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Yeates came into North Eddisto river, about ten leagues to the southward of Charleston, and sent an express to the governor, to know if he and his comrades might have the benefit of his majesty's pardon; promising that, if they might, they would surrender themselves to his mercy, with the sloops and negroes.
The Catawba's negative was his guttural "Wah," and Ephraim Yeates, having carefully restored the final grain of the priming to his powder-horn, proceeded to enlighten us at some length. "Mighty cur'is, ez I was a-saying.
Happily for us two who were out of training, the rainy-day dusk came early; and though Yeates and the Indian, running now with their bodies bent double and their noses to the ground, held on long after Richard Jennifer and I were bat-blind for any seeing of the hoof-prints, the end came at length and we bivouacked as we were, fireless, and with the last of the cooked ration of deer's meat for a scanty supper.
All this I had from Yeates what time Margery was pouring the wine and oil of womanly sympathy into Richard's woundings; and I may confess that whilst the ear was listening to the hunter's tale, the eye was taking note of these her tender ministrations, and the heart was setting them down to the score of a great love which would not be denied.
Happily, the breath-scanting interval was short. From behind our thicket screen we presently saw a file of Indian horsemen riding at a leisurely footpace down the path. Ephraim Yeates quickly named these new-comers for us. "'Tis about ez I allowed some o' the Tuckaseges a-scouting down to hold a powwow with the hoss-captain.
"Should there be need for any, two blades will be better than one. If it come to blows and we are killed or taken, Yeates and the chief must make the shift to do without our help." As you would guess, the old hunter demurred to this halving of our slender force, but we over-persuaded him. If all went well, we were to rendezvous on the scene of action to carry out the plan of rescue.
Here I should have been in despair for the lack of any intelligible hint to point the way; and I think not even Jennifer, with all his woodcraft, could have read the record of the onfall as Yeates and the Catawba did.
After we had ridden in wordless silence a short half hour or less, and I supposed we should be nearing the head of our descending ravine, our little cavalcade was halted suddenly in a thickset grove of the pines, and Ephraim Yeates appeared at my stirrup to say: "H'ist ye off your nag, Cap'n John, and let's take a far'well squinch at the inimy whilst we can." "Where? what enemy?"
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