"The backwoodsman has taken the first trick, Monsieur." I saw De Croix's body dart, like a black arrow, far out into the air, and come sweeping down. He struck to my left, and a trifle behind me; but I waited not to learn just how. With lusty strokes I struck out for the north shore. It was a hard swim, for my deerskins held the water like so many bags, and the current, though not rapid, was sufficiently strong to make me fight valiantly for every foot of way. I came out, panting heavily, upon a low bank of soft mud, and crept cautiously up under the black shadow of some low bushes growing there. I took time, as I rested, to glance back, hoping thus to learn more of the direction I should follow; for the Kinzie light was no longer visible, and my struggle with the current had somewhat bewildered me. I neither saw nor heard anything of De Croix; but the flame of the candle gleaming through the narrow slits of the block-house told me clearly where it stood, while a wild yelling farther to the southward convinced me that our Indian besiegers were yet astir and concocting some fresh deviltry at their camp. With a half-uttered prayer that they might all be there, I hastily pressed the water from my soggy clothes and plunged forward into the unknown darkness. A big cottonwood, as from its shape I judged it to be, rose against the stars in my front,--a dim outline swaying slightly in the westerly wind, and I took it as my first guide-mark, moving over the rough unknown ground as rapidly and silently as possible. The soft moccasins I wore aided me greatly, nor were there many trees along the way to drop twigs in the path to crackle under foot; yet I found the ground uneven and deceptive, rifted with small gullies, and more or less bestrewn with stones, against which I stumbled in the darkness. I was too thoroughly trained in the stern and careful school of the frontier not to be cautious at such a time, for I knew that silence and seeming desolation were no proof of savage desertion; nor did I believe that Indian strategy would leave the north of the Fort wholly unguarded. Any rock, any black ravine, any clump of trees or bushes, might well be the lurking-place of hostiles, who would only too gladly wreak their vengeance upon any hapless straggler falling into their hands. I was unarmed, save for the long hunting-knife I carried in the bosom of my shirt; but my thought was not of fighting,--it was to get through without discovery.