Joe saw the Indian guard leaning against a tree, asleep.  Silvertip was gone.  The captive raised his head and looked around for the chief.  There were only four Indians left, three on the ground and one against the tree.

He saw something shining near him.  He looked more closely, and made out the object to be an eagle plume Silvertip had worn, in his head-dress.  It lay on the ground near the tree.  Joe made some slight noise which awakened the guard.  The Indian never moved a muscle; but his eyes roved everywhere.  He, too, noticed the absence of the chief.

At this moment from out of the depths of the woods came a swelling sigh, like the moan of the night wind.  It rose and died away, leaving the silence apparently all the deeper.

A shudder ran over Joe’s frame.  Fascinated, he watched the guard.  The Indian uttered a low gasp; his eyes started and glared wildly; he rose very slowly to his full height and stood waiting, listening.  The dark hand which held the tomahawk trembled so that little glints of moonlight glanced from the bright steel.

From far back in the forest-deeps came that same low moaning: 

“Um-m-mm-woo-o-o-o!”

It rose from a faint murmur and swelled to a deep moan, soft but clear, and ended in a wail like that of a lost soul.

The break it made in that dead silence was awful.  Joe’s blood seemed to have curdled and frozen; a cold sweat oozed from his skin, and it was as if a clammy hand clutched at his heart.  He tried to persuade himself that the fear displayed by the savage was only superstition, and that that moan was but the sigh of the night wind.

The Indian sentinel stood as if paralyzed an instant after that weird cry, and then, swift as a flash, and as noiseless, he was gone into the gloomy forest.  He had fled without awakening his companions.

Once more the moaning cry arose and swelled mournfully on the still night air.  It was close at hand!

“The Wind of Death,” whispered Joe.

He was shaken and unnerved by the events of the past two days, and dazed from his wound.  His strength deserted him, and he lost consciousness.

Chapter VI.

One evening, several day previous to the capture of the brothers, a solitary hunter stopped before a deserted log cabin which stood on the bank of a stream fifty miles or more inland from the Ohio River.  It was rapidly growing dark; a fine, drizzling rain had set in, and a rising wind gave promise of a stormy night.

Although the hunter seemed familiar with his surroundings, he moved cautiously, and hesitated as if debating whether he should seek the protection of this lonely hut, or remain all night under dripping trees.  Feeling of his hunting frock, he found that it was damp and slippery.  This fact evidently decided him in favor of the cabin, for he stooped his tall figure and went in.  It was pitch dark inside; but having been there before, the absence of a light did not trouble him.  He readily found the ladder leading to the loft, ascended it, and lay down to sleep.