On the Kentucky Frontier: A Story of the Fighting Pioneers of the West. Otis James

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СКАЧАТЬ he might leap upon me, believing one of the savages was creeping upon him, and such realization caused me to hope it would be possible to avoid him.

      It was a strange situation, this being equally afraid of friend and foe, and could have been in a certain degree avoided if I had but accompanied the young scout.

      Nothing interfered with my progress, however, until I was arrived at the point for which I had been aiming, and saw full before me the preparations for the torture.

      Two fires had been built ten or twelve yards distant from the prisoners, evidently for purposes of illumination, and at the feet of the unfortunate ones was heaped a quantity of dry wood, which would be kindled into a flame when the first portion of the terrible work had been concluded.

      Now the savages were making ready for the dance around their victims, and I saw fourteen of the painted brutes, hideous in feathers, beads and gaudy coloring.

      To describe that which followed immediately after I had a view of the scene, would be impossible. The fiends were alternately advancing toward the prisoners, and retreating, moving with a certain measured step, and brandishing weapons in the faces of the two who were helpless.

      The lad seemed literally frozen with terror; but the man faced his cruel enemies as if defying them to wring a cry of pain from his compressed lips.

      Perhaps five minutes passed while I thus remained motionless in the thicket within half a rifle-shot distance, and then one of the murderous brutes approached the boy knife in hand.

      I knew the poor lad was to be maimed in some manner. The same blinding rush of rage which had come upon me while I was in the cabin, overpowered all sense of danger.

      Giving no heed to my own peril; thinking only to save the frightened lad from immediate pain, I fired point blank at the brute who would have drawn the first blood, and when he fell, as though struck by lightning, a cry of triumph rang from my lips.

      What followed I am unable to set down of my own knowledge, for I was become like one in a fever of rage and desperation.

      I set about re-charging my rifle without giving heed to the rush which should have followed the shot, and dimly, as if it was something in which I had no concern, I heard the report of another rifle; another cry which seemed but the echo of my own.

      Before my feverish brain had taken in all this as a fact, I was ready to shoot again, and never had I aimed with more deliberation. I felt certain this second bullet of mine would find its target, and when it sped on its way I needed not to gaze at the be-feathered brute within range to know that he was dead or disabled.

      Again came what was like the echo of my own gun, and I saw four of the villains on the ground, while the others had made for the nearest shelter, each seeking some tree trunk that would shelter his worthless body.

      Now I realized that I had come up nearly opposite where Simon Kenton was stationed, and he it was who had fired immediately after my rifle spoke.

      Thus attacked on either hand, the savages must have believed they were beset by a large force, and their only desire was to shelter themselves from the deadly fire.

      While loading my rifle I looked for an instant at the boy. His eyes were opened wide; his lips parted as if to cry out, and on his face was an expression of mingled hope and doubt painful in its intensity.

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