In the meantime young Brainerd, with his rifle slung over his
shoulder, was pacing back and forth in the same deliberate manner, his
mind busily engaged on an 'improvement' upon the steam man, by which
he was to walk backward as well as forward, although he couldn't
satisfactorily determine how he was to go up and down hill with
safety.
Still occupied in the study of the subject, he took a seat by the
half-extinguished camp-fire and gazed dreamily into the embers. It had
been a habit with him, when at home, to sit thus for hours, on the
long winter evenings, while his mind was so busily at work that he was
totally oblivious to whatever was passing around him.
It must have been that the boy seated himself without any thought of
the inevitable result of doing so; for none knew better than he that
such a thing was fatal to the faithful performance of a sentinel's
duty: and the thought that his three companions, in one sense, had put
their safety in his hands, would have prevented anything like a
forgetfulness of duty.
Be that as it may, the boy had sat thus less than half an hour when a
drowsiness began stealing over him. Once he raised his head and
fancied he saw a large wolf glaring down upon him from the bank above,
but the head was withdrawn so quickly that he was sure it was only a
phantom of his brain.
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