Something crawled across her nose. Lily groggily brushed it away and opened her eyes. A spider! She lurched up, fully awake, banging her head on the branch right above her. Dust rained down, probably bringing more of the hairy pests with it. Scurrying out from under her shelter, she dusted herself off, head and body, shuddering all the time.
Rays of sunshine peeked down through the canopy of forest leaves from a rather high angle. Lily realized that after catching only fitful snatches of sleep during the night and waking at every noise, she had finally fallen into a deep slumber.
But…she glanced around. The men. They never came back.
She reached cautiously beneath a pine limb for the musket and its fixings, then started moving slowly, silently through the thicket toward the spot where she’d hobbled the horses. After only a few steps, she caught a whiff of smoke. Her guides would not have lit a fire. Renewed panic surged through her. No. She must not give in to fear. She had to stay calm. There might be a farmstead nearby.
The breeze appeared to be blowing from the other direction this morning and could have carried the smell from the Palmyra settlement. But like yesterday’s smoke, this was far too strong and heavy to be from a mere fireplace.
Lily stepped gingerly out into a tiny clearing and glanced overhead. Billows of thick smoke crawled toward her from not very far away.
What should she do? Yestereve, a farmstead to the east of her had burned to the ground. Now one from the west had met the same fate. For all she knew, Indians might have passed right by her on the trail during the night. Another shudder rocked her being.
A few yards off to the side, a sudden fluttering of feathers almost stopped her heart as a covey of ground birds took flight. What—or who—had flushed them out?
A horse neighed in the distance. Then another. Lily prayed it was the longhunters returning. She stopped and cocked an ear, waiting for an answering neigh from the men’s mounts.
None came.
Backing toward the fir tree again, she used her free hand to brush away her footprints until she and the weapon were again within its shelter. The single shot from her musket would do little good.
Seconds passed. Having heard nothing else, Lily felt foolish, huddled here with the spiders. She used the rifle to move a branch aside.
The rumble of low voices came from where she’d left the horses. Hopefully Reynolds and Stewart had come back for her. But…on foot? She hadn’t heard hoofbeats.
Lily strained to gain sight of her guides, but with all the trees and underbrush she’d put between herself and the animals, it was impossible to see anything. The frontiersmen would have no idea where she was. Surely they’d call out to her. She waited…and waited.
When she detected the snap of twigs and the clomp of horse hooves, Lily surmised that the animals were being led back onto the trail. Surely the longhunters wouldn’t go off and leave her.
But what if the pair assumed she’d gone on to Palmyra? After all, she’d carefully covered her tracks.
Unless these were Indians…the ones who’d set the farms ablaze!
Slowly, noiselessly, she crawled from beneath the branches. Keeping below the undergrowth, she inched toward the small meadow and raised her head for a peek.
No one was there.
She could still hear sounds coming from the direction they’d taken, so she rose cautiously to her feet. A dire realization came to her. Whoever it was had crossed the trail and headed north!
Sprinting to the place where she’d left the mare and the packhorse, she stopped and checked the ground. A multitude of footprints met her gaze—too many to have been made by Reynolds and Stewart. And all of them were from moccasins!
Overwhelmed at how close the Indians had been to her, Lily’s knees began to give way. Only the support provided by her musket kept her from sinking to the ground. As strength slowly flowed back into her, she inhaled another strong breath of smoky air. She might be safe for the moment, but what about the folks who lived in that house? Had they been warned? She didn’t recall hearing any gunshots. I pray, Lord, that they got safely away before the savages got to their farm.
And what about children! Had any more been captured? Mr. Reynolds had told her that Indians sometimes stole youngsters to hold for ransom. Lily scanned the footprints more closely, looking for small ones. When she found none, she nearly cried with relief. But what if she had? What could she have done? She’d never felt more helpless in her life. Dear Father, please tell me what to do, which way to go. I have no idea.
No matter how much she dreaded it, she knew she had to go to the burning farm. Someone there might still be alive and in desperate need of help.
About half a mile to the west of her haven, Lily came upon a clearing where an assortment of buildings smoldered. During her trek through the woods, she’d hoped and prayed neighbors in the vicinity would have seen the smoke and hastened to help. But to her great disappointment, no horse or wagon team sat parked in the barnyard. No one had come.
Taking full measure of the scene, Lily realized the farm lacked even its own wagon, nor was there any livestock in the pens. The family must have fled after spotting smoke issuing from the neighboring farm.
She stared forlornly at the smoking ruins, knowing the same could happen to the Waldon farmstead. Even if this family had not suffered the vicious attack, they’d lost their home and all their worldly goods. It was almost September. Many of the crops were already harvested and would have been stored to see them through the long winter. It was a huge loss.
Whatever had possessed her to leave Matthew and Luke alone at the farm? She should have insisted that John hog-tie his sons and toss them into the canoe. Filled with renewed urgency, she purposed to get to the boys before the Indians did. She would get them safely out of there.
But another chilling thought gave her pause. John had said the Palmyra settlements lay no more than ten miles south of Beaver Cove—and the Indians were even now cutting through the woods and heading in that direction!
Dear God, I beg of You. Keep my boys safe until I get to them.
Shoving the musket through a tangle of thorny bushes, Lily would have given anything to feel safe enough to travel on the trail, but she had no idea where the small raiding party was headed. They could have changed direction. Worse, they could be a part of a larger group sent by the French to ravage the countryside.
By staying close to the trail, she’d reach whatever fortification might exist at the Palmyra settlement. There she hoped to find someone to guide her across the hills to the Swatara Creek and Beaver Cove.
The ever-present stench of smoke lacing the air gradually diminished as she distanced herself from the burning farm, but the smell grew powerful again a short time later. Perhaps the wind had shifted. Wiping her grimy finger on a fold of her skirt, she licked it and held it aloft. The wind had not changed. Another place up ahead of her must have been set ablaze.
Lily felt utterly defeated. Tears stung her eyes and blurred her vision. Savagely she swiped them away, loathing her weakness. She would not give up. She would head north on her own. She had no other choice.
Checking her pockets, she found she still had a hard biscuit and two pieces of dried beef. She’d save it for supper. And if she didn’t get back to the cove before dark, she’d survive one more night in the woods. She’d done it before. At least it was still summer. Thank heaven for that.
She filled her lungs with air. Turning toward the trail, she listened for several seconds, then crossed it, brushing away her footprints as she went. She was now on the north side—the same side taken by the Indians who stole her horses. And the same side as the last burning farm.
Determined to keep her eyes and ears alert, she dodged through the thick forest growth, keeping the source of light filtering through the trees to her right. She didn’t know if she would reach the Swatara above or below Beaver Creek, but she’d worry about that detail once she came to the river.
The sun had risen high in the sky by the time Lily hiked down a rocky gully and into a small glen with an inviting spring. She stopped to fill her water flask and take a short rest. The small pool edged by water grass and a few reeds looked enticingly cool. As she filled the drinking container, she took a precious moment to enjoy the commonplace sounds of birds twittering overhead. A squirrel chattering as it watched her from a tree branch made her smile.
Once she’d corked the flask, she splashed water over her face to clean off the accumulation of perspiration and dust. It felt incredibly refreshing. She realized her feet needed attention as well and quickly stripped off her shoes and stockings, then sat down on a mossy boulder and lowered her ankles into the cool pond.
Eyes closed, she reveled in this small luxury as her feet began to lose their pain, only to be replaced by the aching of her shoulders and arms from lugging the heavy musket and using the awkward weapon to clear the way before her. She’d gotten so little sleep, it was hard to resist the temptation to take a nap in the cool grass.
That would have to wait for another day. With a sigh, she pulled one of the pieces of meat from her skirt pocket and bit into it.
A twig snapped behind her!
Chills shot through Lily as she whirled toward the sound.
No more than twenty feet away, a stag stared at her through some ferns. Vastly relieved, she sighed. She’d invaded his watering hole. But how easily it could have been savages. Chiding herself for having become careless, she stuffed the dried meat back into her pocket and raised her feet out of the water. She patted them dry with her skirt and replaced her footwear.
Suddenly the deer bounded away through the trees and the squirrel above stopped chattering. The sound of breaking twigs and slapping brush made its way down into the gully. Something big was coming!
Grabbing her musket, Lily dove off the rock and into a stand of ferns among the trees. Would a bear sniff her out? She certainly smelled ripe enough. It took only seconds to realize the noise was not being made by a large animal, but by men moving swiftly as they splashed through the small brook below her and up the other side of the hill.
She cautiously raised her head enough to have a look. Through the smattering of tree trunks, she spied several nearly naked Indian braves. One pulled the packhorse still loaded with the food and blankets and other necessities that would have provided sustenance for her homeward journey. She ducked back down immediately, her heart pounding. Likely the raiding party had done its worst and was now heading northeastward, toward the Swatara Hole, where the creek cut through Blue Mountain to the north.
Lily hoped they were the only raiders in the area. She’d wait here a little longer, then travel on.
When she again set out for home, the close call gave wings to her feet. But before an hour passed, heavy clouds rolled in, and the sky darkened. The faint scent of rain carried on the breeze. Without the sun to guide her she could no longer be sure which way north lay. Didn’t moss grow on the north side of trees? She searched about but couldn’t see moss anywhere.
Then she remembered something John had once told her. The Swatara Creek was the watershed all the little brooks and streams of the area fed into. All she had to do was follow any one of them, and she’d eventually come to the creek. Thank You, dear Lord. You truly are looking after me.
Feeling more encouraged than she had all day, Lily walked down a slope that led to a tiny streamlet. If she followed it and hurried, she might reach Swatara Creek before the rain let loose.
She did not. Not more than an hour or two later, the clouds opened up and great dollops of water splashed down onto the tree leaves, dripping off branches. Lily desperately yearned to go on, but she loathed getting drenched with night approaching. She looked around for the nearest big tree with thick branches and huddled against its trunk, tucking her legs and damp hem as close as she could.
Daylight faded without the rain slowing down, and morose thoughts filled Lily’s mind. Here she sat under a tree again, this time wet from head to toe. Shivers wracked her body. What if she never made it home? What if she were captured and hacked to death, or mauled and eaten by some wild animal? No one would ever know what became of her. The little ones, Davy and Emma. How would they fare if they lost both their “mothers” in the same month? And the boys. They could be under attack at this very minute. John, your children need you to come home. I need you. She hugged herself all the tighter. I need you so desperately to hold me close, to tell me everything will be all right.
Sloshing and crunching sounds coming across the debris and fallen leaves overpowered the sounds of rain.
Lily snatched up her musket. Had someone come across her tracks? Had she been followed?