A Virginia Scout. Hugh Pendexter
chorus of howls in the forest suddenly ceased, then were succeeded by sharp yelps of joy. Cousin stared at me in bewilderment. Darting to the back of the cabin, he peered through a chink. “Come here,” he softly commanded. I joined him and took his place at the peephole. There was a haze of smoke in the eastern sky.
“That’s why Black Hoof an’ his men are hangin’ round here,” he sighed. “He sent a small band farther east. They’ve made a kill. That’s a burnin’ over there.”
“That would be Edgely’s cabin,” I decided. “But they moved back to Dunlap’s Creek three months ago.”
“Thank God for that!” he exclaimed. “But we’ll have more Injuns round us mighty soon. I wish it was dark.”
“They’ve stopped their yowling. Look out for fresh deviltry!”
He nodded and walked to the front of the cabin. The horse neighed shrilly. The call was repeated in the forest. The Indians continued silent. I heard it first; that is to recognize it. For I had heard it the day before. The voice of a man shouting fretfully, much as an angry child complains. Cousin understood it when a whimpering note was added.
“Baby Kirst!” he softly cried. “Black Hoof will ’low his medicine is mighty weak. Baby’s out there an’ in a bad frame o’ mind. Somethin’ is goin’ ag’in’ the grain. It’s good medicine for us that he wandered up this way.”
I began sketching the happenings at Howard’s Creek, but before I could finish the bushes on the hem of the woods were violently agitated and Baby Kirst rode into the clearing, his horse in a lather. When he beheld the dead cows and hogs he yelled like a madman and plucked his heavy ax from his belt, and turned back to the woods. He disappeared with a crash, his hoarse voice shouting unintelligible things.
“Now you can go,” quietly said Cousin as he unbarred the door. “Be keerful o’ the Injuns to the east. They’ll be a small band. I ’low I’ll foller Kirst. If he don’t drive ’em too fast there oughter be good huntin’ for me.”
That night I rode into the Greenwood clearing on Dunlap’s Creek without having seen any Indians along the way.
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