That there would be pursuit Norton knew well enough. He knew also that if he were caught, he would not be brought back to Louisville alive; Blacknose, being a person of sufficient wit to make so shrewd and swift a plot, would have him safely shot in order to preclude all possible danger. Once past Sullivan's ferry, where the post-road crossed the Ohio to Vincennes seven miles below Shippingsport, Norton knew that he would have the wilderness ahead and his own good wits to rely upon.
More than once he pondered on the subject of Charles Duval. He more than suspected the lawyer of being at the bottom of the affair at the tavern, though this seemed hardly possible on sober second thought. He had seen nothing of Duval in the crowd about the door, but the memory of how the man had silenced the riot during dinner still remained with him. Duval had influence, it seemed, and he was also a prominent citizen.
John Norton was pre-eminently just. He admitted to himself that he had taken an instant dislike to Duval upon meeting the latter on the Beargrass Creek Road the day before. The dislike was based on no solid ground. Duval was the type of man best fitted to capture the liking of frontiersmen—strong, powerful, unafraid and brainy. None the less, Norton did not like him. Either, he considered, his errand had been noised abroad and the river-pirates had tried to eliminate him that morning, or else Duval had been behind the two attempts on his life.
"And if I'm to take my choice," he thought, "I'd say it was the pirates."
None the less, it was with a distinct shock that a moment later he recognized Charles Duval slowly riding toward him. Norton drew rein, astounded.
His track had degenerated into a mere forest trail, since he had struck away from the main pike which Ayres had followed, to throw off the pursuers. Trees were on every side, and Norton could only conjecture that he had come some four miles from the town. Yet here was Duval riding toward him—Duval, whom he had supposed was even then urging on his pursuers!
With him was walking a man, and Norton eyed the pair keenly enough as they approached. Duval's horse was warm, but not foam-flecked, and it was a warm day; the lawyer had been doing no furious riding; so much was clear. Almost reluctantly, Norton instantly absolved him of any complicity in the plot at the tavern. The man with him was very tall and gaunt, dressed in backwoods style, carried a rifle, had a bushy grizzled beard, a thin, hooked nose and very deep-set dark eyes. He had not been at the tavern.
The pair sighted Norton almost as he saw them, and stopped for an instant in evident surprise. He saw Duval say something in a low voice; then both came forward. To Norton's great surprise, the lawyer advanced with hand outstretched and a smile upon his face which seemed sincere enough.
"Sir," exclaimed Duval heartily, "I must ask your pardon for my words of yesterday. I was somewhat in liquor, and irritated at the moment. May I have the honour of your name, sir?"
Norton, with no hint of his inward amazement, gripped the other's proffered hand and looked squarely into Duval's dark eyes. He read there only a sincere regret, however, and after giving his name proceeded to compliment the lawyer on his evident prestige among the rivermen as exemplified at the tavern that noon. Duval's eyes narrowed a trifle.
"Yes, I saw you go out," he returned, "and left myself shortly after. As to those flatboat-men, if some one did not overawe them occasionally they would run the town. By the way, Mr. Norton, meet Mr. Grigg, one of our old settlers and a solid farmer of the vicinity."
This designation seemed to draw a grin from Grigg, who stuck up a huge paw with a muttered "Howdy!" to Norton. The latter found the backwoodsman's face a mixture of savagery, cunning and boldness; he wondered idly what Duval had to do with such a man.
"Mr. Grigg and a neighbour are having a land dispute," smiled Duval smoothly, as if reading the thought of Norton, "but we hope to settle it out of court. Thinking of buying a farm hereabouts?"
"No, I'm just on a tour," returned Norton easily. "I'm from Cincinnati, originally."
Which was quite true, but misleading. For one thing, Norton recollected that the man Grigg must be the father of the strikingly beautiful girl he had met on the Beargrass Creek Road yesterday; also, Colonel Boone's description of Grigg did not quite coincide with that just given by Duval. Remembering what Boone had said regarding Grigg's parentage of the girl, Norton eyed the man with no great favour.
Duval, of course, seemed to have no suspicion of what had happened at the tavern—which happening, indeed, having been too recent for him to know of it. Norton concluded the lawyer had left the place while he was absent at the store of Audubon & Rosier, and that after his leaving, the rivermen had formulated their plot. He wondered vaguely whether or not the redoubtable Blacknose himself had been present at dinner.
"Well, I must be going forward," he said. "Can you tell me if this trail will lead me around toward the river?"
"After a bit," nodded Duval, inspecting Norton's outfit piece by piece. "It runs past Mr. Grigg's farm, then forks. Take the fork to the left, which circles around to the river a few miles down. Your servant, sir!"
He bowed, Norton returning the compliment, and the three separated.
Passing through some marshy cane-brake, the Louisianian presently came to higher ground, found the trees thinning, and perceived hemp and tobacco fields to the right. He was thinking of his own situation, however, and wondering at Duval's change of front. What had caused the lawyer to take this sudden attitude?
Norton himself was a man who neither explained nor apologised for his own actions, and knew Duval for the same kind of man. There must be something behind his abrupt apology and surprising amiability, he concluded, though he was at a loss to conceive what it might be. Colonel Taylor had spoken none too warmly of Duval the day before, else he might have thought that Taylor had mentioned him and his errand to the lawyer, as he had done to Rosier.
"By thunder!" frowned Norton, gazing at the few negroes at work in the fields among the scattered stumps and girdled trees. "There's something almighty strange about this whole affair. Well, I'm out of it now, and if they can reach me in the woods—let them! I guess I'll call on the charming Madam Kitty Grigg. Hm! Duval seems to have been ahead of me there, too. I'm afraid that if I lingered in Louisville, Mr. Duval and I would get farther than apologies——"
He laughed a little, feeling that if he came to hand-grips with Duval the result might be dubious, but worth chancing. And so he came to Grigg's cabin, for farm it was not.
There was no mistaking the place; the girl herself was sitting on the steps of the log shack, at work sewing. Behind him, Norton saw the back-ends of the plantations he had passed, whose buildings were perhaps a mile or more distant. Grigg's cabin was placed amid a grove of half-dead maple and walnut—girdled but never cleared. Even as Norton drew rein and dismounted, the girl rising at sight of him, a sudden thought came into his mind: Duval had said that he was in liquor the day before. Now Norton had seen enough drunken men to know that Duval lied in that statement.
Dismissing this thought, however, he advanced to the shack with a smile. He had no cap and had neglected to buy one in town, and his brown hair and bronzed face were very good to look upon in the warm afternoon sunlight.
"This is Madam Kitty Grigg?" he smiled, bowing, "I met your father and Mr. Duval upon the road, and finding that I had to pass here, determined to crave the courtesy of a drink of water."
She looked at him steadily for a moment, one hand at her breast. Once again Norton noted the clear beauty of her grey eyes and gold-red hair, the character and fresh womanliness of her whole face.
"Sir—you met—my father and Mr. Duval?" she said slowly. Norton comprehended the alarm in her eyes, and laughed again.
"Aye, that I did, Kitty!" he cried gaily. "And your Mr. Duval did me the honour of an apology for what happened on the Beargrass Creek Road yesterday. But pardon—my name is John Norton, at your service now and always."
She looked into his eyes for a moment longer, then turned and walked around the corner of the house, beckoning. Norton followed, to find a spring trickling up beneath a crab-apple tree. Gravely, she dipped out a gourd of water, held it to him, and he drank.
"Thanks, Kitty!" he sighed. "You have nigh saved my life this day——"
"Then you had best save it for yourself," she returned quickly, yet with a laugh in her eyes, "by departing speedily. If Charles Duval gave you an apology, look to your steps, sir!"
"Eh?" Startled out of his gay mood, Norton looked keenly at her. "Now what may you mean by that, sweet Kitty?"
The girl, however, only shrugged her shoulders and laughed.
"'Tis easy to see you are from Louisiana, Mr. Norton"—and he marvelled at the ringing timbre of her voice—"since from you it is 'Kitty' and 'sweet Kitty', while our Kentuckians will ever have it 'Madam Grigg' or mayhap 'Miss Kathleen'."
"Faith, I had it Kitty from Colonel Boone," laughed Norton easily.
"Oh, but he is an old family friend—a second father." Abruptly, the girl fell serious, and put out an imploring hand to his arm, as she glanced at the trail. "Pray, Mr. Norton—go at once! You are in danger, I assure you——"
"Not a bit of it," broke in Norton soberly. "I'm in the woods to get out of danger, Miss Kitty. Even now, I suspect that horsemen are searching for me on the Lexington post-road. But I would like to know what makes you think I am in danger——"
"Because my father allows no one around here"—and the girl drew back with a slight flush. Norton thought of Duval, but forbore to mention the obvious. "But—what do you mean? Why are men searching for you? Are you jesting?"
"Well, it's more or less of a joke," he laughed, seeing her quick alarm. Plainly, she knew more than did he; whether from Abel Grigg or not, danger threatened and she was afraid. So, with a light air, he told her of what had chanced at the tavern.
She listened quietly, her eyes flitting from his face to the trees and back again. She was stirred out of herself. Norton had never seen so rare a girl in all his life—clear, incisive, with grey eyes that could harden into ice or sparkle into star-glints. The brown homespun fell loosely enough about her slender figure, but Norton's fancy transformed it into brocade, and he imagined this girl as she would look were she dressed in the fashion of the New Orleans belles.
"By gad," he thought to himself, reaching the end of his story, "Boone was right! She is no daughter of Grigg's. What a glorious girl she is!"
"Evidently, sir, it was a plot against you," she said, her brow wrinkling deliciously in thought. "But why did you not stay and face the absurd charge?"
"For many reasons"—and Norton was instantly on guard—"chief of which was that I have important business down the river. I believe that I take the left fork from this trail, do I not?"
"If you wish to reach the Tennessee settlements, yes," she returned drily. "If you want to reach the river, take the right fork, which brings you out just below the post-road at Sullivan's ferry."
"Eh? You are certain of that?"
"Of course!" There was wonder in the clear grey eyes. "Why?"
"Oh, no reason at all—I must have been hugely mistaken in my notions of your roads hereabouts," he smiled. "You see, I am going to the Blue River settlements and am a stranger in this country. Did you see Colonel Boone this morning?"
Norton was not at all surprised to find that Duval had directed him to the wrong road. He had half suspected as much, and guessed that when the lawyer reached town he would set the pursuers going in the right direction. He was, however, no little astonished when the girl shook her head in reply to his casual question. Though Boone had not said it in so many words, he had distinctly understood that the frontiersman had seen the girl that morning.
"No, Mr. Norton—I was looking for him even now. Was he in town?"
"He came to town with me from Colonel Dick Taylor's this morning, Kitty—or let us say Kathleen, which is more dignified and has a right Irish touch to it. I thought he had intended to visit you long ere this!"
"So had I," she returned, her eyes on the circling trees. "Still, he will be here before he leaves Kentucky. He was doubtless detained on business."
Norton nodded, remembering Elisha Ayres. Probably Boone had sought the little schoolmaster and the latter had detained him. Well, so much the better; friends were at work, and there seemed to be sore need of them all.
"When you see him, then, tell him of seeing me here," said the Louisianian. It would be well to have Boone kept informed. "He is a very good friend——”
"Wait," the girl broke in quietly, frowning. "What are you going to do? If the rivermen are after you, as it seems they are, you would be very foolish to take the river trail——"
"I am a woodsman, sweet Kitty," he laughed easily, "and I am willing to take my chance against any white man save only Boone—and perhaps one other. Would that honest Davy Crockett were here with me! He and I have had many a trail together, but—well, no matter. Trust me, Kitty; the forest can harm me not."
"But the river can, my confident paladin of Louisiana! Bethink you, the rivermen can use canoes to get ahead of you, lay an ambush——"
Norton uttered an ejaculation. She was right—he had overlooked the river. With a sudden anxiety in his brown eyes, he looked at her gravely, thinking hard. His was no lack of self-reliance, else he had not been on this present errand. But he was in a strange country, and the Kentuckians and rivermen were strange to him; above all, to find himself so swiftly and shrewdly attacked, as he had been that morning, was disconcerting. He longed for some man at his back, some man like young Crockett or old Boone, not dreaming what manner of man Fate was even then leading to his comradeship.
"What think you I had best do, Madam Kathleen?" he asked quietly. She flushed a little under his serious eyes, but met the look frankly.
"Take the Tennessee trail," she returned slowly. "Since you are a woodsman, and look it, this will be easy for you. Take the fork to the left, as you first intended; after a few miles, strike west and work back north to the river gradually, through the woods. Blue River is only forty-five miles distant. Do your enemies know your destination?"
"No—it is known only to Mr. Elisha Ayres, who is my friend and helper."
"Oh—you know him, then!" The grey eyes widened suddenly, and he was amazed at their quick friendliness and warmth. "Why, 'twas he who taught me learning! Well, then, by all means circle around through the woods to the Blue River, and God preserve you, sir!"
"I doubt not He will," responded Norton gravely.
He knelt beside the spring and dipped the gourd, more as an excuse for his stay than because he wished a drink. The girl refused the proffered vessel, and Norton put it to his lips.
As he drank, his eyes fell on the shadow cast by the corner of the log cabin. A tuft of grass suddenly leaped from shadow to sunshine; some moving object at the corner of the cabin had caused the change. Norton was on his feet instantly, and a leap took him to the corner, hand on knife.
Quick as he was, he found the front of the cabin deserted. His horse was grazing quietly; there was no flutter of leaves, no swing of branches, to show that anyone had fled hastily into the trees. Half-wondering if he had been mistaken, he glanced down at the ground by the cabin corner, as the alarmed Kathleen joined him.
"Ah!" he cried swiftly, stooping over a faint mark on the ground. "Get me that rifle from my saddle, Kitty! Here is a gentleman who wears a patched moccasin—"
"Stop!" The girl caught his arm as he rose, and her face was set in swift alarm. "It was my father—I told you he did not like to have strangers around! I patched that moccasin myself—please go, and quickly!"
"Hm!" Norton looked at her. "Does it occur to you, Kathleen, that your worthy father may have overheard what we said about my journey? By the way, are you so certain that he is your father?"
"Why—what mean you?" The colour ebbed from her cheeks as she gazed at him. "Of course he is my father! Please depart, sir——"
"Nay, I dislike to be hurried." And Norton calmly pulled out his pipe. He was angry, but it showed only in his narrowed eyes. "Now our mutual friend, Colonel Boone, seems to have an idea that Abel Grigg is not your father, sweet Kitty. I confess that the same thought has come to me, since seeing him. Have you any coals inside?"
She stamped her foot, half in anger and half in dismay.
"Good lack, sir, will you not be gone?"
"Not until you fetch me a coal, at all events."
She looked at him, read determination in his face, and with an impatient gesture ran to the cabin door and vanished inside. After a moment she appeared with a brand in her fingers, evidently pulled from the fire inside. Smiling, he took it and set it to his pipe.
"Ah, that is better! Now, Kitty, as to your birth: Do you know anything of your mother?"
He fully expected fresh expostulation from her; instead, she nodded quietly.
"Yes, though I do not conceive your right to question me, sir."
"My right is the interest of a gentleman," he said gravely, and she flushed. "May I ask who your mother was?"
"I—I do not know her name," stammered the girl, helpless wonder in her eyes. "Her initials were H.E.M., but my father never speaks of her."
"You mean, Abel Grigg never speaks of her," corrected Norton. A new anger flashed into the girl's face.
"Oh, you are insufferable!" she cried bitterly. "I have tried to help you, and your impertinent curiosity——"
"Nay, Kitty, it is only the interest of a gentleman, as I said before," smiled Norton, "Still, you are right. My curiosity is impertinent, it may be, and if you were not the fairest maid I think I have ever seen, perhaps my interest in you would be less. Frankly, I expect to return to this vicinity before a great while, and shall look forward to seeing you again. But tell me, please—how is it that you know your mother's initials, but not her name?"
She looked at him for a long moment, divided between anger at his cool insistence and comprehension of the iron will behind his gentle courtesy. Her hand went to her dress.
"Because of this. It used to be my mother's, father has said——"
She laid a pin in his hand, and Norton stared down at it in rank incredulity. He turned it over and saw the graven initials on the back, "H.E.M." Then, reaching inside his buckskin coat, he brought out its duplicate and laid it beside the other. Both pins were identical—a small golden eagle, with half-obliterated enamel.
"By thunder!" said Norton very softly, "Kitty, do you know what this is?"
"No—a pin, that's all," she looked up at him, perplexed. He turned over his own pin, showing her the twined initials graven there, "C.N.—E.D."
"This was my only legacy from my father," he continued slowly. "Ask Colonel Boone to tell you the story. My father was Charles Norton, my mother Eliza Darby—their initials, you see. But how on earth did you get yours? It could not have belonged to your mother, unless your father had given it her. And if Abel Grigg was an officer in the Revolution—then I'm a liar!"
"But what is it?" she queried, wide-eyed. He came to her side, pointing to the two little gold eagles, and explained:
"This broken enamel, here, showed Cincinnatus at the plough—the Roman story, if you remember"—and she nodded to his words. "The motto was 'Omnia relinquit servare rempublicam'. Kitty, this eagle is from the order of the Society of the Cincinnati, composed only of Revolutionary officers and their eldest male descendants. I am a member, in virtue of my father's having been one before me—but how on earth did you get this? Does your father know what it is?"
"No, because I have asked him," she returned, excited interest in her eyes. "He says it is just a bauble—but please, please go now! He was here, and I'm afraid that—that——"
"Very well, Kitty." And returning one of the eagles to her, he replaced the other beneath his leathern shirt. "Say nothing to him of this, mind. I'll investigate it when I return. Farewell—and remember, I'll come back sooner or later!"
He raised her hand to his lips, bowing, and turned to his horse. He scarcely remembered more than that he rode off with a wave of his hand; his brain was in a wild riot of thought. It was a moral certainty that Abel Grigg had no right to wear that golden eagle, and in fact knew nothing about it—where, then, had Kathleen Grigg's eagle come from?
"'Just a bauble,' eh?" muttered Norton, his lips tightening in anger. "Friend Grigg, I would be pleased to have you repeat those words to me! By thunder, you'd learn something about the Revolution in a confounded hurry!"
And so he rode off into the wilderness, nor looked back to see the girl gazing after him, hands at her breast.