第54章 KASKASKIA(2)

Nothing loath, I made my way to the head of the column, where Bowman's company had broken ranks and stood in a ring up to their thighs in the grass.In the centre of the ring, standing on one foot before our angry Colonel, was Saunders.

``Now, what does this mean?'' demanded Clark; ``my eye is on you, and you've boxed the compass in this last hour.''

Saunders' jaw dropped.

``I'm guiding you right,'' he answered, with that sullenness which comes to his kind from fear, ``but a man will slip his bearings sometimes in this country.''

Clark's eyes shot fire, and he brought down the stock of his rifle with a thud.

``By the eternal God!'' he cried, ``I believe you are a traitor.I've been watching you every step, and you've acted strangely this morning.''

``Ay, ay,'' came from the men round him.

``Silence!'' cried Clark, and turned again to the cowering Saunders.``You pretend to know the way to Kaskaskia, you bring us to the middle of the Indian country where we may be wiped out at any time, and now you have the damned effrontery to tell me that you have lost your way.I am a man of my word,'' he added with a vibrant intensity, and pointed to the limbs of a giant tree which stood at the edge of the distant forest.``I will give you half an hour, but as I live, I will leave you hanging there.''

The man's brown hand trembled as he clutched his rifle barrel.

`` 'Tis a hard country, sir,'' he said.``I'm lost.I swear it on the evangels.''

``A hard country!'' cried Clark.``A man would have to walk over it but once to know it.I believe you are a damned traitor and perjurer,--in spite of your oath, a British spy.

Saunders wiped the sweat from his brow on his buckskin sleeve.

``I reckon I could get the trace, Colonel, if you'd let me go a little way into the prairie.''

``Half an hour,'' said Clark, ``and you'll not go alone.''

Sweeping his eye over Bowman's company, he picked out a man here and a man there to go with Saunders.Then his eye lighted on me.``Where's McChesney?'' he said.

``Fetch McChesney.''

I ran to get Tom, and seven of them went away, with Saunders in the middle, Clark watching them like a hawk, while the men sat down in the grass to wait.Fifteen minutes went by, and twenty, and twenty-five, and Clark was calling for a rope, when some one caught sight of the squad in the distance returning at a run.And when they came within hail it was Saunders' voice we heard, shouting brokenly:--``I've struck it, Colonel, I've struck the trace.There's a pecan at the edge of the bottom with my own blaze on it.''

``May you never be as near death again,'' said the Colonel, grimly, as he gave the order to march.

The fourth day passed, and we left behind us the patches of forest and came into the open prairie,--as far as the eye could reach a long, level sea of waving green.The scanty provisions ran out, hunger was added to the pangs of thirst and weariness, and here and there in the straggling file discontent smouldered and angry undertone was heard.Kaskaskia was somewhere to the west and north;but how far? Clark had misled them.And in addition it were foolish to believe that the garrison had not been warned.English soldiers and French militia and Indian allies stood ready for our reception.Of such was the talk as we lay down in the grass under the stars on the fifth night.For in the rank and file an empty stomach is not hopeful.

The next morning we took up our march silently with the dawn, the prairie grouse whirring ahead of us.At last, as afternoon drew on, a dark line of green edged the prairie to the westward, and our spirits rose.From mouth to mouth ran the word that these were the woods which fringed the bluff above Kaskaskia itself.We pressed ahead, and the destiny of the new Republic for which we had fought made us walk unseen.Excitement keyed us high; we reached the shade, plunged into it, and presently came out staring at the bastioned corners of a fort which rose from the centre of a clearing.It had once defended the place, but now stood abandoned and dismantled.Beyond it, at the edge of the bluff, we halted, astonished.The sun was falling in the west, and below us was the goal for the sight of which we had suffered so much.At our feet, across the wooded bottom, was the Kaskaskia River, and beyond, the peaceful little French village with its low houses and orchards and gardens colored by the touch of the evening light.In the centre of it stood a stone church with its belfry; but our searching eyes alighted on the spot to the southward of it, near the river.There stood a rambling stone building with the shingles of its roof weathered black, and all around it a palisade of pointed sticks thrust in the ground, and with a pair of gates and watch-towers.Drooping on its staff was the standard of England.North and south of the village the emerald common gleamed in the slanting light, speckled red and white and black by grazing cattle.Here and there, in untidy brown patches, were Indian settlements, and far away to the westward the tawny Father of Waters gleamed through the cottonwoods.

Through the waning day the men lay resting under the trees, talking in undertones.Some cleaned their rifles, and others lost themselves in conjectures of the attack.

But Clark himself, tireless, stood with folded arms gazing at the scene below, and the sunlight on his face illumined him (to the lad standing at his side) as the servant of destiny.At length, at eventide, the sweet-toned bell of the little cathedral rang to vespers,--a gentle message of peace to war.Colonel Clark looked into my upturned face.

``Davy, do you know what day this is?'' he asked.

``No, sir,'' I answered.

``Two years have gone since the bells pealed for the birth of a new nation--your nation, Davy, and mine--the nation that is to be the refuge of the oppressed of this earth--the nation which is to be made of all peoples, out of all time.And this land for which you and I shall fight to-night will belong to it, and the lands beyond,'' he pointed to the west, ``until the sun sets on the sea again.''