The stuffed figure … was brought forward, the window looking in the direction of the grove supposed to shelter the savages was thrown open, and the perfectly indifferent head of the automaton thrust incontinently through the opening. The ruse was completely successful. The foe could not well resist this temptation, and a flight of arrows, penetrating the figure in every portion of its breast and face, attested the presence of the enemy and the truth of his aim. A wild and shuddering cry rang through the forest at the same instant—that cry, well known as the fearful war whoop, the sound of which made the marrow curdle in the bones of the frontier settler and prompted the mother, with a nameless terror, to hug closer to her bosom the form of her unconscious infant. It was at once answered from side to side, wherever their several parties had been stationed, and it struck terror even into the sheltered garrison which heard it—such terror as the traveler feels by night, when the shrill rattle of the lurking serpent, with that ubiquity of sound which is one of its fearful features, vibrates all around him, leaving him at a loss to say in what quarter his enemy lies in waiting, and teaching him to dread that the very next step which he takes may place him within the coil of death.
"Ay, there they are, sure enough—fifty of them at least, and we shall have them upon us after this monstrous quick, in some way or other," was the speech of Grayson, while a brief silence through all the party marked the deep influence upon them of the summons which they had heard.
"True and we must be up and doing," said the smith; "we can now give them a shot, [Walter] Grayson, for they will dance out from the cover now, thinking they have killed one of us. The savages—they have thrown away some of their powder at least." As Grimstead spoke, he drew three arrows with no small difficulty from the bosom of the figure in which they were buried.
