Hope and Have; or, Fanny Grant Among the Indians: A Story for Young People

by Oliver Optic

  CHAPTER XIII.

  THE INDIAN MASSACRE.

  Though there were no Indians residing very near the Lake Settlement,they frequently visited the place, and the settlers were on familiarterms with them. At the house of John Grant they were always treatedwith kindness and a generous hospitality. Among those who sometimescame was a chief called Lean Bear. Fanny was much interested in thesedenizens of the forest, and she exerted herself to please them, andparticularly the chief of the Red Irons, as his tribe was called. Shesang to him, brought him milk and bread, and treated him like a greatman. He was a brawny fellow, morose and savage, and though he smiledslightly, he did not seem to appreciate her kindness.

  About the 15th of August, when Fanny had been at the settlement lessthan two months, Mr. Grant started for one of the Indian Agencies, onthe Minnesota River, for the purpose of procuring supplies of thetraders in that vicinity. He went with a wagon and a span of horses,intending to be absent ten days.

  One morning, when he had been gone a week, Mrs. Grant was milking thecows, of which they kept twenty. Ethan was helping her, and Fanny, notyet a proficient in the art, was doing what she could to assist.Doubtless she was rather bungling in the operation, for the cow was notas patient as usual.

  "Seems like you gals from the east don't know much," laughed Ethan."You are on the wrong side of the creetur."

  "So I am! I thought there was something wrong, for the cow don't standquiet," replied Fanny.

  "No wonder; cows allers wants things did accordin' to rule," addedEthan.

  "I didn't mind that I was on the wrong side."

  "What do the gals do out east that they don't know how to milk?"

  "They don't milk there."

  "They don't do nothin'--do they?"

  "Not much; at least, they didn't at Woodville."

  "Well, gals isn't good for much, nohow," said Ethan, philosophically,as he commenced milking another cow.

  "They can do some things as well as boys."

  "Perhaps they kin; but you couldn't milk a cow till you kim out hyer."

  "I could not."

  "Hokee!" suddenly exclaimed Ethan. "What's all that mean?"

  "What, Ethan?"

  "Don't you see all them hosses up to the house? Hokee! Them's Injins,as sure's you live!"

  Fanny looked, and saw about twenty Indians ride up to the house anddismount. The sight did not alarm her, though it was rather early inthe morning for such a visit.

  "D'ye see all them Injins, Miss Grant?" said Ethan to his mistress.

  "Dear me! What can they want at this time in the morning? I must gointo the house, and see to them, for they'll steal like all possessed."

  Mrs. Grant put her milk-pail in a safe place, and hastened to thehouse, which she reached before any of the savages had secured theirhorses. Five or six of the visitors entered by the front door, and therest assembled in a group, a short distance from the dwelling.

  "I wonder what them redskins wants here so airly in the mornin'," musedEthan, when Mrs. Grant had gone. "I wonder ef they know there ain't noone to home but women folks and boys."

  "Suppose they do know,--what then?" asked Fanny.

  "Nothin'; only I reckon they kim to steal sunthin'."

  "They wouldn't steal from aunt Grant."

  "Wouldn't they, though!" exclaimed Ethan, incredulously.

  "She has been very kind to them."

  "They'd steal from their own mothers," added Ethan, as he finishedmilking another cow, and moved towards a third.

  As he crossed the yard he stopped to look at the horses, and to seewhat had become of the riders.

  "Hokee!" cried he, using his favorite expression when excited.

  "What's the matter, Ethan?" asked Fanny.

  "As true as you live, one of them hosses is 'Whiteskin,'" replied he,alluding to one of Mr. Grant's animals.

  "One of the Indian horses?"

  "Yes; as true as you live! I kin see the old scar on his flank."

  "Where could the Indians get him?"

  "That's what I want to know," continued Ethan, now so much excited thathe could not think of his milking. "Creation hokee!" he added--hisusual expression when extraordinarily excited.

  "What is it?"

  "Creation hokee!" repeated Ethan.

  "What do you see, Ethan?" demanded Fanny, who was now so muchinterested that she abandoned her occupation.

  "There's the t'other hoss!" replied Ethan. "They've got both on 'em."

  "Where could they get them?" said Fanny, who regarded the factindicated by her companion as sufficiently ominous to excite her alarm.

  "That's what I'd like to hev some 'un tell me. Fanny, I tell yousunthin' hes happened."

  At this moment a shrill and terrible scream was heard in the directionof the house, followed by the sharp crack of a rifle. Ethan and Fanny,appalled by the sounds, looked towards the house. They saw Mrs. Grantrush from the back door, and then fall upon the ground. Two or threeIndians followed her, in one of whom Fanny recognized Lean Bear, thestalwart chief she had endeavored to conciliate. He bent over theprostrate form of the woman, was seen to strike several blows with histomahawk, and then to use his terrible scalping-knife.

  At the sound of the rifle, which seemed to be a signal for the purpose,the savages who had grouped together outside of the house rushed in,yelling and hooting like demons.

  "Creation hokee!" gasped Ethan, his face as nearly white as itssun-browned hue would permit.

  Fanny's blood was chilled in her veins; she could not speak, and herlimbs seemed to be paralyzed. And now in the distance harsh anddiscordant sounds rose on the still morning air. They came from thedirection of the other portions of the settlement. The shrill screamsof women, the hoarse cries of men, and the unearthly yells of thesavages, mingled in horrible confusion. It was evident to the appalledlisteners that a fearful Indian massacre had commenced. They had seenMrs. Grant fall; had seen the fierce Lean Bear tomahawk and scalp her.

  It was madness to stand still in the midst of so much peril, but bothEthan and Fanny seemed to be chained to the spot where they stood,fascinated, as it were, by the anguished cries of agony and death thatwere borne to their revolting senses by the airs of that summermorning. The savages were at that moment busy in ransacking andplundering the house, but Fanny realized that she might be the nextvictim; that the tomahawk of the terrible Lean Bear might be glaringabove her head in a few moments more. She trembled like an aspen leafin the extremity of her terror, as she heard the terrific cries utteredby the mangled, mutilated, dying men, women, and children, far enoughoff to be but faintly heard, yet near enough to be horribly distinct.

  "It's time sunthin' was did," said Ethan, with quivering lips.

  "What can we do?" asked Fanny, in a husky whisper.

  "We must git out of sight fust. Come along with me, Fanny," addedEthan, as he led the way into the barn.

  "They will find us here," said Fanny.

  "P'rhaps they will; but there ain't nowhere else to go to."

  "Why not run away as fast as we can?"

  "We kin run, but I reckon bullets will travel faster 'n we kin."

  Ethan went up a ladder to the top of the hay-mow, and Fanny followedhim. He carried up with him a small hay-fork, with which he wentvigorously to work in burrowing out a hole in the hay. Fanny assistedhim with her hands, and in a few moments they had made an aperture deepenough to accommodate them. This hiding-place had been made in the backpart of the mow, next to the side of the barn, where there were widecracks between the boards, through which they could receive air enoughto prevent them from being stifled.

  "Now, you get in, Fanny, and I'll fix the hay so I kin tumble it alldown on top on us, and bury us up."

  "Suppose they should set the barn afire," suggested Fanny.

  "Then they will; we must take our chances, such as they be. We hain'tgot much chance nohow."

  Fanny stepped down into the hole; Ethan followed her, and pulled themass of hay over so that it fell upon them. T
hey were four or five feetbelow the surface of the hay.

  "I would rather be killed by a bullet than burned to death in thefire," said Fanny, with a shudder, when her companion had adjusted thehay so as to afford them the best possible means of concealment.

  "P'rhaps they wouldn't kill you with a bullet. Them redskins is awfulcreeturs. They might hack you all to pieces with their knives andtomahawks," whispered Ethan.

  "It's horrible!" added Fanny, quivering with emotion.

  "I've hearn tell that there was some trouble with the redskins up on tothe reserves; and I knowed sunthin' had happened when I see them twohosses. I was kind o' skeery when the varmints rid up to the house."

  "Do you suppose they have killed my uncle?" asked Fanny, sick at heart.

  "I s'pose they hev," answered Ethan, gloomily. "I reckon we'd betterkeep still, and not say nothin'. Some o' the redskins may be lookin'for us. They're pesky cunnin'."

  This was good advice, and Fanny needed no persuasion to induce her tofollow it. Through the cracks in the side of the barn she could see afew houses of the settlement; and through these apertures came also thehideous sounds which denoted the progress of the massacre. Great pilesof curling smoke were rising from the burning buildings of the devotedsettlers, and the work of murder and pillage still continued, as therelentless savages passed from place to place in the execution of theirdiabolical mission.

  The greater part of the detachment which had halted at the house of Mr.Grant had now departed, though the sounds which came from the dwellingindicated that the rest were still there. Lean Bear knew the members ofMr. Grant's household. With his own hand he had slain the woman who hadso often fed him, and ministered to his necessities, thus belying thetraditional character of his race; and it was not probable that hewould abandon his object without a diligent search for the missingmembers of the family.

  Fanny was safe for the present moment, but the next instant might doomher to a violent death, to cruel torture, or to a captivity more to bedreaded than either death or torture. She trembled with mortal fear,and dreaded the revelations of each new second of time with anintensity of horror which cannot be understood or described.

  "They are comin' out of the house," said Ethan, in a tremulous whisper."There's seven on 'em."

  "Are they coming this way?"

  "No; they are lookin' round arter us. They are going down to the lake."

  "I hope they won't come here."

  "But they will kim here, as sure as you live."

  "Do you ever pray, Ethan?" asked Fanny, impressively.

  "Not much," replied he, evasively.

  "Let us pray to God. He can help us, and He will, if we ask Him in theright spirit."

  "I dunno how," added Ethan.

  "I will pray for both of us. The Indians can't hear us now, but Godcan."

  Fanny, in a whisper, uttered a brief and heart-felt prayer forprotection and safety from the savage monsters who were thirsting fortheir blood. She prayed earnestly, and never before had hersupplications come so directly from her heart. She pleaded for herselfand for her companion, and the good Father seemed to be very near toher as she poured forth her simple petition.

  "Thy will, not ours, be done," she murmured, as she thought that itmight not be the purpose of "Him who doeth all things well" to savethem from the tomahawk of the Indians. If it was not His will that theyshould pass in safety through this ordeal of blood, she asked that theymight be happy in death, or submissive to whatever fate was in storefor them.

  Ethan listened to the prayer, and seemed to join earnestly in thepetitions it contained. With his more devout companion, he felt thatGod was able to save them, to blunt the edges of the weapons raised todestroy them, or to transform their savage and bitter foes into thewarmest and truest of friends.

  "I feel better," said Fanny, after a moment of silence at theconclusion of the prayer.

  "So do I," replied Ethan, whose altered look and more resolute tonesconfirmed his words. "I feel like I could fight some o' them Injins."

  "We can do nothing by resistance."

  "I dunno; if they don't burn the house, I reckon I know whar to findsome shootin' fixin's."

  "Where?"

  "Mr. Grant sort o' hid his rifle and things, for fear some un mightsteal 'em, I s'pose. I know where they be; and I reckon them redskinswon't find 'em."

  "Let us not think of resistance. There must be hundreds of Indians atthe settlement."

  "'Sh!" said Ethan, impressively. "They're comin'."

  The light step of the moccasoned feet of the savages was now distinctlyheard in the barn. Their guttural jargon grated harshly on the ears ofthe fugitives in their concealment, as they tremblingly waited theissue.