Warrior Gap

by King, Charles

  South of the Platte, as it rolled past Frayne and Laramie, those Indians were bound by treaty not to go. North of the Platte Hal Folsom was warned never again to venture. These were stories which were well known to the parents of the girl he wooed and won, but which probably were not fully explained to her. Now, even behind the curtain of that sheltering river, with its flanking forts, even behind the barrier of the mountains of the Medicine Bow, she often woke at night and clutched her baby to her breast when the yelping of the coyotes came rising on the wind. There was no woman in Wyoming to whom war with Red Cloud's people bore such dread possibility as to Hal Folsom's wife.

  And so when Marshall Dean came riding in one glad June morning, bronzed, and tanned, and buoyant, and tossed his reins to the orderly who trotted at his heels, while the troop dismounted and watered at the stream, Mrs. Folsom's heart was gladdened by his confident and joyous bearing. Twice, thrice he had seen Red Cloud and all his braves, and there was nothing, said he, to worry about. "Ugly, of course they are; got some imaginary grievances and talk big about the warpath. Why, what show would those fellows have with their old squirrel rifles and gas-pipe Springfields against our new breech-loaders? They know it as well as we do. It's all a bluff, Mrs. Folsom. You mark my words," said he, and really the boy believed it. Frequent contact in the field with the red warriors inspires one with little respect for their skill or prowess until that contact becomes hostile, then it's time to keep every sense on guard and leave no point uncovered.

  "But what if the Indian Bureau should let them have breech-loaders?" she anxiously asked. "You know that is Red Cloud's demand."

  "Oh," said Dean, with confidence born of inexperience in the Bureau ways, "they couldn't be such fools. Besides, if they do," he added hopefully, "you'll see my troop come trotting back full tilt. Now, I'm counting on a good time at Emory, and on bringing your sister and mine up here to see you."

  "It will be just lovely," said Mrs. Hal, with a woman's natural but unspoken comparison between the simplicity of her ranch toilet and the probable elegancies of the young ladies' Eastern costumes. "They'll find us very primitive up here in the mountains, I'm afraid; but if they like scenery and horseback riding and fishing there's nothing like it."

  "Oh, they're coming sure. Jessie's letters tell me that's one of the big treats Mr. Folsom has promised them. Just think, they should be along this week, and I shall be stationed so near them at Emory—of all places in the world."

  "How long is it since you have seen Elinor—'Pappoose,' as your sister calls her," asked Mrs. Hal, following the train of womanly thought then drifting through her head, as she set before her visitor a brimming goblet of buttermilk.

  "Two years. She was at the Point a day or two the summer of our graduation," he answered carelessly. "A real little Indian girl she was, too, so dark and shy and silent, yet I heard Professor M——'s daughters and others speak of her later; she pleased them so much, and Jessie thinks there's no girl like her."

  "And you haven't seen her since—not even her picture?" asked Mrs. Hal, rising from her easy-chair. "Just let me show you the one she sent Hal last week. I think there's a surprise in store for you, young man," was her mental addition, as she tripped within doors.

  The nurse girl, a half-breed, one of the numerous progeny of the French trappers and explorers who had married among the Sioux, was hushing the burly little son and heir to sleep in his Indian cradle, crooning some song about the fireflies and and Heecha, the big-eyed owl, and the mother stooped to press her lips upon the rounded cheek and to flick away a tear-drop, for Hal 2d had roared lustily when ordered to his noonday nap. Away to the northward the heavily wooded heights seemed tipped by fleecy, summer clouds, and off to the northeast Laramie Peak thrust his dense crop of pine and scrub oak above the mass of snowy vapor that floated lazily across that grim-visaged southward scarp. The drowsy hum of insects, the plash of cool, running waters fell softly on the ear. Under the shade of willow and cottonwood cattle and horses were lazily switching at the swarm of gnats and flies or dozing through the heated hours of the day. Out on the level flat beyond the corral the troopers had unsaddled, and the chargers, many of them stopping to roll in equine ecstasy upon the turf, were being driven out in one big herd to graze. Without and within the ranch everything seemed to speak of peace and security. The master rode the range long miles away in search of straying cattle, leaving his loved ones without thought of danger. The solemn treaty that bound the Sioux to keep to the north of the Platte stood sole sentinel over his vine and fig tree. True there had been one or two instances of depredation, but they could be fastened on no particular band, and all the chiefs, even defiant Red Cloud, and insolent, swaggering Little Big Man, denied all knowledge of the perpetrators. Spotted Tail, it was known, would severely punish any of his people who transgressed, but he could do nothing with the Ogallallas. Now they were not two hundred miles away to the north, their ranks swollen by accessions from all the disaffected villages and turbulent young braves of the swarming bands along the Missouri and Yellowstone, and if their demands were resisted by the government, or worse, if they were permitted to have breech-loaders or magazine rifles, then just coming into use, no shadow of doubt remained that war to the knife would follow. Then how long would it be before they came charging down across the Platte, east or west of Frayne, and raiding those new ranches in the Laramie Valley?

  Reassuring as he meant his words to be, Marshall Dean himself looked anxiously about at the unprotected walls. Not even the customary "dugout" or underground refuge seemed to have been prepared. Almost every homestead, big or little, of those days, had its tunnel from the cellar to a dugout near at hand, stocked with provisions and water and provided with loopholes commanding the neighborhood, and herein the besieged could take refuge and stand off the Indians until help should come from the nearest frontier fort. "The name of Folsom is our safeguard," said Mrs. Hal, in her happy honeymoon days, but that was before the mother told her of the threats of Burning Star or the story of the Ogallalla girl he vainly loved. "All that happened so long ago," she murmured, when at last the tale was told. But Hal should have known, if she did not, that, even when it seems to sleep, Indian vengeance is but gaining force and fury.

  Presently Mrs. Hall came tripping forth again, a little carte de visite in her hand, a smile of no little significance on her lips. "Now, Mr. Dean, will you tell me what you think of that for a pappoose?"

  And with wonderment in his eyes the young officer stood and held it and gazed.

  There stood Pappoose, to be sure, but what a change! The little maiden with the dark braids of hair hanging far below her waist had developed into a tall, slender girl, with clear-cut, oval face, crowned by a mass of dark tresses. Her heavy, low-arching brows spanned the thoughtful, deep, dark-brown eyes that seemed to speak the soul within, and the beautiful face was lighted up with a smile that showed just a peep of faultless white teeth, gleaming through the warm curves of her soft, sensitive lips. The form was exquisitely rounded, yet supple and erect.

  "Hasn't Jessie written you of how Nell has grown and improved?" said Mrs. Hall, with a woman's quick note of the admiration and surprise in Dean's regard.

  "She must have," was the answer, "I'm sure she has, but perhaps I thought it schoolgirl rhapsody—perhaps I had too many other things to think of."

  "Perhaps you'll find it superseding these too many things, Mr. Soldier Boy," was Mrs. Hal's mental comment. "Now, sir, if you've gazed enough perhaps you'll tell me your plans," and she stretched forth a reclaiming hand.

  But he hung on to the prize. "Let me keep it a minute," he pleaded. "It's the loveliest thing I've seen in months."

  And, studying his absorbed face, she yielded, her eyebrows arching, a pretty smile of feminine triumph about her lips, and neither noticed the non-commissioned officer hurrying within the gate, nor that half the men in "C" Troop at their bivouac along the stream were on their feet and gazing to northeast, that far down the valley a horseman was s
peeding like the wind, that little puffs of smoke were rising from the crests of the grand landmark of the range and floating into the blue of the heavens. Both started to their feet at the abrupt announcement.

  "Lieutenant, there are smoke signals on Lar'mie Peak."

  * * *

  CHAPTER VII.

  Lieutenant Dean's orders required that he should march his troop without unnecessary delay to Fork Emory, there to take station relieving Troop "F," ordered to change to Frayne, which meant, in so many words, to take the field. Captain Brooks, still wrestling with the fever, had retired to his quarters at the old frontier fort that stood so long on the bluffs overlooking the fords of the Platte. The surgeon said he must remain in bed at least a week, so meantime the troop packed up, sent its wagons ahead over the range, bade God speed to "F" as it passed through en route to the front, exchanged a volley of chaff and chewing tobacco over the parting game of "freeze out" fought to a finish on many an outspread saddle blanket, then, jogged on toward Gate City, making wide détour at the suggestion of the field officer in command at Frayne, that they might scout the Laramie plains and see that all was well at Folsom's ranch. This détour was duly reported to the peppery veteran at Fort Emory, an old colonel whose command was by this time reduced from "headquarters, field, staff and band," six companies of infantry and four troops of cavalry, to the band and two desperately overworked companies of foot. "Two nights in bed" were all his men could hope for, and sometimes no more than one, so grievous was the guard duty. Hence "old Pecksniff," his adjutant and quartermaster and his two remaining companies saw fit to take it as most unkind in Lieutenant-Colonel Ford to authorize that diversion of Dean's, and highly improper on Dean's part to attempt it. By this time, too, there was in circulation at Emory a story that this transfer of "C" to interior lines and away from probable contact with the Sioux was not so much that it had done far more than its share of that arduous work, completely using up its captain, as that, now the captain was used up, the authorities had their doubts as to the "nerve" of the lieutenant in temporary command. A fellow who didn't care to come to Emory and preferred rough duty up along the Platte must be lacking in some essential particular, thought the women folk, and at the very moment that Marshall Dean sat there at Hal Folsom's ranch, as brave and hardy and capable a young officer as ever forded the Platte, looking forward with pleasurable anticipations to those days to come at Emory, with Jessie—Jessie and, of course, Pappoose—so close at hand in town, there was gaining ground at the post an impression that the safety of the board of officers sent to choose the site of the new Big Horn post had been imperiled by Dean's weakening at a critical moment in presence of a band of probably hostile Sioux. Burleigh had plainly intimated as much to his chief clerk and Colonel Stevens, and when Loring and Stone came through a day or two later and questions were asked about that meeting, the aide-de-camp gave it as distinctly to be understood that he had practically assumed command, Dean's inexperience being manifest, and his own prompt measures had extricated the little detachment from a most delicate and dangerous position. The engineer, let it be said, did not hear this statement, and the aid was very careful not to make it in his presence. He was a comparative stranger and as no one presumed to question him, he volunteered no information.

  Planning to bivouac until dawn of the next day at Folsom's, Dean had then intended to reach Fort Emory in three easy marches. He was anxious to bring his horses in in best possible condition, despite all their hard service; yet now, barely two o'clock on this hot June afternoon, came most unlooked-for, most importunate interruption to his plans. Springing to the gate at the sergeant's summons, he first directed his gaze to the distant peak, recognized instantly the nature of the smoke puffs there rising, then turned for explanation to the swift-riding courier, whose horse's heels were making the dust fly from the sun-dried soil. One or two ranch hands, with anxious faces, came hastening over from the corral. The darkey cook rushed up from the kitchen, rifle in hand. Plainly these fellows were well used to war's alarms. Mrs. Folsom, with staring eyes and dreadful anxiety in her face, gazed only at the hurrying courier, clinging the while to the pillar of the portico, as though needing support. The smoke puffs on the mountain, the dust-cloud back of the tearing rider were symptoms enough for Dean.

  "Get in your herd, sergeant!" he shouted at the top of his voice; and over the rushing of the Laramie his words reached the rousing bivouac, and saddle blankets were sent swinging in air in signal to the distant guards, and within a few seconds every horse was headed for home; and then, to the sound of excited voices was added the rising thunder of scores of bounding hoofs, as, all in a dust-cloud of their own, the sixty chargers came galloping in, ears erect, eyes ablaze, nostrils wide, manes and tails streaming in the breeze, guided by their eager guards full tilt for camp. Out ran their riders, bridles in hand, to meet and check them, every horse when within a few yards of his master seeming to settle on his haunches and plow up the turf in the sudden effort to check his speed, long months of service on the plains and in the heart of Indian land having taught them in times of alarm or peril that the quicker they reached the guiding hand and bore, each, his soldier on his back, the quicker would vanish the common foe. Even before the panting steed of the headlong courier came within hailing distance of the ranch, half the horses in the troop were caught and the bits were rattling between their teeth; then, as the messenger tore along the gentle slope that led to the gateway, his wearied horse laboring painfully at the rise, Mrs. Folsom recognized one of her husband's herdsmen, a man who had lived long years in Wyoming and could be unnerved by no false alarm, and her voice went up in a shriek of fear as she read the tidings in his almost ghastly face.

  "Where is Hal?" she screamed. "Oh, what has happened?"

  "He's safe," was the answering call, as the rider waved a reassuring hand, but at the instant he bent low. "Thank God, you're here, lieutenant," he gasped. "Mount quick. Hal's corralled two miles out there under the butte—Sioux!" And then they saw that he was swooning, that the blood was streaming down the left thigh and leg, and before hand could help him, he rolled senseless, doubled up in the dust at his horse's feet, and the weary creature never even started.

  "Saddle up, men!" rang the order across the stream. And then while strong arms lifted and bore the wounded herdsman to the porch, Dean turned to the wailing mistress, who, white-faced and terror-stricken, was wringing her hands and moaning and running wildly up and down the walk and calling for some one to go and save her husband. Dean almost bore her to a chair and bade her fear nothing. He and his men would lose not a moment. On the floor at her feet lay the little card photograph, and Dean, hardly thinking what he did, stooped, picked it up and placed it in the pocket of his hunting shirt, just as the trumpeter on his plunging gray reached the gate, Dean's big, handsome charger trotting swiftly alongside. In an instant the lieutenant was in saddle, in another second a trooper galloped up with his belt and carbine. Already the men were leading into line across the stream, and, bidding the trumpeter tell Sergeant Shaughnessy to follow at speed, the young officer struck spur to his horse and, carbine in hand, a single trooper at his heels, away he darted down the valley, "C" Troop, splashing through the ford a moment later, took the direct road past the stockade of the corral, disappeared from sight a moment behind that wooden fortification, and, when next it hove in view, it was galloping front into line far down the Laramie, then once more vanished behind its curtain of dust.

  "Two miles out there under the butte," was the only indication the young officer had of the scene of the fight, for fight he knew it must be, and even as he went bounding down the valley he recalled the story of the Indian girl, the threats of Burning Star, the vowed vengeance of her brothers. Could it be that, taking advantage of this raid of Red Cloud, far from all the reservations, far from possibility of detection by count of prying agents, the three had induced a gang of daring, devil-may-care young warriors to slip away from the Big Horn with them and, riding stealthily away f
rom the beaten trails, to ford the Platte beyond the ken of watchful eyes at Frayne and sneak through the mountain range to the beautiful, fertile valley beyond, and there lie in wait for Hal Folsom or for those he loved? What was to prevent? Well they knew the exact location of his ranch. They had fished and sported all about it in boy days—days when the soldiers and the Sioux were all good friends, days before the mistaken policy of a post commander had led to an attack upon a peaceful band, and that to the annihilation of the attacking party. From that fatal day of the Grattan massacre ten years before, there had been no real truce with the Sioux, and now was opportunity afforded for a long-plotted revenge. Dean wondered Folsom had not looked for it instead of sleeping in fancied security.