All others kept at a respectful distance.

The four began to talk and, although only an occasional word reached the watching three, they knew too well their subject of converse.

It was the great conspiracy to draw the Spanish from Louisiana into an attack upon the infant settlements, upon the ground that they were or would be interlopers.

It was cannon that the assailants needed to smash the block houses, and cannon in abundance could be brought on the great rivers from New Orleans.
The watchers presently saw Braxton Wyatt take a small parcel from the inside of his deerskin hunting shirt.

He unfolded the parcel and the watchers could see that it consisted of large pieces of the finest, tanned deerskin.
"Maps," said Paul intuitively.