He had a parting warning to give.
“Let my brothers make sure that they do not lose the trail; they must look at the ground often: when they do not see the path they must stop and await the rising of the sun; they can not reach the cabin too soon, but they can never reach it by going wrong; keep to the trail!”
The circuitous route which they had taken under the guidance of Deerfoot, had brought them back to the path at a point fully a hundred yards beyond the camp-fire, which had been started in the small open space only a few rods from the path. So far as they knew there was nothing now between them in the way of a direct advance to the cabin of their hunters.
“Fred,” said Terry, after they were fairly under way, and while he almost stepped on the heels of his friend; “Deerfoot thinks we won’t go more than five or six miles; let’s show him that we ain’t such babies as he thinks.”
“I feel as you do; I propose that we keep it up all night.”
“Will ye be kind enough to raich yer right hand over your lift shoulder and shake wid me on the same?”
Instead of doing precisely as asked, Fred laughingly turned about and shook hands with his friend, whom he loved and for whom he was ready at any time to risk his life. They were on their mettle and they meant to show the young Shawanoe that they were capable of doing much more than he seemed to believe. They intended that when, after a few hours, he started to overtake them, he would find that he had a good many miles further to travel than he supposed.
Had Deerfoot known of their thoughts he would have smiled and been pleased. He wanted them to do their best and he was willing, should it prove to be safe, to allow them to keep up the delusion that their gait could bear any comparison with the speed of which he was capable.
Meanwhile, the boys started in earnest to carry out their intention. Their only fear was that they might be hindered by the difficulty in keeping to the trail; for though the full moon was again overhead, and though many of the leaves had fallen from the trees, little light was there to help them.
But for a time, at least, the difficulty was much less than they expected. The path, though it continued to lead over rough places and around obstructions, sometimes up-hill and sometimes down, was still so clearly marked that Fred Linden went forward with scarcely a halt or any hesitation.
Though there are men who have walked their five and six hundred miles with little rest on the road, it is a severe task for any one to keep it up through an entire day and night, as you can soon become convinced by making the experiment; but Fred and Terry were sturdy, strong-limbed fellows, born and bred on the frontier, who were capable of standing a great deal. When, therefore, they meant to astonish Deerfoot by their progress during the night, they felt no distrust of their ability in that direction.
There was no reason why they should put any restraint on themselves, and they talked quite cheerily, Terry indulging now and then in some of his quaint remarks. But a tired boy does not feel like keeping up a lively conversation for any length of time, and so it came about that after awhile they walked steadily forward, for miles at a time, without exchanging more than a few syllables. Terry could see the figure of his friend with his rifle over his shoulder always a few feet in front, there being just enough light in the gloom to keep his form in sight, while Fred heard the steady tramp, tramp behind him, sometimes keeping pace with his own and sometimes falling “out of step.”
“Helloa! this is too bad!” suddenly exclaimed Fred, coming to an abrupt halt; “I guess this ends our tramp for tonight.”
CHAPTER XXIII
An Infuriate Shawanoe
With the departure of Fred and Terry, Deerfoot felt as though he had flung off a blanket that had been wrapped about his shoulders: his arms were now free and he could use them at will.
He shrewdly suspected that his young friends would fancy they had been put upon their mettle, and would, therefore, exert themselves to their fullest to meet his expectations. He was glad it was so, and he would have been much better pleased could he have known they were in the cabin at the foot of the mountains, or, better still, safe at their home in Greville.
Deerfoot now stealthily approached as close to the camp-fire as was safe. He screened his body behind a tree, but he was nigh enough to catch every word that was said in an ordinary tone, and he understood the Winnebago tongue well enough to want no interpreter.
The Shawanoe had hardly taken his position to act as cowen, when the venison steaks were about one-fourth broiled, which was enough to satisfy the parties interested. Those who had charge of the culinary operations divided the meat into a dozen slices, so that each warrior was provided for, and the feast opened. The strong animal appetites, and teeth like those of the steel traps that were set at the foot of the Ozarks, soon brought the feast to a close, after which the feasters walked the few steps necessary to the brook near at hand, and lying down on their faces drank their fill, just as so many pigs would have done, grunting with satisfaction as they came back and resumed their pipes.
All this Deerfoot had seen so often that it had no interest to him. He kept his eyes on two warriors—the Wolf and one whom he had never seen before. These two sat near each other on the ground while eating, and they talked together in low tones. Since none of those around could overhear the words, it was impossible for Deerfoot, with all his wonderful acuteness, to catch a syllable. He would have given a great deal could he have done so, for he suspected the dark plot that was taking shape in their dusky brains. There was a dangerous flash in the black eyes of the young Shawanoe while he watched their movements.
It was clear to him that the Wolf had lost prestige, instead of gaining sympathy by his last misfortune. Having gone out to gather wool he had come back shorn, to go out a second time and to come back shorn to a still more ludicrous degree. The manner in which the Wolf kept apart from the rest, affiliating only with the single warrior at his side, showed the feeling in the party.
It was easy to recognize the leader or chieftain, though his dress was precisely like the rest, but his air of authority told the story plainly enough. The Winnebagos were a fine set of men in their war paint, and, as I have said, were able to give a good account of themselves in any scrimmage in which they might become engaged.
As unexpectedly to the warriors as to Deerfoot himself, the Winnebago chieftain, who was standing on one side of the fire where his rifle with several others leaned against a tree, took his pipe from between his lips and spoke to the Wolf in tones which caused that redskin to look up in wonder. Seeing that the sachem hesitated, as if waiting for him to rise, the Wolf came nimbly to his feet, as did his friend at his elbow. The majority of the rest, however, sat still and showed no special interest in what was going on.
“The Wolf was the bravest of the Winnebagos,” remarked the chief, “when our war parties met those of the Sauks and Foxes and Pottawatomies who dared to come into our country; the heart of the Wolf bounded with delight and no tomahawk was hurled with such swiftness as his: no gun was fired more often; no scalping knife took back more scalps to hang upon the ridge-pole of his wigwam.
“But the Wolf came across the Big Water and his heart longed for the scalp of the pale face; he went out to hunt for it; he came back; the tongue of the Wolf is not double and tells no lies; the Wolf met a Shawanoe warrior who took his gun from him.
“It was the young Shawanoe called Deerfoot; the Winnebagos have been told about Deerfoot, the friend of the white man; the heart of Black Bear (meaning himself) was angry; he was chief of the Winnebagos; he told the Wolf that he must go forth and bring back his rifle; the Wolf went; he did not bring back his rifle, but left his knife behind; Deerfoot saw him and took it away from him.
“Deerfoot is but a youth; he is not a mighty warrior; the Wolf must get his gun and knife; he must bring back the scalp of the Shawanoe, he shall take Wau-ko-mia-tan with him; each shall have his gun; let them bring back the scalps of Deerfoot and the two pale faces with him; then will Black Bear forget
that the Wolf was not always a great warrior.
“Let the Wolf and Wau-ko-mia-tan make haste; the Winnebagos are on the war path; they will carry back with them the scalps of the pale faces who are gathering the skins of the beaver and otter and foxes by the base of the mountain.”
It may be said that this little speech developed the plan of the Winnebago campaign. The Wolf had fallen so low in the opinion of his chieftain and brother warriors, that it was necessary for him to take heroic measures to restore himself. Seeing this, the sachem had just notified him that he must secure the scalps of Deerfoot and the two white boys with him. Wau-ko-mia-tan (who was the warrior that sat at the elbow of the Wolf), was to be his companion. The chieftain knew how closely the two were allied, and he indulged in the little fiction of allowing one to keep company with the other, when the truth was he was afraid to let the Wolf go alone. Since on each of the two former excursions he had lost something, the probabilities were that if he came back again, it would be without his scalp.
The eagerness with which the Wolf accepted this task, the moment he found that he was to have a companion, showed that he was an admirable representative of the average Indian: gratitude to him was a vice rather than a virtue.
The expression on the face of Deerfoot showed that all forbearance was ended. He had twice spared the ingrate: he would do so no more.
Had the Wolf told his leader that the mercy of Deerfoot had touched his heart, so that his arm could never more be raised in anger against him, but that he would seek the scalps of the hunters at the base of the mountains, the Shawanoe would have felt an admiration for him. Had he sought out Deerfoot and asked for the return of his weapons (though that would have been very unlike his race), Deerfoot would have restored them to him. But now, as it was, when they should meet it would be as mortal enemies.
Nothing showed the vicious ingratitude of the Wolf more vividly than the fact that instead of waiting for the morning before entering upon his wicked enterprise, he started within three minutes after Black Bear, the chieftain, finished his little speech. The sachem picked up his own rifle from where it leaned against the tree and handed it to him, while Wau-ko-mia-tan stood at the other end of the group, until the warrior, his ugly face glowing like that of a demon, stepped to his side. Then the two, without a word or motion like a farewell, turned away and vanished in the gloom of the wood.
They had not taken a dozen steps, when Deerfoot glided from behind the tree and passed after them, as if he were the shadow thrown out by the light of the camp-fire. The expression on his face was such as would have hushed Fred Linden and Terry Clark to awed silence could they have seen it.
The two Winnebagos did not come directly back to the trail, but fell into it at almost the precise point where Deerfoot had led his two friends. They stopped a few minutes and talked in their low, guttural tones, none of which was understood by the Shawanoe, who listened with the closest attention.
There was considerable distance at that time between the warriors and Fred and Terry, who had set out with the ambition to keep up their traveling through the entire night. The Winnebagos did not wait long, when they moved on at their usual pace.
Less than a mile from the camp, the warriors again came to a halt and as before talked in a low voice. The point was where the wood was more open, so that the moonlight which found its way among the limbs above showed their forms quite plainly. More than that, enough of their words were audible to enable the listening Shawanoe, who had crept dangerously near, to catch their meaning.
The Winnebagos turned off at almost a right angle and left the trail behind them. The ground was broken, but they had not gone far, when it became evident that they were following another path, though it was so faintly marked that no eye except that of an American Indian could have discovered it in such an uncertain light.
As they advanced, the surface became not only rougher, but the grade which they ascended was so steep that it would have been tiresome to an ordinary traveler.
Suddenly Deerfoot himself wheeled aside from the indistinct path to which the Winnebagos clung and passed lightly and with great speed through the wood where no one had walked before. So swiftly did he make his way, that, though he crossed a deep ravine and went a considerable distance, it was less than live minutes before he came back to the shadowy trail.
Instead of keeping along this path, in the same direction as that of his enemies, he turned about and advanced to meet the red men who had dared to come that way. He walked with his usual noiseless step, and stopped on reaching the edge of the ravine over which he had leaped when it crossed his path only a few minutes before.
This gully was more than twenty feet in depth, and about half as wide. The trail led to the edge on one side, continuing on the margin directly opposite, so that any one who wished to keep to it was perforce compelled to leap the chasm—a slight task for any Indian, though it would have been easy to make a bridge by means of a fallen tree.
The moon was now directly overhead, so that a flood of light fell into the craggy ravine, lighting up the gray rocks and bowlders, the prostrate trees that had fallen from the sides, the vegetation along the slopes and the mossy grass that had been watered by the torrents when they roared through. The trees grew rank and close to the edge at the top—so close that some of them had slidden off and fallen part way below, carrying the gravel, sand and earth with the prong-like roots part way to the bottom.
So faint was the mark of the trail opposite that even with the help of the moonbeams, it took an eye as keen as that of Deerfoot to tell where his enemies would appear. But he coolly awaited them, though his calmness was the fearful calm of a fury such as even he rarely knew.
CHAPTER XXIV
The Defiance
The expression of the face of Deerfoot was terrible. The whole fury of his nature was at white heat. He knew that the two Winnebagos had set out to commit a fearful crime, and it was his work to stay their hands. There was but the single way in which they could be stayed.
The young Shawanoe kept back a couple of paces from the edge of the ravine, where the shadow of the stunted trees above would hide him from his foes when they should come in sight. He held his gun pointed and cocked. Though his passion had the glow of the furnace, he was as calm as death.
He had not long to wait. By and by a low guttural exclamation struck his ear, and his hearing, strung to a marvelously fine point, caught the sound of the soft moccasins on the hard earth. Less than a minute later the form of the Wolf came into the moonlight, as a bather emerges from the side of a lake. Seeing the open ravine at his feet, he stopped, and instantly his companion, Wau-ko-mia-tan, appeared at his side.
They quickly saw that the leap was an easy one.
“Wau-ko-mia-tan will leap across,” said that warrior, “then the Wolf will follow; let us lose no time, for the Shawanoe may be gone.”
The speaker recoiled a single pace and gathered his muscles for the leap. He took one quick step and made a terrific bound upward and outward, straight for the rocky brink whereon Deerfoot the Shawanoe instantly stepped into the moonlight.
The Winnebago was in mid-air, crouching like a leaper, with his legs gathered under him and his arms at his side, when there was a fierce whiz, like the rush of an eagle’s wing, something flashed in the moonlight, and the tomahawk, driven by a lightning-like sweep of the Shawanoe’s arm, was buried in the chest of the Winnebago as it would have sunk in so much sodden earth.
An ear-splitting screech burst from the throat of the smitten warrior, who struck the edge of the ravine like a bundle of rags flung thither, and then tumbled to the bottom as dead as the jagged rock on which he lay.
The Wolf stood transfixed, unable to understand what had taken place. Then he saw the figure of the youthful warrior on the other side and heard his voice.
“Rattlesnake of a Winnebago! Die the death of the rattlesnake!”
The wretch was given no time to protest again, for the words were yet in the mouth o
f Deerfoot when the flash of his rifle lit up the partial gloom, and the crack of the weapon mingled with the death shriek of the redskin, who slumped end over end down the ravine and lay beside the body of Wau-ko-mia-tan as dead as he.
“Thus shall die all that seek to follow your footsteps,” muttered the Shawanoe, who, standing where he stood when he slew both, proceeded to reload his rifle with as much coolness as though he had just fired at a target on a tree.
This finished, he let himself over the edge of the ravine, holding fast a moment by one hand, and then letting go, dropped lightly beside the two bodies that lay below. His face showed no excitement now, and he moved with his usual care and deliberation. Drawing the hunting-knife which he had taken from the Wolf, he partly bent over, but straightened up again, saying to himself:
“Deerfoot is a Christian Indian and can not scalp a foe though as base as they.”
Picking up each rifle (that of Wau-ko-mia-tan being still clutched by his nerveless fingers while the Wolf’s had fallen from his grasp), he deliberately broke the locks of each by striking them on the stones. He then recovered his own tomahawk, and carried off the useless weapons with him.
He passed down the ravine until he reached a point where the sides were not so high. There he clambered out, still keeping the two broken guns. He had reached high ground on the side from which had come the Winnebagos, and he walked grimly forward, until in a brief while he reached the main trail over which he and the boys had passed a brief while before.
He turned toward the left, which led him in the direction of the camp of the Ozarks as well as toward the camp of Black Bear and his Winnebagos. He took longer steps than usual, but did not trot or run.
When he once more caught the glimmer of the camp-fire among the trees, he slackened his pace and drew nigh with the caution that had become a second nature to him. He quickly saw that the Winnebagos had disposed of themselves for the night. The fire was burning as brightly as ever, because of the attention it received from the two warriors who were standing on guard.
The Edward S. Ellis Megapack Page 234
