"Nor do I," admitted Wyatt, "yet I could have sworn a few minutes ago that we were being followed. Instinct is sometimes a good guide in the forest." "Then I suggest," said Early, "that we turn back for a few miles. We can float with the current close up to the bank under the overhanging boughs, and, if hunters or scouts are following us, they'll soon wish they were somewhere else." He laughed and Braxton Wyatt joined him in his savage mirth. "Your idea is a good one," said Wyatt, "and we may catch a mouse or two in our trap." He gave another signal and the Shawnees turned the boat about, permitting it to float back with the stream, but as Early had suggested, keeping it in the shadow. Despite his experience and the lack of proof that anyone else was near, Wyatt's heart began to beat fast. Suppose the game was really there, and it should prove to be of the kind that he wanted most to take! This would be indeed a triumph worth while, and he would neglect no precaution to achieve it. They had gone back about a mile now, and he signaled to the warriors to swing the boat yet a little closer to the bank. He still heard no sound, but the belief was once more strong upon him that the quarry was there. They drifted slowly and yet there was nothing. His eye alighted upon a great mass of bushes growing in the shallow water at the edge of the river. He told the paddlers to push the boat among them until it should be completely hidden and then he waited. But time passed and nothing came. The sun dropped lower. The yellow light on the water turned to red, and the forest flamed under the setting sun. A light breeze sprang up and the foliage rustled under its touch. Braxton Wyatt, from his covert among the bushes, watched with anger gnawing at his heart. He had been wrong or whoever it was that followed had been too wary. He was crafty and had laid his trap well, but others were crafty, too, and would turn from the door of an open trap. The sun sank further. The red in the west deepened but gray shadows were creeping over the east and the surface of the river began to darken. Nothing had come. Nothing was coming. Braxton Wyatt said reluctantly to himself that his instinct had been wrong. He gave the word to pull the boat from the canes, and to proceed up the stream again. He was annoyed. He had laid a useless trap and he had made himself look cheap before the Indians. So he said nothing for a long time, but allowed his anger to simmer. When it was fully dark they tied up the boat and camped on shore, in the bushes near the water.