believe him!” Shad bellowed. “I hope to beat myself silly, we don’t believe him! He lies in his teeth, that’s what he does! I’m amazed his teeth don’t rot and fall right out a his head from the stinkin’ lies he tries to strain through ’em!”
Gist seemed of the same opinion. He raised his musket and placed the barrel to the Mingo’s head. “I see no reason why we should worry about it any further,” he said fiercely.
But Washington interposed quickly. “Wait, Gist. I’m not inclined to believe our friend any more than you; but that is hardly proof that he’s guilty. If war comes we may yet be able to swing his people over to our side. Killing this man will only give us new enemies.”
Matt, having no desire to see a defenseless man killed in cold blood, nodded, saying, “I agree with you. But you must face the fact that Joncaire and Cassanna have set their friends on you. You and Gist are in grave danger.”
“That is now quite obvious,” Washington said calmly. “Gist and I will have to double our pace, as well as our caution.”
Shad heaved a great sigh of reluctance and removed his hand from the Mingo’s throat. “Well, if you fellas have decided to let this cross-eyed bug-eater go, we better get shed of him afore he ears in on our plans.”
He grabbed the Mingo by the shoulder and propelled him bodily into the thicket. “Run you! Hy-Yi! Before I kick your breeches clear up to your ears and make you look like all legs with a pair a eyes!”
The Mingo picked his way quickly from the thicket and paused to stare blank hate at the white men. Then he turned and loped off into the mistlike gloom. Glancing at Chief, Matt realized that the old Seneca was laughing to himself. Chief loved to see other people pitched head-first into bramble bushes.
“Major,” Shad said huskily, his little eyes jumping from right to left with the strain of concentration, “I guess this St. Pierre message is pretty important to you and old Dumwiddie, so here’s what you do. You’n Gist hit straight south-east for the Forks of the Ohio, and me’n Matt’n Chief will angle past Murder Town and unload our guns into it as we go. That will draw them Mingoes off you, and us three will give ’em a chase clear over to the Allegheny River.”
Matt caught the natural hesitation in the major’s face, and he hastened to say, “Don’t worry about Shad and me, sir. With Chief to guide us, we can outrun any savage born.” He glanced at the frosty sky. “Besides, it’s going to snow. They’ll lose our tracks within an hour.”
Washington smiled and put out his hand, giving Matt a warm clasp.
“You’ve been most helpful. Thank you,” he said simply. Then he turned and shook Shad’s huge hand, his eyes crinkling with humor.
“I won’t thank you in the name of the Ohio Company or the King, but rather for myself.”
Shad looked downright embarrassed. “That’s all right, major,” he murmured. “Any time, any time at all.”
Washington offered his hand to Chief. “Chief of Nothing, I wish you my best.”
Chief nodded eagerly. “Fine,” he said, “fine. Any time ’tall!”
Shad and Matt waved a final time as Gist, the major and Half King vanished into the forest. Matt shouldered his musket with a sigh.
“He’s a fine man. Wonder if we’ll see him again?”
Shad shook his head. “Tain’t likely. Williamsburg’s a far stretch from Harrisburg. C’mon, let’s stir up Murder Town.”
The Mingo village nestled lonely in a shallow cup formed by three small hills. It was disorderly and laid out without meaning as many Indian towns are. A bark hut—a wickiup, Shad called it—sat in the center of the communal clearing, and around it and scattered off into the trees stood the tall conical tepees.
The three hunters slipped silently along the fringe of forest, skirting the eastern edge of the village. At the signal from Chief they discharged their muskets over the town, Chief letting out an ear-splitting war cry, EEE-YUUU! and Shad bellowing, “Hi-Yi! Try catchin’ us, you eight-toed bug-eaters!”
Then they took off swiftly for the woods, knifing due east toward the Allegheny, leaving cries of rage and confusion behind, as the Mingoes came pouring out like irate bees from a kicked hive.
Shad chuckled as they ran. He looked back over his shoulder and called to Matt. “Chief’s sore ’cause we didn’t give him no time to put on his war paint!”
“Save your breath for running!” Matt answered. He felt confident that Chief would lead them safely through the night and away from the Mingoes, but he knew he would feel a whole lot better when they had escaped the goshawful land of bogs and thicket tangles with their unnerving aptitude for tearing at a man’s clothes and eyes.
With black night came the snow, a smothering, strangling universe of snow, turning the icy forest into a whirling world of white crystals. It filled their eyes, their mouths, clogged their nostrils, froze to their muskets, slipped down their necks and up their sleeves.
Chief called a halt and turned back to inspect their vanishing trail. He grunted his satisfaction and Matt sighed with relief. The chase was over. The three hunters huddled together and Chief jabbed a finger first in Matt’s chest and then in Shad’s.
“You,” he said to Matt. “Shad.” He turned the finger to his own chest. “Chief. Fine! Say good-byes. You, Shad, go home. Plenty skins, plenty furs. Fine! Chief go now too. Good-byes!”
Shad grinned and, taking Chief by the shoulders, gave him a playful shaking. “All right, you old bug-grubber! We’ll see you next fall.”
But Chief shook his head. “Sooner, sooner, Shad. Much trouble come. Spring, spring, Shad.” He turned and looked off at the whorling night as if studying it for signs, or listening for words that were beyond the kin of the two white hunters.
“May. May, Shad,” he said suddenly. “Maybe sooner. Good-byes!”
The two young men watched the old man hunch off into the falling screen of snow, and Matt impulsively called, “Be careful, Chief!”
And Chief’s distant reply whispered back to them from beyond the ghostly shoulder of night. “Any time ’tall. Fine!”
Shad chuckled, taking Matt by the elbow. “Know what he’s up to now? He’s gonna cut back on our trail and see if he can’t pick himself up some trophies—Murder Town trophies. That old bug-eater. He’s still sore about that Abenaki scalp he had to pass up.”
“Why do you call him a bug-eater?” Matt asked.
Shad’s beefy face expressed surprise. “Why, ’cause he is one, that’s why! I wouldn’t never mention it around him ’cause I ain’t gonna hurt his feelings if I can help it. But one summer I spent some time with them Laurel Ridgers and I seen ’em eatin’ snails! And snails is bugs. C’mon now, Matty. If we’re lucky, maybe we can get across the Allegheny River tonight.”
But he stopped suddenly, grabbing Matt’s arm again, cocking his head back and to one side. “Listen—”
Faintly, as though it were a phenomenon of the whirling snow, Matt heard a soft pulsating, a distant disembodied beat.
