The Prairie

by James Fenimore Cooper

  CHAPTER V

  Why, worthy father, what have we to lose? --The law Protects us not. Then why should we be tender To let an arrogant piece of flesh threat us! Play judge and executioner. --Cymbeline.

  While the Teton thus enacted his subtle and characteristic part, not asound broke the stillness of the surrounding prairie. The whole bandlay at their several posts, waiting, with the well-known patience of thenatives, for the signal which was to summon them to action. To the eyesof the anxious spectators who occupied the little eminence, alreadydescribed as the position of the captives, the scene presented thebroad, solemn view of a waste, dimly lighted by the glimmering rays ofa clouded moon. The place of the encampment was marked by a gloom deeperthan that which faintly shadowed out the courses of the bottoms, andhere and there a brighter streak tinged the rolling summits of theridges. As for the rest, it was the deep, imposing quiet of a desert.

  But to those who so well knew how much was brooding beneath this mantleof stillness and night, it was a scene of high and wild excitement.Their anxiety gradually increased, as minute after minute passed away,and not the smallest sound of life arose out of the calm and darknesswhich enveloped the brake. The breathing of Paul grew louder and deeper,and more than once Ellen trembled at she knew not what, as she felt thequivering of his active frame, while she leaned dependently on his armfor support.

  The shallow honesty, as well as the besetting infirmity of Weucha, havealready been exhibited. The reader, therefore, will not be surprisedto learn that he was the first to forget the regulations he had himselfimposed. It was at the precise moment when we left Mahtoree yielding tohis nearly ungovernable delight, as he surveyed the number and qualityof Ishmael's beasts of burden, that the man he had selected to watch hiscaptives chose to indulge in the malignant pleasure of tormentingthose it was his duty to protect. Bending his head nigh the ear of thetrapper, the savage rather muttered than whispered--

  "If the Tetons lose their great chief by the hands of theLong-knives[*], old shall die as well as young!"

  [*] The whites are so called by the Indians, from their swords.

  "Life is the gift of the Wahcondah," was the unmoved reply. "Theburnt-wood warrior must submit to his laws, as well as his otherchildren. Men only die when he chooses; and no Dahcotah can change thehour."

  "Look!" returned the savage, thrusting the blade of his knife before theface of his captive. "Weucha is the Wahcondah of a dog."

  The old man raised his eyes to the fierce visage of his keeper, and, fora moment, a gleam of honest and powerful disgust shot from their deepcells; but it instantly passed away, leaving in its place an expressionof commiseration, if not of sorrow.

  "Why should one made in the real image of God suffer his natur' to beprovoked by a mere effigy of reason?" he said in English, and intones much louder than those in which Weucha had chosen to pitch theconversation. The latter profited by the unintentional offence ofhis captive, and, seizing him by the thin, grey locks, that fell frombeneath his cap, was on the point of passing the blade of his knife inmalignant triumph around their roots, when a long, shrill yell rentthe air, and was instantly echoed from the surrounding waste, as if athousand demons opened their throats in common at the summons. Weucharelinquished his grasp, and uttered a cry of exultation.

  "Now!" shouted Paul, unable to control his impatience any longer, "now,old Ishmael, is the time to show the native blood of Kentucky! Fire low,boys--level into the swales, for the red skins are settling to the veryearth!"

  His voice was, however, lost, or rather unheeded, in the midst of theshrieks, shouts, and yells that were, by this time, bursting from fiftymouths on every side of him. The guards still maintained their posts atthe side of the captives, but it was with that sort of difficulty withwhich steeds are restrained at the starting-post, when expecting thesignal to commence the trial of speed. They tossed their arms wildly inthe air, leaping up and down more like exulting children than sober men,and continued to utter the most frantic cries.

  In the midst of this tumultuous disorder a rushing sound was heard,similar to that which might be expected to precede the passage of aflight of buffaloes, and then came the flocks and cattle of Ishmael inone confused and frightened drove.

  "They have robbed the squatter of his beasts!" said the attentivetrapper. "The reptiles have left him as hoofless as a beaver!" He wasyet speaking, when the whole body of the terrified animals rose thelittle acclivity, and swept by the place where he stood, followed by aband of dusky and demon-like looking figures, who pressed madly on theirrear.

  The impulse was communicated to the Teton horses, long accustomed tosympathise in the untutored passions of their owners, and it was withdifficulty that the keepers were enabled to restrain their impatience.At this moment, when all eyes were directed to the passing whirlwindof men and beasts, the trapper caught the knife from the hands of hisinattentive keeper, with a power that his age would have seemed tocontradict, and, at a single blow, severed the thong of hide whichconnected the whole of the drove. The wild animals snorted with joy andterror, and tearing the earth with their heels, they dashed away intothe broad prairies, in a dozen different directions.

  Weucha turned upon his assailant with the ferocity and agility of atiger. He felt for the weapon of which he had been so suddenly deprived,fumbled with impotent haste for the handle of his tomahawk, and at thesame moment glanced his eyes after the flying cattle, with the longingsof a Western Indian. The struggle between thirst for vengeance andcupidity was severe but short. The latter quickly predominated in thebosom of one whose passions were proverbially grovelling; and scarcelya moment intervened between the flight of the animals and the swiftpursuit of the guards. The trapper had continued calmly facing his foe,during the instant of suspense that succeeded his hardy act; and nowthat Weucha was seen following his companions, he pointed after the darktrain, saying, with his deep and nearly inaudible laugh--

  "Red-natur' is red-natur', let it show itself on a prairie, or in aforest! A knock on the head would be the smallest reward to him whoshould take such a liberty with a Christian sentinel; but there goes theTeton after his horses as if he thought two legs as good as four in sucha race! And yet the imps will have every hoof of them afore the day setsin, because it's reason ag'in instinct. Poor reason, I allow; but stillthere is a great deal of the man in an Indian. Ah's me! your Delawareswere the redskins of which America might boast; but few and scatteredis that mighty people, now! Well! the traveller may just make his pitchwhere he is; he has plenty of water, though natur' has cheated him ofthe pleasure of stripping the 'arth of its lawful trees. He has seen thelast of his four-footed creatures, or I am but little skilled in Siouxcunning."

  "Had we not better join the party of Ishmael?" said the bee-hunter."There will be a regular fight about this matter, or the old fellow hassuddenly grown chicken-hearted."

  "No--no--no," hastily exclaimed Ellen.

  She was stopped by the trapper, who laid his hand gently on her mouth,as he answered--

  "Hist--hist!--the sound of voices might bring us into danger. Is yourfriend," he added, turning to Paul, "a man of spirit enough?"

  "Don't call the squatter a friend of mine!" interrupted the youth. "Inever yet harboured with one who could not show hand and zeal for theland which fed him."

  "Well--well. Let it then be acquaintance. Is he a man to maintain hisown, stoutly by dint of powder and lead?"

  "His own! ay, and that which is not his own, too! Can you tell me, oldtrapper, who held the rifle that did the deed for the sheriff's deputy,that thought to rout the unlawful settlers who had gathered nigh theBuffaloe lick in old Kentucky? I had lined a beautiful swarm that veryday into the hollow of a dead beech, and there lay the people's officerat its roots, with a hole directly through the 'grace of God;' which hecarried in his jacket pocket covering his heart, as if he thought a bitof sheepskin was a breastplate agains
t a squatter's bullet! Now, Ellen,you needn't be troubled for it never strictly was brought home to him;and there were fifty others who had pitched in that neighbourhood withjust the same authority from the law."

  The poor girl shuddered, struggling powerfully to suppress the sighwhich arose in spite of her efforts, as if from the very bottom of herheart.

  Thoroughly satisfied that he understood the character of the emigrants,by the short but comprehensive description conveyed in Paul's reply, theold man raised no further question concerning the readiness of Ishmaelto revenge his wrongs, but rather followed the train of thought whichwas suggested to his experience, by the occasion.

  "Each one knows the ties which bind him to his fellow-creatures best,"he answered. "Though it is greatly to be mourned that colour, andproperty, and tongue, and l'arning should make so wide a difference inthose who, after all, are but the children of one father! Howsomever,"he continued, by a transition not a little characteristic of thepursuits and feelings of the man, "as this is a business in which thereis much more likelihood of a fight than need for a sermon, it is best tobe prepared for what may follow.--Hush! there is a movement below; it isan equal chance that we are seen."

  "The family is stirring," cried Ellen, with a tremor that announcednearly as much terror at the approach of her friends, as she had beforemanifested at the presence of her enemies. "Go, Paul, leave me. You, atleast, must not be seen!"

  "If I leave you, Ellen, in this desert before I see you safe in the careof old Ishmael, at least, may I never hear the hum of another bee, or,what is worse, fail in sight to line him to his hive!"

  "You forget this good old man. He will not leave me. Though I am sure,Paul, we have parted before, where there has been more of a desert thanthis."

  "Never! These Indians may come whooping back, and then where are you!Half way to the Rocky Mountains before a man can fairly strike the lineof your flight. What think you, old trapper? How long may it be beforethese Tetons, as you call them, will be coming for the rest of oldIshmael's goods and chattels?"

  "No fear of them," returned the old man, laughing in his own peculiarand silent manner; "I warrant me the devils will be scampering aftertheir beasts these six hours yet! Listen! you may hear them in thewillow bottoms at this very moment; ay, your real Sioux cattle will runlike so many long-legged elks. Hist! crouch again into the grass, downwith ye both; as I'm a miserable piece of clay, I heard the ticking of agunlock!"

  The trapper did not allow his companions time to hesitate, but draggingthem both after him, he nearly buried his own person in the fog of theprairie, while he was speaking. It was fortunate that the senses ofthe aged hunter remained so acute, and that he had lost none of hisreadiness of action. The three were scarcely bowed to the ground, whentheir ears were saluted with the well-known, sharp, short, reports ofthe western rifle, and instantly, the whizzing of the ragged lead washeard, buzzing within dangerous proximity of their heads.

  "Well done, young chips! well done, old block!" whispered Paul, whosespirits no danger nor situation could entirely depress. "As pretty avolley, as one would wish to bear on the wrong end of a rifle! What d'yesay, trapper! here is likely to be a three-cornered war. Shall I give'em as good as they send?"

  "Give them nothing but fair words," returned the other, hastily, "or youare both lost."

  "I'm not certain it would much mend the matter, if I were to speak withmy tongue instead of the piece," said Paul, in a tone half jocular halfbitter.

  "For the sake of heaven, do not let them hear you!" cried Ellen. "Go,Paul, go; you can easily quit us now!"

  Several shots in quick succession, each sending its dangerous messenger,still nearer than the preceding discharge, cut short her speech, no lessin prudence than in terror.

  "This must end," said the trapper, rising with the dignity of one bentonly on the importance of his object. "I know not what need ye may have,children, to fear those you should both love and honour, but somethingmust be done to save your lives. A few hours more or less can neverbe missed from the time of one who has already numbered so many days;therefore I will advance. Here is a clear space around you. Profit by itas you need, and may God bless and prosper each of you, as ye deserve!"

  Without waiting for any reply, the trapper walked boldly down thedeclivity in his front, taking the direction of the encampment, neitherquickening his pace in trepidation, nor suffering it to be retardedby fear. The light of the moon fell brighter for a moment on histall, gaunt, form, and served to warn the emigrants of his approach.Indifferent, however to this unfavourable circumstance, he held his way,silently and steadily towards the copse, until a threatening voice methim with a challenge of--

  "Who comes; friend or foe?"

  "Friend," was the reply; "one who has lived too long to disturb theclose of life with quarrels."

  "But not so long as to forget the tricks of his youth," said Ishmael,rearing his huge frame from beneath the slight covering of a low bush,and meeting the trapper, face to face; "old man, you have brought thistribe of red devils upon us, and to-morrow you will be sharing thebooty."

  "What have you lost?" calmly demanded the trapper.

  "Eight as good mares as ever travelled in gears, besides a foal that isworth thirty of the brightest Mexicans that bear the face of the King ofSpain. Then the woman has not a cloven hoof for her dairy, or her loom,and I believe even the grunters, foot sore as they be, are ploughing theprairie. And now, stranger," he added, dropping the butt of his rifle onthe hard earth, with a violence and clatter that would have intimidatedone less firm than the man he addressed, "how many of these creaturesmay fall to your lot?"

  "Horses have I never craved, nor even used; though few have journeyedover more of the wide lands of America than myself, old and feeble as Iseem. But little use is there for a horse among the hills and woods ofYork--that is, as York was, but as I greatly fear York is no longer--asfor woollen covering and cow's milk, I covet no such womanly fashions!The beasts of the field give me food and raiment. No, I crave no clothbetter than the skin of a deer, nor any meat richer than his flesh."

  The sincere manner of the trapper, as he uttered this simplevindication, was not entirely thrown away on the emigrant, whose dullnature was gradually quickening into a flame, that might speedily haveburst forth with dangerous violence. He listened like one whodoubted, not entirely convinced: and he muttered between his teeth thedenunciation, with which a moment before he intended to precede thesummary vengeance he had certainly meditated.

  "This is brave talking," he at length grumbled; "but to my judgment,too lawyer-like, for a straight forward, fair-weather, and foul-weatherhunter."

  "I claim to be no better than a trapper," the other meekly answered.

  "Hunter or trapper--there is little difference. I have come, old man,into these districts because I found the law sitting too tight upon me,and am not over fond of neighbours who can't settle a dispute withouttroubling a justice and twelve men; but I didn't come to be robb'd of myplunder, and then to say thank'ee to the man who did it!"

  "He, who ventures far into the prairies, must abide by the ways of itsowners."

  "Owners!" echoed the squatter, "I am as rightful an owner of the landI stand on, as any governor in the States! Can you tell me, stranger,where the law or the reason, is to be found, which says that one manshall have a section, or a town, or perhaps a county to his use, andanother have to beg for earth to make his grave in? This is not nature,and I deny that it is law. That is, your legal law."

  "I cannot say that you are wrong," returned the trapper, whose opinionson this important topic, though drawn from very different premises, werein singular accordance with those of his companion, "and I have oftenthought and said as much, when and where I have believed my voice couldbe heard. But your beasts are stolen by them who claim to be masters ofall they find in the deserts."

  "They had better not dispute that matter with a man who knows better,"said the other in a portentous voice, though it seemed deep and sluggishas he w
ho spoke.

  "I call myself a fair trader, and one who gives to his chaps as good ashe receives. You saw the Indians?"

  "I did--they held me a prisoner, while they stole into your camp."

  "It would have been more like a white man and a Christian, to have letme known as much in better season," retorted Ishmael, casting anotherominous sidelong glance at the trapper, as if still meditating evil. "Iam not much given to call every man, I fall in with, cousin, but colourshould be something, when Christians meet in such a place as this. Butwhat is done, is done, and cannot be mended, by words. Come out of yourambush, boys; here is no one but the old man: he has eaten of my bread,and should be our friend; though there is such good reason to suspecthim of harbouring with our enemies."

  The trapper made no reply to the harsh suspicion which the other didnot scruple to utter without the smallest delicacy, notwithstanding theexplanations and denials to which he had just listened. The summons ofthe unnurtured squatter brought an immediate accession to their party.Four or five of his sons made their appearance from beneath as manycovers, where they had been posted under the impression that the figuresthey had seen, on the swell of the prairie, were a part of the Siouxband. As each man approached, and dropped his rifle into the hollowof his arm, he cast an indolent but enquiring glance at the stranger,though neither of them expressed the least curiosity to know whence hehad come or why he was there. This forbearance, however, proceeded onlyin part, from the sluggishness of their common temper; for long andfrequent experience in scenes of a similar character, had taught themthe virtue of discretion. The trapper endured their sullen scrutiny withthe steadiness of one as practised as themselves, and with the entirecomposure of innocence. Content with the momentary examination he hadmade, the eldest of the group, who was in truth the delinquent sentinelby whose remissness the wily Mahtoree had so well profited, turnedtowards his father and said bluntly--

  "If this man is all that is left of the party I saw on the upland,yonder, we haven't altogether thrown away our ammunition."

  "Asa, you are right," said the father, turning suddenly on the trapper,a lost idea being recalled by the hint of his son. "How is it, stranger;there were three of you, just now, or there is no virtue in moonlight?"

  "If you had seen the Tetons racing across the prairies, like so manyblack-looking evil ones, on the heels of your cattle, my friend, itwould have been an easy matter to have fancied them a thousand."

  "Ay, for a town bred boy, or a skeary woman; though for that matter,there is old Esther; she has no more fear of a red-skin than of asuckling cub, or of a wolf pup. I'll warrant ye, had your thievishdevils made their push by the light of the sun, the good woman wouldhave been smartly at work among them, and the Siouxes would have foundshe was not given to part with her cheese and her butter without aprice. But there'll come a time, stranger, right soon, when justice willhave its dues, and that too, without the help of what is called the law.We ar' of a slow breed, it may be said, and it is often said, of us; butslow is sure; and there ar' few men living, who can say they ever strucka blow, that they did not get one as hard in return, from Ishmael Bush."

  "Then has Ishmael Bush followed the instinct of the beasts rather thanthe principle which ought to belong to his kind," returned the stubborntrapper. "I have struck many a blow myself, but never have I felt thesame ease of mind that of right belongs to a man who follows his reason,after slaying even a fawn when there was no call for his meat or hide,as I have felt at leaving a Mingo unburied in the woods, when followingthe trade of open and honest warfare."

  "What, you have been a soldier, have you, trapper! I made a forage ortwo among the Cherokees, when I was a lad myself; and I followed madAnthony,[*] one season, through the beeches; but there was altogethertoo much tatooing and regulating among his troops for me; so I left himwithout calling on the paymaster to settle my arrearages. Though, asEsther afterwards boasted, she had made such use of the pay-ticket, thatthe States gained no great sum, by the oversight. You have heard of sucha man as mad Anthony, if you tarried long among the soldiers."

  [*] Anthony Wayne, a Pennsylvanian distinguished in the war of the revolution, and subsequently against the Indians of the west, for his daring as a general, by which he gained from his followers the title of Mad Anthony. General Wayne was the son of the person mentioned in the life of West as commanding the regiment which excited his military ardour.

  "I fou't my last battle, as I hope, under his orders," returned thetrapper, a gleam of sunshine shooting from his dim eyes, as if theevent was recollected with pleasure, and then a sudden shade of sorrowsucceeding, as though he felt a secret admonition against dwellingon the violent scenes in which he had so often been an actor. "I waspassing from the States on the sea-shore into these far regions, whenI cross'd the trail of his army, and I fell in, on his rear, just as alooker-on; but when they got to blows, the crack of my rifle was heardamong the rest, though to my shame it may be said, I never knew theright of the quarrel as well as a man of threescore and ten should knowthe reason of his acts afore he takes mortal life, which is a gift henever can return!"

  "Come, stranger," said the emigrant, his rugged nature a good dealsoftened when he found that they had fought on the same side in thewild warfare of the west, "it is of small account, what may be theground-work of the disturbance, when it's a Christian ag'in a savage. Weshall hear more of this horse-stealing to-morrow; to-night we can do nowiser or safer thing than to sleep."

  So saying, Ishmael deliberately led the way back towards his rifledencampment, and ushered the man, whose life a few minutes before hadbeen in real jeopardy from his resentment, into the presence of hisfamily. Here, with a very few words of explanation, mingled with scarcebut ominous denunciations against the plunderers, he made his wifeacquainted with the state of things on the prairie, and announced hisown determination to compensate himself for his broken rest, by devotingthe remainder of the night to sleep.

  The trapper gave his ready assent to the measure, and adjusted his gauntform on the pile of brush that was offered him, with as much composureas a sovereign could resign himself to sleep, in the security of hiscapital and surrounded by his armed protectors. The old man did notclose his eyes, however, until he had assured himself that Ellen Wadewas among the females of the family, and that her relation, or lover,whichever he might be, had observed the caution of keeping himself outof view: after which he slept, though with the peculiar watchfulness ofone long accustomed to vigilance, even in the hours of deepest night.