"Come nearer that I may kill you easily," he said, gripping his tomahawk and leaning towards Steve. "Come nearer, pale face, for if you would flee I will dive in after you." Steve made no answer, and indeed took little notice of the man. Without pausing in his course, he surged nearer to the canoe, and then suddenly dived beneath the water as if he were making for the farther side. And very fortunately for him the rain of the previous night had coloured the river a deep brown, so that it was almost impossible to detect the whereabouts of anyone beneath the surface. The Indian stood upright for a moment, staring into the water. Then he leaned one hand on the far side of the canoe, and waited, his keen tomahawk poised in the air, ready to strike the instant the pale face appeared. "He will come up just beneath me," he said in guttural tones. "I will see how far I can cleave this pale face. Pah! who but a pale face would attempt such a manoeuvre? By taking his eyes from me for even a second he throws his life away. His scalp is mine and shall hang from my belt ere his comrades have time to fire at me. Ah! That was one of their bullets." A look of scorn passed across his ferocious features as a missile sent from Silver Fox's weapon screamed past his ear. A miss was a miss to this redskin warrior. He had no time for sentiment, for consideration as to how near he had been to losing his life. "Surely the pale face will rise," he exclaimed, his equanimity somewhat upset by the fact that Steve had not yet appeared. "It is long since he dived. His breath cannot last much longer. Ah! Perhaps he turned back towards the bank when under the water." He swung round to the other side, his draggled feathers and hair swishing a cascade of water on to the surface of the river. But there was no sign of Steve, nothing to tell where he had got to, nothing but the frantic calls of his comrades on the bank. "Look behind you. Look to the smaller canoe," they bellowed, for their keen eyes had been watching the contest, and not a movement had escaped them. "Dive! Leave the canoe!" The Indian started, swung his head round, and then stood as if transfixed. For the cunning of a redskin had for once been outmatched by the astuteness and coolness of a pale face. Steve knew well enough that the man who reached the canoe first would have the game in his hands, and realised that were he to venture to the surface on either side of the craft taken possession of by the Indian he would be immediately tomahawked. An instant before he plunged beneath the water a better plan had flashed across his brain. "There is a spare musket in the store canoe," he said to himself. "If I can only reach it."