3stalwarts (49 page)

He sprinted himself now; not blindly, but picking his next easing point beforehand; he knew the trail, every stone and root of it, from Edmeston to German Flats, as well as he knew Polly Bowers. His easing point would be the ford over Licking Brook. A half mile.

At any time it was worth while to see Adam run. He was the biggest man in the flats, six feet five in his moccasins. With his mass of yellow hair he seemed yet taller. He weighed close to two hundred pounds, without an ounce of fat on him.

He began to draw away from the Indian as soon as he started to sprint. Glancing back again, he saw that the Indian had straightened up a little. He got the feeling that the Indian’s face was surprised. Probably the In-dian fancied himself as quite a runner. Maybe he was champion of some lousy set of lodges somewhere. Adam could have laughed if he had not needed his wind, but the laughter went on in his inside, sending the blood into his hands. His head felt fine and clear. He figured he had gained thirty yards on the Indian when he hit the brook.

He jumped the ford. It was too early to risk wetting his feet and going sore. But as he cleared the water, he threw his rifle from him. It splashed into the pool below the ford and sank. Now that his hands were free, Adam began unlacing his hunting shirt. He got it off. By the time he came to the big butternut tree, he had wrapped his powder flask and bullet pouch in it, and he threw it over a small clump of witch hobble. Then he tightened his belt and stuck his hatchet into the back of his belt where the handle would not keep smacking against his legs.

He was now naked from the waist up. The wind of his running felt good on his chest, cooling the sweat as it trickled down through the short golden mane. He was a wonderful man to see; his skin white as a woman’s except for his hands and face, which were deeply tanned. He was feeling fine and going well. He felt so fine he thought he might almost let the leading Indian pull up and maybe chance a throw at him with his tomahawk. He eased a little, enough to see the Indian. When the buck appeared behind him, Adam saw that he was a new man. He was taller, and his face was painted black and white instead of red and yellow as the other’s had been. He did not come quite so fast, but Adam’s trained eye saw that he had better staying power. Adam decided then and there that he would put all ideas of a quick fight out of his mind. The Indians meant real business.

For the next four miles the chase continued with only a slight variation of the pace, Adam adapting himself to the man behind. He was beginning to feel the pressure, but he was running with greater canniness. He kept his eyes glued to the trail now. He did not dare risk a blind step. His ankles wouldn’t hold up as well if he lit on a rolling stone or a slippery root. He had the feeling very definitely that the race was reaching a climax, and though he ran strongly, strong enough to lick any man in the flats at a hundred yards straightaway this minute, he knew that these Indians were good.

His breathing was still excellent. He had no fear of giving out; he could run till sundown, he thought; and then it came upon him that it would be a fact, if he managed to clear the Indians, that he would hit the flats just about sundown. Even while he ran, he reasoned it out that Brant must have figured on reaching the valley at dark and striking in the morning. Adam wondered what would happen when Brant knew that the word had gone ahead of him. He doubted whether Brant could get up his main body anyway much before sunset. But it didn’t matter much. The only thing in the world Adam could do was to reach the flats. If he got there first some people could get into the forts.

His eyes kept checking in his landmarks and he realized that Andrustown was only a mile, or a little more, ahead. He must have outdistanced most of even the first pursuit. He expected there would not be more than half a dozen who could have held on as long as this, and if that were so they would have to be sending up another man pretty soon. And they would all begin bearing down at the same time.

Adam figured that if he could get through Andrustown clearing he might better take to the woods, for he would have gained as much time as anyone could on the main body.

As he chanced a backward glance, he saw that the Indians were going to try to run him down now. The new man was there and it was evident that he was their best man. He was not tall. He was thickset and had thick short legs. He was entirely naked except for ankle moccasins and breech clout and he was oiled and painted and rather light-colored. He looked like a Mohawk. He wore three feathers. It seemed impossible that he could have kept up with the rest, just to see him at first, for he had a belly that showed out in front. But his belly did not bounce at all. After a minute Adam thought it must be an enlarged place where he kept his wind.

The Indian’s legs moved with incredible rapidity. He had already taken his tomahawk from his belt as if he were confident of being able to haul up on the white man. That gesture gave Adam the incentive he needed. He was enraged, and he took his rage out in his running. When the Indian entered the clearing, Adam was already down past the black ruins of the houses and going away with every stride. It was the greatest running the Indian had ever looked at. He knew he was licked, and he started slowing up very gradually. By the time Adam hit the woods, the Indian had stopped and sat down by the roadside.

When Adam looked back from the woods the Indian wasn’t even looking at him. He was all alone in the clearing and he was futilely banging the ground between his legs with his tomahawk. Adam knew he had made it. He did not stop, nor even let down quickly on his pace. All he had to race now was time. He would have laughed if he could have got the breath for it. Time? Time, hell!

They saw the runner coming down the long hill, his body glistening with sweat and reflecting red from the lowlying ball of the sun. He was coming hard. The sentry in the spy loft of Fort Herkimer saw men come out of houses as the runner passed. Then the men ran back into the houses. Before the runner was out halfway over the flat land, the family of the first house he had passed had their horse hitched to the family cart in front of the door and were piling their belongings and children into it.

The sentry let out a yell.

“It’s Helmer!”

In the yard an officer stopped on his way out.

“Helmer?”

“Yes, Adam Helmer. He’s running hard. He ain’t got his gun. He ain’t got his shirt on.” He paused, looked out again, and then bawled down once more. “He looks pretty near played out.” His voice flattened. “I reckon it’s Brant.”

“What makes you think so?”

“The people are coming in after him.”

Without another word the officer went round the corner of the blockhouse on the run for the church. It was Colonel Bellinger. The sentry heard the whang of his feet on the rungs of the belfry ladder.

Bellinger was now in the steeple. He was yanking the canvas off the swivel. The brass barrel glinted in the sunset. Bellinger stood back, waving the match.

The gun roared. One shot.

All over the valley it brought people outdoors to stare at the church steeple. Before dark they were thronging towards the forts by road and river. Those who had already reached Fort Herkimer stood in front of the church and stared at Helmer’s naked chest. It was whipped with branches, the white skin welted and bloody. But Helmer was breathing easily again. He had never, he thought, felt finer in his life.

12. A Night— and a Morning

Mrs. McKlennar’s barn was a comfortable place to milk in. It was cool and dusky. There were no windows— only the walls of logs and the log ceiling overhead. The four cows stood in a row on rough plank. The whole place was filled with dust and the dry earthy smell, mingled with dung, from the walk behind the cows. It was quiet with the soft breathing of the cows, and the hiss of milk striking its own froth in the pails. Mrs. McKlennar, gray bare head butting one cow’s flank, and Gil, face turned to look through the open door, were milking together. They were not mak-ing any conversation. They were tired from lashing down the wooden barrack roofs over the wheat stacks. And they were both conscious of the finish of the harvest, a good harvest, one they were both proud of— Mrs. McKlennar because the farm belonged to her, and Gil because she had dropped the remark that it was the best yield they had ever had from the land. He knew that it was he himself who had made that best yield a fact. They were thus contented, balanced on the one-legged stools, when the flat impact of the swivel’s roar fell on their ears.

In the first breath, they could hardly believe what they had heard. Then Daisy’s voice lifted in a falsetto screech from the house. “Oh, Mis’ McKlennar! Hit’s de cannon gun over de foht. I seen it going off! Oh, Mis’!”

The widow rose with Gil. Her long face was set. She saw how white he was.

“It’s the alarm gun,” he said. “It’s a raid.”

“One gun.” Her lips compressed; she nodded.

“We’ve got to move to the fort.”

She nodded again. They were out of the barn now, striding towards the stone house. “Don’t run,” said Mrs. McKlennar. “We won’t get there by running. And she’s all right.”

But Gil had to see Lana. Lana would have been feeding young Gil-christened Gilbert McKlennar Martin, with the widow as sponsor.

Lana was sitting in the kitchen, with Gilly at her breast. Her eyes met Gil’s, questioning, terror-stricken, but full of enforced quiet. Thank God, he thought, she hasn’t lost her nerve, yet.

“Now, Gil, where do you think we’d better go?”

“We can get to Dayton by the road. But I’d rather cross the river to Herkimer. It’s quicker. We can take the cart down to the river.”

Mrs. McKlennar nodded.

“We won’t try to take much. I’ll get my money and some brandy. Daisy, you take the pail from Gil and fill a stone jug. Milk is handy sometimes. And that fresh baking of bread and the two hams. And don’t scream. They don’t pay for nigger scalps.”

“Yas’m.”

Gil was surprised to find that he was still carrying the pail. He got the rifle down from the pegs between the beams, and then started through the house, closing and barring the shutters. Mrs. McKlennar collected her money and the brandy and her own clothes and Lana’s. She made bundles of the clothes on the kitchen floor and wrapped the brandy and money in them. Daisy brought the food in a basket. “I fetched de new currant preserve and de side of fresh pohk,” she said proudly. “That preserve and pohk tas’ good together.”

Gil was already out of the house. He chased the pigs into the woods, drove out the cows after taking off their bells, and then hitched the mare to the cart. As soon as he brought it to the door, Mrs. McKlennar tossed their belongings in. Lana buttoned her short gown. She met Gil’s eyes with a pale face, saying, “I thought I’d let Gilly finish his feed. I thought he’d be quieter.”

“Good girl,” said Mrs. McKlennar.

He helped Lana into the cart. Daisy and Mrs. McKlennar scrambled over the tailboard. Gil closed the door and poked the latchstring in. They had done all they could. He took the mare by the head and led her down to the road. As they turned into it, they heard the express rider coming along from Dayton. He passed them at full gallop, leaning forward in his saddle. He did not appear to notice them.

The alarm gun at Eldridge Blockhouse made a single dull thud.

“They haven’t reached the valley yet,” Gil thought. He opened the bars on the far side of the highway and led the mare into the wheatfield. They went at a walk over the stubble towards the river.

Though the darkness was already a shadow in the east, and a mist had begun to hover on the water where brooks entered the river, a hazy after-sunset light reached from beneath a dark bank of clouds rising in the west. Through this dim haze the four adults in the cart could see people moving across the flat land on the far side of the river. The creak of the cart, even the tread of the horses on the opposite road, reached them with startling clearness, but the absence of all talk gave to the approaching night a singular effect of silence.

They themselves got out of the cart without a word when Gil stopped the mare on the riverbank. He drew the bow of the boat on shore and helped the widow into the stern. Then, standing in the water, he passed the baby from Lana’s arms to Mrs. McKlennar’s lap. The child lay still as a mouse. It seemed to them that it must be aware of what was going on, it lay so still, looking straight up at the unaccustomed sky with wakeful eyes. Lana got in next and helped to stow away the basket and bundles. Daisy nearly upset the boat in her anxiety. Her fat hams filled the bow, her striped petticoat swelling over the gunwales. She sat motionless, holding her treasure, a framed small picture of Christ, close to her bosom. Her face was gray under her bright calico kerchief.

Gil climbed up the bank again and unharnessed the mare. After a mo-ment’s hesitation he backed the cart down the bank into the river and threw the harness into it. It would be hard to burn a cart in the river. Then he slapped the mare’s rump, slid down to the water side, and shoved the boat out.

It was overloaded. He had to row slowly. He pulled out into the middle of the quiet river and paused for a last look at the mare. She had stopped a little way from the bank to look after them. She kept pricking her ears nervously.

“Hadn’t we better start?” Mrs. McKlennar suggested quietly.

Gil pulled upstream. The reflections of the willow trees were fading into the general darkness of the water. The valley was yet quiet. There was no sound anywhere, except the passage of carts along the road, until the Casler family, also rowing up the river, overtook them.

Jacob Casler said softly over the water, “You folks all right?”

“Yes. You?”

“We brought all we could. I ain’t got any gunpowder, though.”

“They have some in the fort.”

Mrs. Casler said with a slight shrillness in her voice, “We got plenty of bullets. Jake made a lot this spring.”

They then rowed steadily ahead without further conversation.

The clouds, without rain, gradually filled the sky, and pitch-dark night had fallen by the time the two boats reached Fort Herkimer. Though the gates were still open, there was little noise from inside. Gil got his family on shore and hauled the boat out of the water. Lana carried the baby, and Mrs. McKlennar, Daisy, and he carried everything else. They passed through the gates into the crowded square.