Told in the Hills: A Novel

by Marah Ellis Ryan

  CHAPTER IV.

  THROUGH THE LOST MINE.

  An hour before day in the Kootenais! Not the musical dawn of that earlyautumn, when all the woods were a-quiver with the fullness of color andsound; when the birds called to each other of the coming sun, and thelittle rills of the shady places moistened the sweet fern and spread itsfragrance around and about, until one could find no couch so seductiveas one on the amber grasses with the rare, all-pervading scents of thevirgin soil.

  Not any of those seductions solaced or made more bitter the watch of themen who stood hopeless in the snow of that treacherous ravine. Not evena fire dared be lit all the night long, because of those suddenlymurderous natives, who, through knowing the secrets of the cleft earth,held their fates at the mercy of eager bronze hands.

  "And one man who knew the country could have prevented this!" groanedHardy, with a thought of the little wife and Miss Margaret. How wouldthey listen to this story?

  "If we had Genesee with us, we should not have been penned up in anysuch fashion as this," decided Murray, stamping back and forward, asmany others were doing, to keep their blood in circulation--for what?

  "Hard to tell," chimed in the scout from Idaho. "Don't know as it's anybetter to be tricked by one's own gang than the hostiles. Genesee,more'n likely, was gettin' ready for this when he run off the stock."

  Just then something struck him. The snow made a soft bed, but theassailant had not stopped to consider that, and quick as light his kneewas on the fallen man's chest.

  "Take it back!" he commanded, with the icy muzzle of a revolverpersuading his meaning into the brain of the surprised scout. "That manis no horse-thief. Take it back, or I'll save the Indians the trouble ofwasting lead on you."

  "Well," reasoned the philosopher in the snow, "this ain't the damnedestbest place I've ever been in for arguin' a point, an' as you havefightin' ideas on the question, an' I haven't any ideas, an' don't carea hell of a sight, I'll eat my words for the time bein', and we'llsettle the question o' that knock on the head, if the chance is evergiven us to settle anything, out o' this gully."

  "What's this?" and though only outlines of figures could bedistinguished, the voice was the authoritative one of Captain Holt. "Mr.Stuart, I am surprised to find you in this sort of thing, and about thatsquaw man back in camp. Find something better to waste your strengthfor. There is no doubt in my mind now of the man's complicity--"

  "Stop it!" broke in Stuart curtly; "you can hold what opinion you pleaseof him, but you can't tell me he's a horse-thief. A squaw man andadopted Indian he may be and altogether an outlaw in your eyes; but Idoubt much your fitness to judge him, and advise you not to call him athief until you are able to prove your words, or willing to back themwith all we've got left here."

  All they had left was their lives, and Stuart's unexpected recklessnessand sharp words told them his was ready as a pledge to his speech. Nonecared, at that stage of the game, to question why. It was no time forquarrels among themselves when each felt that with the daylight mightcome death.

  Afterward, when the tale was told, no man could remember which of themfirst discovered a form in their midst that had not been with them ontheir entrance--a breathless, panting figure, that leaned against one oftheir horses.

  "Who is it?" someone asked.

  "What is it?"

  No one answered--only pressed closer, with fingers on triggers, fearingtreachery. And then the panting figure raised itself from its rest onthe horse's neck, rose to a stature not easily mistaken, even in thatlight, and a familiar, surly voice spoke:

  "I don't reckon any of you need be puzzled much to find out; hasn't beensuch a long time since you saw me."

  "By God, it's Genesee!"

  And despite the wholesale condemnation of the man, there was not a heartthat did not grow lighter with the knowledge. They knew, or believed,that here was the one man who had the power to save them, if he cared touse it; but would he?

  "Jack!"

  Someone, at sound of his voice, pushed through the crowd withoutstretched hand. It was not refused this time.

  "I've come for you," was all Genesee said; then he turned to the others.

  "Are you willing to follow me?" he asked, raising his voice a little."The horses can't go through where I've got to take you; you'll have toleave them."

  A voice close to his elbow put in a word of expostulation against thedesertion of the horses. Genesee turned on the speaker with an oath.

  "You may command in a quiet camp, but we're outside of it now, and I putjust a little less value on your opinion than on any man's in the gulch.This is a question for every man to answer for himself. You've losttheir lives for them if they're kept here till daylight. I'll take themout if they're ready to come."

  There was no dissenting voice. Compared with the inglorious deathawaiting them in the gulch, the deliverance was a God-send. They did notjust see how it was to be effected; but the strange certainty of hopewith which they turned to the man they had left behind as a horse-thiefwas a thing surprising to them all, when they had time to think ofit--in the dusk of the morning, they had not.

  He appeared among them as if a deliverer had materialized from thesnow-laden branches of cedar, or from the close-creeping clouds of themountain. They had felt themselves touched by a superstitious thrillwhen he was found in their midst; but they knew that, come as he might,be what he would, they had in him one to whom the mountains were as anopen book, as the Indians knew when they tendered him the significantname of Lamonti.

  Captain Holt was the only rebel on the horse question; to add those tothe spoils of the Indians was a bitter thing for him to do.

  "It looks as if we were not content with them taking half our stock, butrode up here to leave them the rest," he said, aggressively, to nobodyin particular. "I've a notion to leave only the carcasses."

  "Not this morning," broke in the scout. "We've no time to wait for workof that sort. Serves you right to lose them, too, for your damnedblunders. Come along if you want to get out of this--single file, andkeep quiet."

  It was no time for argument or military measures for insubordination;and bitter as the statement of inefficiency was, Captain Holt knew therewere some grounds for it, and knew that, in the eyes of the men, he wasjudged from the same standpoint. The blind raid with green scouts didseem, looking back at it, like a headlong piece of folly. How much offolly the whole attack was, they did not as yet realize.

  It was not far that Genesee led them through the stunted, gnarled growthup the steep sides of the gulch. Half-way to the top there were, in thesummer-time, green grass and low brush in which the small game couldhide; but above that rose a sheer wall of rock clear up to where thesoil had gathered and the pines taken root.

  In the dusk they could see no way of surmounting it; yet there was noword of demur, not even a question. He was simply their hope, and theyfollowed him.

  And their guide felt it. He knew few of them liked him personally, andit made his victory the greater; but even above that was the thoughtthat his freedom was due to the girl who never guessed how he should useit.

  He felt, some way, as if he must account to her for every act she hadgiven him the power to perform, as if his life itself belonged to her,and the sweetness of the thought was with him in every step of the nightride, in every plan for the delivery of the men.

  At the very foot of the rock wall he stopped and turned to the man nexthim. It was Hardy.

  "It's a case of 'crawl' here for a few lengths; pass the word along, andlook out for your heads."

  The next instant he had vanished under the rock wall--Hardy followinghim; then a flicker of light shone like a star as a guide for theothers, and in five minutes every man of them had wriggled through whatseemed but a slit in the solid front.

  "A regular cave, by hooky!" said the moral guide from Idaho, as he stoodupright at last. His voice echoed strangely. "Hooky! hooky! hooky!"sounded from different points where the shadows deepened, suggestingendless additions to the
room where they stood.

  Genesee had halted and was splitting up some pine for a torch, using theknife Rachel had cut his bonds with, and showing that the handle wasstained with blood, as were the sticks of pine he was handling.

  "Look for some more sticks around here, and lend a hand," he said. "Weneed more than one torch. I burnt up what I had in working through thathole. I've been at it for three hours, I reckon, without knowing, till Igot the last stone away, whether I'd be in time or find daylight on theother side."

  "And is that what cut your hands?" asked Lieutenant Murray. "Why,they're a sight! For heaven's sake, what have you been doing?"

  "I found a 'cave-in' of rock and gravel right at the end of thattunnel," answered Genesee, nodding the way they had just come, anddrawing their notice to fresh earth and broken stone thrown to the side."I had no tools here, nothing but that," and he motioned toward amallet-like thing of stone. "My tools were moved from the mine over toScot's Mountain awhile back, and as that truck had to be hoisted away,and I hadn't time to invite help, it had to be done with these;" and heheld out his hands that were bleeding--a telling witness of hisendeavors to reach there in time. And every man of them felt it.

  There was an impulsive move forward, and Hardy was the first to hold outhis hand. But Genesee stepped back, and leaned against the wall.

  "That's all right, Hardy," he said, with something of his old carelesssmile. "I'm glad you're the first, for the sake of old times; but Ireckon it would be playing it pretty low down on a friend to let himtake me in on false pretenses. You see I haven't been acquitted ofhorse-stealing yet--about the most low-lived trade a man can turn to,unless it is sheep-stealing."

  "Oh, hell!" broke in one of the men, "this clears the horse business sofar as I'm concerned, and I can bet on the other boys, too!"

  "Can you?" asked Genesee, with a sort of elated, yet conservative, air;"but this isn't your game or the boys' game. I'm playing a lone hand,and not begging either. That torch ready?"

  The rebuff kept the others from any advance, if they had thought ofmaking it. Lieutenant Murray had picked up the stone mallet and wasexamining it by the flickering light; one side was flattened a little,like a tomahawk.

  "That's a queer affair," he remarked. "What did you have it made for?"

  "Have it made! The chances are that thing was made before Columbusever managed a sail-boat," returned Genesee. "I found a lot of them inhere; wedges, too, and such."

  "In here?" and the men looked with a new interest at the rocky walls."What is it?"

  "An extension I tumbled into, over a year back, when I was tunneling ata drift the other side of the hill. One day I found that hole there, andminded it this morning, so it came in handy. I reckon this is theoriginal Tamahnous mine of the old tribe. It's been lost over a hundredyears. The Kootenais only have a tradition of it."

  "A mine--gold?"

  "Well, I was digging for a silver show when I struck it," answeredGenesee; "and, so far as I see, that's what was here, but it's workedout. Didn't do much prospecting in it, as I left the Kootenai hills lessthan a week after. I just filled up the entry, and allowed it would keeptill I got back."

  "Does it belong to you?" asked one man, with speculation in his voice.

  Genesee laughed. "I reckon so. Tamahnous Peak is mine, and a few feet ofgrazing land on the east. Nobody grudges it to me up this way. Indiansthink it's haunted, 'cause all the rocks around it give echoes; and I--"

  He ceased speaking abruptly, his eyes on the pile of debris in thecorner. Then he lit a fresh torch from the dying one, and gave the wordto strike for the outside, following single file, as the hill was prettywell honey-combed, and it was wise to be cautious.

  "Because," said their leader, "if any should stray off, we might nothave time this day of our Lord to come back and hunt him up."

  Before leaving what seemed like the back entrance, he walked over to thecorner and picked up the thing that had arrested his attention a minutebefore, and slipping it in his pocket, walked to the head of the longline of men, several of whom were wounded, but only one less than thenumber who had left camp. And the one lacking was the man who had firedthe first shot and killed the messenger from Grey Eagle--he himselfdying from a wound, after the ride into the gulch.

  As the scout passed the men, a hand and a pair of gloves were thrust outto him from a group; and turning his torch so that the light would showthe giver, he saw it was Stuart.

  "Thank you, sir," he said, with more graciousness than most of the menhad ever seen in him; "I'll take them from you, as my own are damagedsome." They were torn to shreds, and the fingers under them worn to thequick.

  The echoing steps of the forty men were as if forty hundred were makingtheir way through the mine of the Tamahnous; for no living tribe everclaimed it, even by descent. The hill that contained it had forgenerations been given by tradition to the witches of evil, who spokethrough the rock--a clever scheme of those vanished workers to guardtheir wealth, or the wealth they hoped to find; but for what use?Neither silver in coin nor vessel can be traced as ever belonging totribes of the Northern Indians. Yet that honey-combed peak, with itswide galleries, its many entries, and well-planned rooms, bespoketrained skill in underground quarrying. From some unseen source freshair sifted through the darkness to them, and the tinkle of drippingwater in pools came to their ears, though the pools were shrouded in thedarkness that, just beyond the range of the few torches, was intense;and after the long tramp through echoing winds and turns, the misty dawnthat was still early seemed dazzling to the eyes, red and haggard fromthe vigil of the night.

  "You will have to get away from here on a double-quick," said Geneseesharply, after a glance at the sky and up the sides of the hill fromwhich they had come. "Once down there in the valley, the fog may hideyou till sun-up, and then, again, it mightn't. Just mind that they havehorses."

  "We are not likely to forget it," was Captain Holt's answer; and thenhesitated a moment, looking at Genesee.

  "Are you not coming with us?" asked Lieutenant Murray, giving voice tothe question in his commander's mind as well as the others.

  "Yes, part of the way," said the scout quietly, but with a challenge todetention in the slight pause with which he glanced at the group; "but Ihave a beast to carry me back, and I'm just tired enough to use it." Anddisappearing for a minute in the brush, he led out Mowitza, and,mounting her, turned her head toward the terraces of the lower valley.

  They passed the isolated cabin that brought back to Stuart a remembranceof where they were; then down the steps of the Tamahnous and along thelittle lake, all swathed alike in the snow and the mist leaving null allcharacter in the landscape.

  The cabin was commented on by the men, to whom it was a surprise,looming up so close to them through the cloud curtain.

  "That's mine," their guide remarked, and one of them, puzzled, stated itas his belief that Genesee claimed the whole Kootenai territory.

  The scout gave up his saddle to a man with a leg-wound, but he did notlet go the bridle of Mowitza; and so they went on with their guidestalking grimly ahead, ready, they all knew, to turn as fiercely againstthem at a sign of restraint as he had worked for them, if a movement wasmade to interfere with his further liberty.

  The sun rolled up over the purple horizon--a great body of blushessuffusing the mountains; but its chaste entrance had brazened into avery steady stare before it could pierce the veil of the valleys, andpick out the dots of moving blue against the snow on the home trail.

  It had been a wonderfully quiet tramp. Most of the thoughts of the partywere of the man walking ahead of them, and his nearness made thediscussion of his actions awkward. They did not know what to expect ofhim, and a general curiosity prevailed as to what he would do next.

  They learned, when at last the ridge above camp was reached, about themiddle of the forenoon. He had been talking some to the man on Mowitza,and when they reached that point he stopped.

  "Whereabouts?" he asked; and the man pointed to a pl
ace where the snowwas colored by soil.

  "Over there! I guess the boys buried him."

  "Well, you can get down from that saddle now. I reckon you can walk downto camp; if not, they can carry you." Then he turned to the rest.

  "There's a body under that snow that I want," he said sententiously."I'm not in condition for any more digging," and he glanced at hishands. "Are there any men among you that will get it out for me?"

  "You bet!" was the unhesitating reply; and without question, hands andknives were turned to the task, the man on horseback watching themattentively.

  "May I ask what that is for?" asked Captain Holt; at last, as amiably ashe could, in the face of being ignored and affronted at every chancethat was given Genesee. He had saved the commander's life; that was aneasy thing to do compared with the possibility of hiding his contempt.

  He was openly and even unreasonably aggressive--one of the spots in hisnature that to a careless eye would appear the natural color of hiswhole character. He did not answer at once, and Captain Holt spokeagain:

  "What is the object of digging up that Indian?"

  Then Genesee turned in the saddle.

  "Just to give you all a little proof of how big a fool a man can bewithout being a 'permanent' in a lunatic asylum."

  And then he turned his attention again to the men digging up the looseearth. They had not far to go; small care had been taken to make thegrave deep.

  "Take care there with your knives," said Genesee as one shoulder wasbared to sight. "Lift him out. Here--give him to me."

  "What in----"

  "Give him to me!" he repeated. "I've given your damned fool lives backto forty of you, and all I'm asking for it is that Kootenai's deadbody."

  Stuart stooped and lifted the chill, dark thing, and other hands werequick to help. The frozen soil was brushed like dust from the frozenface, and then, heavy--heavy, it was laid in the arms of the man waitingfor it.

  He scanned from the young face to the moccasined feet swiftly, and thenturned his eyes to the others.

  "Where's his blanket?" he demanded; and a man who wore it pushed forwardand threw it over the figure.

  "Denny took it," he said in extenuation, "and when Denny went under, Itook it."

  "Yes!" and again his eyes swept the crowd. "Now I want his rifle, hisknife, a snake-skin belt, and a necklace of bear's teeth--who's gotthem?"

  "Well, I'll be damned!" "How's that for second sight?" "Beats the devilout of hell!" were some of the sotto-voce remarks exchanged at theenumeration of the things wanted.

  "I've no time to waste in waiting," he added. "If they're in this crowdand ain't given up, I'll straighten the account some day, if I have tohunt five years for the trail to them. I'm a-waiting."

  His hand was laid on the breast of the dead Indian as he spoke, andsomething in the touch brought a change to his face. The hand wasslipped quickly inside the fringed shirt, and withdrawn, clasping a rollof parchment cured in Indian fashion. A bitter oath broke from him as heuntied the white sinews of the deer, and glanced at the contents.

  "What is it? What is it?" was the question from all sides.

  Genesee, in a sort of fury, seemed to hear most clearly that of the, forthe hour, displaced commander.

  "I'll tell you what it is!" he burst out wrathfully. "It's a message ofpeace from the Kootenai tribe--an offer of their help against theBlackfeet any time the troops of the United States need them. It is sentby Grey Eagle, the oldest of their war chiefs, and the messenger sentwas Grey Eagle's grandson, Snowcap--the future chief of their people.And you have had him shot down like a dog while carrying that message.By God! I wouldn't have blamed them if they had scalped every mother'sson of you."

  To say that the revelation was impressive, would express the emotions ofthe men but mildly. Captain Holt was not the only one of them who turnedwhite at the realization of what a provoked uprising of those jointtribes would mean, in the crippled condition of the camp. It would meana sweeping annihilation of all white blood in their path; the troopswould have enough to do to defend themselves, without being able to helpthe settlers.

  "In God's name, Genesee, is this true?" and forgetting all animosity inthe overwhelming news, Holt pressed forward, laying his hand on theshoulder of the dead messenger.

  "Take it off!" yelled Genesee, looking at the unconscious hand thatinvoluntarily had moved toward him. "Take it off, or, by Heaven, I'llcut it off!"

  And his fingers closing nervously on the hunting-knife emphasized hismeaning, and showed how stubborn and sleepless were the man'sprejudices.

  The hand dropped, and Genesee reached out the document to one of thecrestfallen scouts.

  "Just read that out loud for the benefit of anyone that can't understandmy way of talking," he suggested with ironical bitterness; "and whileyou are about it, the fellows that stripped this boy will be good enoughto ante up with everything they've got of his--and no time to wasteabout it either."

  And Captain Holt, with a new idea of the seriousness of the demand,seconded it, receiving with his own hands the arms and decorations thathad been seized by the victorious Denny, and afterward divided among hiscomrades. Genesee noted that rendering up of trifling spoils with sulleneyes, in which the fury had not abated a particle.

  "A healthy crew you are!" he remarked contemptuously; "a nice,clean-handed lot, without grit enough to steal a horse, but plenty of itfor robbing a dead boy. I reckon no one of you ever had a boy that ageof your own."

  Several of them--looking in the dark, dead face--felt uneasy, and forgotfor the moment that they were lectured by a horse-thief; forgot even howlight a thing the life of an Indian was anyway.

  "Don't blame the whole squad," said the man who took the articles fromthe Captain and handed them up to Genesee. "Denny captured them when hemade the shot, just as anyone would do, and it's no use cussin' aboutDenny; he's buried up in that gulch--the Kootenais finished him."

  "And saved me the trouble," added the scout significantly.

  He was wrapping as well as he could the gay blanket over the rigid form.The necklace was clasped about the throat, but the belt was more awkwardto manage, and was thrust into the bosom of Genesee's buckskin shirt,the knife in his belt, the rifle swung at his back.

  There was something impressively ghastly in those two figures--the liveone with the stubborness of fate, and the stolidity, sitting there, withacross his thighs the blanketed, shapeless thing that had held a life;and even the husk seemed a little more horrible with its face hiddenthan when revealed more frankly; there was something so weirdlysuggestive in the motionless outlines.

  "No, I don't want that," he said, as the man who read the message wasabout to hand it back to him; "it belongs to the command, and I may geta dose of cold lead before I could deliver it."

  Then he glanced about, signaling Stuart by a motion of his head.

  "There's a lady across in the valley there that I treated pretty badlylast night," he said, in a tone so natural that all near could hear him,and more than one head was raised in angry question. "She was just goodenough to ride over from the ranch to bring a letter to me--hearing Iwas locked up for a horse-thief, and couldn't go after it. Well, as Itell you, I was just mean enough to treat her pretty bad--flung her onthe floor when she tried to stop me, and then nabbed the beast she rodeto camp on--happened to be my own; but may be she won't feel so bad ifyou just tell her what the nag was used for; and may be that will showher I didn't take the trail for fun."

  "That" was one of the gloves he had worn from his hands with his night'swork, and there were stains on it darker than those made with earth.

  "I'll tell her;" and then an impulsive honesty of feeling made him add:"You need never fear her judgment of you, Jack."

  The two looked a moment in each other's eyes, and the older man spoke.

  "I've been hard on you," he said deliberately, "damned hard; all at onceI've seen it, and all the time you've been thinking a heap better of methan I deserved. I know it now, but it's about over.
I won't stand inyour way much longer; wait till I come back--"

  "You are coming back? and where are you going?" The questions, a tonelouder than they had used, were heard by the others around. Geneseenoted the listening look on the faces, and his words were answers tothem as much as to the questioner.

  "I'm going to take the trail for the Kootenai village; if any white manis let reach it, or patch up the infernal blunder that's been made, Ican do it with him," and his hand lay on the breast of the shroudedthing before him.

  "If I get out of it alive, I'll be back to meet the Major; if Idon't"--and this time his significant glance was turned unmistakably tothe blue coats and their leader--"and if I don't, you'd better pack yourcarcasses out of this Kootenai valley, and hell go with you."

  So, with a curse for them on his lips, and the dogged determination tosave them in his heart, he nodded to Hardy, clasped the hand of Stuart,and turning Mowitza's head, started with that horrible burden back overthe trail that would take a day and a night to cover.

  The men were grateful for the bravery that had saved their lives, butburned under the brutal taunts that had spared nothing of theirfeelings. His execrable temper had belittled his own generosity.

  He was a squaw man, but they had listened in silence and ashamed, whenhe had presumed to censure them. He was a horse-thief, yet the men whobelieved it watched, with few words, the figure disappear slowly alongthe trail, with no thought of checking him.