Two Arrows: A Story of Red and White
by William O. Stoddard · English · Gutenberg #29616 · 320,994 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: Two Arrows: A Story of Red and White
Author: William O. Stoddard
Release date: August 5, 2009 [eBook #29616]
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/29616
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TWO ARROWS
HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE'S SERIES
NEW LARGE-TYPE EDITION
TOBY TYLER James Otis
MR. STUBBS'S BROTHER James Otis
TIM AND TIP James Otis
RAISING THE "PEARL" James Otis
ADVENTURES OF BUFFALO BILL W. F. Cody
DIDDIE, DUMPS AND TOT Mrs. L. C. Pyrnelle
MUSIC AND MUSICIANS Lucy C. Lillie
THE CRUISE OF THE CANOE CLUB W. L. Alden
THE CRUISE OF THE "GHOST" W. L. Alden
MORAL PIRATES W. L. Alden
A NEW ROBINSON CRUSOE W. L. Alden
PRINCE LAZYBONES Mrs. W. J. Hays
THE FLAMINGO FEATHER Kirk Munroe
DERRICK STERLING Kirk Munroe
CHRYSTAL, JACK & CO. Kirk Munroe
WAKULLA Kirk Munroe
THE ICE QUEEN Ernest Ingersoll
THE RED MUSTANG W. O. Stoddard
THE TALKING LEAVES W. O. Stoddard
TWO ARROWS W. O. Stoddard
HARPER & BROTHERS
PUBLISHERS
[Illustration: TWO ARROWS EXPLORES THE RUINS]
TWO ARROWS
A STORY OF RED AND WHITE
BY
WILLIAM O. STODDARD
Author of "THE TALKING LEAVES"
ILLUSTRATED
[Illustration]
NEW YORK AND LONDON
HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
COPYRIGHT, 1886, BY HARPER & BROTHERS
COPYRIGHT, 1914, BY WILLIAM O. STODDARD
F.-Y.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. THE HUNGRY CAMP 1
II. A YOUNG HERO 9
III. A BRAVE NAME 17
IV. THE MINING EXPEDITION 24
V. A VERY OLD TRAIL 32
VI. A THIRSTY MARCH 40
VII. THE GREAT CAÑON 48
VIII. WATER! WATER! 56
IX. INTO A NEW WORLD 64
X. SILE'S POCKET 71
XI. A TRAPPED BOY 80
XII. THE ERRAND OF ONE-EYE 88
XIII. GREAT SCOUTING 96
XIV. A WRESTLING MATCH 103
XV. A GREAT CAPTAIN 111
XVI. VISITING 117
XVII. MORE FUN 126
XVIII. TWO WAR-PARTIES 136
XIX. WONDERFUL FISHING 146
XX. A FULL CORRAL 157
XXI. THE GOLD MINE 166
XXII. A NEW SETTLEMENT 174
XXIII. DANGER 182
XXIV. SILE'S VICTORY 191
XXV. A MIDNIGHT MARCH 199
XXVI. PREPARING FOR AN ATTACK 207
XXVII. FROM BOW TO RIFLE 216
XXVIII. THE APACHES HAVE COME 224
XXIX. STIRRING TIMES 232
XXX. A DARING RIDE 239
ILLUSTRATIONS
"Two arrows explores the ruins" _Frontispiece_
"Not a boy or girl among them had such a
treasure as that mirror" _Facing p._ 120
"The midnight march of the Nez Percés" " 206
"His right hand with his palm up to show
that he was peaceful" " 230
TWO ARROWS
TWO ARROWS
A STORY OF RED AND WHITE
CHAPTER I
THE HUNGRY CAMP
The mountain countries of all the earth have always been wonder-lands.
The oldest and best known of them are to this day full of things that
nobody has found out. That is the reason why people are always exploring
them, but they keep their secrets remarkably well, particularly the
great secret of how they happened to get there in that shape.
The great western mountain country of the United States is made up of
range after range of wonderful peaks and ridges, and men have peered in
among them here and there, but for all the peering and searching nothing
of the wonder to speak of has been rubbed away.
Right in the eastern, edge of one of these mountain ridges, one warm
September morning, not long ago, a band of Nez Percé Indians were
encamped. It was in what is commonly called "the Far West," because
always when you get there the West is as far away as ever. The camp was
in a sort of nook, and it was not easy to say whether a spur of the
mountain jutted out into the plain, or whether a spur of the plain made
a dent in the ragged line of the mountains. More than a dozen "lodges,"
made of skins upheld by poles, were scattered around on the smoother
spots, not far from a bubbling spring of water. There were some trees
and bushes and patches of grass near the spring, but the little brook
which trickled away from it did not travel a great way into the world,
from the place where it was born, before it was soaked up and
disappeared among the sand and gravel. Up and beyond the spring, the
farther one chose to look, the rockier and the ruggeder everything
seemed to be.
Take it all together, it was a forlorn looking, hot, dried-up, and
uncomfortable sort of place. The very lodges themselves, and the human
beings around them, made it appear pitifully desolate. The spring was
the only visible thing that seemed to be alive and cheerful and at work.
There were Indians and squaws to be seen, a number of them, and boys and
girls of all sizes, and some of the squaws carried pappooses, but they
all looked as if they had given up entirely and did not expect to live
any longer. Even some of the largest men had an air of not caring much,
really, whether they lived or not; but that was the only regular and
dignified way for a Nez Percé or any other Indian warrior to take a
thing he can't help or is too lazy to fight with. The women showed more
signs of life than the men, for some of them were moving about among the
children, and one poor, old, withered, ragged squaw sat in the door of
her lodge, with her gray hair all down over her face, rocking backward
and forward, and singing a sort of droning chant.
There was not one quadruped of any kind to be seen in or about that
camp. Behind this fact was the secret of the whole matter. Those Indians
were starving! Days and days before that they had been away out upon the
plains to the eastward, hunting for buffalo. They had not found any, but
they had found all the grass dry and parched by a long drought, so that
no buffalo in his senses was likely to be there, and so that their own
ponies could hardly make a living by picking all night. Then one
afternoon a great swarm of locusts found where they were and alighted
upon them just as a westerly wind died out. The locusts remained long
enough to eat up whatever grass there was left. All through the evening
the Nez Percés had heard the harsh, tingling hum of those devourers, as
they argued among themselves whether or not it were best to stay and dig
for the roots of the grass. The wind came up suddenly and strongly about
midnight, and the locusts decided to take advantage of it and sail away
after better grass, but they did not leave any behind them. They set
out for the nearest white settlements in hope of getting corn and
apple-tree leaves, and all that sort of thing.
The band of Nez Percés would have moved away the next morning under any
circumstances, but when morning came they were in a terribly bad
predicament. Not one of them carried a watch, or he might have known
that it was about three o'clock, and very dark, when a worse disaster
than the visit of the locusts took place. By five or six minutes past
three it was all done completely, and it was the work of a wicked old
mule.
All but a half a dozen of the ponies and mules of the band had been
gathered and tethered in what is called a "corral," only that it had no
fence, at a short distance from the lodges. Nobody dreamed of any danger
to that corral, and there was none from the outside, even after the boys
who were set to watch it had curled down and gone to sleep. All the
danger was inside, and it was also inside of that mule. He was hungry
and vicious. He had lived in the white "settlements," and knew
something. He was fastened by a long hide lariat to a peg driven into
the ground, as were all the others, and he knew that the best place to
gnaw in two that lariat was close to the peg, where he could get a good
pull upon it. As soon as he had freed himself he tried the lariat of
another mule, and found that the peg had been driven into loose earth
and came right up. That was a scientific discovery, and he tried several
other pegs. Some came up with more or less hard tugging, and as fast as
they came up a pony or a mule was free. Then he came to a peg he could
not pull, and he lost his temper. He squealed, and turned around and
kicked the pony that belonged to that peg. Then he stood still and
brayed, as if he were frightened to find himself loose, and that was all
that was needed.
It was after three o'clock, and in one minute the whole corral was
kicking and squealing, braying, biting, and getting free, and joining in
the general opinion that it was time to run away.
That is what the western men call a "stampede," and whenever one occurs
there is pretty surely a mule or a thief at the bottom of it; but
sometimes a hail-storm will do as well, or nearly so. By five or six
minutes past three all of that herd were racing westward, with boys and
men getting out of breath behind it, and all the squaws in the camp were
holding hard upon the lariats of the ponies tethered among the lodges.
When morning came there were hardly ponies enough to "pack" the lodges
and other baggage and every soul of the band had to carry something as
they all set off, bright and early, upon the trail of the stampeded
drove of ponies. Some of the warriors had followed it without any
stopping for breakfast, and they might have caught up with it, perhaps,
but for the good generalship of that old mule. He had decided in his own
mind to trot right along until he came to something to eat and drink,
and the idea was a persuasive one. All the rest determined to have
something to eat and drink, and they followed their leader. It was not
easy for men on foot to catch up with them, and before noon the warriors
sat down and took a smoke, and held a council as to what it was best to
do. Before they finished that council the ponies had gained several
miles more the start of them. The next council the warriors held
contained but three men, for all the rest had gone back as messengers to
tell the band that the ponies had not been recovered. By nightfall the
remaining three had faithfully carried back the same news, and were
ready for a fresh start.
After that there had been day after day of weary plodding and continual
disappointment, with the weather growing hotter and the grass drier,
until the trail they were following brought them to the spring in the
edge of the mountain range without bringing them to the wicked old mule
and his followers.
That had not been the whole of the sad history. On the evening before
the stampede that band of Nez Percés had been well supplied with riding
ponies and pack-mules, and had also been rich in dogs. No other band of
their size had more, although their failure to find buffaloes had
already begun to have its effect upon the number of their barking stock.
Not a dog had been wasted by feeding him to the other dogs, but the
human beings had not been allowed to starve, and after the march began
towards the mountains there was less and less noise in that camp night
after night.
There was no help for it; the ponies ate the grass up at the spring, and
then one of them had to be eaten, while the warriors rode all around the
neighborhood vainly hunting for something better and not so expensive.
They did secure a few rabbits and sage-hens and one small antelope, but
all the signs of the times grew blacker and blacker, and it was about as
well to kill and eat the remaining ponies as to let them die of
starvation. A sort of apathy seemed to fall upon everybody, old and
young, and the warriors hardly felt like doing any more hunting. Now at
last they sat down to starve, without a dog or pony left, and with no
prospect that game of any kind would come into camp to be killed. It is
a curious fact, but whole bands of Indians, and sometimes whole tribes,
get into precisely that sort of scrape almost every year. Now it is one
band, and now it is another, and there would be vastly more of it if it
were not for the United States Government.
There was nothing droll, nothing funny, nothing that was not savagely
sad, about the Nez Percés' camp that September morning. Every member of
the band, except two, was loafing around the lodges hopelessly and
helplessly doing nothing, and miserably giving the matter up.
CHAPTER II
A YOUNG HERO
Away from the camp a long mile, and down in the edge of the dry, hot,
desolate plain, there was a wide spread of sage-bushes. They were larger
than usual, because of having ordinarily a better supply of water sent
them from the mountains than if they had settled further out. In among
such growths are apt to be found sage-hens and rabbits, and sometimes
antelopes, but the warriors had decided that they had hunted out all of
the game that had been there, and had given the bushes up. Two of the
members of the band who were not warriors had not arrived at the same
conclusion, and both of these were among the "sage-brush" that morning.
The first had been greatly missed among the lodges, and had been much
hunted for and shouted after, for he was the largest and most
intelligent dog ever owned by that band. He was also about the ugliest
ever owned by anybody, and his misfortunes had earned for him the name
of One-eye. He could see more with the eye he had left--and it was his
right--than any other animal they had ever had, or than most of the
warriors. He saw what became of the other dogs, for instance, and at
once acquired a habit of not coming when an Indian called for him. He
kept his eye about him all day, and was careful as to where he lay down.
Just about the time when the ponies began to go into the camp-kettles he
was a dog hard to find, although he managed to steal pony-bones and
carry them away into the sage-brush. Perhaps it was for this reason that
he was in even better condition than common that morning. He had no
signs of famine about him, and he lay beside what was left of a
jackass-rabbit, which he had managed to add to his stock of plunder.
One-eye was a dog of uncommon sagacity; he had taken a look at the camp
just before sunrise, and had confirmed his convictions that it was a bad
place for him. He had been to the spring for water, drinking enough to
last him a good while, and then he had made a race against time for the
nearest bushes. He lay now with his sharp-pointed, wolfish ears pricked
forward, listening to the tokens of another presence besides his own.
Somebody else was there, but not in bodily condition to have made much
of a race after One-eye. It was a well-grown boy of about fifteen years,
and One-eye at once recognized him as his own particular master, but he
was a very forlorn-looking boy. He wore no clothing, except the
deer-skin "clout" that covered him from above his hips to the middle of
his thighs. He carried a light lance in one hand and a bow in the
other, and there were arrows in the quiver slung over his shoulder. A
good butcher-knife hung in its case by the thong around his waist, and
he was evidently out on a hunting expedition. He was the one being,
except One-eye, remaining in that band of Nez Percés, with life and
energy enough to try and do something. He did not look as if he could do
much. He was the son of the old chief in command of the band, but it was
two whole days since he had eaten anything, and he had a faded, worn,
drawn, hungry appearance, until you came to his black, brilliant eyes.
These had an unusual fire in them, and glanced quickly, restlessly,
piercingly in all directions. He might have been even good-looking if he
had been well fed and well dressed, and he was tall and strongly built.
Just such Indian boys grow up into the chiefs and leaders who make
themselves famous, and get their exploits into the newspapers, but as
yet this particular boy had not managed to earn for himself any name at
all. Every Indian has to do something notable or have something
memorable occur to him before his tribe gives him the honor of a
distinguishing name. One-eye knew him, and knew that he was hungry and
in trouble, but had no name for him except that he suggested a danger of
the camp-kettle.
There could be no doubt about that boy's pluck and ambition, and he was
a master for any dog to have been proud of as he resolutely and
stealthily searched the sage-bushes. He found nothing, up to the moment
when he came out into a small bit of open space, and then he suddenly
stopped, for there was something facing him under the opposite bushes.
"Ugh! One-eye."
A low whine replied to him, and a wag of a dog's tail was added, but a
watch was kept upon any motion he might make with his bow or lance.
"Ugh! no. Not kill him," remarked the boy, after almost a minute of
profound thinking. "Eat him? No dog then. All old fools. No dog hunt
with. No pony. Starve. Keep One-eye. Try for rabbits."
He called repeatedly, but his old acquaintance refused to come near him,
whining a little but receding as the boy advanced.
"Ugh! knows too much."
It was a matter to lessen the value of One-eye that he understood his
own interests, and his master ceased, wearily, his efforts to entice
him. He pushed on through the bushes, but now he was instantly aware
that One-eye was searching them with him, keeping at a safe distance,
but performing regular hunter's duty. He even scared up a solitary
sage-hen, but she did not fly within range of bow and arrow. She was an
encouragement, however, and so were the remains of the rabbit to which
One-eye managed to pilot the way. They seemed like a promise of better
things to come, and One-eye stood over them for a moment wagging his
tail, as much as to say,
"There; take that and let me up!"
The boy picked up the rabbit and said several things to the dog in a
clear, musical voice. He spoke the guttural, Nez Percé dialect, which is
one of the most difficult in the world, and One-eye seemed almost to
understand him--and yet there are white boys of fifteen who stumble
dreadfully over such easy tongues as Greek and Latin.
The boy and dog seemed to be on better terms after that, and went on
through the sage-brush towards where a straggling line of mesquite
scrubs marked the plain. The dog was ranging the bushes right and left,
while the boy slowly followed the narrow lane of an old, hard-beaten
"buffalo path," with an arrow on the string, ready for anything that
might turn up. They were nearly out of the mesquites when One-eye
uttered a quick, sharp, low-voiced whine, which his master seemed to
understand. It is not every dog that can whine in the Nez Percé dialect,
but the boy at once dropped upon his hands and knees and crept silently
forward. He had been warned that something was the matter, and his
natural instinct was to hide until he should discover what it might be.
Again the dog whimpered, and the boy knew that he was hidden ahead and
beyond him. He crawled out of the trail and made his way under and
through the bushes. He made no more sound or disturbance than a snake
would have caused in doing the same thing, and in half a minute more he
was peering out into the open country.
"Ugh! buffalo!"
His brilliant eyes served him well. Only an Indian or a dog would have
rightly read the meaning of some very minute variations in the brown
crest of a roll of the prairie, far away to the eastward. Only the
keenest vision could have detected the fact that there was a movement in
the low, dull line of desolation. Back shrank the boy, under the bushes
at the side of the trail, and One-eye now had enough of restored
confidence to come and crouch beside him. In a few minutes more the
spots were noticeably larger, and it was plain that the buffalo were
approaching and not receding. At another time and under different
circumstances, even an Indian might have been unwise, and have tried to
creep out and meet them, but the weakness of semistarvation brought with
it a most prudent suggestion. It was manifestly better to lie still and
let them come, so long as they were coming. There was no sort of fatigue
in such a style of hunting, but there was a vast deal of excitement. It
was a strain on any nerves, especially hungry ones, to lie still while
those two great shaggy shapes came slowly out upon the ridge. They did
not pause for an instant, and there was no grass around them to give
them an excuse for lingering. They were on their way after some, and
some water, undoubtedly, and perhaps they knew a reason why there should
be an ancient buffalo-trail in that direction, trodden by generation
after generation of their grass-eating race. The boy was a born hunter,
and knew that he was lurking in the right place, and he drew back
farther and under deeper and more perfect cover, hardly seeming to
breathe. One-eye did the same, had almost looked as if he wanted to put
his paw over his mouth as he panted. On came the two bisons, and it was
apparent soon that no more were following them.
"Bull--cow," muttered the boy. "Get both. Laugh at old men then. Have
name!"
His black eyes flashed as he put his best arrow on the string and
flattened himself upon the dry, hot earth. Nearer and nearer drew the
gigantic game, and with steady, lumbering pace they followed the old
trail. It was a breathless piece of business, but it was over at last.
The bull was in front, and he was a splendid-looking old fellow,
although somewhat thin in flesh. Neither he nor his companion seemed to
have smelled or dreamed of danger, and they walked straight into it. The
moment for action had come, and the boy's body rose a little, with a
swift, pliant, graceful motion. With all the strength starvation had
left in him he drew his arrow to the head. In another second it was
buried to its very feathers in the broad breast of the buffalo bull, and
the great animal stumbled forward upon his knees, pierced through the
heart. The young hunter had known well the precise spot to aim at, and
he had made a perfect shot. The cow halted for a moment, as if in
amazement, and then charged forward along the trail. That moment had
given the boy enough time to put another arrow on the string, and as she
passed him he drove it into her just behind the shoulder, well and
vigorously. Once more he had given a deadly wound, and now he caught up
his lance. There was little need of it, but he could not be sure of
that, and so, as the bull staggered to his feet in his death-struggle,
he received a terrific thrust in the side and went down again. It was a
complete victory, so far as the bull was concerned, and One-eye had
darted away upon the path of the wounded cow.
"Ugh! got both!" exclaimed the boy. "Have name now."
CHAPTER III
A BRAVE NAME
One-eye followed the arrow-stricken cow, and he ran well. So did the
cow, and she did not turn to the right or left from the old buffalo
trail. There was but one road for either the trail or the cow or the
dog, for the very formation of the land led them all into the mountains
through the nook by the spring, and so by and by through the camp of the
starving Nez Percés. On she went until, right in the middle of the camp
and among the lodges, she stumbled and fell, and One-eye had her by the
throat.
It was time for somebody to wake up and do something, and a
wiry-looking, undersized, lean-ribbed old warrior, with an immense head,
whose bow and arrows had been hanging near him, at once rushed forward
and began to make a sort of pin-cushion of that cow. He twanged arrow
after arrow into her, yelling ferociously, and was just turning away to
get his lance when a robust squaw, who had not been made very thin even
by starvation, caught him by the arm, screeching,
"Dead five times! What for kill any more?"
She held up a plump hand as she spoke, and spread her brown fingers
almost against his nose. There was no denying it, but the victorious
hunter at once struck an attitude and exclaimed,
"No starve now, Big Tongue!"
He had saved the whole band from ruin and he went on to say as much,
while the warriors and squaws and smaller Indians crowded around the
game so wonderfully brought within a few yards of their kettles. It was
a grand occasion, and the Big Tongue was entitled to the everlasting
gratitude of his nation quite as much as are a great many white
statesmen and kings and generals who claim and in a manner get it. All
went well with him until a gray-headed old warrior, who was examining
the several arrows projecting from the side of the dead bison, came to
one over which he paused thoughtfully. Then he raised his head, put his
hand to his mouth, and sent forth a wild whoop of delight. He drew out
the arrow with one sharp tug and held it up to the gaze of all.
"Not Big Tongue. Boy!" For he was the father of the young hero who had
faithfully stood up against hunger and despair and had gone for game to
the very last. He was a proud old chief and father that day, and all
that was left for the Big Tongue was to recover his own arrows as fast
as he could for future use, while the squaws cut up the cow. They did it
with a haste and skill quite remarkable, considering how nearly dead
they all were. The prospect of a good dinner seemed to put new life into
them, and they plied their knives in half a dozen places at the same
time.
One-eye sat down and howled for a moment, and then started off upon the
trail by which he had come.
"Boy!" shouted the old chief. "All come. See what."
Several braves and nearly all the other boys, one squaw and four
half-grown girls at once followed him as he pursued the retreating form
of One-eye. It was quite a procession, but some of its members staggered
a little in their walk, and there was no running. Even the excitement of
the moment could get no more than a rapid stride out of the old chief
himself. He was well in advance of all others, and at the edge of the
expanse of sage-brush in which One-eye disappeared he was compelled to
pause for breath. Before it had fully come to him he needed it for
another whoop of delight.
Along the path in front of him, erect and proud, but using the shaft of
his lance as a walking-stick, came his own triumphant boy hunter. Not
one word did the youngster utter, but he silently turned in his tracks,
beckoning his father to follow.
It was but a few minutes after that and they stood together in front of
the dead bull bison. The boy pointed at the arrow almost buried in the
shaggy chest, and then he sat down; hunger and fatigue and excitement
had done their work upon him, and he could keep his feet no longer. He
even permitted One-eye to lick his hands and face in a way no Indian dog
is in the habit of doing. Other warriors came crowding around the great
trophy, and the old chief waited while they examined all and made their
remarks. They were needed as witnesses of the exact state of affairs,
and they all testified that this arrow, like the other, had been
wonderfully well driven. The old chief sat down before the bull and
slowly pulled out the weapon. He looked at it, held it up, streaming
with the blood of the animal it had brought down, and said:
"Long Bear is a great chief. Great brave. Tell all people the young
chief Two ARROWS. Boy got a name. Whoop!"
The youngster was on his feet in a moment, and One-eye gave a sharp,
fierce bark, as if he also was aware that something great had happened
and that he had a share in it. It was glory enough for one day, and the
next duty on hand was to repair the damages of their long fasting. Two
Arrows and his dog walked proudly at the side of the Long Bear as he led
the way back to the camp. No longer a nameless boy, he was still only in
his apprenticeship; he was not yet a warrior, although almost to be
counted as a "brave," as his title indicated. It would yet be a long
time before he could be permitted to go upon any war-path, however he
might be assured of a good pony when there should be hunting to be done.
There had been all along an abundance of firewood, of fallen trees and
dead mesquite-bushes, in the neighborhood of the camp, and there were
fires burning in front of several lodges before the remainder of the
good news came in. The cow had been thoroughly cut up, but the stern
requirements of Indian law in such cases called for the presence of the
chief and the leading warriors to divide and give out for use. Anything
like theft or overreaching would have been visited with the sharp wrath
of some very hungry men. The Big Tongue had seated himself in front of
the "hump" and some other choice morsels, waiting the expected decision
that they belonged to him. He also explained to all who could not help
hearing him how surely that cow could have broken through the camp and
escaped into the mountains if it had not been for him, until the same
plump squaw pointed at the hump and ribs before him, remarking,
cheerfully,
"Go get arrow. Kill him again. Need some more. Boy kill him when he
stood up."
There was not strength left in the camp for a laugh, but the Big Tongue
seemed to have wearied of the conversation. He looked wearier afterwards
when the hump was unanimously assigned to the old chief's own lodge,
that Two Arrows might eat his share of it. Indian justice is a pretty
fair article when it can be had at home, not interfered with by any kind
of white man. The division was made to the entire satisfaction of
everybody, after all, for the Big Tongue deserved and was awarded due
credit and pay for his promptness. If the buffalo had not already been
killed by somebody else, perhaps he might have killed it, and there was
a good deal in that. He and his family had a very much encouraged and
cheerful set of brown faces as they gathered around their fire and began
to broil bits of meat over it.
One fashion was absolutely without an exception, leaving out of the
question the smaller pappooses: not one man, woman, or child but was
diligently working away at a slice of raw meat, whatever else they were
doing or trying to do. It was no time to wait for cookery, and it was
wonderful what an enlivening effect the raw meat seemed to have.
Indian etiquette required that Two Arrows should sit down before his
father's lodge and patiently wait until his "token" should be given him.
His first slice of meat was duly broiled by his mother, and handed him
by his father, and he ate it in dignified silence. It was the proudest
hour of his whole life thus far, and he well knew that the story would
spread through the Nez Percé nation and lead the old men of it to expect
great things of him: it was a beginning of fame, and it kindled in him
a tremendous fever for more. His ambition grew and grew as his appetite
went down, and his strength began to come back to him.
It was a grand feast, and it was not long before there were braves and
squaws ready to go and cut up the bull and bring every ounce of him to
camp. Starvation had been defeated, and all that happiness had been
earned by "Two Arrows."
CHAPTER IV
THE MINING EXPEDITION
The place away out upon the rolling plain, at which the unlucky
hunting-camp of the Nez Percé band had been pitched when the locusts
visited them, was occupied again a few days after they left it. The
new-comers were not Indians of any tribe but genuine white men, with an
uncommonly good outfit for a small one. They were one of the hundreds of
mining and exploring expeditions which every year set out for one range
of mountains or another to try and find what there is in them. They are
all sure to find a good deal of hard work, privation and danger, and
some of them discover mines of gold and silver.
This expedition consisted of two very strongly built but not heavy
wagons, with canvas-covered tilts, and each drawn by four large mules.
What was in the wagons except the drivers could only be guessed at, but
riding at the side or ahead or behind them as they came towards the
camping-place were six men and a boy. There were several spare horses
and mules, and the whole affair looked as if it had cost a good deal of
money. It costs a great deal to bring up eight men and a boy so that
these may be fairly included, but there were wide variations in the
external garnishing of the riders and drivers.
They had all been guided to that spot, partly by the general aim of
their undertaking, partly by the trail they were following, and a good
deal by a tall old fellow with a Roman nose and a long, muddy yellow
beard, who rode in front upon a raw-boned, Roman-nosed sorrel mare, with
an uncommon allowance of tail. When they reached that camping-ground it
was not late in the afternoon, but it was not well to go on past a deep
pool of water, surrounded by willows and cottonwood-trees, however
little grass there was to be had in the neighborhood. They had found
water and grass getting scarcer and scarcer for two or three days, and
there was quite enough in the look of things to make men thoughtful.
They knew nothing about the Nez Percés and the grasshoppers and the
wicked old mule, but the tall man in front only looked around for one
moment before he exclaimed,
"I'd call it--Been some kind of Injins here lately. No game, I reckon,
or they'd ha' stayed."
"No kind of game'd stay long in such a burned-up country as this is,"
added a squarely made, gray-headed man who rode up alongside of him.
"We've nothing to do but to push on. We must get out of this or we'll
lose our whole outfit."
"Sure as shootin'! I move we just unhitch long enough for a feed and a
good drink, and lay in what water we can carry, and go on all night.
There's a good moon to travel by, and it'll be cooler work for the
critters."
"It's our best hold. Sile, don't you gallop that horse of yours one rod.
There's work enough before him. Save him up."
"All right, father. But isn't this the camp? He can rest now."
"No he can't, nor you either. It's an all-night job."
Sile was not gray-headed. He was very nearly red-headed. Still, he
looked enough like his father in several ways. He was broadly and
heavily built, strong and hearty, with something in his merry, freckled
face which seemed to indicate a very good opinion of himself. Boys of
fourteen, or thereabout, who can ride and shoot, and who have travelled
a little, are apt to get that kind of expression, and it never tells
lies about them.
Sile's horse was a roan, and looked like a fast one under a light weight
like his. Just large enough not to be called "ponyish," and with signs
of high spirit. The moment the youngster sprang from the saddle and
began to remove it it became manifest that there was a good
understanding between horse and boy. Any intelligent animal is inclined
to make a pet of its master if it has a fair chance.
"Now, Hip, there isn't any grass, but you can make believe. I'll bring a
nose-bag as soon as you've cooled off and have had a drink of water."
He was as good as his word, and there were oats in the nose-bag when he
brought it, and Hip shortly left it empty, but in less than two hours
from that time the two tilted wagons were once more moving steadily
onward towards the West and the mountains.
There had been a hearty supper cooked and eaten, and there was not a
human being in the party who seemed much the worse for fatigue. The
spare horses and mules had taken the places of the first lot in harness,
and it was plain that there was plenty of working power remaining, but
there was a sort of serious air about the whole matter. The sun set
after a while, and still, with occasional brief rests, the expedition
pushed forward. It was a point to be noted that it travelled about twice
as fast as the band of Nez Percés had been able to do after they had
lost their ponies. It was not hampered by any heavily burdened
foot-passengers. The moon arose, and now Sile was riding on in front
with the muddy-bearded veteran.
"Pine," said he, "s'pose we don't come to grass and water?"
"Most likely we will before mornin', or before noon anyhow. If we
don't, we must go on till we do."
"Kill all the mules?"
"They'll all die if we don't, sure's my name's Pine--Yellow Pine."
"They can't stand it--"
"They can stand anything but starvation. Did you ever try giving up
water?"
"No; did you?"
"Well, I did. I was glad to give up giving it up after a few days. It's
the queerest feeling you ever had."
"How'd it happen?"
"I don't feel like tellin' about it jest now. There's too good a chance
for tryin' it again to suit me."
"Is that so? Pine, do you know, I wish you'd tell me how they came to
call you Yellow Pine."
The fear of either thirst or hunger had plainly not yet fallen upon
Sile, or he would not have asked that question just then. It sounded so
much like fourteen years old and recklessness that the great, gaunt man
turned in his saddle and looked at him.
"I'd call it--Well, now, you're a customer. Some reckon it's my
complexion, and I am turned kind o' yaller, but it ain't. It's my own
name."
"How'd you get it, anyway?"
"How? Well, my father was just like me; he was a wise man. He named me
after his brother, my uncle Ogden, and after Colonel Yell, that was
killed in the Mexican war. So I'm Yell O. Pine, and nobody but you ever
cared how it kem so."
Sile was satisfied as to that one point, but there did not seem to be
anything else on that prairie about which he was satisfied, and at last
his companion remarked to him,
"Now look here, Sile Parks, you go back and tell the judge, if I've got
to answer questions for you all night, he'll hev to raise my wages. I'm
thirsty with it now, and there's no water to spare."
Sile was in no wise disconcerted, but rode back to the main body in
excellent spirits. It was the first real danger of any sort that the
expedition had encountered, and there was a keen excitement in it. He
had read of such things, and now he was in one without the least idea in
the world but what everything would come out all right, just as it does
in a novel. Before midnight he had asked every other human being around
him all the questions he could think of, and had dismounted four times
to examine the grass at the wayside and see if it were of any better
quality. Each time he was compelled to mount again and ride on to his
father, "Chips."
When bunch-grass gets to be so dry that it will crumble in the fingers
it ceases to be of any use except to carry a prairie-fire in a great
hurry. It will do that wonderfully, but it will not do to feed animals
on, and it was needful to have something better.
When a halt was called, at about twelve o'clock, and a rest of two hours
was decided on, the barrels of water in the wagons were drawn upon for
only a moderate ration all around, and the animals plainly testified
their eagerness for more. They were not at all distressed as yet, but
they would have been if they had done that amount of work under
sunshine. When the moment for again setting out arrived and the word was
given, Judge Parks inquired,
"Pine, where is Sile?"
"Where? I'd call it--There he is on his blanket, sound asleep. I'll
shake him up."
"Do, while I put the saddle on his horse. Guess he's tired a little."
A sharp shake of Sile's shoulder had to be followed by another, and then
a sleepy voice responded,
"Water? Why, Pine, there's a whole lake of it. Was you ever at sea?"
"Sea be hanged! Git up; it's time to travel."
"Ah, halloo! I'm ready. I dreamed we'd got there. Riding so much makes
me sleepy."
He was quickly in the saddle again, and they went forward; but there
were long faces among them at about breakfast-time that morning. They
were halted by some clumps of sickly willows, and Yellow Pine said,
mournfully,
"Yer's where the redskins made their next camp. They and their critters
trod the pool down to nothin' and let the sun in onto it, and it's as
dry as a bone. We're in for a hard time and no mistake."
CHAPTER V
A VERY OLD TRAIL
During all that was left of that happy day in the Nez Percé camp there
was an immense amount of broiling and boiling done. Whoever left the
great business of eating enough and went and sat down or lay down got up
again after a while and did some more remarkable eating. All the life of
an Indian trains him for that kind of thing, for he goes on in a sort of
continual vibration from feast to famine.
All the other boys in camp were as hungry as Two Arrows, and as their
hunger went down their envy of him went up; he had suddenly stepped
ahead of them and had become an older boy in a moment. It was very much
as if a boy of his age in the "settlements" had waked up, some fine
morning, with a pair of mustaches and a military title, uniform and all.
Two Arrows was entitled to strut a little, and so was One-eye, but for
some reason neither of them was inclined to anything but eating and
lying down. One-eye may have felt lonely, for he found himself the only
dog in all that camp, and he knew very well what had become of the dogs
he used to know: they had gone to the famine, and there had been no
sort of funeral ceremonies, and now there could be no kind of neighborly
quarrel over bones any more. There was a reason, why One-eye should
attach himself more closely than ever to his master and follow his every
movement. They had killed two buffaloes in company, and there was no
telling what they might or might not yet do if they kept together.
Two Arrows found the effects of his long fasting rapidly passing away,
but he was like everybody else and needed a big sleep. One-eye had the
only eye that did any watching all that night, and nobody but the fat
squaw was up very early next morning. Her next company was the Big
Tongue, and he at once began to talk about the game he intended to kill,
now he had had something to eat. Two Arrows might not have been the next
riser if it had not been for a friendly tug from One-eye, but the moment
he was awake he knew that he was hungry again. He was hungry, but he was
silent, and it was plain that he was thinking about something uncommonly
interesting. He stood in front of his father's lodge, waiting for the
breakfast that was now sure to come, when a light hand was laid upon his
arm and a soft musical voice exclaimed, triumphantly,
"Two Arrows! Name!"
"Ugh," said he. "Na-tee-kah."
He hardly looked around, but the pleasantest face in all that band was
smiling upon him. It bore a strong resemblance to his own, and belonged
to an Indian girl a year or so younger than himself. She was well grown,
slender, and graceful, and had a pair of eyes as brilliant as his, but a
great deal more gentle and kindly in their expression. They lacked the
restless, searching, eager look, and his, indeed were quieter than they
had been the day before.
"Got plenty to eat now," she said. "Not starve to death any more."
"Eat all up," replied he. "Fool! Starve again, pretty soon."
"No, Long Bear and old men say, keep all there is left. Work to-day. Dry
meat. Go hunting somewhere else. Not stay here."
There was a little more talk that indicated a very fair degree of
affection between the brother and sister, and then Two Arrows said to
her,
"Keep tongue very still. Come."
She followed him to the lower edge of the camp, and he silently pointed
her to the place where the old buffalo trail came in.
"Great many make that. Long time. All know why."
"The cow came in there."
"Ugh! now come."
She followed him now to the upper end of the camp, and he pointed again
to the trail, deeply and plainly made, going on into the gorges of the
mountains.
"Buffalo go that way; Two Arrows follow. Say no word. Not find him
pretty soon."
That was the meaning of all his thoughtfulness. He meant to set off on a
hunt of his own planning, without asking permission of anybody. Two days
earlier he would not have dreamed of such a piece of insubordination.
Now he had won his right to do that very thing, and he meant to take
advantage of it instantly. All the young ambition in him had been
stirred to the boiling point, and his only remaining anxiety was to get
a good supply of provisions and get out of the camp without being seen
by anybody. He could look out for his weapons, including several of his
father's best arrows, and Na-tee-kah at once promised to steal for him
all the meat he wanted. She went right into his plan with the most
sisterly devotion, and her eyes looked more and more like his when she
next joined her mother and the other squaws at their camp-fire. There
was no doubt but what her brother would have his marching rations
supplied well, and of the best that was to be had.
There was no need for Two Arrows to steal from Long Bear. What between
pride and buffalo meat the old chief was ready to give or rather lend
him anything, and he deemed it his heroic son's day to parade and show
off. He was entitled to do so with the best weapons in his father's
collection. The day would surely come when he would be allowed to paint
himself and do a great many other things belonging to full-grown braves
and warriors. It was even lawful for him to wear a patch or two of paint
now, and Na-tee-kah helped him to put it on. If he had been a white boy
with his first standing-collar, he could not have been more particular,
and every other boy in camp had something to say to the others about the
fit of that vermilion.
It was a day of drying and smoking meat, and of eating as much as the
older men permitted, and everybody wore an aspect of extreme good-humor
except One-eye and his master. The dog and the boy alike kept away from
the camp-fires and from all grown-up Indians. Towards the middle of the
afternoon, Na-tee-kah slipped quietly out at the upper end of the camp,
carrying her own buckskin sack nearly full of something, and nobody
thought of asking her what there might be in it. She had not been gone
many minutes before anybody loafing at that end of the camp might have
seen her brother was following her. He had been standing near the spring
for some time, in full rig, for the other boys to admire him, and now he
walked dignifiedly away as if he were weary of being looked at. Half a
mile farther up the rugged valley he caught up with Na-tee-kah, and she
returned to camp without her bead-worked sack. There was nothing at all
noticeable in the whole affair, unless some suspicious person had been
closely watching them. It was after sunset before there was any special
inquiry for Two Arrows, and it was dark before Na-tee-kah expressed her
belief that he had "gone hunt." She replied freely to every question
asked her, well knowing that there would be no pursuit, but she was more
than a little relieved when the old chief, instead of getting angry
about it, swelled up proudly and remarked,
"Two Arrows! young brave. All like father, some day. Kill more buffalo."
Then Na-tee-kah felt courage to speak about the trail and her brother's
reasoning as to where it might lead to. She had her ears boxed for that,
as it had a sound of giving advice to her elders, but it was not long
before her father gravely informed a circle of the warriors and braves
that the path pointed out by the buffalo cow was the one by which they
must seek for more like her. It was very easy to convince them that they
could do nothing upon the dry, sunburnt plains, or by staying to starve
again in that camp. The objection made by Big Tongue that nobody knew
where that old trail might carry them was met by Long Bear conclusively.
He picked up a dry pony-bone that lay on the ground and held it out to
Big Tongue.
"All other trail go this way. Know all about it. Been there."
It was enough. It was better to follow an unknown trail than to starve,
and it was not long before it leaked out that Two Arrows was believed to
have gone ahead of them on that very road.
Precisely how far he had gone nobody had any idea. They would hardly
have believed if he had sent back word, for he had travelled most
diligently. There were no longer any traces of starvation about him,
except that he carried no superfluous weight of flesh. He had load
enough, what with his provisions and his weapons, but he did not seem to
mind it. He tramped right along, with a steady, springy step, which told
a good deal of his desire to get as far away from camp as he could
before his absence should be discovered.
For a little distance he had found the trail rising gently with the
land. Then it turned to the left and went up and over a rocky hill, and
then it turned to the right again, and just about sunset it looked for
all the world as if it were running right into the side of a great
precipice of the mountain range. The light of the sinking sun fell
clearly and brightly upon the grand masses of quartz and granite rocks,
and showed him the very point where the pathway seemed to end. It looked
so, but Two Arrows knew that you cannot cut off the end of a buffalo
path in that way, and he pushed on, every moment finding the way steeper
and more winding. He could not make any "short cuts" over such ground
as that, and every Indian boy knows a fact which the white engineers of
the Pacific Railway found out for themselves--that is, that a herd of
buffaloes will always find the best passes through mountain ranges, and
then they will go over them by the best and easiest grades. Only by
bridging a chasm, or blasting rocks, or by much digging, did the railway
men ever improve upon the paths pointed out by the bisons.
Two Arrows had carefully marked his point, and just as the last rays of
daylight were leaving him he sat down to rest in the mouth of what was
little better than a wide "notch" in the side of the vast barrier.
"Ugh! pass," he said.
CHAPTER VI
A THIRSTY MARCH
That was a hard day's toil for the mining expedition. It was the second
day of feasting by the Nez Percés upon the game won by Two Arrows, but
there was no feasting done by Judge Parks and his men. Even Sile had no
more questions to ask, and at nightfall their scanty supply of water was
nearly gone. Every old watercourse and even "tow-heads" of dying bushes
that they came to did but each give them another disappointment. The
animals were holding out well, with frequent rests, for they had been
taken care of even at the expense of the human beings.
Just before sunset, as they were plodding wearily along, Yellow Pine
drew his rein, turned in his saddle, and pointed away across the plain
in advance and to the right of them, exclaiming,
"Redskins!"
There was no mistake about it. In a few minutes more a pretty long line
of pony-riders could be seen travelling steadily southward.
"Will they attack us, father?"
"I guess not. We are too strong, even if they were hostile."
"They won't make any muss," said Pine, confidently, as he again rode
forward. "There's only some two dozen on 'em, and it isn't a good time
for a fight."
It was evident that the two lines of travel, crossing each other at
right angles, would bring the white and red men pretty near each other,
and the latter even went out of their way to have it so. Sile all but
forgot how thirsty he was when the train approached the straggling array
of lances, and a bare-headed warrior rode out to meet Yellow Pine. The
Roman-nosed sorrel mare sniffed at the pony as if she would have
preferred a bucket of water, and the two riders held out their hands.
"How?" said Pine.
"Ugh! bad. No water. How?"
A significant motion of his hand towards his mouth accompanied the
response, and Pine made one like it. Then he pointed at the wagons, and
again towards the west, and made motions as if he were digging. The
Indian understood, and nodded and pointed at himself:
"Ugh! Kiowa."
He made a motion as if pulling a bow, pointed southward and pretended to
drink something, but when he turned his finger towards the west he shook
his head.
"How?" said Pine again, and the two shook hands and all the Kiowas rode
on as if they were in a hurry.
"That's a pretty bad report," said Pine to Judge Parks, and Sile
muttered to himself:
"Why, he hardly uttered a word."
"What does he say?" asked his father.
"Worst kind," said Pine. "He says they have been hunting northerly for
several weeks. Little game, and the drought driving it all away. He
doubts if we find any water between here and the mountains. Hopes to
reach it by to-morrow night in the direction he's taking. The rest of
his band are down there now."
"Did he say all that?" exclaimed Sile in amazement.
"You wasn't a-watchin' of him. I told him what I thought about it and
what we meant to do. Tell you what, my boy, if you're to meet many
redskins you've got to learn sign language. It beats words all holler."
"Well, I did see his hands and yours a-going."
"Yes, and his face and mine too, and elbows and legs. It's as easy as
fallin' off a log when you once get the hang of it."
"What do you think we had better do after that?" asked Judge Parks.
"Read our own signs. Push on for water till we get some. It can't be
more'n one day, now. I know just about where I am. Risk my life on it."
So they went forward, but that night had to be taken for rest and the
morning found men and horses in a terrible plight. Not one drop of
water had they left, and all they had been able to do for the horses and
mules had been to sponge their parched mouths. They had camped near some
trees and bushes, as usual, and it was just about daylight that Yellow
Pine came to wake up his employer.
"Look a' here, jedge. I was too much played out to find it last night,
but here it is. Come."
"Well, what is it?" asked the judge, a moment later.
Yellow Pine was pointing at a broad, deeply trodden, flinty looking rut
in the surface of the prairie.
"That's the old bufler path I follered last year, when I went into the
mountains, or I'm the worst sold man you ever saw. It led me jest to
where we all want to go, 'zackly as I told you."
"We'd better hitch up and follow it now, then."
"We had. It'll take us west on a bee-line, and it'll go to all the
chances for water there are."
The buffaloes could safely be trusted for that, and before the sun was
up the mining party was following the very path which had led the big
game within reach of Two Arrows and One-eye. It was less than two hours
afterwards, without anybody to carry a report of it to anybody else,
that the whole Nez Percé camp disappeared, and all its human occupants
also took the advice of the buffaloes. It was necessary to carry all the
meat they had, and all the pappooses, and a number of other things, and
so it had not been possible to take all the lodges with their
lodge-poles. Two of the smaller and lighter found bearers, but there
were not squaws enough for the rest, and a sort of hiding-place was made
for them among the rocks until they could be sent for. Indians on a
journey load their ponies first, then their squaws, then the boys, but
never a "brave" unless it is a matter of life and death. A warrior would
as soon work for a living as carry a burden. It never takes long to
break up an Indian hunting-camp, for there are no carpets or stoves or
beds or pianos, and the band of Long Bear was on its way after Two
Arrows and his dog in remarkably short order.
Judge Parks and his men and all his outfit would have travelled better
and more cheerfully if they could have set out from beside a good spring
of water. As it was, the best they could do was to dream of finding one
before they should try to sleep again.
"Father," said Sile, at about twelve o'clock, "are we to stop anywhere
for dinner? I'm getting husky."
"So is everybody. Imitate old Pine; he's chewing something."
"All the men have stopped chewing tobacco; they say it makes 'em
thirstier."
"Of course it does. Try a chip or a piece of leather or a bit of
meat--not salt meat."
"There isn't anything else."
"The less we eat the better, till we get something to drink."
"We'll all die, at this rate."
"Stand it through, my boy. I hope Pine is right about his trail and
where it leads to."
He seemed confident enough about it, at any rate, and he and his
Roman-nosed mare kept their place steadily at the head of the little
column. So he was always the first to examine a hole or a hollow and
look back and shake his head to let the rest know that it contained no
water.
The sun seemed to shine hotter and hotter, and not a living creature
made its appearance upon the dry and desolate plain. Away in the western
horizon, at last, some dim and cloud-like irregularities began to show
themselves, and Sile urged his weary horse to the side of his father,
pointing at them.
"Will there be some rain?" he asked, in a dry and husky whisper.
"My poor boy! are you so thirsty as that? Those are the mountains."
Sile's mind distinctly connected the idea of mountains with that of
water, and he took off his hat and swung it, vainly trying to hurrah.
"They're a long way off yet, but we can get there. Old Pine is right."
It was wonderfully good news, but every man had been allowed to gather
it for himself. Nobody cared to say an unnecessary word to anybody else.
It was impossible to tell the horses, and the poor brutes were suffering
painfully.
"I reckon they'll hold out," said Pine; "but they'll only jest do it.
We're making the tightest kind of a squeeze."
So they were, and it grew tighter and tighter as they went on. Sile
managed finally to get up to Yellow Pine in the advance, and whisper,
"Were you ever any thirstier than this in all your life?"
"Yes, sir! This isn't much. Wait till you know yer tongue's a-turnin' to
a dry sponge and there's coals of fire on the back of yer neck. Keep
your courage up, my boy."
Sile had done so. His father had said a good deal to him about the pluck
with which young Indians endured that sort of thing, and he had
determined to show "Indian blood," as if he had some in him. It was the
hardest kind of hard work, and it kept him all the while thinking of
rivers and lakes and ice and even lemonade. At last he saw a sage-hen,
and he said to Pine,
"Isn't that a sign of water?"
"Them things never drink," said Pine "When you come to eat 'em they need
to be b'iled twice. They're jest the driest bird there is. There's the
mountains, though."
"Oh dear me!" groaned Sile. "But they're getting bigger, and perhaps
we'll reach 'em some time."
CHAPTER VII
THE GREAT CAÑON
It was not yet dark when Two Arrows and One-eye halted at the mouth of
the pass. One-eye looked forward and whined, but his master looked back
and thought the matter over. He had travelled well and over some pretty
rough ground, but the trail had been wide and well marked. It was almost
like a road, so far as room went, but Two Arrows knew nothing of wheels,
neither did that trail. He was considering the curious fact that not a
man of his band knew that such a path existed or where it led to. It was
something to set his ambition on fire only to have discovered and
followed anything so new and remarkable. It was a deed for an old brave
rather than for a boy of fifteen. He needed rest, but when he again
turned and looked into the pass he at once arose and walked on.
"Dark soon. Maybe can't walk then. Do some more before that," said Two
Arrows.
He was in a spot worth looking at. Some old-time convulsion of nature
had cleft the mountain barrier at that place so that giant walls of rock
arose on either side of him for hundreds of feet, almost
perpendicularly. For some distance ahead the cleft was nearly straight,
and its gravelly bottom was from ten to thirty yards wide. There were
not many rocky fragments or bowlders, but it was evident that at some
seasons of the year torrents of water came pouring through that gorge to
keep it clean.
"When snow melts," muttered Two Arrows, "pretty bad place."
No doubt, or after any great storm or "cloud-burst" among the peaks
beyond; but all was dry as a bone now. It was sure to become dark early
in such a chasm as that, and there was no telling how much need there
might be for seeing the way. On went the young explorer until he came to
a point where the chasm suddenly widened. It was a gloomy sort of hollow
and littered with fragments of trees, drift-wood of old torrents.
"Camp," said Two Arrows to One-eye. "Make fire."
If a dog could use flint and steel, no doubt One-eye would have obeyed;
as it was, Two Arrows had to attend to that business for himself, and it
was not long before a great blazing fire of mountain pine was throwing
flashes of magnificent light upon the mighty precipices in all
directions. The gray granite stood out like shadows, and the white
quartz glittered marvellously, but the Nez Percé boy had no time to
admire them. He had his supper to cook and eat, and he had found some
water in a hollow of the rocks; no sunshine hot enough to dry it up had
ever found its way down there. Then drift-wood was gathered to keep some
sort of a blaze burning all night. There was no danger from human
enemies in that utter solitude, but there were wild beasts among the
mountains; night would be their prowling-time, and not one among them
would venture too near a fire.
Two Arrows was well entitled to a sound sleep, and he had one; when he
awoke, in the earliest gray of the next morning, the world was in fair
daylight everywhere outside of that deep crack in the mountains. He ate
heartily and at once pushed on, determined to have some fresh game
before night if possible. Such thoughts as he sent back to the Nez Percé
camp did not include the idea that it was already breaking up to follow
him; still less did he have any imagination of thirsty white people
toiling across a waterless plain along that buffalo trail.
He was in no danger of losing the way, for his path was walled in for
him. Towards midday it ceased to go up, up, up, and the chasm widened
into a great rocky cañon of wonderful ruggedness and beauty. Two Arrows
had been among the mountains before, in other ranges, and this seemed to
him very much like what he might have expected. Now, however, the trail
turned to the right and picked its way along the steep side of the
varying slopes. Here it was wider and there it was narrower, until it
came to a reach of natural roadway that even a bison must have hunted
for before he found it. Away up it went in zigzags, seeming to take
skilful advantage of every natural help it came to, and then it shot
along the mountain-side for a thousand feet, traversing a mere ledge,
where one formation of rock projected out below another and made a shelf
for it to go upon. If a man had fallen from that shelf he would have
gone down a tremendous depth upon jagged rocks at the bottom of the
cañon.
Two Arrows wasted no time in useless observations or admiration. Where
herd after herd of wild cattle had tramped before him he could surely
follow, and at the end of that ledge the road began to descend. The
descent was gradual, and uncommonly free from breakages. It led, before
a great while, once more to the bottom of the gorge. Several times Two
Arrows saw "big-horn" or Rocky Mountain sheep among the rocks above him,
far out of the reach of his arrows. He felt a longing for antelope
venison, but there was no use in trying to catch one of those fellows.
Hotter than anything else he felt the fever and fire of his ambition,
stirring him to push on and do more than he had ever heard of as done by
any other boy of his age among all the bands of his nation. It made him
walk fast and firmly in the bracing mountain air, and he drew his breath
somewhat quickly at times, when he thought of the wonderful things
which might be before him. He had no watch, but just as the sun stood
nearly over his head, or, rather, over the middle of the great gorge, he
could see that this was beginning to grow broader and not so steep. It
was promising to lead out into something, and One-eye dashed on ahead as
if to ascertain what it might be. Two Arrows stood still for a moment
and watched him, and then he started as if something had pricked him.
The dog was crouching and creeping as if he had his remaining eye upon
game of some sort or on danger. His master also crouched and crept,
slipping forward rapidly from rock to rock. In three minutes more he lay
beside One-eye, and they both had something worth while to look at. Not
more than three hundred yards beyond them, on the crest of a rocky ledge
that came out from the mountain-side like an abutment, stood a big-horn
antelope. He had seen One-eye and was looking at him. He may have been
studying whether or not it could be needful for an antelope away up
where he was to spring away any farther from a dog and an Indian boy. He
had better have been looking behind him and above him, for his real
danger was not in the quiver of Two Arrows; it was crouching upon a
higher fragment of the very ledge which held him, and it was preparing
for immediate action. It was a cougar, or American panther, of full
size, on the watch for antelopes, and now had crept almost within
springing distance. Two Arrows laid his hand upon the head of One-eye to
keep him silent, and watched breathlessly to see the end of that
hunting. Nearer and nearer crept the cougar, and still the big-horn was
absorbed in his study of matters down below. He stepped forward to the
very edge, and below him the rock came down with a perpendicular face of
a hundred feet. There was no danger that he would grow dizzy, but even
the cougar would have done wisely to have ascertained beforehand the
precise nature of the trap set for him. As it was, he gathered his lithe
and graceful form for his leap, every muscle quivering with eagerness,
and he put all his strength into one great, splendid bound. It was as
sure as a rifle-shot, and it landed him upon the shoulders of the
big-horn. He had seized his prize, but he had done too much: he had
fallen with a weight and force which sent him and his antelope
irresistibly over the rocky edge, and down, down, down they came
together with a great thud upon the granite below.
"Whoop!" The voice of Two Arrows ringing through the gorge was joined by
the fierce bark of One-eye as they sprang forward. An older warrior
might have waited to know the effect of that fall before he interfered
between a cougar and his game, but Two Arrows did not think of
hesitation. It was just as well. What between the blow of the cougar and
the force of the fall, the big-horn was dead. He had somewhat broken the
effect of the terrible shock upon his enemy by falling under him, but
even the tough body of the great "cat o' mountain" had not been made for
such plunges, and he lay on the rock stunned and temporarily disabled.
Whether it would, after all, have killed him, he was never to know, for,
just as he was staggering to his feet, a Nez Percé Indian boy charged
upon him with a long lance, while a large and ambitious dog rushed in
and seized him by the throat. He was taken at an advantage.
Thrust, thrust, thrust, in fiercely rapid succession, came the keen
blade of the lance, and One-eye bore down and throttled a brute that
could have killed four such dogs in anything like a fair fight.
It was tremendous hunting for a boy of fifteen. A cougar to bring down
his antelope for him, and a precipice to help him kill his cougar, and
only just enough work for his lance and dog to entitle him to the honor
of closing, single-handed, with one of the most dangerous of wild
animals. He had done that very thing, nevertheless, and was entitled to
all the credit of it. If he had waited to consider the matter, he might
have had a much harder fight for it. What was more, his energy and
enterprise and endurance had resulted in bringing him to the right place
at the right time, instead of somewhere else.
CHAPTER VIII
WATER! WATER!
By the time the band of Nez Percés was well on its way, the Big Tongue
had persuaded himself that the movement was in large part a following of
his own advice. He felt very free to say as much in the presence of
several squaws. He even ruffled up and looked large when Na-tee-kah
laughed and turned away her head. She was too young to say anything in
reply to a grown-up brave, but just behind her was the fat squaw, and
her tongue was habitually more at liberty.
"Kill cow same way," said she. "Two Arrows kill him first; then Big
Tongue. Great brave!"
Big Tongue turned upon her almost fiercely, exclaiming.
"Squaw no talk!"
"Big Tongue keep still. Squaw-boy beat him. Big Tongue shoot arrows into
dead cow. Ha-ha-pah-no not afraid of squaw-brave."
Ha-ha-pah-no had a tongue and a reputation for it, and the Big Tongue
did not threaten her any more. Too many squaws and girls joined in the
laugh against him. Perhaps the fact that Ha-ha-pah-no had a husband
over six feet high had something to do with it, and that Na-tee-kah was
the only daughter of Long Bear. It was not safe to quarrel overmuch with
either of them. They were almost as safe as a large dog is if he is
known to be quick-tempered. Nobody kicks him.
There was an attempt made at pretty fast travelling, for all the wise
warriors knew that the tramp across the mountains must be a hard one,
however good the trail might be, and there were a good many very sober
faces among them. They had lost their horses and their dogs, and now
they were leaving behind them a great many other things, and they felt
as if hard times had come. Starvation is a very severe school-master.
So, for that matter, is thirst, even if provisions are plentiful, and
Sile Parks learned a great lesson of endurance that day. His father had
not uttered a word of complaint. Yellow Pine had not murmured, and when
Sile said to him,
"All the men seem to stand it the very best kind," he had all but
contemptuously replied,
"Them? Why, every soul on 'em's an old mountain man. Not a greenhorn or
a tenderfoot among 'em. You won't catch one on 'em a whimperin', not if
they die for it."
So there were other men besides red Indians who were able to suffer and
be silent, and Sile tried hard to be that kind of man; but long before
sunset he felt as if he were choking.
The mountains to the westward loomed up larger and less cloudily as the
worn-out teams were urged forward. The trail pointed steadily towards
them, and Yellow Pine unhesitatingly asserted that they were on the
right track.
"No mistake about it, jedge. It ain't no common cross-prairie trail.
It's one of their old migration tracks. They've been a treadin' of it
sence the year one."
The "year one" was a good while ago, but a good deal of hard tramping,
by many bisons, year after year, had been required to make that ancient
cattle-path. No grass had grown upon it for nobody could guess how many
generations, and it was likely to be in the way of ploughing whenever
that plain should be turned into farming-land.
The greatest care was taken of the animals, those in the traces being
taken out and changed frequently, and at last all the riders dismounted
and led their horses. Yellow Pine every now and then went around and
examined to see how things were looking, and Sile went with him.
"They'll stan' it, every critter of 'em," he said, repeatedly. "They're
all good stock; good condition. I picked 'em out."
"Your mare is the ugliest in the lot," said Sile, recklessly.
"Best though. Out-walk, out-run, and out-starve any critter in the
outfit, 'cepting me."
"Can you out-travel a horse?"
"Course I can--most horses. I don't know 'bout the old mare. She can
out-travel anything. She's good tempered, too; knows just when it's the
right time to kick and break things. Oh but can't she tear, though!"
He looked at her affectionately, as if her very temper were one of her
virtues, and she glanced back at him, showing the whites of her eyes in
a way that indicated anything but a placid mind.
"She's always riley when she doesn't get plenty to drink," said Pine,
"but she hasn't kicked once in all this. Knows it isn't any fault of
mine. We'll git there, old lady. Don't you go off the handle."
Another hour and the mountains were very tall, and looked cool, and
seemed to promise all sorts of things.
"The mines we are after are in among 'em," said Judge Parks to his son.
"Our trip across the plains has been a quick one; all the quicker for
this push."
"Hope there'll be a good spring of water right in the edge of them,"
said Sile, but his voice was huskier than ever and he was struggling
against a feeling of faintness.
"Poor fellow!" said the judge to himself. "I mustn't say too much to
him. It's an awful time for me."
So it was, for every now and then the thought would come to him,
"What if, after all, we should not find water when we get there?"
The sun sank lower and lower, and now at last Yellow Pine stood still
and leaned against his mare, pointing forward.
"Jedge! Jedge--there they are!"
"What is it, Pine?"
The judge could hardly speak, and Sile had such a ringing in his ears
that he could hardly hear, but Yellow Pine gasped out,
"Them there mesquite scrubs. I was just a beginning to say to myself,
what if I'd mistook the lay of the land, and there they are. I went
through 'em last spring was a year ago. It's all right!"
The men tried hard to cheer, but it was of no manner of use. All they
could do was to plod on and drag their horses after them. The teams in
the wagons halted again and again, panting and laboring, and every
slight roll of the plain was a tremendous obstacle, but all was
overcome, inch by inch.
Yellow Pine had evidently felt his responsibility as guide more deeply
than he had been willing to confess. He led on now with his mouth open
and panting, for he had given his own last ration of water to Sile Parks
and was thirstier than the rest of them. So, for that matter, had Sile's
father, but some men suffer more from thirst than others and the judge
had held out remarkably. Just inside the range of mesquites Yellow Pine
stopped short.
"Bufler been killed here inside of two days," he exclaimed. "Must be
Indians nigh, somewhere. Keep an eye out, boys."
It was no time for any caution that included delay, and he walked on
like a man who knew exactly where he was, and all followed him, the men
cutting away the bushes here and there to let the wagons pass more
easily. On, on, until at last Yellow Pine reached the spring.
"Here it is," he said faintly, and then he lay down by it and began to
drink slowly, using his hand for a cup.
"Boys," said Judge Parks, "be careful how you drink too much at first.
Take it easy. Sponge the mouths of the horses and then let them have a
little at a time. Sile, my poor boy, come with me."
Sile was making a tremendous effort. He had been doing it all day. He
almost wanted to cry when he saw that spring of water. Then he wanted to
laugh, but his mouth was too dry for that. All he could do was to smile
in a sickly sort of way and take the cup his father held out to him.
There was only a little water in the bottom of it.
"Oh father, give me some more."
"Not yet, Sile. Sit right down and wait till you get the effect of that.
Hold it in your mouth before you swallow it. I don't mean to let you
kill yourself."
"Aha! But isn't it good? There isn't anything else quite so good as
water."
"That's a fact, Sile, but it's like a great many other good things, you
don't know the value of it until you've had to go without it."
A full hour was spent in getting men and animals ready to drink without
injury, and Yellow Pine at last declared, triumphantly,
"Jedge, we've won the riffle; we won't lose a hoof. All the men are
doing first-rate too. This 'ere's my old campin'-ground, but there's
been an Indian camp here since sun-up."
"How do you know that, Pine?"
"Found live fire. There hasn't been any dew on it to put it out. What's
more, they've gone on into the mountains. Hunting-party. We're all
right, jedge."
The mining expedition now kindled fires of its own, and something was
done in the way of getting supper. There was no grass, but the horses
and mules could attend fairly well to the contents of their nose-bags,
and the men paid them all manner of attention. Only a greenhorn is
careless of the comfort and welfare of his horse.
Sile drank well at last, under his father's direction, and then he felt
like eating something. After that it seemed to him as if the whole world
had only been made as a good place to sleep in. He did not care whether
the tents were pitched or not. All he wanted was a piece of ground large
enough to lie on, and a blanket, and he was ready to sleep as soundly
and silently as if he had been one of the mountains which raised their
shadowy heads into the light of the rising moon. He had been without
water for the first time in his life. He had stood it through
heroically, he had found a spring, and now he needed a long sleep.
CHAPTER IX
INTO A NEW WORLD
Two Arrows wiped the blood of the cougar from the blade of his lance. He
was glad it was a good lance. His father had traded a pony for it, as he
well knew, with a Mexican, years before that, and it was no ordinary
weapon. He had chosen it from among half a dozen, as the very thing with
which to do something uncommon, and now it had proved its value. He
almost felt an affection for that lance.
One-eye had lain down close to the dead body of the cougar, as if
watching him for any returning signs of life. If that great cat had
quivered, there was a dog ready to shake the quiver out of him.
"It's all good meat," said Two Arrows, "but what shall I do with it?"
There was but one answer to that question. He took off the skins of both
animals, cut them up as well as he could, carried all the meat he did
not need at once to a cool place among the rocks, piled stones over it
and left it. He had no ice-house, and that was the best he could do, but
he made a fire and ate plentifully of antelope venison, and of what the
Western men call "painter meat." It was hard for him to say which he
liked the best. Then he took a bit of charcoal and made his mark upon
the rocks where he buried his game. He was immensely proud of his right
to do that. He scored two very large and distinct arrows, heaped on some
more heavy stones, shouted to One-eye, and again pushed forward. His
exploring trip was already brimming full of glory and adventure, and he
was ready to fight all the cougars in the mountains. So was One-eye, for
he had had one of the biggest dinners he had ever eaten, and not another
dog on hand to dispute it with him. He seemed to be possessed with an
idea that that place must have more antelopes and mountain-cats in it,
and that he was likely to find some of them behind rocks. He was
doubtless right on the main point, but not a stone of the many he
smelled under turned him out a cougar or a big-horn. Hunting was over
for that day, and so much time had been consumed that Two Arrows felt
like running to make it up. He did but walk, however, and as the road
was now all the way downhill, like a bad man's life, he walked easily.
The great gorge widened until its broken walls stretched away to the
right and left, and the eager-hearted explorer came out from among the
scattered rocks at a point from which he could suddenly see a great
deal. Away beyond and below him spread such a scene as he could hardly
have hoped for, and yet which can be found in hundreds of places all
over the mountain country of the American continent. Just such scenes
are to be found among the Alps, the Andes, the Himalayas, and every
other similar group of rocky upheavals, but Two Arrows knew of no other
country than his own, the one his band of Nez Percés had hunted and
feasted and starved in.
It was a great, deep, grassy, well-wooded, well-watered valley, the very
home of game and a sure promise of all comfort to a hunter. How far it
might reach to the westward no eye could tell, for the prospect was
bounded by other mountains, and there were plain tokens that a
considerable stream ran through the middle of it.
"Much water, perhaps," said Two Arrows. "Must go somewhere. Find out
some day."
The idea of a river suggested the other idea that it could be followed
until an ambitious boy could ascertain where it went to. All that was
swallowed up at once by the immediate desire to get down upon that green
grass and among those trees. One-eye had seen the valley, but was
inclined to stick pretty closely at the side of his master. There were
only two of them, and they might need each other's help at any moment.
The road tramped by the bison herds did not wind much, as it went on
down towards the level ground, but it lazily picked out the easiest
slopes and turned the corners of the great rocks on good curves. As Two
Arrows and his faithful companion wound around one of these curves,
almost at the bottom of the long descent, they suddenly came upon a
discovery that startled them. Even the dog pricked up his ears and began
to growl, and Two Arrows stepped quickly back behind the rock. He had
never been in a white man's village, but he had seen a fort and a few
houses around it, and he had seen the houses of Mexican Indians and some
others, built of "adobe" or sunburnt brick. He was not, therefore, a
judge of such matters, and what he saw filled him with astonishment. He
was not exactly alarmed, for a house could not chase him, but he
exclaimed,
"Pale-face lodge. Good many. Very bad. What can he do now?"
He peered silently forth for several minutes, but not a human being was
in sight. There were no signs of life, no curling smoke, no barking
dogs, no cattle, nothing but scattered structures of stone. These must
have been put there by somebody, but it began to look as if whoever had
built them had gone to some other hunting-ground.
Two Arrows noted everything with eyes that grew more brilliant in their
swift and searching glances. There could hardly be any danger in such a
solitude as that, but the occasion required caution, and the young
"brave" made his advances from cover to cover as if there were eyes in
every stone of those houses. One-eye crept at his side with his head and
tail up, very much as if there had been game ahead. It was a curious
piece of business. The nearer they drew to the objects of their
curiosity the safer and lonelier became the appearance of all things.
Some of the stone walls had tumbled down, and not one of them had a roof
over it of any sort. That was nothing to Two Arrows. For all he knew
there were tribes of cunning and wicked pale-faces who built their
lodges without roofs. If the world contained anything cunning and wicked
and dangerous, in the mind of Two Arrows it was a pale-face. He had been
brought up to look upon a white man as a being to be watched, and as an
evil to be avoided or destroyed, as the case might be, and yet as a sort
of magician, capable of doing wonders, and of bringing the richest
presents in all the earth.
He now at last felt confidence and courage to actually crawl through an
opening of one of those walls and look around him. It was one great,
empty room, strewn with bits of stone, and growing thickly, here and
there, were grass and tall weeds.
"Nobody here for ever so long," had already been his conclusion, and he
was thoroughly satisfied of it now. He arose and walked around and
looked at things in that and every other house. Some of them had
windows so high up as to prove that they must have had two or even three
stories in some old time when people used them, but those were "signs"
that Two Arrows could not read. The main thing to him was that he was
still all alone and in perfect safety. If the wisest white man in the
world had been there with him, he could not have formed an idea by whom
those houses were constructed. Just such ruins have been found in many
places among the valleys of the western mountains, and all that learned
people can yet do is to guess how they came to be there. The houses did
not come up like so many mushrooms, and beyond that they have almost
nothing to say for themselves. Two Arrows had no further questions to
ask, and One-eye had searched nooks and corners with an assiduity which
had been duly rewarded: he had captured a fine, fat rabbit, and he
brought it to his master as a sort of token. No rabbit would have made a
home in a place infested by white men, for rabbits have the same idea of
them that Indians have and for somewhat similar reasons. The rabbits get
very little good from them, however, and the Indians a great deal--that
is, unless the rabbits live near a white man's farm and garden. In that
case they come up fully to the Indian standard and help themselves to
all they can get hold of.
Two Arrows picked up the rabbit and walked out to what had been the door
of that house. It was nearly sunset, and there could be no more
exploring done that day. He looked away off into the valley and saw
another token that he was alone in that part of it: no less than three
gangs of deer were feeding quietly between him and a bit of forest not
more than half a mile away.
Right past the group of old ruins ran a dancing brook of cool, pure
water from the mountains, and a better place to camp in could not have
been imagined. It was evidently safe to build a fire and cook the
rabbit, but for more perfect safety Two Arrows made his blaze on a spot
where some old walls prevented the light of it from being seen at too
great a distance. After his supper was eaten there came over him a
feeling that he had seen and done altogether too much for one boy in one
day. He had come out into a sort of new world through a cleft in the
mountains, and he did not know that precisely the same thing happens to
every boy in the world who makes up his mind to be something. The boys
who are contented not to be anything do not have much of a world to live
in, anyhow, poor fellows; they only hang around and eat and wear
clothes.
CHAPTER X
SILE'S POCKET
Na-tee-kah had all the load a girl of her size could comfortably carry
when she set out with her people. So had all the rest except the
dignified warriors. For that reason all the urging in the world could
not get out of that dispirited cavalcade one-half the speed attained by
Two Arrows and One-eye the previous evening. Na-tee-kah thought
continually of her pony, between thoughts of her daring brother and
wonderings of what he had done and seen. She knew very well that there
is nothing so disables a "plains Indian" as to dismount him. It is not
so bad as to break both his legs, but he is so accustomed, from
childhood, to use a horse's legs instead of his own that he is like a
man lost when he is set on foot. He has learned to hunt on horseback
mostly, and all his fighting has been done in the saddle. The old-time
Indians of the East and of Cooper's novels had hardly any horses, and in
their deep forests could not have used them to advantage. What the far
Western tribes did in those days nobody knows, but all the tribes which
have migrated out of the woods into the prairie country have become
"pony-men."
Na-tee-kah could not remember another time when she, daughter of a
chief, had been compelled to carry so much, even for a short distance.
She knew how to pack a pony capitally well, for that is one of the first
arts of Nez Percé house-keeping. When and where should they ever get
some more ponies? Her father was a renowned horse-thief, and so were
several others of the best warriors in the band, and there was hope in
that thought; still there is a double difficulty before a man who sets
out to steal horses without having one of his own to ride.
"Two Arrows will steal horses some day," she said to Ha-ha-pah-no,
confidently.
"Big chief: steal a heap. No boy any more. Big Tongue find a horse; say
he stole him. No brave. Pony come somehow."
Nobody else in that band could have guessed how the mind of Long Bear
himself was busy with plans concerning that very matter. He thought of
all the horses of all the tribes at any kind of difference with the Nez
Percés, and he thought of the white traders and their rich droves of
quadrupeds of all sorts. He had won his rank fairly, as his son was
likely to do after him, and he had a great deal of courage and ambition;
just at present, however, he was a dismounted horse-thief, and he felt
the disgrace of it even more than the inconvenience. It was a sad thing
to be afoot at his time of life, and he brooded over it like some great
white merchant who had suddenly failed in business. He feared that it
would take some time to set up that band again, without any four-footed
capital to begin on.
It was pleasant to find the trail so good, at all events, and before
dark they made out to reach the very spot where Two Arrows had camped.
They had been more than twice as long in getting there, but the first
brave who pushed on into the open space found the dead embers of a fire
and began to study them. Not far behind him were Na-tee-kah and
Ha-ha-pah-no, and it was hard to say which of them was the first to
point at the black coals and ashes, and exclaim, "Two Arrows!"
The word was echoed from lip to lip until it came to Long Bear and his
wife. For a wonder he was walking beside her, which was as near as he
could come to carrying her load for her. She was only the step-mother of
Na-tee-kah and her brother, and had a pappoose of her own as part of her
burden, but she took her full share of the family pride when her husband
drew himself grimly up and shut off the strong temptation to "whoop."
"Young brave," he said to her with great calmness. "Great chief some
day. All like father. Same. Go steal pony pretty soon."
The camp was quickly made, and there was food for all in moderate
allowance. They were certain of resting in perfect security, and in the
morning they were as eager as Two Arrows had been to push on out of such
narrow quarters. Nothing happened to any of them until late in the day,
and then the whole band went suddenly into camp again.
The Big Tongue had become almost a silent Indian under the effects of
hard walking, but he had been stung again by remarks from Ha-ha-pah-no,
and he had gone ahead. He had not gone far enough to make him look
enterprising, but all at once the cañon fairly rang with a whoop he sent
back, to let the rest know he had found something. At the same moment
three great vultures, or buzzard-eagles, arose from a prize they had
found, and soared away. They were wonderfully wide-winged birds, and
each carried off a good dinner, for they had nearly finished the offal
left upon the ground by the carcasses of the cougar and the big-horn.
The Big Tongue pointed proudly at the discovery he had made, and was
about to say something, when he was once more overwhelmed. His whooping
had brought a swarm of the braves around him, but of course no squaws
had presumed to push in. It was for that very cause that the eyes of
Na-tee-kah had been busy among the rocks, and so she had discovered the
charcoal "token" scored upon one of them.
"Two Arrows!" she screamed, and in a moment more there were warriors
there, taking away the stones which covered the meat and the skins.
It was time now for Long Bear to do all the whooping there was in him.
His son had slain a cougar single-handed, and had killed a big-horn, and
here were the proofs of it. The whole band could at once have another
feast of fresh meat, provided by the young hero, for whom they were
indebted to the great Long Bear.
It was decided that they had travelled far enough for one day, but that
an early start should be made the next morning. That had also been an
interesting day at the camp by the spring.
The over-wearied pale-faces slept well, but Yellow Pine arose three
times to go around among the animals and see how they were doing. He had
them all fed and rubbed down most carefully in the morning. It was a
good thing to do, and when Sile Parks awoke and stretched himself, he
felt as if he also wanted to be fed and rubbed down. Almost everybody
else was already astir, and breakfast was soon ready for him.
Yellow Pine did a deal of exploring, before and after he breakfasted,
and Sile at once set out to imitate him. He asked some question or other
of every one he saw, and believed that he had learned a great deal. At
last he came to a heap of stones and bushes that seemed to him to have
been piled up remarkably.
"How could they ever have got there?" he said, as he began to pull upon
a bush with green leaves yet clinging to its twigs. In five minutes more
he knew where the Nez Percés had made their hasty "cache" for their
lodges and other treasures, and he went at once to report it to his
father and to Yellow Pine. The latter looked at Sile with positive
respect, and exclaimed,
"There now, jedge; that settles it. I know I'm right; them Indians had
lost their ponies. I couldn't find a hoof-mark on their trail this
morning; they dragged some lodge-poles along, though. I say, we must
leave their cache jest as we found it. We must foller right along, too,
or we'll run short of fodder. They've taken my old road. We needn't be
afraid of 'em, only we'd best keep a sharp lookout."
Horses and mules and all felt as if a day's rest would be as good as a
treat; but after all was said and done it was decided to keep moving.
The start made was not an early one, and there was work for all hands
here and there. The herds of bisons had not prepared that road for the
passage of wagon wheels, and it needed the axe in one place and the
crow-bar in another before the teams could pass. There was no sort of
danger that the Nez Percés would be caught up with by the mining-party,
and Yellow Pine seemed to breathe more freely at the end of every mile.
"No, jedge," he said; "we won't have to leave the outfit anywhere.
There'll be a heap of hard work at some spots, but we can make our way
through, and we can come and go by this track forever after it's well
opened."
Sile Parks learned a great deal that day about the mysteries of
road-making; he also learned how much a really well-built wagon will
stand if it is not too heavily loaded. For all that, however, the best
part of his time was expended in staring at the peaks, and in searching
the walls of the cañon for traces of gold and silver ore.
"Father," said he at last, at a place where the wagons were "stuck" for
a while, "I'm going ahead to see what'll turn up."
"Don't go too far, that's all."
"Keep yer eye out for mines," shouted Yellow Pine, with a laugh, and
Sile took it seriously.
"It's a gold country," he said to himself, "and I might stumble upon
some of it."
That was precisely what he made out to do. He was marching along, with
his eyes on all the rocky precipices, as if the mouth of a gold-mine
might open to him at any moment, and he was not so careful of his feet
as he should have been. A loose stone shot away from under him, and down
he came upon a fairly level floor of sand and gravel. It was so sudden
and so sharp a dropping that he sat still for a moment and looked
around him.
"Halloo, what's that?" Something bright and yellow had caught his eye,
peering out at him from the gravel his boot-heel had disturbed. "Gold!
gold! A chunk of gold!"
Thousands upon thousands of "placer miners" have raised precisely such a
shout in just such sandy gullies, but Sile felt as if he were the first
being on earth to whom such an experience had ever happened. He at once
began to dig and sift among the gravel fiercely. He took out his
hunting-knife and plied it as a trowel. Little bits of dull yellow metal
rewarded him every now and then until he worked along to where a ledge
(or the edge of one) of quartz came nearly to the surface. On the upper
side of that, and lying closely against it, he pried out something that
made him shout "Hurrah!" and that then gave him almost a sick feeling.
It was a gathering of golden nuggets and particles which would nearly
have filled his hat, and there were others like it, only smaller, all
along the edge of that stone. For unknown centuries it had been serving
as a "bar" in the natural "washer" made by that ravine, and had caught
and kept whatever the torrents had borne down from crumbling quartz
rocks above and had drifted against it.
Sile thought of Aladdin and his wonderful lamp; then he thought of the
California miners; then he shut his eyes for a moment. Then he went on
digging, and he was hard at it when a tall form stooped over him and the
voice of Yellow Pine exclaimed,
"I'd call it--If the youngster hasn't lighted onto a placer and scooped
the biggest kind of a pocket! Sile, you've done it. You can jest ax me
all the fool questions you've a mind to after this. You was really
learnin' by 'em."
CHAPTER XI
A TRAPPED BOY
When the light awoke Two Arrows, he found One-eye standing guard as if
he did not like the look of things, but no danger showed itself. It was
a new country--too much so, perhaps--and a dog with a high sense of duty
could not be too careful. Two Arrows also had duties, and he felt that
one of them was to go back at once and tell his band what he had
discovered. He had no idea that they were already on the march, or he
might have been less troubled in mind about them. His other duty, not
quite so plain, was to explore the valley a little and see how many
buffaloes and deer and all that sort of thing were in it. He wondered at
the greenness of the grass, not knowing that the mountain range east of
it took care of that, taking the water out of the winds from the west so
that they were often sponge-dry when they passed over upon the parching
plains beyond. He had never heard of Eden and he could not make any
comparisons, but he roundly declared that he had never been in a place
that promised better hunting. He did not even ask himself how a herd of
bisons should remember what their fathers had told them about that
valley and come hundreds of miles to find grass there. He had not seen
one yet, but he had caught a glimpse of a gang of deer in rapid motion.
That fact set him to thinking and made him cautious, for it was an hour
when deer are feeding unless they have been disturbed. He cooked and ate
his breakfast, providing liberally for One-eye, but could hardly make up
his mind in which direction to go. There was the mouth of the cañon,
telling him one thing, and in all other directions were the possible
secrets of that valley.
His feet took him along, at last, and he wandered for nearly a mile
before he came to any sort of adventure. Then he suddenly discovered why
the deer were in motion, and why it was time for him and One-eye to
wander back again. It was almost as bad as a war-party of another tribe
or even a band of wicked pale-faces, for at the edge of a little grove
of wild plum-trees One-eye broke out into something between a howl and a
bark, and turned, running towards his master. Then Two Arrows himself
turned and ran, for his quick eyes caught the meaning of it. The head of
a grisly bear came out between two bushes, and no idea of heroism called
for any waiting. The cañon, or the ruins, or almost any other place,
would have been better, at that moment, than the spot where he was when
Bruin saw him.
The grisly may have had bad-luck that morning. At all events, he was out
after game, and was in a bad temper. He hated all dogs, naturally, and
he had seen One-eye. He hated men, as well, but his first rush was after
the scared quadruped. That was an excellent thing for Two Arrows. He was
the best runner of his age in his band, and never before had he done
quite so well, but he stuck to his weapons. His bag of provisions had
been hidden among the old houses, and he was glad of it as he bounded
away across the grass. Every jump counted, for One-eye was doing the
right thing. He was not following his master too closely, he was only
thinking of getting away from that bear. He, too, had been the best
runner of his tribe, when there had been other dogs to run with him, and
he certainly was now. He ran well, but so did the bear, for a good horse
does not too easily overtake a grisly, and a man on foot can never do it
if the bear does his best.
It was an exciting race, but Two Arrows knew it must have an end some
time. He longed for a tree, and to be away up in the top of it, but
there were none near enough to be of any use. He kept an eye on the
other racers, and it was not many minutes before he saw that One-eye was
doing almost too well. He was getting away so fast that the grisly gave
him up and turned to his other chance for a breakfast. It was as if he
had said to himself,
"Dogs are no good. They run too well. A nice, tender, well-fed Indian
boy, now, and I'll get him in a moment."
Two Arrows had gained a pretty good start, and it led him towards the
cañon. He tried to calculate the distance, and how long it would take
him to get there, but his next thought was that he had never heard of a
grisly that could gallop and rush like this one.
"It'll all be over with me. I'd fight him, but he's too much for me. Got
to die now."
It was an awful moment, and all the courage in him did not make it any
less so. The claws and jaws and hug of a mountain grisly are a terrible
prospect to set before anybody's ambition.
Just then another prospect and a ray of hope dawned upon him. Away to
the right he saw a solitary bowlder of gray granite, with a round top,
nearly thirty feet above the grass.
"If it isn't too smooth to climb," flashed through the mind of Two
Arrows, as he turned and ran for it. He was running now for his life,
and the bear was rapidly gaining on him, but it told well for his valor
that he did not drop lance or bow.
Nearer, now, and he could see that the rock was one of those
bald-headed, smooth-cheeked affairs that look as if they had been ground
and polished in a mill.
"Ugh! Other side, maybe," groaned Two Arrows, as he dodged around the
hopeless side he came to. Away around, and the same mocking smoothness
made his heart sink, while the fierce growl of the huge wild beast
behind him thrilled him through and through.
"Ugh! rough place! Climb."
It was a mere crack at the surface of the ground, but at a few feet
above it the granite surface was somewhat broken. A good spring, aided
by the tough shaft of his lance, and Two Arrows managed to brace himself
upon a tolerable holding. If he should slip there would be an end of it,
for the grisly was close up now. He clung like a fly, and found place
after place for his hands and feet. In a moment more he was sitting upon
the round top of the rock safe, but a prisoner, with a guard set to keep
him secure. He had come out after adventures and he had found one of the
very largest kind. He had never heard such tremendous roaring growls as
the disappointed grisly was now uttering. Between these he could also
hear, at no great distance, the mournful howls of One-eye. The sagacious
animal had not self-conceit enough to match his weight and size against
a brute that could have whipped a lion in five minutes, but he could
express his feelings concerning the state of affairs.
"He can't get up here," said Two Arrows, but he said it doubtfully, for
the grisly is a rock bear, and is made for climbing. He was now
studying the face of that rock at the cleft, and it was not long before
he made up his mind that he could do something.
"I won't waste any arrows on him," said the boy on the top of the
bowlder. "Besides, if I don't get him too angry he may go off."
Not without trying a climb for his human game; and it was wonderful with
what care and consideration, as well as skill and strength, Bruin made
his effort.
Two-Arrows lay down, bow in hand, and watched him, as he raised his huge
bulk against the side of the rock. The long, strong, cruel-looking claws
took hold of crevices and roughnesses much more powerfully than a human
hand or foot could have grasped them. A grunt, a growl, a great lift,
and the grisly was off the ground.
"He is coming. Let him come one length nearer."
Two Arrows did not know that he was testing his quality as a warrior and
chief to be. It was a marvellous trial of cool courage to lie there,
with an arrow on the string, and bide his time.
"Now! Ugh!"
The arrow went truly to its mark, but the hide of a grisly is a tough
shield, and the shaft did not go as deeply as it might have gone into a
deer or bison. Arrow after arrow sped in swift, unerring succession, and
the bear received them with roars of fury, struggling upward as his
wrath and pain aroused him to greater efforts.
"My last two arrows. One for that leg, just above the claw."
Cool and correct again, and the last brace of shafts did their work to
admiration. They did not kill the grisly nor even loosen the gripe of
that great forearm and claw upon the rock, but the next struggle of the
bear brought him upon smooth stone, gently rounding. He reached out over
it with his wounded limb, and the black hooks at the end of it did not
work well. His game was within a length of him, but it was game that
held a long Mexican lance in its ready hand. Under other circumstances
Bruin could have parried that thrust and closed with its giver, but not
now. It went through his other forearm, and his gripe with that loosened
for a second or so--only for an instant, but that was enough. Slip,
slide, growl, tear, roar, and the immense monster rolled heavily to the
ground below, full of rage and arrow-wounds, and altogether unfitted for
another steep climb.
Two Arrows drew a great breath of relief, but he well knew that he had
not yet escaped. There were oceans of hate and fight in the wounded
grisly, and there was no use whatever in going down for a fair match
with him upon the grass. He was in his most dangerous state, and the top
of the rock would have to answer all purposes for a season. There was no
telling how long that would be, for even when the bear arose and limped
all the way around the bowlder, his ferocious growls plainly declared
his purpose. He had not the least idea of letting the matter stop there.
He meant to stay and watch it out. Perhaps more grislies would come to
help him and keep guard while he should doctor himself. It was a most
remarkable trap for a young explorer to get caught in, and he well knew
that a grisly will take more killing and die longer and harder than any
other known animal. Besides, he had no idea how much or how seriously
his shafts had touched the vitals of his enemy.
He must stay where he was, and now he felt something like a sensation of
mortification. One-eye had deserted him. All the howling had died away
while the bear was climbing the rock. The last dog of that band of Nez
Percés had turned tail and left his master on the top of a bowlder to be
starved out by a bear.
CHAPTER XII
THE ERRAND OF ONE-EYE
The wagons came slowly on down the pass, but it was only a few moments
before everybody but the two drivers had dismounted and stood gazing at
Sile's remarkable "find." There were old "placer miners" among them, and
they all declared that it was just the place in which they would have
expected a "bonanza." Then they all added that without water to wash the
sand and gravel with, there would be little use in doing anything more
than to hunt for "pockets." There might be "pay dirt" in all directions,
but a man might scratch and sift until he starved and not get more than
enough to buy him a new hat. They had been through all that sort of
experience, and their heads were not to be turned by it. Still, it was
decided to try that level again some day, and the whole cañon, at a time
of the year when water was to be had. All that could now be done was to
carefully search for and gather up the odds and ends of Sile's "luck."
Even the necessity of grass for the horses compelled the train to move
onward.
When they came to the rocky ledge, with the precipice on one side and
the mountain wall on the other, Judge Parks turned to Yellow Pine with a
face full of doubt.
"Don't you be skeered, jedge. I took a measure of it at the narrerest
p'int, and it'll let the wheels go by and two feet to spare."
That was close work, when they came to it, and Sile shuddered all over
as he saw how near the wheels came to the edge of destruction. A restive
mule, a scared horse, a little backing and plunging, and disaster was
ready to come. Not an animal shied, however, though some of them
trembled and sheered in towards the rock. It was hardest when they had
to hold back going down and around some of the sharper curves. Sile had
several tremendous shudders at such places and drew long breaths of
relief afterwards, as the wagons rolled on in safety. Then, on the next
level below, there was more axe and crow-bar work to be done, and it was
late in the day when the train once more reached a deserted
camping-ground of the band of Indians they seemed to be pursuing.
"We'd better take a rest here, jedge. It's been a hard day on the men
and the hosses, and we've struck gold a'ready."
Sile had been strangely aware of that fact for some hours, and it had
dazed him a little. He had walked on without asking a question of
anybody. He had a dim idea that the metal he had found was worth a
great deal of money, but he hardly cared to know how much. It was a new
and wonderful sensation. His father told him there was enough of it to
buy him a farm and stock it, and when Yellow Pine had finished his other
duties, at going into camp, and had noted all the signs the Nez Percés
left behind, he said to Sile,
"Now, my boy, gather up all the charcoal you can rake from those dead
fires and I'll show you something. Slugs are safer to carry than dust
and nuggets. I allers used to slug my finds, first thing."
That was Greek to Sile, but Yellow Pine rummaged one of the wagons and
brought out a long-nosed bellows and a crucible and a sort of mould that
opened with two handles. He put the crucible in among the coals, filled
it from Sile's yellow heap, covered it, and began to work the bellows.
Sile was astonished to find how speedily what Pine called "bullion"
would melt, and how easy it was to run it into little bars. There did
not seem to be so much of it, but there was less danger that any of the
smaller chunks and scales and particles could get away.
"There, Sile. There's your farm, cows, hosses, hogs and all, and it only
cost you a gitten' thirsty."
"They're wonderful," was all Sile could make out to say, and his father
put them in a bag and locked them up in an iron-bound box in one of the
wagons.
"You needn't scratch into all the sand you come to after this," said
Yellow Pine. "That's what takes the tuck out of placer miners. One good
pocket'll most ginerally spile the eyes of a green hand."
He assured the judge that one more push would bring them to good grass,
and he added,
"What's more, we ain't in any hurry to ketch up with no redskins till we
know what they are. It's peace with most on 'em, but this 'ere isn't a
strong band, and I kinder want to feel my way."
There was sense in that, especially as he knew that Indians without
horses are also Indians on the lookout for some. What he did not know
was the state of mind that band of Nez Percés was in at that hour.
They had set out very early that morning, and were plodding on steadily
down the winding slopes of the cañon, when there came to them an
unexpected sensation. It was a dog.
Right up the trail trotted One-eye, all alone, and with an air of
business anxiety. He neither paused nor turned until he came to Long
Bear himself, and in front of the chief he sat down, threw up his head,
and let out the most mournful howl he knew--and he knew a great many.
"Where Two Arrows?" asked the chief, as if the dog had been human, and
he was answered first by another howl and then by an eager look and a
tug at his deer-skin leggings. Then One-eye trotted off a little
distance along the trail and looked back and barked, and the dullest man
in the world could have understood him. It all plainly meant,
"Come on. There's a fellow down this way that's in need of help. Follow
me and help him."
"Ugh!" exclaimed Long Bear, and he added the names of half a dozen of
the leading braves. "Two Arrows send dog after warrior. Come."
That was somewhat more than the truth, seeing that all the credit
belonged to One-eye, but in a minute or so the old chief was leading his
men rapidly down the pass. There was nothing whatever to be said, and
One-eye kept well ahead of them, every now and then trying to express an
idea he had that no time was to be wasted.
"Ugh!" was all the remark made by any brave when the valley came in
sight, and hardly more was remarked upon the ruins of the ancient
village, but every grunt meant a great deal.
"Not here. Dog go right on," said Long Bear. "Follow. Find Two Arrows
somewhere."
They had not far to go now before they halted as if with one accord.
From the summit of a granite bowlder, a hundred yards in advance of
them, came a shrill whoop, and there stood the object of their search,
firmly erect and seemingly unharmed.
"Boy all right," said Big Tongue. "Better come down."
"Two Arrows no fool," said Long Bear. "Go slow. Watch dog."
One-eye still trotted on, but more slowly, until he turned the corner of
the rock. He reappeared in a second, with a sharp, warning yelp,
followed by the fierce growling charge of an uncommonly large grisly
bear.
"Ugh!" said Long Bear. "Stand still. Boy been treed."
He had not been "treed," he had been bowldered, and the grisly had been
arrowed and lanced thoroughly. His angry charge had been made with his
last energies, and before he advanced half-way he reeled and fell.
There was no boy upon the rock now. Two Arrows darted down from his
perch, slipping, sliding the instant the bear followed One-eye. He had
waited up there for hour after hour, looking down at his half disabled
enemy, and he was tired of it. He had seen that the strength of the bear
was failing and that he bled freely, and was not far behind him when he
fell.
"Whoop! whoop! whoop! I have killed a grisly. My bear!" he shouted, and
it was all in vain that the Big Tongue ran faster than even the Long
Bear himself, for Two Arrows had the advantage of them. His lance was
the first to be plunged into the dying monster, and the great brute tore
up the sod around him for only half a minute before he stretched himself
out and all was over. With the help of several hours of quiet bleeding,
which cannot always be provided for in such cases, Two Arrows had fought
and killed a grisly single-handed, and again Long Bear was the proudest
man in the whole Nez Percé nation. The steepness of the rock had helped
a good deal, and the bear had hardly had a fair chance, but after all he
had been whipped by a boy of fifteen. It was a disgrace to the grisly
but it was a great honor to the young hero, for by all Indian law he was
thenceforth entitled to wear the claws of that bear on state occasions.
Adding all things together, bisons and big-horn and cougar and grisly,
Two Arrows was rapidly getting to be a middle-aged warrior, and the
other boys had no hope of catching up with him. He might also fairly be
said to have led his band into that valley, and now the pity of it was
that they had no ponies to eat such excellent grass.
The remainder of the band came down the pass remarkably, with Na-tee-kah
well in advance of everybody else.
"Could anything terrible have happened to Two Arrows?"
Her heart beat hard with exertion and anxiety, and when she reached the
level she hurried right along upon the trail of the braves. It was not
many minutes before she could see them, and a sort of mist came before
her eyes. They were all sitting upon the grass around something, and she
could hear her father's voice chanting. It was a curious kind of song of
triumph, belonging especially to a case of large grisly bear slaying,
but Na-tee-kah could not hear it clearly at first, and it might have
been a funeral song for all the music there was in it. All out of breath
she toiled on, as near as an Indian girl might come to a party of
warriors, and then she understood it like a flash. Red or white, she was
only a girl, and she sat down on the grass and began to cry. The Big
Tongue had risen as she came near, and he was polite enough to say to
her,
"Squaw not cry. Boy all right. We have killed a bear. Ugh!"
CHAPTER XIII
GREAT SCOUTING
The quadrupeds of the mining expedition showed many signs of the hard
time they had been having, and it was needful to get out from among the
rocks quickly. It was yet quite shadowy in the deep cañon when the
wagons were set in motion, but not a great deal of "road mending" was
called for from that point onward. Early in the day they came out upon
the level, and before noon the horses and mules were picking the rich
grass around the ancient ruins.
It was a grand time, and Sile had a dim idea that he only drew his
breath now and then, the great, long ones came so frequently. He had
felt one kind of awe in the cañon and in looking at the mountain peaks.
Now he felt quite another kind of awe in looking at the rude mason-work
of those houses.
"Father," he asked, "do you s'pose they were people anything like us?"
"They built three-story houses. No Indians ever did that."
"Is there nothing at all about them in history?"
"Yes, here are the ruins. Here are little books like this."
He handed Sile what looked for all the world like a broken piece of an
old pot, and Sile said so.
"That's it. If it is one, it shows that they understood making pottery.
Nobody has ever found anything to prove that they were miners, and all
the stones of these houses are only broken. None of them are cut or
trimmed."
It was a wonder of wonders to stand there and talk about a lost and
vanished people, but Yellow Pine was thinking of a people who had
vanished without being lost. They were the Indians whose camp-grounds he
had moved into and out of, and he had an idea that they might be found
again at any hour. He advised the judge not to move on again until some
exploring and scouting should have been done. Meantime the "critters,"
as he called them, did their feeding under a strong guard and close
watching.
"Sile," he said, "as soon as your horse has had a good feed, you and I
will ride a circuit and see what we can find."
Sile's blood danced a little. Scouting after Indians was a thing he had
read about, and he did not dwell too much upon the fact that he was
chosen to go with Pine rather because his horse was a fast one and had
not pulled wagons than for any reason. Pine said to him,
"Your eyes are pretty good ones, too. Who knows but what you might see
something. Jedge, I won't run him into any danger. Them Indians is all
on foot."
Sile set to work at once upon his repeating-rifle, his revolver, and the
edge of his hunting-knife, as if he had a battle with Pawnees on hand.
He gave up studying the ruins at once, and even forgot how many nuggets
his gold had been run into. He had never before felt precisely that kind
of excitement, and was too young to know that every entirely new
enthusiasm is worth a whole book in the way of education, if it comes
rightly. People who have never been waked up are apt to be dull people.
It was an old story to Yellow Pine, and when at last they both were
mounted and ready to ride away, it was worth while to look at his
cast-iron face and then at that of Sile Parks.
"Sile," said his father, as he looked at him, "bring me in some Indians;
not a whole tribe; just a few."
"Come on, Sile," said Pine. "We'll bring all we find, I reckon."
He showed no disposition to ride fast, but cantered away to the right,
skirting the edge of the mountain slope, and seeming to study every
clump of trees and bushes they came to. It was mostly grassy "open" for
quite a distance from the mouth of the cañon.
"No smoke anywhere," said Pine. "They're not camped hereaway."
"I walked out along their trail, at the ruins," said Sile. "Why didn't
you follow it?"
"That's a fair question, Sile. It looks as if I'd orter ha' done it, but
you see, I don't want to ketch up with 'em or let 'em know we're here. I
want to find 'em without telling 'em what road I kem by."
It was a sort of half-Indian cunning, but it was not quite equal to the
needs of the matter. Full-blooded Indian cunning beat it all to pieces,
as they were to find out before morning. It came to pass in a perfectly
easy and natural sort of way.
When the entire band of Nez Percés had arrived, and every soul in it had
taken a look at the dead grisly, they had no notion of walking back a
single rod. The braves had noted the indications of running water in the
distance, and they pushed on until they found a camp-ground on the
border of a swift, bright stream, almost alive with trout. It was
bordered by a wide band of forest, and the trees were magnificent. Here
at last they could all sit down in a kind of peace and plenty, and mourn
for their dogs and ponies.
Two Arrows had no mourning to do. What he really needed was to be
hooped, like a barrel, for fear his pride and ambition might burst him.
He felt as if he were about ten feet high and weighed more than a horse.
All the other Indians he had heard of were nothing at all to what he
was or was pretty soon going to be. He almost despised cougars and even
grislies until he recalled how he had felt when the open jaws of the one
which had hunted him came up over the curve of the bowlder.
It occurred to him that he had better have a rock or something to help
him next time, but his vanity suggested that after all he had invented
that rock. The other Indian boys hardly felt like speaking to him, and
Na-tee-kah called him to supper as respectfully as if he had been a
full-grown warrior. He felt like one, and as if the camp were too small
for him; so he walked out of it after supper, and his feet carried him
farther. They seemed to have an idea of their own that it would be good
for him to take another look at the bowlder where he had been watched
for by the grisly. A thorough understanding of that matter might have
taken him down a little, but he was to have better medicine yet before
he again reached his father's lodge. He had his bow and arrows with him
but no lance, and it was getting too dusky for hunting. The ground he
was walking over was pretty level but it had its hollows, and as he came
up out of one of these he suddenly dropped flat upon the grass. He had
not been hurt, but he had seen something that in a manner knocked him
down. It was the biggest surprise he had had since he came through the
cañon, for two pale-faces on horseback were cantering along at no great
distance. They had not seen him, he was sure of that, although they were
evidently looking for something. He let them pass and go on until he
felt safe in following. Every nerve in his body tingled with fierce
excitement.
"War-path!" he exclaimed. "Ugh! Two Arrows a brave now. Get horse. Big
warrior. Grow a heap. Find pale-face camp."
Running, walking, creeping, as the mists of evening deepened, the young
Nez Percé followed those two horsemen, cunningly avoiding all detection.
He followed them to the edge of the rocky ground at the foot of the
mountain slope, and there he saw them turn to the left.
"Know now," he muttered. "Pale-face came through cañon. Follow Nez
Percé. Got plenty horse. Two Arrows great brave. Ugh!"
He should have gone for help and have performed the rest of his task in
older company, but he was full to over-flowing with the vanity of
winning another "heap" of glory. He felt entirely competent to deal with
one band of white men, and to carry all their horses into his own camp.
His rapid successes had been too much for him, and it is sometimes very
nearly the same with young fellows of a different color.
He lost sight of his human game several times, and it was now pretty
dark, but his keen eyes caught the glow of camp-fires at last, and he
knew what that meant. What he did not know was that Yellow Pine and Sile
had ridden a wide circuit across that open and had discovered no sign
of danger.
"Them Indians," said Pine, as they were riding in, "have gone on to the
timber. They can't have the least idee that we're here, on the ground
they passed over. To-morrer we must make another scout, though I sha'n't
be easy till I know jest what kind of neighbors we're to have."
That was common-sense, and so was the extreme care with which the
quadrupeds were gathered and hobbled and "corralled" between the
protecting masses of the ruins. The members of the mining party were
already divided into "watches," taking regular turns, and Sile and a man
named Jonas were in the first watch with Yellow Pine. That gave him a
chance for an unbroken sleep when his work was done. What was also good,
it gave him a rest to get sleepy in, and to let all the steam of his
excitement get away from his head. He ate well, and he felt somewhat
weary afterwards, but there was a queer idea growing in his mind that he
was in the neighborhood of strange Indians, and that nobody could tell
what might turn up.
"Pine," said he, "if I see an Indian shall I kill him?"
"Yell first, and get out of his way, unless he holds out his hand and
says 'How?' But you won't have any chance this night."
CHAPTER XIV
A WRESTLING MATCH
The moon was to come up late that night, and all the first part of it
would be lighted only by stars and camp-fires. The mining party had but
two of these latter burning low, and the Nez Percé band had not any,
after they had done their cooking, but the stars sent down enough light
to make things visible at short distances. The two camps were not over
four miles apart.
The only really wide-awake watchman in one of them was One-eye, and he
patrolled in all directions as if he had an idea that matters must be
less secure in the absence of his wonderful young master. Only one dog
to do the barking for a whole village was something very uncommon in
Indian history, but it was well to have the great duty given to an
entirely competent dog.
The boy whom One-eye considered the greatest personage in all that
valley had now crept near enough to the mining camp to get a fair idea
of what it contained. He saw a wealth of horse-flesh and mule-flesh,
every quadruped of it worth half a dozen Indian ponies, and his
ambition almost lifted him up from the grass. It stirred any amount of
reckless daring, and it made him remember all the stories he had ever
heard of famous chiefs who stole into camps and then stripped them clean
of everything. He was already that kind of chief in his own estimation,
and did not know that within a hundred yards of him there sat a white
boy, of about his own age, not so tall but broader in the shoulders, who
was at that moment recalling a long list of just such stories.
Sile had fairly read up on Indian fiction before he left home, and his
ideas of the way some things could be done were a little misty. He could
hardly sit still for one moment, and preferred to stroll around among
the horses to make sure no red man's hand was reaching out for one of
them. Old Pine smiled grimly now and then, for he felt perfectly safe on
the Indian question, but at last he heard an unaccountable rustling at
one end of the corral, and then a loud hurrah from Sile.
The idea had been in Sile's head that his proper course was to go about
very much as if he were himself about to steal the horses, and his
noiseless movements carried him to the outer edge of the corral at
exactly the right moment. He was standing at the side of a tall mule, in
the shadow of it and completely hidden, when he saw something darker
than a shadow glide out from between two tall weeds and swiftly writhe
its way forward. His heart beat like a trip-hammer. His first thought
was to use his rifle, but it was a new and dreadful thing to take a
human life, and he could not lift his weapon. His eyes said, "Not a
large Indian," and his hands let go of the rifle. The next instant, and
just as Two Arrows rose to his feet, Sile sprang forward and grappled
with him.
It was a most perilous thing to do, considering that Two Arrows carried
a knife; but the young Nez Percé had also been thinking, and had made up
his mind that "war" was no part of his errand. His tribe was at peace
with the pale-faces, except as to horse-flesh, and that fact saved
Sile's life. He had been accounted the best wrestler in his set, at home
and at school, and his muscles were in capital order. It was not by any
means an uneven match, therefore, and Two Arrows would have been glad
enough to get away. He had no clothing for Sile to hold him by, and
there was more and more danger of losing him every moment, but the shout
of warning had hardly begun to rouse the general camp before a pair of
long, sinewy arms wound around poor Two Arrows from behind.
"I've got him," said Yellow Pine. "Run for a rope. You're jest the
luckiest youngster I ever knowed."
By the time the rope was there, every man in camp was up and out, and
the grass and weeds within sight had rifle muzzles pointed at
everything among them as big as a human head.
"No whoopin' sounded," said Yellow Pine. "This cub was alone. I say, you
young coyote, you jest answer my questions now, or I'll tan the hide
clean off ye."
Two Arrows drew himself up proudly and looked at him in silence, but
Pine led his captive on into the fire-light and picked up a heavy
"black-snake" whip, for he was justly angry.
It was a terrible come-down for the ambition of a young chief. Captured
on his first raid and threatened with a horsewhipping. He felt ready to
burst, but it was not with vanity this time.
"Where's yer band? Where's their camp?" asked Pine, with a significant
flourish of the black-snake, but the Indian boy looked him unflinchingly
in the face without a sound or a motion.
"Speak, now," began Pine; but Sile had finished answering some hurried
questions from his father, and he now asked one for himself.
"I say, Yellow Pine, didn't I grab him first? Isn't he my prisoner as
much as he is yours?"
"What do you mean?"
"Well, now, I don't want him flogged. He didn't use his knife. You
always said it was best to be friends with 'em."
"I'd call it---- Jedge, it's jest so. Sile's right. I'd kinder lost my
head. Look a-here, redskin, next time you come for hosses you won't get
off so easy. I'll unhitch ye now, and let ye up. There now, Sile, shake
hands with him."
"How?" said Sile, as he held out his hand to the loosened captive.
"How?" said Two Arrows, and he said it a little sullenly, but he had
been glancing from Pine's face to Sile's and understood pretty well that
the latter had stopped the proposed work of the black-snake.
"Make him a present of something, Sile," said his father. "Here--give
him this."
It was a small round pocket-mirror, worth twenty-five cents, but there
was no telling what it was worth in the estimation of such a boy as Two
Arrows--perhaps a pound or so of gold nuggets, if he had them, or the
skin of his grisly bear, after the glory of killing it had worn a little
thin. At all events, he was a most astonished Indian. Evidently these
monsters in human form were disposed to be friends with
him--particularly this red-headed young chief who had proved himself so
good a wrestler. All he had ever heard of pale-faces was against
believing it, but there was no chance of escaping from the ring of
riflemen now gathered around him, and he gave it up. He answered Yellow
Pine's questions by signs only, until something he said brought an
exclamation from the old miner Jonas.
"Nez Percé! He's a Nez Percé, Pine. I know their lingo. He can talk
some English, too. He needn't play 'possum any longer."
Two Arrows felt that he was completely beaten, and even pride failed to
carry him any farther. It came to his mind, also, with a peculiar force,
that he was by no means sure of the approval of Long Bear and his
warriors. They had not sent him out to kill pale-faces and bring upon
them the vengeance of the terrible "brass-button men" he had heard of.
He had seen a few of them, and had wondered at their great knives, twice
as long as his arm. He decided to speak out now, and in a few moments
Jonas had pumped him thoroughly.
"He isn't on any war-path," said Yellow Pine to Judge Parks; "he's jest
a fool of a boy. We'll keep him till mornin' and carry him over to his
own camp. It's the best way in the world to make friends with 'em."
"All right," replied the judge; "we must get out some presents. See that
he doesn't get away."
"I'll look out for that--you bet I will."
So he did, and Two Arrows had now no knife with which to cut the rope
whereby he was tied to Yellow Pine's elbow when that "big brave" lay
down again. Sile rolled himself up in a blanket, only a few feet from
them, and hardly slept a wink. He had captured a wild red Indian and it
beat all the novels he had ever seen. He did not hear his father chuckle
to himself, nor could he read the thoughts of the old judge. Long Bear
himself was not prouder of Two Arrows and his grisly than was Sile's
father of the manner in which his own boy had met and grappled with a
sudden peril.
"He'll be at the head of something or other some day," he muttered, as
he was dropping asleep.
Not even Na-tee-kah knew anything of the movements or whereabouts of Two
Arrows this time, and her father questioned her in vain. His absence was
"irregular," and when the hours went by and he did not return, the Long
Bear's face put on an expression of stern displeasure.
"Boy too big," he said; "grow too fast. Brave too soon. Young chief,
though. Great warrior by-and-by, like father. Come back. Talk hard to
him."
Na-tee-kah's thoughts followed her hero brother so long as her eyes were
open. She had no doubt whatever that he would quickly turn up again with
a great heap of new glory. She dreamed of his performing all sorts of
marvellous things. All the other boys in camp were planning to catch up
and get ahead of him, she knew, for she had heard some of them say so.
The Big Tongue had told her of a large number of bears belonging to his
record, and he was going on to tell of more when Ha-ha-pah-no overheard
and asked him,
"Kill bear all with tongue? Shoot big lie right through? Catch old bear
and talk to him; bear die!"
Her tongue was sharp enough, and she strongly sympathized with
Na-tee-kah's enthusiasm for Two Arrows. The Big Tongue got away from her
and the camp grew more and more quiet.
The spot chosen for it, in a curve of the stream, was one of rare
beauty, and the loop formed by the long sweep of the rippling water
would have been just the place for a secure corral, if that band of Nez
Percés had had any four-footed property to be anxious about. It was not
needful to keep a guard over their hope of stealing some thereafter.
CHAPTER XV
A GREAT CAPTAIN
The band of Nez Percés had done very well thus far, and so had the band
of white miners, but there had been one other band of travellers which
had accomplished a good deal by reason of having an uncommonly good
commander.
The wicked old mule that had engineered the stampede of the Nez Percé
ponies had continued to hold his position as captain. He could out-kick
and out-bray any other mule there, and no mere pony would have dreamed
of disputing him. There was some grass to be had, next day after the
escape, and there was yet a little water in the pools rapidly drying
away, but there was nothing anywhere to tempt to a stoppage. On he went,
and on went the rest after him, and the reason why the warriors could
not find his trail was because he did not leave any. He obeyed the
strong instinct of all large animals, and some smaller ones, to "follow
a beaten path and keep in a travelled road." He struck the well-made
buffalo trail and did not find any reason for wandering from it.
Multitudes of men have a precisely similar instinct, and keep in any
particular path in life mainly because they are in it; they stick all
the closer if they can see anybody else doing the same thing. That was
what the wicked old mule saw, and he may have imagined that the squad or
rather string of bisons ahead of him knew where they were going and what
for. At all events he led his band closely behind them, and they plodded
on in a way that carried them ahead quite rapidly. It carried them into
the pass and through it, mule, ponies and all, and there was no one to
tell them of what had happened there before or what was about to occur.
Something had happened--something that is pretty sure to come to all
bisons, sooner or later. In due season their great bodies reel and fall,
and the wolves and buzzards are fed. But for such things the wolves
would all die, and they have an unerring judgment as to the condition of
an ailing bison. They never attack a healthy bull or cow unless they are
in great force and the animal is alone.
The migration of bisons from the parching plain to better pasture had
been going on for some time, and the coyotes had followed it as a matter
of course. The very day that the old mule halted his runaways at the
spring for all the water they could hold, there should have been a
painter on the great ledge which was followed by the trail in the middle
of the pass. There was a tragedy there worth sketching.
Herd after herd of bisons had gone along that ledge road in clumsy
safety, but right there now, at the curve of the projecting rock, stood
one who could go no farther. A fragment of an arrow still sticking
through one of his hind-legs told what had made him lame in the first
place, and the marks of wolf-teeth explained why he had grown lamer and
lamer until all he could do was to turn his back to the rock and stand
at bay.
Mile after mile of weary walking and painful struggling the poor old
beast had contended with the enemies now swarming around him; they had
assailed him always from behind, and they had altogether crippled him.
His great, terrible head was lowered threateningly, and his deep,
sonorous bellow was thick with pain and fury. The watching coyotes sat
down or walked around, barking, yelping, howling, snapping their teeth
like castanets, sure of a feast to come and hungrily impatient for its
beginning. One, hungrier or bolder than the rest, made a rush too soon,
and the quick horn of the old bison caught him. Up, up he went, whirling
over and over, and his last yelp went down with him into the deep cañon.
The head of the bison sank again, and his bloodshot eyes grew filmy; he
was faint and sinking, and he swayed staggeringly to and fro. He gave a
great lurch forward as his faintness grew upon him, and in an instant he
seemed to be all but covered with wolves. They attacked every square
foot of him at the same moment, climbing over each other, yelling,
tearing, and the bison's time had come. The terror and agony stirred all
his remaining life for one last, blinded rush. His instinct was to
"charge" and he made one lumbering plunge. The trail at that point
afterwards but barely passed the wagon-wheels, and there was no room to
spare for the bison's last effort. It bore him heavily, helplessly over
the sickening edge, and half a dozen of clinging coyotes went down with
him. Hundreds of whirling feet the hunters and the hunted-down bison
fell together, to be dashed to pieces upon the rocks at the bottom.
A chorus of howls arose from the remaining wolves, but it did not
express pity or horror. Only for a moment did they seem to be in doubt
as to what was best to be done. After that it was a wolf-race as to
which should first get back to the point at which they could safely
clamber and tumble to the bottom of the pass. Their feast had been
provided for them, and they ate every part of it, buffalo meat and wolf
meat alike, with the help of some buzzards, before Two Arrows or any
other human being entered the cañon to disturb them. Then they followed
their prospect of further feasting, and it led them on into the grassy
valley.
The wicked old mule knew nothing of all this. No coyotes annoyed him or
his command, but not a mouthful to eat did they find until they came
out where they could see the ancient ruins. At sight of these, hinting
of human presence, they halted briefly and then sheered away so as not
to approach too nearly so very unpleasant a suggestion. The bisons had
led them well, whether or not the mule got the credit of it. Also, there
was a fair degree of justification of the instinct concerning beaten
paths. New ones may be better, and somebody must hunt them up all the
while, but the old roads will do very well for most people until the new
ones are fairly mapped out. Christopher Columbus had a hard time of it,
and Captain Cook got himself eaten up at last, after finding ever so
many new things.
It was a matter of course that the runaways should feel their way
farther and farther down the valley, and all sorts of happiness seemed
to be before them. Grass, water, nice weather, no masters, no
responsibilities, and plenty of good company among themselves. It was a
time to grow fat, and to think well of the world they lived in.
The wicked old mule had done his work, but he had gained neither name
nor fame by it. He looked sidewise more slyly, whisked his ropy tail
more demurely, and kicked his nearest neighbors more viciously than
ever. Still, all he or they had gained was a vacation; no work to do for
anybody but themselves, but with winter only a few months ahead and with
a certainty that wolves, buzzards, coyotes, cougars, grislies, frost,
snow-storms, and all the other unknown possibilities of the mountain
country were only holding off for a season.
CHAPTER XVI
VISITING
Two Arrows was treated to an excellent breakfast the morning after his
capture. He also saw a white man eat with a knife and fork, and had all
the sugar he wanted for the first time. It was a wonderful morning, and
a very brilliant pair of eyes were drinking in its marvels greedily.
Rifles, pistols, and all that sort of thing were familiar enough to the
young Nez Percé, but he saw new patterns of them and gained tremendous
notions of the wealth and skill of the pale-faces who could make such
weapons.
"Father," said Sile, "I wish he could read. He's a bright fellow."
"Show him everything you have with a picture in it."
There was no fear that Two Arrows would try to run away after that
process began. The printed matter of any sort did not convey to him an
idea; it was so much mud; it meant nothing whatever. The pictures were
another thing, and Sile had provided himself well with illustrated
reading. Two Arrows almost gave up the sullen pride that refused to be
astonished, and Sile began to understand "sign language." At all events
he nearly twisted himself out of shape in an effort to explain to his
captive the nature of ships, cannon, camels, and steam-engines. He felt
as if he were a sort of missionary. At last Judge Parks himself handed
Two Arrows a photograph of an Indian chief, given him at one of the
frontier agencies a few weeks before.
"Ugh! Pawnee!" said Two Arrows.
"I told you so," exclaimed Yellow Pine. "If you showed him dogerrytypes
of every tribe there is, he'd name 'em at sight. Jedge, it's about time
we set out. I've got a mount ready for him."
Jonas more fully explained to Two Arrows that a visit of peace was
planned, and that he was to be marched home again, but the face of the
young Indian clouded. That was the one thing he stood in mortal dread
of. He thought of the jeers and derision sure to greet him from all
other Nez Percé boys when they should see him come home without any
glory, and he hung back.
"Mount now," shouted Yellow Pine, with a motion towards the animal he
had selected.
A horse! To ride back, instead of returning tired and on foot. That was
quite another matter.
"Whoop!" he could not have restrained that yell of relief, and in an
instant he was in the saddle. He had been used to riding a barebacked
pony, and that made his present outfit the more splendid. All his vanity
and ambition came pouring back upon him, and he almost felt as if he had
captured that squad of pale-faces and was bringing them in as prisoners.
He dashed forward at once, with Sile on one side, Yellow Pine on the
other, and the rest following, except a camp-guard of two miners.
Less than an hour later all the Nez Percé band came out under the trees
to see what was coming.
"Two Arrows!" almost breathlessly exclaimed Na-tee-kah. "Caught some
pale-faces this time."
"Got horse," said Ha-ha-pah-no.
Long Bear and his warriors did not say a word, for they were all but
dumb with astonishment from the moment that they recognized the
returning wanderer. What would not that remarkable boy do next? Had he
killed anybody? Had he really stolen all those white men, or had they
stolen him? There he was, anyway, and in a few moments more Yellow Pine
and Judge Parks had said "How?" to Long Bear and his best men. Indian
manners required that Two Arrows should be silent before his elders
until spoken to, but Long Bear almost instantly inquired,
"Where find boy?"
"In camp," said Yellow Pine. "Try to steal horse. Too many pale-face.
Catch him. All safe. Big thief some day. Boy now."
All of Two Arrows's dream of glory went out of sight before the grim
smiles with which the Nez Percé warriors heard that explanation. They
perfectly understood the matter, and that the pale-faces before them
wished to be good friends. On their part, they were a good deal more
than willing, for they had much to gain from peace and very little from
war with mounted riflemen.
"Prisoner?" groaned Na-tee-kah.
"Boy all right," grumbled Ha-ha-pah-no, indignantly. "Find pale-face
camp anyhow. Go right in. Old brave all asleep. Never find anything. Big
chief by-and-by."
There was some truth in that view of the matter, and Long Bear made a
remark that had a little the same sound. At all events Two Arrows was
permitted to dismount and walk away, while the conference with his
captors went on. In ten seconds he was exhibiting his little hand-mirror
to Na-tee-kah and a crowd of other young people, and found his
importance coming back to him. None of them had ever ventured to creep,
all alone, into a white man's corral. Not a boy or girl among them had
such a treasure as the mirror. He had made friends with the pale-faces,
at all events. In fact, his standing in that community was rising with
tremendous rapidity, until somehow or other the story of his
wrestling match with Sile Parks began to be whispered around, and it
became necessary for Two Arrows to point at Yellow Pine as the great
brave who had really pinioned him. There was not a Nez Percé in the
band, old or young, who felt any longing for a grapple with the sinewy,
big-boned old miner and all would have been right but for the fact that
Two Arrows had not at once escaped from Sile.
[Illustration: NOT A BOY OR GIRL AMONG THEM HAD SUCH A TREASURE AS THAT
MIRROR]
A good understanding was easily established between the miners and the
red men, and it was not long before Sile was off his horse and was going
around among the young people. He used his eyes as busily as Two Arrows
had done, but it is to be doubted if he saw as much, even in what there
was to see. It was not long before Na-tee-kah had as good a
looking-glass as her brother, and a general distribution of small
presents sealed the arrangement that the miners were not to be plundered
by that particular band.
"Now, jedge," said Yellow Pine at last, "it's time we moved. S'pose we
fetch along that young cub and his sister. Company for Sile. Make the
old chief feel fine."
Long Bear gave several grunts of assent when spoken to, and once more
Two Arrows felt as if he were growing very fast indeed.
"We'll go back and move the wagons," said Pine to Sile. "You and your
young redskin can scout on down the valley. You've got your directions
'bout finding us. Don't go too fast nor too far. The Indian'll smell any
danger long before you will. He won't be roped in by anybody in broad
daylight, I can tell ye."
He did not look like it as he rode proudly away from the village. Jonas
had mounted Na-tee-kah behind him, but Ha-ha-pah-no was to follow the
wagons on foot, that the chief's daughter might have somebody to
superintend her visit. When Ha-ha-pah-no set out in her turn nearly half
the village went with her uninvited, and it took all the authority of
Long Bear to keep the other half from keeping them company.
"Come," said Two Arrows to Sile, after a few minutes of silent riding.
"We go. Ugh! Shoot a heap."
He had picked up more English words, somehow or other, than he had at
first acknowledged, but Sile found it needful to work the sign language
pretty industriously for all that.
Na-tee-kah had spent her life in the close retirement of an Indian
village. She had been housed up among plains and mountains from all the
world, and knew nothing about it. She had lived in a narrower prison
than the smallest country village in all the East. The idea of visiting
a white man's camp and seeing all there was in it made her tremble all
over. She knew her father and ever so many others would be there in an
hour or so, and that her wonderful brother had gone on a hunt with the
son of the pale-face chief, but she was to enter a strange place with
only white warriors for company. It was an awful thing to do, and she
could not have done it, nor would Long Bear have consented to it, but
for something they both saw in the face of old Judge Parks when he
patted her on the head and said,
"Be my daughter a little while. Make a white girl of her for a week.
Take good care of her."
Red men have keen eyes for character, and Long Bear understood. So did
Na-tee-kah, and yet she would have run away and hidden but for her
curiosity, stirred up by what Two Arrows had told her of the contents of
that camp and its wagons. An offer to a white girl of a trip to Paris
might be something like it, but it would not be much more. Her eyes
danced and her fingers tingled as they drew near, and yet the only thing
she could see was a couple of commonplace tilted wagons and a lot of
horses and mules. The moment she was on the ground the old judge came to
her assistance.
"Now, Na-tee-kah, I'll show you something. Come this way."
She stood as straight as an arrow and walked along courageously, but it
required all her strength of mind and will to do so. She watched him in
silence, as he went into and came out of one of those mysterious rolling
tents full of all unknown riches.
"There, now. That'll keep you busy while we're getting ready to move."
She held out both her hands, and when Ha-ha-pah-no at last put her own
hand upon her shoulder and said "Ugh!" Na-tee-kah started as if she had
been waked from a dream. She had been looking at pictures that told her
of another world.
"Heap lie," said Ha-ha-pah-no. "Pale-face tell 'em. Make lie about
squaw. There!"
It was a picture of several ladies in evening dress, and Na-tee-kah had
been looking at it for five minutes. No such woman as those could
possibly be, nor could any human beings get themselves up so
wonderfully. It was all a lie, and any intelligent squaw could detect
the fraud at a glance.
Na-tee-kah drew a long breath that sounded like a sigh, and just then
the shout of Yellow Pine announced that all was ready for a move.
"We'll reach that mine to-morrow night, jedge, if we're lively.
Everything's goin' prime now."
With or without an invitation the relatives of Na-tee-kah trudged along
with the wagons mile after mile, and Long Bear gained an extra pound of
tobacco by sticking to Yellow Pine until the train halted at noon.
Ha-ha-pah-no scolded Na-tee-kah pretty nearly all the way for not
knowing more about pale-faces, but she broke down at the noon camp-fire.
She undertook to play cook, and in half a minute Jonas discovered that
she did not know how to make coffee.
"Wouldn't you have b'iled a black soup?" he exclaimed.
"Poor old squaw!" said Ha-ha-pah-no. "Know all about him. Drink some
once; bitter. Put sweet in. Stir him up, so."
"Ugh!" said Na-tee-kah. "Know so much. Ask Two Arrows when he come."
CHAPTER XVII
MORE FUN
Sile Parks and Two Arrows had the whole valley before them and all the
mountains and valleys beyond, and one knew as much about them as did the
other. Neither had ever been just there before, and yet the young Nez
Percé was at home, and Sile was in a new country. Sile could ride well
and he could shoot well, but here at his side was a born hunter. With
all sorts of descriptive signs he asked him,
"Did you ever kill a deer?"
"Ugh! heap deer. Heap bear. Heap buffalo. Big heap."
And then all the pride of Two Arrows came to help him explain that he
had killed a cougar all alone, and a big-horn and a grisly. By the time
he had succeeded in doing so Sile regarded him as a red-skinned wonder,
but had so interpreted some of his signs as to include a big snake, a
land-turtle, and a kangaroo in the list of asserted victories. It gave
him some doubts as to the others, for he said to himself,
"No rabbit can jump as far as he says that thing did. There are no
kangaroos here, and they have no horns. I give it up. Maybe he is
lying, but he doesn't look so."
Two Arrows was boasting quite truthfully, and the trouble was with
Sile's translation.
"Ugh! look. Rifle--"
Sile's eyes followed the pointing finger in vain for a moment. At first
he saw nothing but a clump of sumach bushes, but for once he asked no
questions. What could be among them? One seemed to move a little. Could
it be possible? the horns of a buck!
"Maybe I can hit him. I've heard of such a thing. I'll aim below them;
his body is there somewhere."
Two Arrows could have told him just how that deer was standing, but
Sile's guess-work was pretty good. He let his rifle-muzzle sink on a
line with one of those antlers, and had lowered it a little too much
when he pulled the trigger. The kicking of the rifle made the aim a good
one, for the sharp report was answered by a great bound from the cover
of the sumachs, and in an instant a mortally-wounded buck was dashing
across the open, with One-eye close at his heels.
"Ugh! got him," said Two Arrows. "Heap shoot. Bow not so good."
Sile had offered to lend him a rifle at starting, but Two Arrows had
prudently refused to disgrace himself. He had never owned one and did
not care to show his lack of skill.
That was a fine dash after One-eye and the wounded buck, but it was a
short one. The bullet had done its work so thoroughly that there was
little trouble left for the dog when he seized his victim's throat to
pull him down.
There had been some hunting done by the mining party on their long
journey, but Sile could have told Two Arrows if he had chosen to do so,
that here lay the first deer he had ever killed. He could also have told
him that it appeared to be the largest, fattest, finest, most miraculous
buck that anybody in the world had ever killed; as it really was even
Two Arrows spoke well of the buck and thought well of the shot which had
brought it down.
"If I knew where to find our train I'd take it right in," said Sile, as
they hoisted the buck to his own saddle. "I'd just as lief walk."
"Find him," said Two Arrows, understanding the searching look Sile gave
towards the mountains. "Go so. Come. Get on horse; ride."
He took the lead at once, but it seemed to Sile that he was going in the
wrong direction. He was not at all aware that his friend had skilfully
directed their hunt on a line nearly parallel, at no great distance,
from that which the train must follow. He was therefore doubly
astonished when a brief ride brought them within sight of the
wagon-tilts. They had halted, and Sile had double comfort: he could
show his father his first deer and he could get a hot dinner, for
Ha-ha-pah-no could do very well with a steak if not with coffee.
"Which of you killed the deer?" asked the judge, as they rode in.
Sile was silent long enough for Two Arrows to point at him and remark,
"Heap shoot."
"So I did, father, but he pointed him out. I'd never have seen him if
I'd been alone."
"Jest so," said Yellow Pine. "There isn't anything else on the earth
like the eyesight of an Indian. I've had 'em sight game more'n once that
I'd ha' missed sure."
It puzzled Na-tee-kah somewhat that anybody else should have won
anything while her wonderful brother was near by, but Ha-ha-pah-no
relieved her by remarking,
"Ugh! The red-head kill deer. Two Arrows show him how. Good."
One of the miners had ridden out from the line of march and returned
with another deer, so that fresh venison was plentiful in the camp. Two
Arrows felt no longing for any more hunting that day, and he bluntly
said so. It was ten times more to his liking to ride along with the
train and keep his eyes busy. He was studying white men, and all the
world knows what a curious study they are. One white boy was also
studying him and his sister, and could not understand them at all.
Sile's eyes and thoughts ran about over everything he heard or saw
until he almost had a headache.
"Tell you what, father," he said to the judge, "when we go into camp
again I'm going to show them my box."
"It's a curiosity box. Show it to them."
The road was necessarily somewhat rough, and wagoning was slow work, and
before sunset a place was chosen for an all-night camp. Then came Sile's
experiment. He hauled a stoutly-made, leather-covered trunk out of one
of the wagons, before the eyes of Two Arrows and Na-tee-kah, and it was
instantly evident that neither had ever seen one, but that both
understood its use. He unstrapped it, but it did not open, and he made
them try it. Lock and key were mysteries they had no thought of, and
they almost started back with surprise when Sile pushed a thin bit of
steel into one side of that contrivance and all the upper part of it
could be tipped right over.
Sile's "box" would have been first-rate rummaging for any boy of his
acquaintance, and it was a mine of wonders to the two young savages. He
had put into it some things which could hardly be useful to him, even if
he should be cast away upon a mountain, as Robinson Crusoe was upon an
island, and it was so much the better fun for Two Arrows and Na-tee-kah.
The fishing-hooks, lines, reel, etc., made the eyes of the former fairly
dance, and Sile brought out a joint-rod and put it together, with a
reel on, to show him how the machine worked. Two Arrows grew thoughtful
over that affair.
"Big fish break him."
"No. Show you about that to-morrow morning."
"Ugh! ugh!" suddenly exclaimed Ha-ha-pah-no. "Red-head got squaw? Boy!"
He did look young to be married, but she was pointing straight at a
brush and comb and some other articles which, to her notion, did not
belong in the treasury of a young warrior. Sile at once explained that
he used them himself, but there were several brushes and combs, and she
added,
"Ugh! Beat squaw. Take 'em away from her. What she do?"
"Try it on," said Sile, handing a brush and comb to Na-tee-kah, and a
peal of laughter announced the pleasure of the two Indian ladies, old
and young. Even Two Arrows dropped a "spoon-hook" to take an interest in
that proceeding.
"Come," said Ha-ha-pah-no, with a long string of merry gutturals of
explanation that she had seen a white lady at one of the forts putting
up the hair of another. She herself could do it, and in twenty seconds
more there was a yell from Na-tee-kah and a tooth out of the comb.
"Let me show you," said Sile, and from that moment there was not one
sound from the lips of Na-tee-kah. Whether she was hurt or not nobody
knew, for if the comb had extracted hair by the handful she would not
have whimpered. Ha-ha-pah-no insisted on having her hair combed by
Na-tee-kah. She must know how now, it was evident, and she did, for the
comb lost another tooth in the very first tangles of Ha-ha-pah-no's
hair.
"That's fun," said Yellow Pine. "Jest look at them critters. That there
squaw'll crack that lookin'-glass, twistin' her face, 'fore her combin'
is done."
She stood it pretty well, but the other contents of the box had less
interest now. She and Na-tee-kah preferred to go on with the brush and
comb. Even Two Arrows looked at them so enviously that Sile told him the
white chiefs did comb their hair. It was enough. Squaws were made to
serve braves, and they were both commanded to take charge of his long,
bushy, and decidedly tangled barbering. Not for his life would he have
uttered a cry of pain, but he made up his mind that a pale-face can
endure a great deal before they got through with him.
Supper had to be eaten, and sharp appetites helped them to get away long
enough for that duty, but then the brush and comb began again under
Sile's instruction.
"That there comb won't last long," said Yellow Pine. "Tell 'em to put
on some grease, Sile, and some ribbons. Ribbons, Sile, and some beads,
and--"
"And some red flannel," said Jonas, "and some tinware."
"I'd forgotten all about that," exclaimed Sile, springing up.
In a few moments his visitors were in a new state of excitement, for
they were tying up their now glossy locks with brilliant ribbons and
strips of gay cloth. To these were added some of the brilliant
white-metal ornaments that pass for silver among the very youngest
pale-face children. Two Arrows put on his full share of all that was
offered and became a very gay-looking young Indian. There was no danger
that he would stand on his head and spoil his ribbons, but he felt
almost too proud to stand on his feet. He felt more and more sure that
the world did not contain quite such another hero, and longed for the
presence of his whole band, and of his entire tribe, and of several
other tribes, that he might walk up and down in front of them and be
admired. No white boy with a new stovepipe hat and a pair of yellow kid
gloves ever wanted to walk through so many streets or past quite so many
"boarding-schools" as did Two Arrows--only that his showing-off places
were such as he was best acquainted with.
Na-tee-kah was more quiet than even Ha-ha-pah-no, for that highly
respectable squaw had done up her head remarkably.
"All she wants to finish it off is two tin dippers and a set of
sleigh-bells. I saw a squaw do that once. There's no telling what they
won't put on. But I say, jedge, that there littler one is a born lady,
and she's right down good-lookin' too. All she needs is good dressin'
and she'd kind o' shine."
There was not a doubt of it, and her highly-colored ribbons had been put
on with better taste than those of Ha-ha-pah-no, and they showed to good
advantage her clear, dark complexion, brilliant eyes, and regular
features. Old Long Bear had a right to be proud of both his children.
It was grand fun, but there came an end to it at last. Two Arrows went
out to share with Sile his camp-watch, and Ha-ha-pah-no and Na-tee-kah
were shown to a small tent which had been pitched for them. It was
something of a trial to take all that finery away from the admiring
blaze of the camp-fire and carry it into the dark hiding-place of that
tent, but it had to be done. At all events they could rise early in the
morning and comb their hair again and arrange the ribbons and things in
some other way.
Na-tee-kah's new world was opening to her wonderfully, and she lay for a
long time wide awake, staring into the darkness and trying to imagine
pale-face squaws and their ways of doing up their hair and painting
themselves and putting on whole heaps of blankets of the most striking
colors and patterns.
CHAPTER XVIII
TWO WAR-PARTIES
That was a time of uncommon interest and excitement to the entire Nez
Percé hunting village. They had plenty to eat and to drink, and some of
them had received presents, and the prospect ahead seemed to brighten a
little. By nightfall all the warriors were returned from accompanying
the mining party, and it was a time for a grand smoke. Some of them had
begged Yellow Pine for "fire-water," but not a drop had been obtained.
Instead of it they had been informed,
"We're not jest that kind of white men. There isn't a pint of
tangle-foot in this 'ere outfit. Ef I want to murder a feller I'll take
a rifle to him and do the job clean. I won't go around the bush and
massacre him with a whiskey-jug."
The red men understood perfectly well that there was no "fire-water,"
but that was all they gathered. Plenty of smoking tobacco they did
obtain, and it was a grand addition to the dignity of their "council,"
if every half-naked brave with a pipe in his mouth had a right to
consider himself a councillor. They all smoked, and they all wondered
what it was best to do next, and they all said so, and every brave among
them regretted that it was out of the question for them to acquire
possession of the quadrupeds ridden and driven by Judge Parks and his
men. The Big Tongue and a few of the younger braves even went so far as
to "talk war," but the wiser heads merely grunted at the suggestions
volunteered. The Big Tongue had much to say to the smokers nearest him
concerning a pale-face warrior whose scalp was among his own treasures.
Ha-ha-pah-no was not there to make any sly remarks as to how he actually
obtained such a trophy as that and some others on which his reputation
as a warrior mainly rested. They sat up until they had smoked all the
wisdom out of several pipes of tobacco to each warrior, but did not seem
to be any nearer a conclusion. The camp was under the special charge of
One-eye, but that dog was becoming quiet and solemn. His especial master
had departed, he knew not whither. All the bones in camp now belonged to
him, and he had no time to bury so much as one of them. He was not fond
of tobacco, and as soon as the smoking began he walked out of camp to
patrol the edge of the woods and to keep all the eye left him on duty
against possible intruders. He had no faith in a country which was
evidently infested by pale-faces.
If he had known more about that valley and the region into which it
led, he would have had an even worse opinion of it. The fact that it
contained a large stream of water had already suggested many things to
the experienced mind of Long Bear. All such water, he well knew, kept on
running, no matter what might be its crooks and turnings. If he and his
braves could have followed that stream far enough while they were
smoking and talking over plans, they might have reached a place where it
turned a corner of the mountains and was joined by another and larger
stream. The two in partnership were able to float a canoe. There was no
canoe afloat there, but there was something yet more important away on
down, a pretty long way, below the fork made by the junction of the two
streams. There was a camp occupied by red warriors only, without one
squaw to be seen in it, and it was therefore the camp of a "war-party."
It was accompanied by a large drove of ponies, horses, and mules, and
some of these had saddles and others carried packs. These were signs
that the war-party had been successful and that pale-faces had been the
sufferers. Every quadruped visible wore an air of being more or less
fatigued, in token of having been driven or ridden both fast and far.
From this it might have been gathered that these red men, however
successful had been their expedition, believed or feared that they were
followed by somebody whom they preferred to get away from. All these
signs told the exact truth; it was also true that some pains had been
taken to discover whether or not the supposed pursuit continued.
At the very hour when One-eye was making the best use he could of the
bright moonshine in front of his own camp, and knew nothing at all about
this other, a tall man stood in the deep shadow of a pine-tree, miles
and miles down stream from the resting-place of the war-party. The
bridle of a horse hung over his right arm, but the animal stood as
motionless as did his master, and both were intently watching a dark
shape that rode nearer and could be seen more and more clearly, and that
paused at last upon the river-bank within thirty yards. Just as it did
so there came from under the shadow of the pine-tree a flash and a sharp
report, and all the upper part of the dark shape on the bank fell
suddenly to the earth, uttering a loud, fierce yell.
"Got him!" was shouted from under the pine-tree, and the man walked out,
leading his horse, while instantly there could be heard the sound of
galloping hoofs beyond him. In a minute or so more a stern, hoarse voice
rang out.
"Halt! What is it, Garry?"
"Got him, captain. 'Nother of them 'Paches. He won't carry back no news.
Dead as a mackerel. Reckon they can't be far away now."
"We've taken pretty good care of their scouts, anyhow."
"Jest so many the less to fight when we come up with 'em. They'll
outnumber us bad enough, I reckon, best we can make of it."
"Back to camp, Garry. Corporal Peters, take the same post, with two men.
There may be more of them."
"All right, captain."
There was a little more talking done, but these seemed to be a somewhat
quiet set of men. There were six of them besides the captain. They were
all dressed in blue, and wore brass buttons and carried short-barrelled
carbines and sabres. A good look at them would have recalled to the mind
of Two Arrows all the arguments he had ever heard as to the wisdom of
keeping the peace with the pale-faces. When they reached the camp, after
"changing the guard" at Garry's river-side post, it was easy to see that
their entire force consisted of several times as many men of the same
sort. Every man was on his feet, wide awake and waiting for orders. One
squad of five stood with each man's hand upon the bridle of a saddled
horse, ready to mount, just as the first squad must have been, when it
heard the warning report of Garry's carbine. A company of United States
cavalry, veteran Indian fighters, following a "hot trail," keeps itself
wonderfully ready for action. It is not easy to take such men by
surprise. Now, however, at the word of command, all was instantly quiet
again. The actual meaning of the alarm was rapidly told from man to man,
and several remarked:
"Good for Garry! We'll catch 'em yet."
All who had a right to go to sleep, did so as unconcernedly as if they
had been in a hotel. On the whole, it looked as if something else than
peace were on its way into the valley where One-eye was keeping watch
for the smokers. The last man to lie down was the captain, and one of
the wide-awake squad nodded at him and said to another,
"If there was forty alarms 'fore sun-up, old Grover'd be the first man
to turn out every time."
"Not much reg'lation 'bout him."
"But there's lots of fight."
"He can get more hard work out of men and hosses, and he can do more
himself, and he can sleep less, and say less about it all, than any
other captain I ever served under."
That, therefore, was the kind of soldiers from whom the Apaches were
wisely trying to get away, and Garry's carbine had destroyed their
prospect of learning how very near he and his might be. It looked very
much as if two days more of hard riding would bring them into a sort of
trap, with the mountains before and the cavalry behind. Still, even
then, there would be the pass, if they knew where to find it. There
also were One-eye and all of his men and Sile Parks and his party; and
the wicked old mule, too, with his command, was in the valley somewhere.
Only a few days earlier the entire sweep of forest and "open and
mountain-side" had been unoccupied by anything more dangerous or more
interesting than wild game and the wild animals that fed on it. It is
very curious how suddenly immigrants will sometimes pour into a new
country if there is a good trail pointing out the way.
The spot chosen by Yellow Pine for the camp of the mining party was by a
dancing little brook which came down from the mountain to the right of
them, and the path by which they travelled that day had barely kept them
outside of the rocky slopes. Some coyotes came prowling around, to yelp
over the faint smell of roasted meat that floated out to them from the
camp-fires. Once during the night the cry of a wandering cougar came
wailing through the silence and was followed by that of a horned owl who
had noiselessly flapped near enough to blink his great eyes at the
blaze. For all that, it was the loneliest kind of a place, and the hours
went by until sunrise without the smallest real disturbance or hint of
perils to come.
Judge Parks himself was on the watch in the first gray of dawn, and the
camp was dim enough even after there were rosy tints upon the distant
mountain summits. He stood gazing at these and leaning upon his rifle,
when Yellow Pine walked out to take his customary survey of matters.
"We're going to have a fine day, jedge."
"Splendid weather. Pine, just think of all this magnificent country as
it will be when it's settled. Farms, towns, villages, mines, railways,
factories--"
"There won't be any game, then, or any red Indians, either."
"There isn't a finer country in all the world. The new time is coming,
Pine."
"Of course it is. Our mine's coming first thing. We'll get there 'fore
sundown. Wish I knew what else was coming."
"Afraid of anything?"
"Got a curious feeling in my back. Always have it when there's something
up. It's as much like the rheumatiz as it is like anything."
"Guess that's what it is, then."
"I dunno 'bout that. I've had all sorts of things happen when I had this
'ere feeling onto me."
"Exactly, Pine. I've had dinner happen to me a good many times just when
I had a sort of feeling it was coming. Soon as I got right down hungry I
knew it was a sure sign. I say, look at those boys."
"Going a-fishing. I'd call it--Well, it's a good thing for 'em to do.
They can't miss bringing in a good string. Sile, see here."
"Halloo!"
"Get back with some for breakfast if you can. We'll be right here till
the critters have done feeding. Catch a heap."
"All right," shouted Sile. "He says the water's full of 'em."
"Of course it is."
"Sile," said his father, "don't throw away your time on fly-fishing. Use
bait, and pull 'em right in. They'll bite."
"I'm going to spoon for 'em. Can't find any bait."
"Never mind, jedge," said Pine. "I've seen trout in some of these
mountain streams jump for a bare hook quick as it tetched the water.
There's too many on 'em, and they get the hungriest kind."
"They won't mind much what they jump at, that's sure. I must say I'd
like some for breakfast, though."
Yellow Pine and the judge had other matters on hand, and the latter had
a short nap to take, after his "watch." The animals had to be cared for,
moreover, before any mere human being had a right to be fed.
The first noise that was made in camp brought Na-tee-kah and
Ha-ha-pah-no out of their tent, comb and brush in hand. They both made
sure of their ribbons and that all was in order before they had a word
to say to anybody. It could not be denied that they were a very bright
looking and highly ornamented pair, Ha-ha-pah-no being perhaps a little
ahead.
CHAPTER XIX
WONDERFUL FISHING
There had been a good deal of discussion of the fishing question between
the two young friends, for Two Arrows knew nothing of the powers of a
"spoon-hook." Sile had them of several sizes, and Two Arrows admitted to
himself that anything so very bright and pretty must have special
effectiveness. Any of those spoons was brilliant enough to have been
worn in the hat of a great chief, but the doubt remaining was as to what
the trout would think of them. The gaudy assortment of artificial flies
Two Arrows quite turned up his nose at. The fish of the western
mountains were not in the habit of biting at such things, and could not
be taught to do so. As to the hooks, however, large and small, anybody
could see their superiority over such as he was accustomed to using, and
the lines were elegant. Sile provided him with a rod, and when he
marched away with it he felt a strong desire to carry it to and through
his own camp, that everybody he knew might see what an extraordinary
thing he was doing. No Nez Percé boy that he had ever heard of had been
able to go a-fishing with a joint-rod and a spoon-hook.
They had but a mile or so to walk in order to reach the nearest bend of
the little river, and they startled more than one gang of deer on the
way. Sile had his rifle and Two Arrows had his bow, but the morning had
been given up to fish, and they stuck to their original purpose in spite
of all temptation. On the bank of the stream they paused for a moment
and took a survey of the situation. The water was not more than fifty
yards wide, and did not seem to be deep, but it ran with rippling
swiftness.
"That'll do," said Sile. "It's plenty strong enough to carry a spoon.
You won't have to skitter it a bit."
"Ugh! Heap fish," said Two Arrows, but he did not understand Sile's
remark and wondered what was to come next. During all his life thus far
he had never thought of the pale-faces as fishermen, or that they really
knew anything valuable about such matters. The contents of Sile's box
had staggered him, and now he looked on in silence while the "Red-head"
(as Ha-ha-pah-no had named him) put his rod together, setting the reel
firmly in its socket, and then deftly fitted on the spoon-hook with its
fine wire "snell." Sile's father was an enthusiastic fisherman and had
given his son more than a little good schooling. Up went the rod, and
the line swing lightly back for a second, and then, with a perfect cast,
the brilliant "spoon" flew over the water and alighted among the swift
ripples. The current caught it and whirled it away, the polished silver
glittering and dancing near the surface, but it was visible only for an
instant. There came a rush and a plunge, and away out of the water
sprang a splendid trout with Sile's hook fastened firmly in his too
hasty jaw.
"Hurrah!" shouted Sile. "Got him!"
"Ugh! Good," said Two Arrows. "Break!"
"No, he won't break any line. See!"
Two Arrows did see a great deal in a very few moments. The tough rod
bent, and Sile gave a little line at first; but the trout made an
up-stream rush and was guided to the shore. He was lying on the grass,
quietly enough, just after that. So was another and another, and now Two
Arrows had mastered the idea and was at work with energy. It surprised
Sile to see how perfectly his red friend could handle his new tools, but
it was well that the rod was a stout one, for the reel and its uses were
as yet an enigma. It was exciting sport, for there was hardly any
waiting for bites whatever. The trout were on the lookout for their
breakfasts, and nobody had ever before offered them such attractive
little silvery fish as they now saw, every now and then struggling
through the water, all ready to be seized upon.
It was a great lesson to Two Arrows, and it promised a capital breakfast
to the mining party.
"Guess we've got enough," said Sile at last. "We'd better hurry back to
camp."
At that moment a strange and unexpected sound came to his ears from some
point lower down the stream, and Two Arrows came near to dropping his
rod into the water.
"Ugh! Catch now!"
"Yes, you've caught your fish, but what's that? It sounds for all the
world like a mule braying."
"Two Arrows know him. Heap bad mule. Nez Percé lose all pony. Find 'em
now. Red-head come?"
Sile looked with admiration upon the fiercely excited face of the young
Nez Percé. The dark eyes fairly glittered with pleasure and expectation,
and he was striving, with all the words and signs he was master of, to
convey an idea of the loss his band had sustained, and now once more,
and more sonorously, the "morning bugle" of a mule in command of
something came ringing up the river.
"I'll string the trout," said Sile, as he began to do so, "then I'll go
with you. It'll be grand if we can really catch them."
"Two Arrows catch 'em all, heap time. Get one, get all tribe."
"Wish we were mounted. Better go to camp and get some horses."
"Ugh! No wait. Find now."
There was no such thing as resisting his eager urgency, and Sile
himself began to get excited. The trout made two magnificent "strings,"
but were pretty heavy to carry, and it was decided to hang them and the
two rods upon the limb of a tree until a visit should have been paid to
the owner of that bray. All this was quickly attended to, and then the
two fishermen were instantly changed into pony-hunters.
Not even his adventure with the grisly, or his timely success with the
two bisons when his people were starving, had so aroused the ambition of
Two Arrows. The future fortunes of his entire band seemed to him to
depend once more upon his own individual good-conduct. Sile thought he
had never seen so proud looking a human being.
The speckled beauties from the river swung heavily from the high but
bending branch as the two boys hurried away, but these were almost
forgotten by both in the course of a few minutes. They did not have to
follow far the windings of the stream before Two Arrows, who was
somewhat in the advance, dodged behind a tree and beckoned eagerly to
Sile:
"Ugh! Look! Pony!"
Just beyond him was a grassy glade glistening with morning dew, and
scattered over it was the entire command of the wicked old mule, the
wealth and the comfort together of the Nez Percé pony-riders. To have
been seen by them prematurely would have been a pretty sure way of
stampeding them again, and the occasion called for prudence and good
management. Some of the animals still had their long hide lariats
hanging and dragging from their necks and some had not, but Two Arrows
noted one of the former, a very good-looking pony, feeding at no great
distance from a clump of hazel and willows beyond him. He made Sile
understand his purpose of getting into that cover, and then all that
Sile had to do was to watch him. Down dropped the young Nez Percé, and
from that moment there was little of him to be seen, except when his
gayly ribboned head now and then showed itself, peering over the wet,
luxuriant grass and weeds. Then a slight movement among the willows told
of his safe arrival, and still the runaways were feeding quietly,
unaware of the nearness of human beings or other enemies. Sile peered
from behind his tree and watched the movements of the particular pony
his friend had pointed out. He was a brisk sort of fellow, and he was
working at his breakfast busily. Nearer and nearer he fed his way
towards a projecting growth of the hazel-bushes and Sile perceived a
promising shake in one of these. There was something more than a shake
hidden by them, for in about one minute more a light, lithe, graceful
human form sprang suddenly out. A quick grasp at the trailing lariat, a
rapid twist of a loop of it around the animal's face, a buoyant leap,
and Two Arrows was a mounted Indian once more. Every beast of the
wicked old mule's startled command was familiar with the tones of the
whoop of triumph which called them all away from their grass and their
freedom. They had many a time been driven in from other pastures by that
particular yell, and it seemed now as if each of them took a swift look
around him and listened for the expected voice of One-eye. It should
naturally have followed that whoop. After that it was as if they had
only been waiting for somebody to come, and wished to say as much. Their
commander put out his head and brayed lustily, and so did all the other
mules, but the ponies took the matter more soberly. Whether or not they
had already begun to discover warning signs of cougars, wolves, grislies
and other insecurities of their situation, they actually felt better to
be once more in the company of a human being whom they knew. Sile
wondered greatly to see how readily the whole drove obeyed the shouts of
Two Arrows, and permitted themselves to be gathered and driven. He
refused the invitation given him to mount one of the ponies, for he had
doubts of his success in managing it barebacked and with such a
halter-bridle. He explained as well as he could that he preferred to
carry the fish and the rods and the news to his own camp, leaving Two
Arrows to handle his captives as best he could. That was just what Two
Arrows wanted. He was almost afraid lest the pale-faces should send him
some help and so take from him part of the glory of his fresh
achievement. There was little danger of that, as Sile was soon to
discover. He hurried back after his fish in a state of such excitement
that he very nearly forgot that he was in a new country. He would have
forgotten it more completely if it had not been for something he heard
as he drew nearer the spot where he had left his speckled game.
"What's that?" he suddenly exclaimed, stopping short and listening.
"What's all that growling? I never heard a bear, but it might be one."
So it might be, indeed, in a country where they were so plentiful, but
it was not a grisly this time. It was only a common black bear, very
fond of fish, and tremendously disgusted at the failure of his efforts
to get hold of some which had plainly been caught and left expressly for
him. Standing upon his hind-feet, and springing up as far as he was
able, his paws just reached the end of the longest string of trout and
set it a swinging. Two Arrows had wisely insisted upon bending down a
branch and hanging the fish pretty high, Indian fashion, and Sile now
saw the reason of it.
"He'd bring 'em all down as it is if I should let him take his time to
it. What shall I do now? Oh, but ain't I glad I brought along my
rifle!"
He was glad of it, very; but when he raised it in the direction of that
bear the sight seemed to dance in all directions, and he could not get a
good aim, short as was the distance.
Sile had the "buck ague."
Even old hunters sometimes find their nerves playing tricks on them. It
would not do to miss a shot then and there, and Sile lowered his rifle.
"I'll try a rest and see about this thing. I must hit that bear in the
head the first time, sure." He stepped behind a tree and put his rifle
through the crotch of a projecting branch. That tree had no shake in it;
and the barrel grew steady. "He is getting up on his hind-feet again.
Now for him."
The bear poised himself, with uplifted head, and, just as he lifted his
paw for another scratch at the fish, Sile pulled the trigger.
The range was very short, the rest was a good one, the sight was quick
but careful, and the bit of lead went straight to its intended place
under the ear of that black bear. He would need no more fish from that
time forth, and he pitched heavily forward upon the ground.
"Wait a moment, Sile! Never run in on a b'ar till yer sure of him.
Reckon he's dead, though. Stand where you are, my boy!"
"Why, father! Yellow Pine! You here? I never expected to see you."
"Well, my son," said the judge, "we thought we'd come over and see what
luck you were having. Where's Two Arrows?"
"We watched ye jest a moment," said Pine. "Allers take sight from a rest
if you can get one. You did that thing fine. There's the making of a
prime good shot in ye."
"I shook all over at first," said Sile, walking a little nearer the
bear.
"Buck ager. I've had it. He won't come to. If he does it's no matter,
now we've got here. I'll come back after breakfast with a hoss and fetch
him in. Where's the redskin?"
Sile rapidly explained the cause of his delay in getting back to camp;
but what he did not know or explain was the fact that the Nez Percés had
had no idea that their drove of lost ponies had wandered into that
valley.
"Glad they've got 'em," said Yellow Pine. "Every hoof of ourn'll be
safer from this time on, treaty or no treaty, good Indians or bad."
"Would they really steal from us, after all?" asked Sile, soberly.
"Steal hosses? Well, now, that isn't jest the way it looks to them.
They're brought up to it. All hoss-flesh is fair game to a plains
redskin. The more they have of their own, the easier it is to get 'em to
keep their hands off from them that you have and to make believe good.
These 'ere Nez Percés ain't a bad lot. Hope we won't run afoul of any
that's worse than they are, and more of 'em."
Sile was proud of his fish, and tenfold prouder of his bear, but the
proudest person in the mining-camp that morning was Na-tee-kah. Her
wonderful brother had earned some more glory. The next proudest being
was probably Ha-ha-pah-no, and she asked, several times in succession,
of both herself and Na-tee-kah, and without any satisfactory answer,
"What Big Tongue say, now? Tell how he caught pony?"
CHAPTER XX
A FULL CORRAL
Two arrows was a born horseman. About the earliest memory he had was of
riding rather than walking. The pony he was now on was one which had
carried him many a time. As soon as he had cut and trimmed a very long
and serviceable tree-branch all the other ponies and the mules perfectly
understood what it was for.
He was in a serious hurry. It was the most important affair of his life.
So far as he could see, the only ponies now missing from the drove were
the ones which had not been stampeded, but had remained in camp to be
eaten. All the rest had been rescued and kept in good order by the
genius and generalship of the wicked old mule. Two Arrows could but wish
that a dozen or so of the best dogs had been stampeded at the same time.
He rode busily hither and thither, shouting vigorously and lashing his
charges away from every tuft of grass they lingered over. He knew
exactly where to find his people, and he meant to find them quickly. The
distance was nearly the same that had been travelled the day before by
the mining party, but the loaded wagons had taken more time upon it
than loose ponies would, followed by an excited boy with a long "gad."
The fact that he had eaten no breakfast was one which hardly occurred to
Two Arrows, in his eager determination to get his runaways home in the
shortest possible order. Once they were headed in the right direction
there was but little difficulty in guiding them rightly, and now the old
mule took his accustomed place in the advance. It was as if he had
repented and was even willing to get some credit for leading his
reformed command in the way they should go.
The Nez Percé community had all eaten a good breakfast that morning;
there had been no vegetables, to be sure, but not a soul had missed
them. With plenty of fish and fresh meat they had all that red Indians
expect to be provided with, and they asked for no more. Their kind of
human life can be kept a-going upon a very narrow diet. The laziest
brave in camp was well fed, but for all that there was a general air of
dejection and despondency. Long Bear himself sat in front of his lodge,
cross-legged and moody, all the forenoon: his children were away from
him, on a visit to the pale-faces; his ponies were away upon another
visit, he could not guess with whom; his dogs, with the solitary
exception of One-eye, had all visited the camp-kettles. His only
remaining consolation seemed to be his pipe, and he was rapidly and
extravagantly using up all the tobacco he had obtained from Yellow Pine.
The shadow of the mighty maple near him grew shorter until it had little
more left to lose and could almost announce the arrival of midday. Just
then there arose, at the edge of the woods, a long, ear-piercing howl,
followed by such a volley of yelps and barking as can only be fired off
by a very remarkable dog. One-eye was informing the camp that something
great was drawing near, and was doing his best to make up for the
absence of the other dogs.
The Nez Percé warriors went for their weapons instinctively but somewhat
listlessly, until they heard a tremendous whoop join in with the barking
of One-eye and recognized the powerful voice of the Big Tongue. He could
out-whoop any other brave he knew of, and he was now doing his best. He
had been strolling out towards the open country when One-eye began, and
had found and seized upon a sudden heap of unexpected glory.
Away in advance of his command, farther and farther, had wisely trotted
the long-legged, long-eared, long-absent wicked old mule. Not another
quadruped was in sight when One-eye gave the alarm. The Big Tongue
bounded forward as if he were charging upon a beaten enemy, and the mule
did but whinny affectionately when he caught the remains of the lariat
at the place where it had been gnawed asunder, and sprang triumphantly
upon the back of the recaptured mule.
Whoop followed whoop as the happy warrior rode his prize towards the
camp, and the entire band, squaws and children included, poured out
under the trees to rejoice that they now had a mule as well as a dog.
Long Bear came among the rest. Ha-ha-pah-no was not there to make
unpleasant remarks, but the old chief knew that mule very well and he
knew that by no chance had he returned to his owners of his own free
will. He would have remained more contentedly with a man who had found
or stolen him. Long Bear was positive that he had not followed his
masters lovingly across the mountains, and that he need not make any
pretence of having done so. He could hardly have believed that the mule
was there at all but that he could see him, with the Big Tongue sitting
upon him to be admired.
The old chief turned and looked keenly and wistfully across the grassy
rolls, and so did several others of the wiser warriors. There was quite
a rise of ground at a little distance and One-eye was making for it as
fast as his legs could carry him. Suddenly, as if by a common impulse,
all the woods rang with a full chorus of whooping. Over the crest of
that green ridge came galloping pony after pony and mule after mule, in
a confused rush, and then a shrill shout arose beyond, and they could
shortly see Two Arrows, gayly ribboned, ornamented, mounted, dashing
madly back and forth and lashing forward the rear-guard of that
battalion.
Long Bear folded his arms and stood erect and still, as if he were
trying to hold himself in. His own boy, and therefore he himself, had
done another mighty deed.
"Ugh! Two Arrows! Young chief! Find pony all alone."
The Big Tongue tried hard to look as if he had found the mule, but it
did not seem to fit, somehow, and twice he opened his mouth widely and
shut it again in silence; there was no whoop ready to come. Every other
brave had a score or more quite ready, but Two Arrows grew silent as he
came nearer and rode more sedately. There was almost an air of
stateliness about him when at last he followed the trail of his
important cavalcade in under the shadows of the forest.
It was not becoming for him to volunteer, in boyish haste, an
explanation of his utterly unlooked-for exploit. Even the gray-heads
felt that he was entitled to a respectful and dignified reception, and
Long Bear himself stepped forward and inquired, in due form, precisely
how that wonderful rescue had been accomplished. Now that the question
was asked of him, Two Arrows was willing enough to tell the entire
story, and to point to all the animals as witnesses to the truth of it.
As fast as he told it, the more or less distorted facts went swiftly
round from lip to lip among the squaws and younger people. It was almost
unlucky for the Big Tongue to remark, dignifiedly,
"Boy find pony. Warrior ride him;" for a half-grown warrior near him
added,
"Boy _there_. Big Tongue _here_. Same way hunt buffalo."
It sounded a little like Ha-ha-pah-no, and the Big Tongue was silenced.
He and the rest now listened to the answers of Two Arrows as to his
visit, and he gave a full account of the good treatment he had received.
It looked as if honors had fairly been heaped upon him and Na-tee-kah,
and, for their sakes, upon Ha-ha-pah-no. Some of the older squaws
shortly picked up the annoying fact concerning the latter that she had
learned how to make coffee, and that her hair was now brushed and combed
and made shiny. They knew what combs were. She would probably wear one
now. She would never again be the same woman in her own estimation, they
were sure of that. She had always held her head high enough, for her
husband was a renowned brave and her tongue was always in good order.
The drove of ponies and mules was the centre of attraction, after Two
Arrows had finished his recital, and every Nez Percé searched it
eagerly for his own. It was decided to send off several braves at once,
with some squaws and pack-ponies, to bring through the pass the lodges
and other materials they had hidden near the camp of their starvation.
Two Arrows ate his breakfast and dinner in one meal, and was then bidden
to mount a pony at once and ride away after his pale-face friends, with
the strongest assurances that the Nez Percés regarded them as so many
brothers. Long Bear also sent a handsome cougar-skin to Sile, as a
proper acknowledgment of the fact that he had been a looker-on at the
rescue of the quadrupeds from the misguiding leadership of the bad old
mule. Two Arrows rode gladly away upon his errand, and some of the
braves set out at once after the "left baggage." All whom they left
behind them had now abundant subject-matter for conversation and for
unlimited "Ughs!" The entire future suddenly brightened up for that band
of Nez Percés, and they were entirely confident of their ability to
procure a new supply of dogs. As for One-eye, that sagacious brute
wandered around the corral, from hoof to hoof, until he knew the facts
of the case thoroughly. He would have followed Two Arrows, but for the
stern refusal of Long Bear. He was needed at home all the more now that
there would be additional watching and barking to be done. On the whole
he was as well satisfied to have it so, for his accumulation of bone
treasures was becoming an affair for any dog to think about seriously.
Sile was not exactly a hero when he reached camp, but he was an
uncommonly hungry boy. It seemed to him that he could eat as many trout
as Ha-ha-pah-no could broil for him, and he certainly worked at it
steadily for a long time. Every other human being in camp did the same,
although some had already made a fair beginning upon venison cuts and
coffee. All had room for some fresh trout, and all said they wo
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