The low exclamation that escaped
Deerslayer and the slight scream of Judith were hardly uttered,
when an Indian youth, between the ages of fifteen and seventeen,
stood beside her. These two entrances had been made with moccasined
feet, and consequently almost without noise, but, unexpected and
stealthy as they were, they had not the effect to disturb Deerslayer's
self possession. His first measure was to speak rapidly in Delaware
to his friend, cautioning him to keep out of sight, while he stood
on his guard; the second was to step to the door to ascertain
the extent of the danger. No one else, however, had come, and a
simple contrivance, in the shape of a raft, that lay floating at
the side of the Ark, at once explained the means that had been used
in bringing Hetty off. Two dead and dry, and consequently buoyant,
logs of pine were bound together with pins and withes and a little
platform of riven chestnut had been rudely placed on their surfaces.
Here Hetty had been seated, on a billet of wood, while the young
Iroquois had rowed the primitive and slow-moving, but perfectly
safe craft from the shore.
As soon as Deerslayer had taken a close survey of this raft, and
satisfied himself nothing else was near, he shook his head and
muttered in his soliloquizing way - "This comes of prying into
another man's chist! Had we been watchful, and keen eyed, such a
surprise could never have happened, and, getting this much from a
boy teaches us what we may expect when the old warriors set themselves
fairly about their sarcumventions.
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