Page:The last of the Mohicans (1826 Volume 2).djvu/163

 and waving in triumph a fragment of the green riding veil of Cora. The movement, the exhibition, and the cry, which again burst from the lips of the young Mohican, instantly drew the whole party once more about him.

"My child!" said Munro, speaking quick and wildly; "give me my child!"

"Uncas will try," was the short and touching answer.

The simple but meaning assurance was lost on the agitated father, who seized the piece of the veil, and crushed it in his hand, while his eyes roamed fearfully among the adjacent bushes, as if he equally dreaded and hoped for the secrets they might reveal.

"Here are no dead!" said Heyward, in a voice that was hollow and nearly stifled by apprehension; "the storm seems not to have passed this way."

"That's manifest, and clearer than the heavens above our heads," returned the cool and undisturbed scout; "but either she or they that have robbed her have