Kitabı oku: «Elam Storm, the Wolfer: or, The Lost Nugget», sayfa 10
CHAPTER XIV.
ELAM UNDER FIRE
"Yes, that's bad business," the sutler continued. "They steal furs and pass them off as their own. I couldn't do that."
"But this is the fourth time they have robbed me," Elam went on. "You have handled skins that they took from me last winter. They'll try to sell them at this store, most likely. There aint no traders here, are they? I aint seen any of them hanging around."
"No; they have been scarce of late," answered the sutler, who would have been glad to know that none of the fraternity would ever show their faces in that country again. He wanted to do all the trading that was done at that post himself.
"Then they will be sure to sell them to you, if they sell them to anybody; but I don't want you to buy them," said Elam. "They belong to me, and I've worked hard for them."
The sutler leaned his elbows on the counter, placed his chin on his hands, and looked out at the door, whistling softly to himself. Elam waited for him to say something, but as he did not, the boy continued:
"I don't want you to buy them skins. You heard what I said to you, I reckon?"
"Oh, yes, I heard you," said the sutler, straightening up and jingling a bunch of keys in his pocket; "but I don't see how I can help you. When hunters come here with furs to sell, I never ask where they got them, for it is none of my business. Besides, I don't know these men who you say robbed you."
"I will be here to point them out to you," said Elam quickly. "I would know them anywhere."
"But I couldn't take your unsupported word against the word of two men," continued the sutler. "If they told me that the property belonged to them, I should have to believe them."
"But I will be here," said Elam indignantly.
"Well, you must get somebody to prove that the skins are yours."
Elam looked down at the counter, turning these words over in his mind, and when he had grasped their full import, it became clear to him that he had no one to depend on but himself. It became evident to him that the arm of the law was not extensive enough to reach from the States away out there to the fort, and, as the sutler would not lend him assistance, he must either take the matter into his own hands or stand idly by and see the proceeds of his work go into the pockets of rascals. That he resolved he would never do. The very thought enraged him.
"Look a-here, Mr. – Mr. Bluenose," said Elam – Elam did not know the sutler's name, and this cognomen was suggested to him by the most prominent feature on the man's face, which was a dark purple, telling of frequent visits to a private demijohn he kept in the back room – "you shan't never make a cent out of that plunder of mine, because it will not come into this fort!"
"Don't get excited," said the sutler.
"I aint. I'm only just a-telling of you."
"What are you going to do?"
"Well, the major wouldn't make them two fellows give back my furs, and so I asked him if he would raise a furse in case I got them back in my own way, and he said he wouldn't," said Elam. "That's all I've got to say."
"I'll tell you what's the matter," said the sutler, a bright idea striking him; "the Cheyennes have got them. Were they afoot?"
"Yes, they were. I don't know whether they tried to steal my horse or not, but anyway they didn't get him."
"Then the Cheyennes have got them beyond a doubt. They could never travel through the country you came through."
"Then what's become of my furs? Do you reckon the savages have got them, too?"
"I certainly do. I'll tell you what I could do: If the Cheyennes came here to sell their furs, I could easily tell your furs from their own, and I could throw them out. But, you see, the Indians don't come here. They take all their furs to Fort Mitchell."
"Maybe you would throw them out and maybe you wouldn't," said Elam emphatically. "I guess I had better take the matter into my own hands. When I get my grip on to them furs, you'll know it."
The sutler merely nodded and gazed after Elam, who marched out as if he intended to do something.
"That boy is going to be killed," said he to himself. "He thinks more of those furs than he does of so much gold. If I was commander of this fort, I wouldn't let him go out."
Elam directed his course toward the barn in which he had left his horse and rifle when he went in to visit the surgeon. He found them there yet, and it was but the work of a moment to shoulder the one and unhitch the other, who greeted him with a whinny of recognition, and lead him out to the gate. As he expected, there was a sentry there, and he stepped in front of him with his musket at "arms port."
"You can't go out," said he.
"Why, what's the matter?" asked Elam innocently.
"Too many Indians," was the reply.
"Oh, well, I just want to let my horse have some grass. He don't think much of the hay you have here."
"You don't want your rifle if you're just going out to get grass," said the soldier, with a smile.
"No, but I like to have it handy when the pinch comes. If I hadn't had it and been able to use it, you wouldn't have seen me here now."
"That's so," said the sentry. "I don't suppose you care enough about them as to go among them again. But we'll have to see the corporal about that." Then, raising his voice, he called out:
"Corporal of the guard No. 1!"
In process of time the officer of the guard came up, and the sentry made known Elam's request in a few words. He looked at Elam and said:
"Oh, let him go. It aint likely that he will go far away with the Indians all around him. You don't want to get too far away," he added, turning to the young hunter, "because the men on post have orders to fire on people that are going out of range."
"Do you see this rifle?" said Elam. "Well, when they come, I will let you know. You will never see me inside that fort again," said Elam to himself, as the sentry brought his musket to his shoulder and stepped out of the way, leaving the road clear for him. "I am going to get my furs the first thing, and then I am going down to trade them off to Uncle Ezra for a grub-stake for three months. That's what I'll do, and I bet you that those two fellows will get hurt."
Elam passed through the gate, and the horse began to crop the grass as he went out, thus doing what he could to prove that it was grass he wanted, and not the hay that was served up to him in the stable. Being continually urged by his master, he kept getting further and further away from the stockade. The sentries on guard looked at him, but supposing that, as he had got by post No. 1, he was all right, although one sentinel did shake his head and warn him that he was going further off than the law allowed; so Elam turned and went back.
"I don't like the looks of that fellow, for he handles his gun as though he might shoot tolerable straight," said Elam. "We will go more in this direction, for here's where the stock was when the Indians came up. We'll be a little cautious at first, but we are bound to get away in the end."
By keeping his horse on the opposite side from him, and paying no attention to the warning gestures of the sentries, he succeeded in reaching a point beyond which he was certain that the guards could not hit him, and, with a word and a jump, he landed fairly on his nag's back.
"Now, old fellow, show them what you can do," he whispered, digging his heels into his horse's sides.
He looked back and saw that the sentry he feared most was already levelling his gun, and a moment later the bullet ploughed up the grass a little beyond him. Had he remained fairly in his seat, it would have taken him out of it; but he did just as he had seen the Cheyennes do – he threw himself on the side of his horse opposite the marksman, and so he had nothing to shoot at save the swiftly running steed. Another musket popped, and still another, but Elam did not hear the whistle of their bullets. That was all the guards on that side of the stockade, and Elam knew he was safe. Before they could load again he would be far out of range. He raised himself to a sitting posture, took off his hat and waved it at the guards, and then settled down and kept on his way, taking care, however, to watch against all chances of pursuit. The fact was that his escape had been reported to the major, who, out of all patience, exclaimed: "Let him go!"
Elam was now a free man once more, and he resolved that it would be a long time before he would again trust himself in the power of the soldiers. His first care must be to go back to the sheep-herder's cabin in which he had camped the night before he reached the fort, and get his saddle and bridle, for he rightly concluded that the savages had been so anxious to capture him that they had not time to go in and see if he had left anything behind him. It required considerable nerve to do this, but Elam had already shown that he had a good share of it. He had not gone many miles on his way until he began to meet some sheep-herders and cattle-men who were fleeing from their homes and going to the fort for protection. The men were generally riding on ahead, and the women came after them in wagons drawn by mules. He waved his hat whenever he came within sight, for fear that the men might shoot at him, and he knew by experience that they could handle their rifles with greater skill than the soldiers could handle their muskets.
"Where you going?" demanded one of the men, as he galloped up to meet Elam. "Seen any Indians around here?"
"There were plenty of them here this morning," said Elam. "Did they come near you?"
"Well, I should say so. They've jumped down on us when we wasn't looking for them, and I've got one brother in the wagon that's been laid out. You must have been in a rucus with them, judging by the looks of your hand and the horse."
"Yes, I got into a fight with them right along here somewhere, and I didn't go to the fort without sending one of them up. There was no need of my going there at all, but I went to shut off some trade that wasn't exactly square. There are no Indians between here and the fort."
"Well, I wish you would ride by the wagon and tell that to my old woman, will you? She is scared half to death. Where are you going?"
Elam replied that he was going to the sheep-herder's ranch to get a saddle and bridle that he had left there, and after that he was going back to the mountains. He had a partner there, and he didn't know whether he was alive or dead. He had had enough of depending on the soldiers for help, for they had declined to assist him, and, furthermore, had shot at him when he attempted to leave the fort.
"Well, I say!" exclaimed the frontiersman, giving Elam a good looking over, "you are a brave lad, and I know you will come out all right."
Elam carried the news to the wagon that there were no Indians between them and the fort, and afterward continued on his lonely way to the sheep-herder's ranch. He came within sight of it about eleven o'clock that night, and, dismounting from his horse and leaving him on the open prairie, he proceeded to stalk it as he would an antelope, being careful that not a glimpse of him should be seen. It was a bright moonlight night, and for that reason he was doubly careful. There was something more than the saddle and bridle he wanted, and that was his blankets. There was some of the lunch left in there. He had eaten but one meal that day, and he had nearly a hundred miles to go before he could get any more.
Elam was nearly an hour in coming up to that ranch, and he was sure that anyone who might be on the lookout would have been deceived for once in his life. He crawled all around the hay-racks without seeing anybody, and finally went in at the open door without seeing or hearing anybody. He found all the articles of which he was in search – the saddle tucked away in one corner of a bunk to serve as a pillow, the blankets spread over them, and the bridle and lunch placed on a box near the head of the bed, and, quickly shouldering them, he made his way out of the cabin in the direction in which he had left his horse.
"Now," said Elam, as he strapped the saddle on the animal's back and slipped the bridle into his mouth, "the next thing is something else, and it's going to be far more dangerous than this. I am going to have those furs. I need them more than they do. I have got the map of the hiding-place of that nugget at my shanty, and some of them are going to get hurt if I don't get it."
Elam kept out a portion of his lunch (the rest was strapped up in the blankets, which were stowed away behind the saddle), eating it as he galloped along, and this time he directed his course toward the willows that lined the base of the foot-hills. At daylight he discovered something – the track of an unshod pony. He looked all around, but there was no one in sight. He dismounted and saw that the horse had been going at full jump, and as there was dew on the ground, the tracks must have been made before it fell. A little further on he found another, and by comparing the two he made up his mind that they must have been made the day before. They were going the same way that he was, and appeared to be holding the direction of a long line of willows a few miles off. Elam's hair seemed to rise on end. He could imagine how those painted warriors had yelled and plied their whips in the endeavor to hunt down their victims; for that they were in plain view of someone Elam could readily affirm. He thought he could hear the yells, "Hi yah! yip, yip, yip!" which the exultant savages sent up as a forerunner of what was coming.
"They got them in there as sure as the world," muttered Elam. "It's all right so far, and I can go on without running the risk of seeing any of them. I just know I shall see something after I get up there."
Elam put his horse into a lope and followed along after the trail as boldly as though he had a right to be there. He didn't feel any fear, for he knew that he was on the trail of the Indians instead of having them upon his, and he knew they would not be likely to come back without the prospect of some gain. Presently he came to the place where some of the savages had dismounted and gone into the willows to fight their victims on foot, and then something told him that if he got in there he would find the bodies of the men who had robbed him of his furs. How that little piece of woods must have rung to the savages' war-whoops! But all was silent now. He led his horse a short distance into the bushes and dismounted, following the trail of an Indian who had crept up on all fours toward the place where the doomed men were concealed, and presently came into a valley in which the undergrowth had been trampled in every direction. Near the middle of the valley were two men who were stretched out on the ground, dead. There was nothing on them to indicate who they were, but Elam had no difficulty in recognizing them.
"Well, it is better so," said he sorrowfully. "The Indians have got you, and that's all there is of it. Now my furs have gone, and I shall have to go to Uncle Ezra's to get a grub-stake."
There were no signs of mutilation about them, as there would have been if the men had fallen into the hands of the Indians when alive. The Cheyennes had evidently been in a hurry, for all they had done was to see that the men were dead, after which they had stripped them of their clothes, stolen their guns and ammunition and furs, and gone off to hunt new booty. In this case it promised to be Elam, who made a desperate fight of it. The young hunter resolved that he would go into camp, and he did, too, hitching his horse near the stream that ran through the valley, just out of sight of the massacred men. He saw no ghosts, but slept as placidly as if the field on which the savages had vented their spite was a hundred miles away.
When he awoke, it was dark, and the peaceful moon was shining down upon him through the tree-tops. He watered his horse, ate what was left of the lunch, and began to work his way out of the valley, when he discovered that both his nag and himself were sore from the effects of their long run. He had gone a long distance out of his way to see what the Cheyennes had done, and he didn't feel like bracing up to face the eighty miles before him. His horse didn't feel like it either, for when he stopped and allowed him to have his own way, he hung his head down and went to sleep. The horse seemed to be rendered uneasy by the bandage he wore round his neck, and when it was taken off he was more at his ease.
It took Elam two days to make the journey to the camp where he had left Tom Mason, for he did all of his travelling during the daytime, and stopped over at some convenient place for the night. He was getting hungry, but his horse was growing stronger everyday. He dared not shoot at any of the numerous specimens of the jack-rabbit which constantly dodged across his path, for fear that he would betray himself to some marauding band of Indians, and not until he got within sight of Tom Mason standing in the edge of the willows did he feel comparatively safe. Tom gazed in astonishment while he told his story, and it was a long time before he could get dinner enough to satisfy him.
"Thank goodness they have left you all right," said Elam, settling back on his blanket with a hunk of corn bread and bacon in his uninjured hand and a cup of steaming coffee in front of him. "Do you know that I have worried about you more than I have about myself?"
"Well, how did those Indians look when they were following you?" asked Tom, who had not yet recovered himself. His hand trembled when he poured out the coffee so that one would think that he was the one who had had a narrow escape from the savages. "Did they yell?"
"Yell? Of course it came faintly to my ears because they were so far away, but if I had been close to them, I tell you I wouldn't have had any courage left," said Elam, with a laugh. "I've got my saddle and bridle, and that's something I did not expect to get."
"Was there no one in the sheep-herder's ranch to look for you?"
"If there had been, I wouldn't 'a' been here. There was nobody there at all. I just went in and got my saddle, and that's all there was to it. You see, I was on their trail, and they had passed over that ground once and thought they had got everybody."
"Well, I am beaten. I never heard a whisper of an Indian since you went away. It is lucky for me that they didn't know I was here. How did those men look that were killed?"
"They were dead, of course. There was no mutilation about them, only just enough to show who killed them. If the Indians had got hold of them before they were dead, then you might have expected something. They would have just thrown themselves to show how much agony they could put them to. I never want to fall into the hands of the Indians alive. Do you know that the soldiers always carry a derringer in their pockets? Yes, they do, and that last shot is intended for themselves."
"By George!" said Tom, drawing a long breath. "Let us get out of here."
"Where will we go?"
"Let's go back to the States. I never was made to live out here."
"Hi yah! I couldn't make a living there."
"But you talk well enough to make a living anywhere. You won't find one man in ten out here who talks as plainly as you do."
"That's all owing to my way of bring up. Ever since I was a little kid I have been under the care of Uncle Ezra, who talks about as plain as most men do."
"Well, let's go and see him."
"We'll go just as soon as this blizzard is over. It is coming now, and in a few minutes you will see my horse coming in here."
"Is that the blizzard? Why, I thought it was snow."
"You go to sleep and see if you don't find snow on the ground in the morning. There is one thing that you can bless your lucky stars for: the Indians are safely housed up. They'll not think of going out plundering while this blizzard lasts."
"They know when it is coming, I suppose?"
Elam replied that they did, and wrapped himself up in his blanket, while Tom went out to throw more wood on the fire and to make an estimate of the weather. The sky was clouded over, not making it so very difficult to travel by night, the wind was in the south, and the rain was quietly descending, as though it threatened a warm spring shower. It beat the world how Elam could tell that this storm was three days off, that before it got through everything would be "holded up," and that the snow would be six inches deep. The horse came in about that time and took up a position on the leeward side of the fire, where he settled himself preparatory to going to sleep. Then Tom thought he had better go, too, but the thrilling story to which he had listened took all the sleep out of him. What a dreadful fate it would be for him to be killed out there in the mountains, as those men were who stole Elam's furs, and no one find his body until long after the thing had been forgotten! He fell asleep while he was thinking about it, and when he awoke it was with a chill, and a feeling that the storm had come sure enough. The wind was in the north, and he could not see anything on account of the snow. He didn't have as many blankets now as he did when he first struck the mountains, for he had left a good portion of them in the gully. All he had was his overcoat, and, wrapping himself up in it, he went to sleep and forgot all about the blizzard.
