They went a little farther,
and then all lay down again to look.
Tom Ross had not spoken a word, but none was more eager than he.
He was almost flat upon the ground, and he had been pulling
himself along by a sort of muscular action of his whole body.
Now he was so still that he did not seem to breathe. Yet his
eyes, uncommonly eager now, were searching the thickets ahead.
They rested at last on a spot of brown showing through some
bushes, and, raising his rifle, he fired with sure aim. The
Iroquois uttered his death cry, sprang up convulsively, and then
fell back prone. Shots were fired in return, and a dozen
riflemen replied to them. The battle was joined.
They heard Braxton Wyatt's whistle, the challenging war cry of
the Iroquois, and then they fought in silence, save for the crack
of the rifles. The riflemen continued to advance in slow,
creeping fashion, always pressing the enemy. Every time they
caught sight of a hostile face or body they sent a bullet at it,
and Wyatt's men did the same. The two lines came closer, and all
along each there were many sharp little jets of fire and smoke.
Some of the riflemen were wounded, and two were slain, dying
quietly and without interrupting their comrades, who continued to
press the combat, Henry always leading in the center, and
Shif'less Sol and Heemskerk on the flanks.
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