Wunpost

by Dane Coolidge

  CHAPTER XXII

  THE FEAR OF THE HILLS

  Wunpost romped off down the canyon, holding the hair up like ascalp-lock--which it was, except for the scalp. Manuel Apache, with thepride of his kind, had knotted it up in a purple silk handkerchief; andhe had yelled louder when he found it was gone than he had when he wascaught in the trap. He had, in fact, acted extremely unreasonable,considering all that had been done for him; and Wunpost had been obligedto throw down on him with his six-shooter and order him off up thecanyon. It was taking a big chance to allow him to live at all and, notto tempt him too far along the lines of reprisal, Wunpost left theApache afoot. His gaunted pony was feeding hobbled, down the canyon, andWunpost took off the rawhide thongs and hung them about his neck, afterwhich he drove him on with his mules. But even at that he was taking achance, or so at least it seemed, for the look in the Apache's eye as hehad limped off up the gulch reminded Wunpost of a broken-backedrattlesnake.

  He was a bad Indian and a bad actor--one of these men that throwbutcher-knives--and yet Wunpost had tamed him and set him afoot and comeoff with his back-hair, as promised. He was a Government scout, the pickof the Apaches, and he had matched his desert craft against Wunpost's;but that craft, while it was good, was not good enough, and he hadwalked right into a bear-trap. Not the trap in the trail--he had gonearound that--but the one in the rocks, with the step-diverting bushpulled down. Wunpost had gauged it to a nicety and this big chief of theApaches had lost out in the duel of wits. He had lost his horse and hehad lost his hair; and that pain in his heel would be a warning for sometime not to follow after Wunpost, the desert-man.

  There were others, of course, who claimed to be desert-men and to knowDeath Valley like a book; but it was self-evident to Wunpost as he rodeback with his trophies that he was the king of them all. He had taken onLynch and his desert-bred Shoshone and led them the devil's own chase;and now he had taken on Manuel, the big chief of the Apaches, and lefthim afoot in the rocks. But one thing he had learned from thissnakey-eyed man-killer--he would better get rid of his money. For therewere others still in the hills who might pot him for it any time--andbesides, it was a useless risk. He was taking chances enough withoutmaking it an object for every miscreant in the country to shoot him.

  He camped that noon at Surveyor's Well, to give his mules a good feed ofgrass, and as he sat out in the open the two ravens came by, but now helaughed at their croaks. Even if the eagles came by he would not losehis nerve again, for he was fighting against men that he knew.Pisen-face Lynch and his gang were no better than he was--they left atrack and followed the trails--and after he had announced that his moneywas all banked they would have no inducement to kill him. Theinducements, in fact, would be all the other way; because the man thatkilled him would be fully as foolish as the one that killed the goosefor her egg. He alone was the repository of that great and goldensecret, the whereabouts of the Sockdolager Mine; and if they killed himout of spite neither Eells nor any of his man-hunters would ever see thecolor of its ore.

  Wunpost stretched his arms and laughed, but as he was saddling up hismules he saw a smoke, rising up from the mouth of Tank Canyon. It wasnot in the Canyon but high up on a point and he knew it was ManuelApache. He was signaling across the Valley to his boss in the Panamintsthat he was in distress and needed help, but no answering smoke rose upfrom Tucki Mountain to show where Wunpost's enemies lay hid. ThePanamints stood out clean in the brilliant November light and eachpurple canyon seemed to invite him to its shelter, so sweetly did theylie in the sun. And yet, as that thin smoke bellied up and was smotheredback again in the smoke-talk that the Apaches know so well, Wunpostwondered if its message was only a call for help--it might be a warningto Lynch. Or it might be a signal to still other Apaches who werewatching his coming from the heights, and as Wunpost looked again hishand sought out the Indian's scalp-lock and he regarded it almostregretfully.

  Why had he envenomed that ruthless savage by lifting his scalp-lock, thetoken of his warrior's pride; when by treating him generously he mighthave won his good will and thus have one less enemy in the hills?Perhaps Wilhelmina had been right--it was to make good on a boast whichmight much better have never been uttered. He had bet her his mine andeverything he had, a thing quite unnecessary to do; and then to makegood he had deprived this Indian of his hair, which alone might put himback on his trail. He might get another horse and take up once more thatrelentless and murderous pursuit; and this time, like Lynch, he would beout for blood and not for the money there was in it.

  Wunpost sighed and cinched his packs and hit out across the flats forthe mouth of Emigrant Wash. But the thought that other Apaches might bein Lynch's employ quite poisoned Wunpost's flowing cup of happiness, andas he drew near the gap which led off to Emigrant Springs he stopped andlooked up at the mountains. They were high, he knew, and his mules weretired, but something told him not to go through that gap. It was anarrow passageway through the hills, not forty feet wide, and all alongits sides there were caves in the cliffs where a hundred men could hide.And why should Manuel Apache be making fancy smoke-talks if no one butwhite men were there? Why not make a straight smoke, the way a white manwould, and let it go at that? Wunpost shook his head sagely and turnedaway from the gap--he had had enough excitement for that trip.

  Bone Canyon, for which he headed, was still far away and the sun wasgetting low; but Wunpost knew, even if others did not, that there was awater-hole well up towards the summit. A cloudburst had sluiced thecanyon from top to bottom and spread out a great fan of dirt; but in theearlier days an Indian trail had wound up it, passing by the hiddenspring. And if he could water his mules there he could rim out up aboveand camp on a broad, level flat. Wunpost jogged along fast, for he hadleft the pony at Surveyor's Well, and as he rode towards thecanyon-mouth he kept his eyes on the ridges to guard against a possiblesurprise. For if Lynch and his Indians were watching from the gap theywould notice his turning off to the left, and in that case a good runnermight cut across to Bone Canyon before he could get through the pass.But the mountain side was empty and as the dusk was gathering he passedthrough the portals of Bone Canyon.

  Like all desert canyons it boxed in at its mouth, opening out later in abroad valley behind; his road was the sand-wash, the path of the lastcloudburst, now packed hard and set like stone. In the middle of thesand-wash a little channel had been dug by the last of the sluicingwater; above the wash there rose another cut-bank where the cloudburstbefore it had taken out an even greater slice; and then on both sidesthere rose high bluffs of conglomerate which some father of all thecloudbursts had formed. Wunpost was riding in the lead now on hisfast-walking mule, the two pack-animals following wearily along behind;in his nest on the front pack Good Luck was more than half sleeping,Wunpost himself was tempted to nod--and then, from the west bluff, therewas a spit of fire and Wunpost found himself on the ground.

  Across his breast and under his arm there was a streak that burned likefire, his mules were milling and bashing their packs; and as they turnedboth ways and ran he rolled over into the channel, with his rifle stillclutched in one hand. Those days of steady practise had not been invain, for as he went off his mule he had snatched at his saddle-gun anddragged it from its scabbard. And now he lay and waited, listening tothe running of his mules and the frenzied barking of his dog; and itcame to him vaguely that several shots had been fired, and some from theeast bank of the wash. But the man who had hit him had fired from thewest and Wunpost crept down the wash and looked up.

  A trickle of blood was running down his left arm from the bullet woundwhich had just missed his heart, but his whole body was tingling with astrength which could move mountains and he was consumed with a passionfor revenge. For the second time he had been ambushed and shot by thisgang of cold-blooded murderers, and he had no doubt that their motivewas the same as that to which the Indian had confessed. They had doggedhis steps to kill him for his money--Pisen-face Lynch, or whoever itwas--but their shooting was poor and as he rose b
eside a bush Wunposttook a chance from the east. The man he was looking for had shot fromthe west and he ran his eyes along the bluff.

  Nothing stirred for a minute and then a round rock suddenly moved andaltered its shape. He thrust out his rifle and drew down on itcarefully, but the dusk put a blur on his sights. His foresight wasbeginning to loom, his hindsight was not clean, and he knew that wouldmake him shoot high. He waited, all a-tremble, the sweat running off hisface and mingling with the blood from his arm; and then the man rose up,head and shoulders against the sky, and he knew his would-be murdererwas Lynch. Wunpost held his gun against the light until the sights werelined up fine, then swung back for a snap-shot at Lynch; and as therifle belched and kicked he caught a flash of a tumbling form andclutching hands thrown up wildly against the sky. Then he stooped downand ran, helter-skelter down the wash, regardless of what might be inhis way; and as he plunged around a curve he stampeded a pack-mule whichhad run that far and stopped.

  It was the smallest of his mules, and the wildest as well, Old Walkerand his mate having gone off up the canyon in a panic which would takethem to the ranch; but it was a mule and, being packed, it could not runfar down hill so Wunpost walked up on it and caught it. Far out in theopen, where no enemy could slip up on him, he halted and made a saddleof the pack, and as he mounted to go he turned to Tucki Mountain andcalled down a curse on Lynch. Then he rode back down the trail that ledto Death Valley, for the fear of the hills had come back.