by Grey, Zane
"You've got a high color. Looks like a fever," said the woman, her bright bold eyes studying Milly's face. "Better let me mix you a dose of paregoric."
"Thanks, no. I'm all right," returned Milly. But despite her calm assurance she was intensely annoyed to feel an added heat in her flushed cheeks. It might not be so easy to fool this woman. Milly divined, however, that it was not beyond the bounds of possibility for Mrs. Jett to be sympathetic regarding Tom Doan. Still, Milly dare not trust such impulsive premonition. She performed her accustomed tasks more expeditiously and even better than usual, then repaired to her tent.
After that the interminable hours faced her. How many till moonrise! They seemed everlasting and insupportable. She could neither read nor sew; all she could do was to sit with idle hands, thinking. At length, however, she discovered that this very thinking, such as it had come to be, was happiness itself. She had only the short morning and evening tasks now, and all the hours to wait here in this permanent camp for the stolen meetings with Tom Doan. Hours that would become days and weeks, even months, all to wait for him! She embraced the fact. Loneliness was no longer fearful. She had a wonderful secret.
The morning was still and warm, not so hot as on other days, by reason of a cloudily hazed sky. The birds had gone away, and there was not a sound close at hand. But from the plain above and from across the stream that flowed into the Red River, and from all around it seemed, when she concentrated her attention, there came the detonations of guns. None were close by, and most appeared very distant. They had no regularity, yet there were but few intervals of perfect silence. On the other hand, sometimes a traveling volley of reports would begin away in the distance and apparently come closer and then gradually withdraw to die away. A few shots together appeared a rare occurrence.
"At every shot perhaps some poor buffalo falls--dead--or dying like that great crippled bull I saw. Augh!" exclaimed Milly, in revulsion at the thought. "I'd hate to have Tom Doan grow rich from murdering buffalo. . . . But he said he did not kill many-- that he was a skinner."
Then her ears seemed to fill with a low murmur or faint roar, like the rumble of distant thunder. At first she thought a storm was brewing out toward the Staked Plain, but the thunder was too steady and continuous. In surprise, she strained her hearing. Long low roar! What could it be? She had heard about the rumble of an earthquake and for a moment felt fear of the mysterious and unknown force under the earth. But this was a moving sound that came on the still summer air. It could be made only by buffalo.
"The thundering herd!" exclaimed Milly in awe. "That's what Jett called it."
She listened until the roar very slowly receded and diminished and rolled away into silence. Still the shooting continued, and this puzzled Milly because it was reasonable to suppose that if the hunters were pursuing the herd the sound of their guns would likewise die away.
Milly wandered round the camp, exploring places in the woods, and several times resisted a desire to go up the trail to the edge of the plain. Finally she yielded to it, halting under cover of the last trees, gazing out over the green expanse. It was barren as ever. The banging of guns appeared just as far away, just as difficult to locate. Milly wished she could climb high somewhere so that she might see over the surrounding country.
Near by stood a tree of a kind she did not know. It had branches low down and rose under one of the tall elms. Milly decided she would be much less likely to be seen up in a tree; besides, she could have her desire gratified. To this end she climbed the smaller tree, and from it into the elm, working to a high fork not easily attained. Then she gazed about her, and was so amazed and bewildered by the panorama that she had to exert her will to attend to any particular point of the compass.
Westward the green prairie rose in a grand fan-shaped slope of many leagues, ending in the horizon-wide upheaval of bold gray naked earth which the hunters called the Staked Plain. It was as level- topped as a table, wild, remote, austere, somehow menacing, like an unscalable wall.
In the middle of that vast stretch of green plain there were miles and miles of black patches, extending north and south as far as eye could see. Though they seemed motionless at that distance Milly recognized them as buffalo. Surely they could not be parts of the herd whence came the low, thundering roar.
Far to the left, along the shining green-bordered river, there appeared a belt of moving buffalo, moving to the southwest, and disappearing in what seemed a pall of dust. By turning her ear to that direction and holding her breath Milly again caught the low roar, now very faint. Much banging of guns came from that quarter.
Out on the plain from this belt were small herds of buffalo, hundreds of them, dotting the green, and some were in motion.
Then Milly espied thin threads of black moving across the river.
Buffalo swimming to the southern bank! These were several miles away, yet she saw them distinctly, and line after line they extended, like slender bridges, across the river until they, too, vanished in the curtain of dust. South of the river the boundless plain showed irregular ragged areas of black, and meandering threads, leading into the haze of distance. Eastward Milly gazed over a green river-bottom jungle, thick and impenetrable, to the level prairie blackened with buffalo. Here were straggling lines moving down toward the river. Altogether, then, the surrounding scene was one of immense openness, infinite waving green prairie crossed by widely separated streams, and made majestic by the domination of buffalo--everywhere buffalo, countless almost as the grasses of the prairie.
"What a pity they must die!" murmured Milly. For in the banging of the guns she heard the death knell of this multiplicity of beasts.
She had seen the same in the hard, greedy, strong faces of Jett, and buffalo-hunters like him. Nature with its perfect balance and adjustment of the wild beasts was nothing to Jett. He would kill every buffalo on the plains for the most he could get, if it were only a bottle of rum.
Milly pondered over vague ideas in her developing mind. God might have made the buffalo to furnish the Indians and white men with meat and fur, but surely not through the sordidness of a few to perish from the earth.
Above Milly, in the blue sky, and westward till her sight failed, were huge black birds, buzzards, sailing high and low, soaring round and round, till the upper air seemed filled with them.
Buzzards! Birds of prey they were--carrion-eaters, vultures that were enticed from their natural habits, from the need for which nature created them, to fall foul on this carnage left by the hunters.
Some of these uncanny birds of prey swooped down over Milly, and several alighted in a tree not far distant. Solemn, repulsive, they inspired in Milly a fear of the thing called nature. Were they necessary?
She did not long remain up there in her perch, and she discovered that descent was not so easy as climbing. Nevertheless she got by the worst of it without mishap, and then she breathed easier.
The thud of hoofs below caused her to stop abruptly. Horsemen were somewhere close at hand. Owing to the thick foliage she could not see what or where they were. Circling the trunk of the tree with her arm she leaned against it, making sure of her balance. She was still thirty feet from the ground, adequately hidden by bushy leaves, unless some one looked upward from directly beneath her.
It was natural to suppose these riders were buffalo-hunters.
Presently she espied them, indistinctly through the network of branches. They were riding from the north, evidently having come along the stream. To Milly's consternation they halted their horses almost directly under her. Then she made out that they were soldiers. She need have no fear of them, yet she did not like the idea of being discovered.
"Captain," spoke up one, "there's a good spring down this trail.
I'd like a drink of fresh cold water.--Here, one of you men take some canteens down and fill them. The trail leads to the spring."
One of the half dozen soldiers dismounted, and collecting several canteens from his companions he lounged off out of
sight.
"Ellsworth, you know this Red River country?" spoke up another soldier.
"Reckon I do, though not very well down this far," came the reply.
"This is God's country compared to the Staked Plain. I know that well enough."
"Well, I figure we're on a wild-goose chase," said another, evidently an officer. He had dismounted to fling himself under one of the trees. He removed his sombrero to reveal a fine, strong, weather-beaten face, with mustache slightly gray. "We can never persuade these hide-hunters to go to the fort on account of Indian raids."
"Reckon not. But we can persuade them to send their women to a place of safety. Some of the fools have their women folk. For my part, I'd like to see these hunters band together against the Indians."
"Why?"
"Well, they're a hard lot and Lord only knows how many there are of them. They'll do what we soldiers never could do--whip that combination of redskin tribes."
"Better not say that in the colonel's hearing," said the officer, with a laugh.
"I wouldn't mind. Reckon I've hinted as much. I'm serving on scout duty, you know. But one thing's sure, these hide-hunters have started a bloody mess. And it's a good thing. This section of Texas is rich land. It's the stamping-ground of the Indians.
They'll never give it up till the buffalo are gone. Then they'll make peace. As it is now they are red-headed as hell. They'll ambush and raid--then run back up into that devil's place, the Staked Plains."
"I'll bet you we get a taste of it before this summer ends."
"Like as not. If so, you'll remember the campaign," said the other, grimly.
Presently the soldier returned with the canteens, which manifestly were most welcome.
"There's a camp below, sir," said the soldier.
"Buffalo outfit, of course?"
"Yes. Three wagons."
"Did you ask whose outfit it is?"
"No one about camp, sir."
The officer got to his feet, and wiping his heated face, he stepped to his horse.
"Ellsworth, we've passed a good many camps of hide-hunters, all out in the open or along the edge of the timber. What do you make of an outfit camped way down out of sight. That's a hard pull for loaded wagons."
"Hunters have notions, same as other men," replied the scout.
"Maybe this fellow wants as much protection as possible from storm and dust. Maybe he'd rather get out of the beaten track."
"Colonel's orders were to find trace of hide thieves," said the officer, thoughtfully. "That stumps me. They're hundreds of these outfits, all traveling, killing, skinning together. How on earth are we going to pick out thieves among them?"
"You can't, Captain," returned the scout, decidedly. "That'll be for the hunters themselves to find. As I said, they're a hard lot and jumbled one. Outlaws, ex-soldiers, adventurers, desperadoes, tenderfeet, plainsmen, and pioneers looking for new ground, and farmers out on a hunt to make money. I reckon most of them are honest men. This hide-hunting is something like the gold rush of '49 and '51, of course on a small scale. Last summer and fall there were hide thieves operating all through the Panhandle. A few of them got caught, too, and swung for it. This summer they'll have richer picking and easier. For with the Indian raids to use as cover for their tracks how can they be apprehended, unless caught in the act?"
"But, man, you mean these robbers waylay an outfit, kill them, steal the hides, burn the camp, and drive off to let the dirty work be blamed on Indians?"
"Reckon that's exactly what I do mean," replied Ellsworth. "It's my belief a good many black deeds laid to the Indians are done by white men."
"Did you tell the colonel that?"
"Yes, and he scouted the idea. He hates Indians. Got a bullet in him somewhere. I reckon he'd rather have bad white men on the plains than good Indians."
"Humph!" ejaculated the officer, and mounting his horse he led the soldiers west along the edge of the timber.
Milly waited a good while before she ventured to descend from her perch; and when she reached the ground she ran down into the woods, slowing to a walk when within sight of camp. She repaired to her tent, there to lie down and rest and think. She had something to ponder over. That conversation of the scout and officer had flashed grave conjectures into her mind. Could her stepfather be one of the hide thieves? She grew cold and frightened with the thought; ashamed of herself, too; but the suspicion would not readily down. Jett had some queer things against him, that might, to be sure, relate only to his unsociable disposition, and the fact, which he had mentioned, that he did not want men to see her.
Milly recalled his excuse on this occasion, and in the light of the soldiers' conversation it did not ring quite true. Unless Jett had a personal jealous reason for not wanting men to see her! Once she had feared that. Of late it had seemed an exaggeration.
Fearful as was the thought, she preferred it to be that which made him avoid other camps and outfits, than that he be a hide thief and worse. But her woman's instinct had always prompted her to move away from Jett. She was beginning to understand it. She owed him obedience, because he was her stepfather and was providing her with a living. Nothing she owed, however, or tried to instil into her vacillating mind, quite did away with that insidious suspicion.
There was something wrong about Jett. She settled that question for good. In the future she would listen and watch, and spy if chance offered, and use her wits to find out whether or not she was doing her stepfather an injustice.
The moon took an unconscionably long time to rise that night, Milly thought. But at last she saw the brightening over the river, and soon after, the round gold rim slide up into the tree foliage.
Her task of safely leaving camp this evening was rendered more hazardous by the fact that Jett and his men were near the camp, engaged in laborious work of stretching and pegging hides. They had built a large fire in a wide cleared space to the left of the camp. Milly could both see and hear them--the dark moving forms crossing to and fro before the blaze, and the deep voices. As she stole away under the trees she heard the high beat of her heart and felt the cold prickle of her skin; yet in the very peril of the moment--for Jett surely would do her harm if he caught her--there was an elation at her daring and her revolt against his rule.
Halfway up the trail she met her lover, who was slowly coming down.
To his eager whispered "Milly" she responded with an eager "Tom," as she returned his kiss.
Tom led her to a grassy spot at the foot of a tree which was in shadow. They sat there for a while, hand in hand, as lovers who were happy and unafraid of the future, yet who were not so obsessed by their dream that they forgot everything else.
"I can't stay long," said Tom, presently. "I've two hours pegging out to do to-night. Let's plan to meet here at this spot every third night, say a half hour after dark."
"All right," whispered Milly. "I always go to my tent at dark.
Sometimes, though, it might be risky to slip out at a certain time.
If I'm not here you wait at least an hour."
So they planned their meetings and tried to foresee and forestall all possible risks, and from that drifted to talk about the future.
Despite Tom's practical thought for her and tenderness of the moment, Milly sensed a worry on his mind.
"Tom, what's troubling you?" she asked.
"Tell me, do you care anything for this stepfather of yours?" he queried, in quick reply.
"Jett? I hate him. . . . Perhaps I ought to be ashamed. He feeds me, clothes me, though I feel I earn that. Why do you ask?"
"Well, if you cared for him I'd keep my mouth shut," said Tom.
"But as you hate him what I say can't hurt you. . . . Milly, Jett has a bad name among the buffalo outfits."
"I'm not surprised. Tell me."
"I've often heard hints made regarding the kind of outfits that keep to themselves. On the way south some freighter who had passed Jett ahead of us gave Pilchuck a hunch to steer clear of him. He ga
ve no reason, and when I asked Pilchuck why we should steer clear of such an outfit he just laughed at me. Well, to-day Pilchuck found Jett skinning a buffalo that had been killed by a big-fifty bullet. Pilchuck knew it because he killed the buffalo and he remembered. Jett claimed he had shot the buffalo. Pilchuck told him that he was using a needle gun, and no needle bullet ever made a hole in a buffalo such as the big fifty. Jett didn't care what Pilchuck said and went on skinning. At that Pilchuck left, rather than fight for one hide. But he was mad clear through. He told Hudnall that hunters who had been in the Panhandle last summer gave Jett a bad name."
"For that sort of thing?" inquired Milly, as Tom paused.
"I suppose so. Pilchuck made no definite charges. But it was easy to see he thinks Jett is no good. These plainsmen are slow to accuse any one of things they can't prove. Pilchuck ended up by saying to Hudnall: 'Some hunter will mistake Jett for a buffalo one of these days!'"
"Some one will shoot him!" exclaimed Milly.
"That's what Pilchuck meant," rejoined Tom, seriously. "It worries me, Milly dear. I don't care a hang what happens to Jett. But you're in his charge. If he IS a bad man he might do you harm."
"There's danger of that, Tom, I've got to confess," whispered Milly. "I'm afraid of Jett, but I was more so than I am now. He's so set on this hide-hunting that he never thinks of me."
"Some one will find out about you and me, or he'll catch us. Then what?" muttered Tom, gloomily.
"That would be terrible. We've got to keep any one from knowing."
"Couldn't you come to Hudnall's camp to live? I know he'd take you in. And his wife and daughter would be good to you."
Milly pondered this idea with grave concern. It appealed powerfully to her, yet seemed unwise at this time.
"Tom, I could come. I'd love to. But it surely would mean trouble. He could take me back, as I'm not of age. Then he'd beat me."
"Then I'd kill him!" returned Tom, with passion.
"He might kill you," whispered Milly. "Then where would _I_ be?
I'd die of a broken heart. No, let's wait a while. As long as he's so set on this hunting I have little to fear. Besides, the women out here with these buffalo-hunters are going to be sent to the fort."
