabell.

"We'll be in Duquesne tonight," said the sanguine Stuart.

"In very truth we will," said the equally confident Grosvenor.